Caterwauling

Oh, gee, you think I should post my (Gemini) horoscope? GREAT IDEA!

A new phase in your life is beginning, Goddess. The previous phase can be interpreted as having taught you to be serious and devoted to professional responsibilities. And you did accomplish some good deeds. Now you can relax and look forward. Let yourself feel the welcome tug of the future…

I’m starting to get that work doesn’t totally define me. I dunno. I think i got nervous for a few years there, that the only way to show my devotion and appreciation for the opportunities was to work constantly. Now I’m seeing where I can scale back, delegate and otherwise preserve what’s left of my sanity.

I’ve started volunteering, socializing and — gasp — remembering some needs that I’ve, ah, neglected in the recent past. Needs that can be filled by something other than the Energizer Bunny. 😉

My friend Scot did a brilliant blog post about human body cell memory. I’m totally stealing part of it because it’s brilliant:

“If the cell is constantly bombarded by the negative peptides, from chronic stress like abusive living situations, war, depression, marital strife, trauma response (from rape, abandonment, homelessness, death of a loved one) even financial stresses or a long period of unemployment, the cells will produce more receptor sites for the ‘negative’ peptides, and less sites for the ‘positive’ peptides.

“So stress (sadness, despondency, anger & aggression, worry, jealousy) becomes the ‘natural state’ of the cell. The cells themselves begin to ‘forget’ how to feel pleasure. The body and the mind’s ability to be happy is actually degraded. And the longer this persists, the greater the shift in receptor site loci. This is why mom always told you it is no good to bear a grudge.”

So, in his summation, pleasure is a forgettable skill. And hot damn if that didn’t just click in my head in a way little else has. I forget what “normal” used to be. I forget what it’s like to be with — really, honestly, presently with — someone of the other gender.

I think I briefly found myself in a groove of “I don’t need anybody; I have a suitcase full of vibrators that don’t talk/date other women/cheat/lie/break my heart/have cooties.” And I’ve been sort of OK with that. But reading Scot’s tome on becoming conditioned to strife, I realized that has become my comfort zone as well.

Oooohhh, noooooo. No more of that. Whether past joy was real or merely an apparition, I’m going to find it and replicate it and do it bigger and better next time around.

Which explains why my little epiphany threw me for such a freaking loop. Because it involved me feeling — nay, feeling STRONGLY — about something. I haven’t felt passionate about much of anything other than the presidential election, and here my heart was telling me, “Hey asshole — PAY ATTENTION TO ME.”

So, that’s exactly what I’m doing. Because that void must be filled, whether it’s the way I envisioned it or whether the universe woke me up so that I’d be alert when opportunity walks into my life.

And, if I may, opportunities are in the air. I’m grateful. And ready.

There’s hope yet. As he noted, we just have to learn pleasure all over again. OK, so the “just” is a misnomer, but I have worse things on my to-do list. 😉

K, so I have entirely too much to do to actually spend any time blogging, but I also need the distraction.

Have been feeling rather victorious these past couple of days, for reasons best left unexplained. But what I can share in public is that while I only lost a pound last week (yaar), my shirt is falling off of my shoulders today. Victory — can has!

I just find myself so exhausted these days. Maybe it’s only living on rabbit food, maybe it’s having no real resolution to much of anything going on, maybe it’s just trying to sidestep the aggravation landmines as best I can, but I’m whipped.

I’ve always said that if emotional endurance tests could translate into physical calories burned, I’d be back down to my birth weight. Shit, after the past month I’d be back down to zygote weight!

I’ve had the same dream for several nights in a row. Much as I welcome sleep, I’m coming to dread it as well.

But … and there’s always one of those … it’s all temporary. There’s hope on the horizon yet. Perhaps life isn’t one big cosmic joke after all. …

Today’s Astrocenter.com read for Gemini: “A new woman is being born in you; clear the path for her to come through!”

I had a real breakthrough in meditation class tonight. I was focused and happy and really did clear the toxins out of my heart when I was told to do so. I mean, I cried. I felt so good afterward — like, wow, this tree-hugging hippie shit really works! 😉

Actually, it’s been a draining few weeks. But one that’s been punctuated by several blasts from the past. Their timing was strange at first, and impeccable in retrospect. A bittersweet distraction. But that’s the key word: distraction.

There are names I can drop and memories I can share — and many of you will say, “Here we go again. …” — but suffice it to say that stories are never really over.

And I’m glad about that.

I mean, there’s the one I will always wonder what if he’d married me instead, and then there’s the one who wonders why I was present one minute and gone the next. Go figure.

That’s OK. I’ve gotten better with age.

And I’m not the only one.

Anyway, I saw the Cirque du Soleil movie “Delirium” yesterday, and I have some songs from the soundtrack but I have yet to figure out which song had the lyric that damn near changed my worldview:

“Your fate is defined by the questions you never ask.”

So, I’m asking: “Why not?” And I’m not saying it with a pointed look at anyone (*innocent look*) but instead to remind myself to keep asking the tough questions and making damn sure to not walk away when there’s something too precious to leave behind and to definitely close the door (and throw a dresser behind it) if there isn’t.

Train’s leaving the station; last chance to ride. …

Your result for The Ultimate 80’s Pop Music Test…

80’s Music Encyclopedia

You scored 93 percent! I’m not worthy! I’m not worthy!

Take The Ultimate 80’s Pop Music Test at HelloQuizzy

‘Me and these feet have some years to reclaim’, originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn.

Another banner day in Dawn-dom. I swear, this is one I’m going to take to a therapist someday and point to various parts on the doll to show where it abused me.

I’ve taken this same photo at this same desk, although with different shoes. But what no one else will realize that I do is that my legs are thinner. 😉 Well, minus the muscles — I could totally kick someone’s ass. (And have. …) Really, is there any other reason to re-take this same stupid picture?

I sort of rediscovered a favorite song, “Little Black Sandals,” and since I love my black-and-silver ones, I kicked them up to complement the earworm. (Another earworm this week was “Amanda.” Thank you to everyone who is making my brain bleed this week!)

So anyway, so much to say, so much reticence toward saying it. If you can’t say it to who’s supposed to hear it, well, it’s not much fun saying it to anyone else, y’know?

But alas, as an episode of “The Hills” was aptly titled last season, “Truth and Time Tells All.” (And don’t get me started on how “The Hills” is airing opposite “Paranormal State.” I watch the latter and catch the former in reruns. Because, really. 🙂

So anyway, have a shit-ton of work to do before taking a fast ‘ho bath in the ladies’ room and frolicking off to dinner at a great restaurant with someone who’s hopefully just as intriguing. 😉 It’s quite a process, once you’ve got an ideal in your head, to try to move past it.

But you have to, I guess. That is, unless you get the balls to go after what you thought was your ideal. And since I’m feeling slightly neutered (spayed?), well, let’s just say my ass hurts and leave it at that. 😉

At least my shoes are cute, my skivvies are scandalous and my smiles will come easier, the more days that pass.

“Thank you feet, for guiding me
I’m glad somehow I got brains down there, at least.”

Well, my heart is starting to feel less like it’s been pummeled against a cheese grater.

And the belt I chose to wear today — at the same hole I used to use to keep the thing secured at my waist — is now a hip belt.

Oh, and the shirt that would just never button over the ol’ muffin top? Stays buttoned even when I sit.

I used to assume that any boy troubles I had were inversely related to the size of my pudgy pork roast ass. Now I realize, as it’s a leaner pork roast these days, that size really only matters when it comes to THEIR pants. And also, they’re mostly just clueless anyway.

In any event, I can has progress? Can has!

more cat pictures

Yes, I do read my horoscope every day. Funny you should ask.

Courtesy Astrocenter.com: Something is changing inside you, and in the way you react to situations, and the desire to incorporate the more unpredictable aspects of life into your personality is the basis for these changes.

I have feared making changes in my life for some time now. “Don’t step on a crack …” yadda yadda yadda. I used to dance on ’em; now I tread carefully as I seem to have absorbed everyone else’s problems. If I run too far and too fast, it’ll upset the proverbial apple cart.

Pfft. I say let’s take those apples and make some hard cider!

I want to sing and dance and laugh and create beautiful things and love and be loved. I have the power within me. I’ve had it all along. I’ve just chosen not to use it.

To hell with that. I’ve missed too much already. I was always used to outshining the competition — and if they can do it, why the hell can’t/haven’t I? When did I become the very person I swore I wouldn’t, and how soon can I shed this old skin and fly?

Am still slightly blown away from yesterday’s memorial service for Leanne. I was fine — cheerful, even — but once I heard the first sentence out of J’s mouth (and saw him cry), I was done for.

I’ll never forget what he said. And I’ll never forget how I felt. I’ve had two friends ask me to reconsider my reconsideration of my epiphany. After yesterday, I might.

What I will say was that here was this beautiful person that many of us only knew peripherally. And yet, there was a venue overflowing with people whom she had touched in some way — some lucky enough to have known her well; the rest of us getting a glimpse of the person we missed out on knowing better.

And what I know I loved was that, not only did they play Bon Jovi in her “favorite songs” soundtrack, but that the celebration was equal parts tears and laughter. Maybe just a shade more laughter. As it should be.

The overarching theme in my head for the past two weeks was solidified. I want a love like theirs. Not transient, of course — but the easy soulmate-type compatibility that he described to us. I barely knew them as a couple but what I did witness was downright effortless. It clicked. It worked. It was strong and real and natural.

And as I look around for those natural connections, well, it makes you wonder why you spend so much time on forcing what just doesn’t fit with all the other ones. And not only maybe pretending to be something you’re not, but also pretending they’re something that they, simply, are not, as well.

Do we think we’re noble or do we congratulate ourselves on being overachievers? Who taught us that it’s supposed to be difficult? And is anyone ever going to show/prove to us that it doesn’t have to be?

Oh well. Time to get ready for another harrowing week of work. Besides, at times like these, the story is best told through music. Click to play; lyrics are below the fold.

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Mix a fabulous old friend, a ridiculously awesome restaurant and six hours of conversation, and you get a happy Goddess.

What I love about Girls’ Night Out for us is that we just keep talking. And talking. And talking some more — long after the restaurant closes and we get thrown out onto the street for the next couple of hours. 😉

We have a somber day ahead of us with our friend’s memorial service, so we very much appreciated the time to pontificate and celebrate the moments that we are lucky (or, not-so-lucky, with some of them) to have. I’m pretty sure the staff at Jaleo would have been offended by our peals of laughter had the restaurant been anywhere close to full. Oh well!

When I was younger, we had the “quote wall.” Anytime one of us would say something stupid, funny or just plain ponderous, we would take a neon Post-It Note, write it down and slap it to the wall. Tiff and I could probably have built our own mini quote wall by the end of the night.

Of course, to sum it all up in one word: “Milk.”

*bwahahahaaaaaa*

On a more-serious note, text me if you knew Leanne and need the details of today’s service/celebration, or if you want to make a donation in her memory. Her passing has manifested itself in a variety of ways among the friends (mostly in the form of impatience for time-wasting b.s.), but today it unites us.

So, let’s all hug a person or a pet today and remember that life’s too short to spend it on the wrong things and people. No more excuses, world — it’s time to start feeling alive instead of just barely living.