20 January 2008

good grief

There are not many flights that make me miserable, especially now that I am flying international. But today, well I spent the day in bed recovering instead of enjoying this quaint town of BHX. I picked up the trip and worked in my favorite cabin. Things were going smoothly until the captains family boarded and after throwing their stuff around the cabin preceeded to walk in and out of the cockpit (directly in my way of working) and then started demanding stuff from me. It is an unwritten rule that as a non-rev passanger you are to sit and mind you own business and take what you can get. Majority of the time we treat non-revs like gold, going above and beyond for them because they don't expect it. Well, this bitch expected me to kiss her ass. She didn't let up at all the whole flight and the worse part about it, it that 1. she is haunting me on the layover and 2. I have to deal with her ass on the way home.
So whe finally get the door closed and are ready to taxi when...I hear a hissing sound. I walk to the mid galley to throw away cups and see the emergency slide laying in the jetway. My reaction: get the hell out of there before it blows and to look at the flight attendant that caused this and say "you're fucked". Long story short: three hour delay on the ground. I am exhausted and can't wait for tomorrow to end. And yes, I have already touched her food with dirty hands.

17 January 2008

bfs

My third time in Belfast finds me walking around the city alone. I turn the corner and a huge, brightly lit ferris wheel consumes my line of vision. So the child in my took a ride, and saw the city in a whole new light.

All I brought with me on my walk around the city is a zip lock bag of previously separated pounds. The kind man at the bodega volunteered to change in into bills, 15 to be precious. I am loaded! The clear night allowed me to walk around the city that has never been seen through sober eyes. It is a perfect European city filled with warmth from memories of my first visit with Janene. I am now back in the room and about to curl up on the coach in the shadow of a BBC satellite and read a book. Let me also state that it is a first for me to spend a day in Ireland without a beer in my hand. It must be the absence of the red hair.

11 January 2008

a year long week

The trembling has finally stopped and you would think that it was due to the fact that I have had only seven combined hours of sleep in the last 52 hours plus a couple of lattes to make it through the day. No...I just found out information, clues if you will that left me kneeling on the floor with my head on my hands and my tears pooling on the lacered floors of my studio. The studio I share with her. The old phone was left out, plug in as if I was supposed to go up to it and look. I don't know what I was looking for, something in my gut told me to look at her text messages. Mind you I had forced myself to stay up until midnight so I could send him a happy birthday text. I was multi-tasking and brushing my teeth as I reached for the phone and I what I found was a familiar number. A name was not attached to it as with all the other messages, just a number. I number I subconsciencly memorized even though I had deleted it from my phone through advice from a friend a month ago.

A perfectly wrapped birthday for him present sits on the floor making a mochery of me. I went out and pulled together a nice box of goodies that were Oregon related. I even gave a call to my ex to get advice on what I should add.

I haven't told anyone that I was back to seeing him again for fear that things might fall apart and he would drift away again. I didn't want everyone to ask me why I wanted to be with someone who I had to do the chasing with. When we started talking again, it was slow and pleasant, and the night we met up it was like nothing changed. He was my perfect kiss on New Years and it seemed as though we started fresh. He even started texts with me. We are so great together and he was almost everything I want in a future husband (those of you who know me, know I want perfection, even a 110%). I want to be loved, I am tired of being lonely. We made plans for his birthday, it now after midnight on his birthday. I did not send the text because moments before the calander day changed, toothbrush in motion, roommates phone in my hand, my heart stopped beating.

So many questions fill my mind as to when it started, who initiated it, why, and how, how could she do this to me? The questions which fill my head now are how to deal with it. He will be confronted and left behind without my dignity (no sir, that is coming with me.) He is a lot easier to walk away from than her. What happens to living together? I bet she thinks I will just move home with my tail between my legs, well I am not leaving. This my apartment and I am going to be the survivor. Stronger than ever, is my silent reminder. My heart will not be the same for a long time, if ever. Those walls, yah, there are five feet thick filled in my mind with the souls of those who just knocked me out of my mind.

I tried to sleep but it is no use. I have returned to the phone, the one that sits there are taunts me with my stupidy to be in situation that a 17 year old would be in. I walk to it with my calander to find out what I was doing during those texts. Mostly I was away but one weekend, I was here all alone. Things are now being pieced together in my head and I wonder if she wanted me to find out. We had a conversation of a simliar story regarding our old roommate who left behind her old phone on purpose.

I feel ashamed but yet I have done nothing wrong.

There is a line between wanting to know everything and not wanting to know anything that could hurt me more. I have decided that I will only as two questions: who initiated it and is it still going on? I am sitting here, looking amazing still looking at his present waiting to meet up with him this evening. I want the face to face to see if he will lie or if he will tell me so I won’t have to admit I looked at the phone. Unfortunately I have had to use the lure of sex to guarantee a meeting but I’ll be damned if he getting any. I spent the day drinking coffee and doing beautifying things to help mask the pain on the exterior. I want the next 24 hours to be over. I want her to leave peacefully but I fear it will mirror a break up when things get nasty. I don’t know her anymore, and it looks as though I never really did. My anger lays majority with her, my hurt lies with both, and the pain that is all mine.

Two friends have posed the question to me: would I stay with him if he told me the story and begged for me to stay with him as he had chosen me. We had in fact not been seeing each other and I have no idea when all of this started. I didn’t consider the possibility of staying with him while planning out my speeches. But now it is haunting me as I stand looking out the window wishing that none of this would have happened and I could have the man, the friend, and roommate. I am glad that I found out now though.

I don’t even feel like fighting the fight right now, last night yes, today yes. Right now I am tired and I hope when I see him the mind will take charge and not the girl inside. The idea of being in his arms makes me want to pretend that nothing has happened and he wants to be with me. I won a battle I wasn’t even aware I had been fighting.

The fight in me is still depleting. Session one of the conversations was calm and collected and with a little womanly nudging, he told me the truth. Not the whole truth but I couldn’t push it without revealing my source.

My mind was in battle with my body. I wanted to be held, and told that I was beautiful. But my mind was screaming get out. I finally left while he was sleeping. Now I came home to find that she beat me here. I think about how much hassle it will be to deal with the living situation, to end my friendship, to drag out the hurt and physically examine it.
What if I don’t say anything? What if I stay with him? I only have another six months here, would it be so bad to play dumb but cautious? What if I have someone to be with in the city with? I am lonely. How foolish would I be?

She went somewhere and left the new phone behind as almost a daring for me to look at it. I didn’t, I don’t want to know any more. I am pretty sure she knows I know. There is a mild tension but I am just being me without the overnice until the time is right. It wasn’t right yesterday. I realized that I couldn’t be in such close quarters with her for a minute more so I went out to watch the game and have a beer. Well, Jack Daniels and I decided to have a fling, a fling that has left with nothing but a headache and more empty. Luckily I was able to sleep away the time she spent here today and woke up as she was leaving for work.

I sought out advice from a New Yorker about the rules of leases and etc. I found that I need to get a lawyer to have her removed and if I don’t proceed with caution, I could wind up in jail over this. Here is some advice, never have to break up of any kind in New York State; it will cost you.

My good friend, Butch was my shoulder this evening and the strength I needed. He reminded me that I was a good person and the person in my house is poison and I needed to get her out. Hopefully I can take care of all this soon as everyday I have to look at her or her stuff, it just kills me.


I want a reprieve, an hour at least where this is not the only thing on my mind. I awake each day and then it hits me like a ton of bricks. I haven’t been able to read, the words just sit on the page. I tried to wash it away with booze and it came back even stronger. I leave tomorrow for work and I am hoping I am able to leave the hurt in NY where it belongs. Today however I am here and at least she is not.

Aries
March 20 - April 19
Think of today as a time of restoration for yourself, dear Aries, in which you can come to a point of great ease and comfort. Trust yourself and the people around you. Open your eyes to the reality of the situation at hand. If you are currently working through some major changes in your life, make sure you have faith that whatever happens will work out to your benefit.

My friend visited today and without knowing it, spoke directly to my heart. I have also just written the legal form that I pray she signs without hassle that will allow me to have the apartment. Please let this be over soon.


I just found out something that has made the incident at hand disappear. It is a secret that I will not share but has changed my point of view on him forever. I almost wish now that she knows and we can agree to walk away from him jointly and salvage a friendship. A friendship that would consist of the fun we used to have. And no, I would never introduce her to anyone I was seeing, still need to be cautious. Actually to tell you the truth, I am done dating here because you ever know with someone here. There are no morals, no boundaries, and no concern for a partner. This town has kicked my ass and I very much look forward to returning home.


I awoke this morning to miss texts from him wondering if I was okay. A new day and it took a bit for it to come to mind but as I brushed my teeth, there it was. Each day the anger desinigrates. I knew that I needed to print out my letters and get my ducks in a row before she came home just in case the time was right so I walked until she was due to arrive. What is strange is how at ease we were with each other as we talked about everything but. She talked to me as she held both her old and new phone in her hands explaining that she was transferring numbers. That explains why the old phone may have been plugged in. I replied that I would rather pay the ten dollars than have the hassle. She called her mom briefly and I could assume what the other side of the conversation was. “No, I hadn’t brought it up yet” would have been my answer if I were speaking with her mom. There were a couple more lead-ins, which I led the other way. Then she pulled her beanie over her eyes and put her head in her hands and said, “there are so many text messages and missed calls from men in my new and old phone which I just get involved with and then don’t want. I don’t know why I do it because it doesn’t even make sense at the time it starts, but I think maybe I will see how it goes. I feel stupid.” I just looked at her as she continued along this line, I know that she wanted me to address it but I didn’t want to start the conversation and then leave for work. I told her that telling the men the truth is the best thing and honesty always works for me. We also ended up talking about prom and I told her mine was horrible because my date had taken another girl to hers and I knew that he was sleeping with her as well. She turns to me and says, “Some guys are just like that.” She also asked me how my 2008 was going and I told her it was dragging on. Seriously, it feels like a month has been lived in the past five days. She told me that she woke up on NYD and felt enlightened. I don’t know if that was her way of indirectly apologizing but I took it as a sign to leave for the airport. So here I am, wondering if I forgive and let her stay what does that say about me? That I am a good person or that I am looking for more pain?

I awoke today with a peace in my heart. I have decided to forgive. I am on my way home on the train and sent a silent prayer for the talk to go peacefully. I got a piece of advice today via email which simply says, “when God takes something from your grasp, He is not punishing you, but merely opening your hands to receive something better.” This week has been a test of my strength, a re-evaluation of what I want in my life, and a realization that I really do have a good heart.

bhx

My commute home usually runs very smoothly as I am not ruled by the clock, the trains seem to be right there and I get home pretty quickly. This was not the case yesterday after I returned from a lovely trip to BHX. I got pulled to go through agriculture in customs, and then the escalator to the air train was broke. I just missed the train to NY but it was such a nice day outside, I didn’t mind. Once I was at Penn Station, I waited forever for the E train. We made one stop before some announcement about changing of the lines due to an investigation in Queens. So I had to get off the train, carry my bags up the stairs, through Port Authority, under the street up another broken escalator then down the stairs to catch the 7. I was among the confused masses that packed the train and I prayed silently for patience. Two stops left me in Grand Central as I began the long watch to the 5 train. Luckily this was an express train and I was home in two stops. Next was the half a mile walk home with my wheels making as much noise as possible to remind me of their presence. My street at last! Now I just had to get up the narrow four stories worth of stairs to the apartment.



Did you know that magnificent was a word, among many, invented by Shakespeare? It was a fact I learned prior to my trip to Birmingham, England. We stay 25 miles away in Strafford-upon-Avon where Shakespeare was born and is buried. My crew was absolutely fantastic and included this gay couple from Staton Island. These boys should have had their own stage show, they were so funny. I was able to catch the evening show as we drank sangria in the rooms after my minuture exploration.
This town is so quaint and so beautiful with the cobblestones, the river passing gently underneath the bridge into town. They seem to be big fans of Christmas as hordes of lights still graced the town. The little shops were welcoming and everyone it seemed was out for a spot of tea during my walk. I truly understand where he received his inspiration, this place is absolutely magnificent!

04 January 2008

nothing but cold going on here

Currently at a Tasti D-Lite using the internet to pick up a trip to BHX since my lunch date ran long. I have fourteen minutes left on my time so I thought an update of non interesting details would make me feel like I made the most of working internet.
The weather here has been bitterly cold, I mean longjohns, hat, scarf, gloves still freezing but here I am out and about because I feel guilty if I spend my time in my apartment versus soaking up the city. The new year is treating me well with alone time, happiness, and the keeping up with my resolutions to eat well everyday and not to over indulge in the spirits. Seriously I have nothing to write about...

02 January 2008

cab-cab

Luck was on my side this NYE as I walked towards the liquor store to pick up a bottle of champange, a lady was getting out of a cab. Perfect. The rooftop/penthouse party at my friend, Lances was the perfect way to spend the evening. Everyone was dolled up in suits, gowns, and tuxes and yours truly opted for a tiara. We watched the ball drop on tv, toasted, and kissed. Then I spent the rest of the evening dancing to early 80's disco. As I was leaving the building, a cab was dropping off people. This may not seem like a big deal but you have to understand how many people came into NYC for the new year. It was estimated 2 million total with a million of these pain-in-the-ass tourist crowding into Times Square. So that leaves all the locals and the other million tourist vying for one of the 50,000 cabs that inhabit Manhattan. The city was packed but there was such a great energy. And yes, I will share with you that I had a perfect New Year's kiss, I just happened to still be on west coast time.

christmas

It was two years ago that I was spending my holiday in NYC, a planned getaway with my friend; it was then I rode the subway for the first time then. That is what triggered my memory, last night as I rode the 6-line home from my movie. My second trip of the month took me back to jolly ol’ London on a short adventure with a great crew. The plane has spots of eye candy to make the journey go by faster, and we all gathered in the crew room to drink, eat, and be merry. I got a little too merry as I woke up face down, fully clothed (even my shoes) in my hotel room. Let me tell you, working at 36,000 feet with a hangover is not pleasant. Never the less, I decided to spend my Christmas, not at home with my sick roommate who was watching some Russian movie but instead eating Chinese food on Bleeker and catching my favorite Christmas movie at a nearby theatre. It was the second time in five days I had watched “It’s a Wonderful Life” and it was every bit as good as the first time I saw it, ages ago. All in all my holiday was great, not the least bit home sick as I received tons of pressies and cards from friends.
I had a feeling when I journeyed to the big apple for the first time that I would return, in some capacity. It still blows my mind sometimes to think that I live here, New York City…wow. I was standing on Lance’s rooftop the other evening and thinking how comfortable it was being in the middle of the universe. Did you know that this year marks the 100th anniversary of the ball drop in Times Square? Granted you couldn’t pay me to be in the middle of all the tourist, but I will be somewhere. Hopefully somewhere getting the perfect New Years kiss.
A part of the reason I returned to NY permanently was to pick up my heart, where I thought I had let it prior during my visit. That and all the Sex in the City I had been watching.