Hot Shit!

Hot damn it's a beautiful day today! I mean, ditch work, go to a park and lay around reading a book beautiful OR even better yet - hop on blue steel (my bike) and bike the lakefront, find an empty bench and sit there and read... I love the beginning of fall, even though it apparently makes me feel like an extra from Degrassi Jr. High..

Yesterday I went downtown to the old job (the job that sucked my life away for five long years) for the last time. I had volunteered to help out and I have and now it is over. Which is a relief on so many levels. It's so strange to look back a year and realize that I was still pushing my way through every day, biting my tongue and not getting paid nearly enough to do it. This time last year I was also just closing a show and starting rehearsal on another - a schedule that I don't miss, working with people who I certainly do miss. Is it always hard to stay in touch with friends, is it harder because the folks I thought were friends were really acquaintances? Doesn't it seem redonkulous that my phone bill is constantly over a hundred dollars but, I feel like I don't keep in touch with anyone....

Yesterday on the way from job I like to job I no longer have to do I listened to This American Life from a few weeks ago (NERD ALERT! I know, I know..) It was the heartbreak episode which I had half listened to at work weeks ago but after talking to the Cazzer about it I wanted to listen again. First off I heart This American Life, I heart it because it's like a radio version of 2nd Story, I heart it because Ira Glass is so nebbish and wonderful. And I zoned out on the train and listened to stories about heartbreak, about the moment when the bottom drops out of a relationship and the mess of an aftermath. And it has happened to me, and it has happened to everyone and it is one of those universal emotions that can feel so uniquely your own. I had my heart broken in a big way a few years ago. A slow steady breakup that was never officially verbalized (as in "I think we should break up") but done in a form of excuses given back and forth (i.e. Him: "I can't do this, it's not fair to both of us" Me: "We can make this work...but, but, BUT we're in love"). And it sucked. And it hurt and it kept me up at night and the only good thing about it was that I lost weight - really that was it. The most redonkulous part about this episode of heartbreak is that unlike normal people who would nip this shit in the bud I let this break up go on for over a year - a YEAR of me thinking that maybe things would work out. So, I'm listening to this podcast of This American Life, thinking about the heartbreak in my life (which is what I LOVE about the show, that it makes me relate on such a human level) and suddenly Phil Collins was talking, and he was talking to me (and also, apparently Caz since she and I had discussed this part) or it seemed like just to me. And he said something along the lines of: you will always miss people who meant a lot to you, who broke your heart and it made sense...You can try to escape, go to Paris, London, the northside from downtown but your memories (both good and bad) will always stay with you. They are your ghosts and the house they haunt is you. ....
P.S. Phil Collins is stuck in my head now...BOO