I thought it was a bird, but it was just a paper bag

Enough. Enough now. In an overly dramatic and severly twisted (if enlightening) turn of events, things are finally over between myself and JB. Yes, I sould have seen it coming, yes, I deserve better. But that doesn't make it any less difficult. I rehearsed breaking up with him every day for the last 3 weeks (and nearly accomplished it twice) but I couldn't do it. I so wanted it to work. It was a mutual parting - we both knew what needed to happen, he just put it into words, and i'm glad he did because I never would have. I would have stayed to long at the party just because I couldn't bring myself to leave - even if the cake was gone and the music sucked. I didn't want to give up because I don't like losing.

It occurs to me that certain people may be reading this who won't like the things that I'm about to say, to which I reply: I am way beyond the point of caring. I've never censored myself here before and I'm not about to start now because of some dumb man and an even dumber situation. Not today. I might fuck some shit up, but at this point I think I've earned the right. My shit has been fucked with enough already, and I've been completely powerless over it. Now I'm getting some of my own back. I'm airing my dirty laundry and am completely unapologetic about it. I need this. And if he loves me as much as he says he does, he won't hate me. It's the truth anyway, and you can't fault me for that.

Yes, this had much to do with His Ex, as I should have realized it would - all the signs were there, I just ignored them. It was nothing she did, not really. She was just a part of the one thing that put things in motion for our eventual demise. If that hadn't happened...... well, there's no use wondering, is there?

There were lies. Oh, my, were there lies. And not just to me, but about me, and to lots of others as well. And he was unbelievably selfish; normally I'm the selfish one, so this came as a bit of a shock. I've never been cheated on before, and FYI: it sucks like a drunk cheerleader, especially when you don't know about it until the end and are then told it isn't any of your business. That's when I started to realize that it all goes way beyond just he and I, this is about who he is as a person, and his issues that he needs to deal with. I was ready to stick it out and make it work, and for a while so was he. Then it became apparent to both of us (as different times) that this was not something that could be fixed together.

He's still in love with her. Says he's still in love with me. Whatev. He just needs to figure out what the hell he wants. I'm just sad I was dragged down because he couldn't bring himself to stop this whole thing right when he knew he felt this way.

Thing weren't always awful, though. The first half was amazing (and then the thing happened that changed it all) - he adopted on my speech patterns and inflection, he became great friends with The Boys, and I learned that I can, in fact, enjoy cuddling. Hell, we even lit stuffed bears on fire together. In retrospect I realize that this is the shortest relationship that I've ever been in - and that's saying something - but it felt like the longest by far.

Things I have learned from this relationship:
1. Text messenging is the coward's way of communication.
2. Love makes people do both really great and really fucked up things.
3. Anyone who makes you wait around for them that much is not worth waiting for at all.
4. When that much Ex drama is involved, it is time to GO.
5. You shouldn't always think the worst of people, but neither can you always think the best of them. Blind spots BLOW.
6. Just because you have to work at sex, doesn't mean it can't be good.
7. BE CAREFUL.

I can't even bring myself to cry. I'm all out of tears. But despite all this, I still like him very much. I want him to be happy, and learn how to be a better person, get past this, and not do this to anyone else; I want what's best for him. But at the same time he's now so unattractive to me. He was so everything that I wanted, he was my ideal - aside from the pathological lying, and the bourgeoning alcoholism, and the emotional baggage. Maybe I can find that again.

And now for a little public service announcement to JB and His Ex (oh, he's going to be pissed about this. Whatev. He's torn apart my life and treated me like dirt, I'm entitled): As soon as you guys realize what you really want, be honest with eachother and say how you feel. It's going to make things so much easier, whatever the outcome. Invite no more third parties (which is, I suppose, a bit hipocritical since I'm writing about it here) who know more of the truth than either of you together.

And I'm fully expecting some e-mails after this, but I don't know if I can read them at this point, I'm sorry.

And so I close this chapter. I haven't the slightest what's going to happen in the next, but my rough draft looking promising. It's a beautiful day and I'm going for a walk.

Service with a smile - it goes both ways

There are some customers who, no matter how nice a server you are, will always give you the cold shoulder. You can plaster your face with a smile so big that it hurts, and inflect your voice with as much cheer as you can muster, but you'll still be met with an impassive stare and an air of absolute indifference.

These are the people who answer your questions with a command, in the manner of:
Me: How does everything taste, sir?
He: (crumpling a bread bag) More bread.
I'm not suggesting that they be overly conversational - that can be annoying, too - I'd just prefer a happy medium. I feel as if I could walk up to the table and say, "Here's you spinach and artichoke dip, and I'm pleased to inform you that you've just won the largest Powerball jackpot ever awarded. Here's your check for one trillion dollars," and still be met by the same cold expression.

To these people, waiters don't have names, and if we do they are in another language that most closely resembles a clearing of the throat.

James Bond is one of these people. Do you ever notice the way he orders around servers as if they are mindless drones incapable of higher brain function(and I suppose, to him, they probably are)? To him, his drinks should just appear on to his table out of the ether. While this is part of his badass persona (I'm not trying to diminish his badass-ery, here, as it is generally acknowledged that his ass is as bad as it gets - in more ways than one. Ahem.). I don't think it would kill 007 to tag on a "please" after demanding that his martini be shaken, not stirred.

It seems to me that people should treat those who handle their food with a little more nicety. We can spit in your chicken marsala, after all (not that I ever would).

I may have completely fucked myself over. Maybe doing things the Slytherin way would have been more beneficial. Whatev. I started this thing in motion, knowing full well what I was doing, and I'm going to have to suffer the consequences of what happens next - I just don't think I was really prepared for those consequences. We'll see, though. I've been told by the two most important men in my life to "give it time." Of course now is the perfect opportunity for me to become impatient.......

As The Phocian would say, "Keep the faith."

Keep the faith.

Too bad I don't have any Spell-o-tape

A part of me broke this Valentine's Day. No, it was not my heart, it was my wand. My wand. In the irony of all ironies, it snapped in my canvas bag 2 days after I composed a post enumerating its many glorious qualities. I am distraught. Words cannot describe the immense sadness that has enveloped my very being; the loss of my wand has struck me to the core. Just look at these two pathetic little pieces of wood, no longer bound by the magic that formerly held them together:



See that shocked face, those eyes brimming with tears? That was only after I had calmed down considerably and decided that it would make for a pretty good entry. Last night my dreams were filled with images of Mr. Ollivander going through box after box of new wands, trying to find a new one for me. Then I woke up and remembered I had some superglue. Then it broke again. One thing that has made me mildly less depressed about that fact: when I describe what happens to my friends and they are overcome witha somber expression and say, "Oh my God, are you okay?!" It's good to have people around who know you that well.

Time for a trip to the Three Broomsticks to drown my sorrows in Ogden's Old Firewhiskey.....

Ok that was once... and I was drunk... and it was Valentine's Day.

Happy V-Day, all. Am thankfully not working this year, as last year's mass of rude and finicky patrons was enough to scare me away from this day for the rest of my table-waiting future. I've never been keen on celebrating Valentine's Day, though neither am I the type to refer to it as "singles awareness day" and trudge through the 14th in a haze of Hallmark-fueled anger and depression. Do have cause to celebrate this year, though have no plans to do anything special. But, to all those who do, have a splendid evening, tip your waiter well, and lick things off eachother afterward. :)

Update: at the suggestion of Red, we will be dancing around the apartment like this tonight:



I am very excited. Something about Fiona Apple in a red dress singing about unrequited love just screams Valentine's Day.

Foolish wand-waving

I carry a wand. Yes, a wand. This is not a metapjor for anything - I actually carry a wand. Though any explanation may prove fruitless in making that previous statement any less odd, I will at least attempt to convince you that this fact is not the characteristic of a pathetic individual out of touch with reality, but rather the charmingly cute idiosyncracy of a lovable obssessive.

Any of you who know me or have spent any considerable amount of time reading here know that I am an avid fan of "Harry Potter." And that is quite possibly the understatement of the century - the Potterverse reduces me to that wretched state of near annoying over-infatuation: the Fangirl. J.K Rowling's page-turning tomes have have generated in me an embarassing amount of sqeeage that can only be rivaled by a throng of pre-adolescent females a Backstreet Boys concert.

So, it was with much excitement last August that on my 21st birthday I received a package marked with that logo that I have come to associate with all things magical: Alivan's.I knew this could mean only one of two things, and since the box was considerably smaller that what could hold a broom.... I opened [read: unceremoniously ripped apart] the package with an embarassing degree of unbridled excitement, and lo! What did I find? A hand-crafted Rosewood wand, 14.5 inches, with a core of dragon heartstring. It was love at first sight. SInce that day my wand and I have been inseparable - I take it everywhere. Everyday tasks have been made so much easier with the aid of a wand - cooking, cleaning, assassinating heads of state, opening doors at Wal-Mart (which I had previously done with the help fo the Jedi mind trick. There are those who tell me that they can open doors at Wal-mart without the use of magic or The Force - must investigate these claims).

What has started to become a problem is the fact that I carry my wand to work. I twirl it between my fingers, stick it in my hair in a Luna Lovegood-esque fashion, much to the amusement of my fellow employees. The trouble begins when I quite forget myself and bring it out in front of my tables*, gesturing with it and pointing out items on the menu. Oh, my. This practice has elicited many a response ranging from," why are you playing with a stick?" to "so, what, are you, like, a pagan?"** Often customers won't even comment, which is worse, I've come to decide. There's nothing more off-putting than walking away from a table wondering why they were looking at you oddly and then realizing that you'd been scratching your head with your magic wand. Now, if I could just accio their food to the table, then I'd show 'em......

* Mind out of gutter, please.
**To which I of course responded with, "No, I'm Jewish. And this is Kosher wood."

But where to put you......

The question is: do I go about this in the Slytherin or Gryffindor way? Both have their advantages, each of which could have vastly different outcomes.

Groundhog day

Work somewhere long enough and you're bound to serve some of the same people a few times over. Regulars are nice, conversational, and usually tip well, especially if they specifically ask for your section. But every once in a while that manner of regular customer comes along who, though you may have waited on them many a time, still acts as though though they have no idea who you are, and so carries on the exact same conversation with you every. single. time.

Case in point: The Voice. This guy does the announcements and voice-overs for a local pageant of uppity white bitches and comes in with his wife and 3 teenage sons every few weeks. Now, it would be one thing if he just came in and let me serve him in the usual passive manner, but he is almost OVERLY conversational, and makes it a point to engage me in conversation that, out of the FOUR TIMES I've waited on them, always goes as follows:

(As I'm about to leave and put in salad orders)
V: Hey, now sugar, where are you from?
Me: (thinking: here we go...) Originally I'm from Michigan, but my family moved to a city about 3 hours south of here.
V: Michigan, really?! What part?
Me: (holding up my hand in that mitten-like imitation of my home state) Little town by the Wurtsmith Air Force Base.
V: (laughing) I love that - holding up your hand. It's funny how you guys all do it, too.
Me: (thinking: you've got some family in Muskegon)
V: I've got some family in Muskegon.

(I leave and return with the salads)
Me: Anything else I can get for you?
V: So, you go to [local uni.]?
Me: (uuuggghhhhh.....) Yeah, I do. Double theatre and english major. (thinking: Your nephew Chris who's trying to break into musical theatre in New York).
V: Hey, that's great. My nephew Chris is trying to break into.....blah blah blah.
Me: That's exciting.
V: THink you'll stick with it? You look like you've got it - you sure are pretty (nervous laughter from V's wife).
Me: In it for the long haul, sir.

(I leave, and then bring back their entreés)
V: You know, you seem very familiar to me.
Me: (thinking: I've been your waiter 4 times in the last month and a half.) I was the light board op for the annual parade of uppity white bitches.*
V: That's right. Hourglassy girl in the red dress!
Me: (sigh) ...yeah............

And so on and so forth. Once he changed it up and asked if I had a boyfriend, and then tried to set me up with his son (who must have been about 17), to which proposition I politely declined. The thing I find the most odd about this guy, though, is that the rest of his family remains relatively silent throughout the whole encounter. They say absolutely nothing, save for the occasional nervous laughter when V says something that could be seen as making me uncomfortable. Which makes me wonder.... do they remember me, and they're just letting him carry on with this existential farce for their own amusement? I suppose as long as they all keep being as nice as they are and tipping me as well as they do, I really shouldn't be bothered to care.

*Boy, how great would it have been if I'd actually called it that?