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Sunday, Sept. 12, 2004 / 11:17 a.m. ~Life Goes On~ Last night I went to a small town street festival with two of my coworkers, and while the potential for fun was indeed just below the surface, the surface was awash in blank facades, insincerity, and severe repression and reserved emotions. These two women are so closed, so reserved, and I know they're thinking, they have thoughts, opinions, ideas, are possibly even capable of intelligent and animated discourse, but not last night. The one whose idea it all was is the coworker who causes me so much anguish. I want to like her, but our values are so very vastly different I know we must always tiptoe around every topic but entertainment media and work. And sometimes even work. There is just not a lot to talk about. Not that I can't go on and on about the latest movie or TV program, but we have differing tastes there as well. Being with her is hard to describe. She seems so insincere it's disconcerting. But she also seems to be trying to be friends with me. She's ten years older, lost her mother to Alzheimer's just a few months ago, lives with her boyfriend who is younger than I, and has a house full of dogs, cats, a bird and a fish. I like her, I mean I want to like her, I try so hard to like her, and she can be so generous, so giving, but then there is this wall between us that leaves me feeling outrageously uncomfortable when I'm alone with her. Or even when others are around. The other woman used to work with us, but now works for the company holding us under contract. She broke out and got the good job, and she is my contact now. She's usually fairly quick to laugh at my jokes, but she can be sullen and silent, and not share her reasons why. She tends to be cranky and unpleasant, is twentysomething, very overweight, and last night, after giving blood early in the day and being almost too tired to go with us, ended up eating some fried onion thing and an ice cream cone, and then drinking a glass of wine... and being very tired again. I wonder why. We sat and listened to some live music, one really good 'cover band' (excellent rendition of "Jane Says", just guitar, bass and drums, no, no steel), and wandered past the food booths, but I was starving at first and it was hard to pin these two down. They can neither one make a decision. I don't know, Virgo and Libra, is this how they are? I'd point out cute two year olds dancing, and cute dogs, and try not to point at the endless parade of pregnant women and interracial couples, not comment on how incredibly 'white bread' it was, despite the African American population, but couldn't resist saying how this brand new Town Square seemed straight out of Disney World, seemed so artificial and phony, and how I'd much rather be 'intown', how uncomfortable I was as well, and being with the two of them only exacerbated the issue. It all left a bad taste in my mouth, just so much discomfort after my big day of bringing one of my cats home from the hospital. Now Norm won't eat, hasn't moved her bowels since Thursday, and it suddenly struck me first thing this morning that she could easily die soon. I have no idea. And I have to go to work every day this week so I can't possibly monitor her like I'd prefer. Doctor wants her back in the hospital, but I don't want to stress her out further, and I don't care to incur further hundreds, approaching thousands of dollars worth of medical bills in an attempt to diagnose and treat a mystery ailment. Seems to be inflammatory bowel disease, but only surgery and biopsies, post-ultrasound, would indicate for certain. For now, I just want her to eat, and have some normal shit, not diarrhea, and maybe we can all relax. Things are just really hard right now, and yesterday my cousin wrote me an email note asking why I'd not gotten back to her on her recent longer email. After an entire summer has gone by in which she never responded to my email. Interweb newbies. What can you do? So I bombarded her with ALL my news, barely touched on her letter, just went off about what hell my job has been, how sick I've been in the past couple of months, how sick the cats have been, and I hope that now she's sorry she fucking pestered me. I don't even know this woman, we only just reconnected, or connected at all because her father, my uncle, died. Yes, yes, great to have family, sort of, even though she lives in Germany. She was in Oregon over the summer and invited me there, and I planned to go before Gladys got so sick, then I canceled. But now this woman writes one email and freaks out if I don't reply in a day or two. Sigh. I have to find some inner strength here. Maybe after my period comes and goes I'll feel better, but now I'm drained and depressed and can't see light at the end of this particular tunnel of darkness. Honestly, most things in my life are getting progressively much worse. I'd like to think it's a cycle and there is an upside, but I know the cats are going to die and it will be much worse than the caregiving part now. Ah, life goes on. Cost of the War in Iraq
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