once again, i have given my heart to someone who didn't handle it carefully. fuck! well, to make a long story short, my on again, off again partner of the last 4+ years (mostly on) is moving out and moving away next sunday. we are great friends and have lived together through dating,not dating, then dating again. The worst part is that i moved over 2,000 miles (for other reasons too, but mostly) to be with him. i found out he was moving when i accidentally heard a voicemail message left for him a few months ago. i am trying to be a good, supportive friend. i am trying not to be bitchy ex girlfriend. i woke up at 4am weeping Saturday and woke him up and all he had to say was "i don't think we're good for each other" and "i don't like myself when i'm with you". This from a young man who made no concessions to be with me. i wish he could feel something. like if he would have said"i hate how you get crazed and have to draw for three days straight and not sleep and sometimes you only eat the sushi paper and not the rice" or, "yeah, it's too bad it didn't work out, but damn, i love you and i can't wait to hear about your future antics as a single gal again." Which is fine. But I wish he wouldn't act like we are just housemates who sleep together when so much more went on than that. UGGHH!!!! Anyway, enough griping. I just had to finally say something. The next week is going to be really hard for me and I hope I don't bug out too much and I hope I can start eating and sleeping again soon. fuck! and I hope I can get over this and find someone who adores me and will kiss me and do very naughty awesome things with me....doesn't seem very likely right now. fuck! got any advice? i don't drink or do hallucinagens or narcotics. there is no one to have casual, erasing sex with.there is no one here that would bring me flowers or sleep next to me. just rain and pavement and my sad sorry ass to haul around this town.

There is no known cure for a broken heart...only temporary pain relief like chocolate, hugs from friends, candlelit bubblebaths (except if they're a painful reminder of fun times gone past), dancing nekkid to loud music, and renting soppy movies so you have an excuse to cry extra hard. I'm thinking the main problem is his lack of caring or sentiment after such a long time? Sadly, there's not a lot you can do to make someone else feel something. Just don't torment yourself over why he doesn't feel the way he should. And don't blame yourself. If he's so insensitive and downright cruel (not telling you himself..sheesh!), he doesn't deserve your beautiful heart. Four years is a long time to invest in someone who patently isn't worthy of your love. You're now free to find someone who will worship every awesome inch of your body and adore all the deliciously-twisted corridors of your mind. You'll get over him, but I suspect he'll remember and regret you for a long time to come. p.s. Jump the Llama! (sorry, couldn't help myself)

thanks cat. i feel better already. i'm gonna go empty the molly ringwald section of the video store and cry my fucking head off. nothing like the taste of snot mixing with ice cream to put you in your place.....

Jeez,Mavis, if I send you this Cry On Cue disc,you're really gonna bawl. It's all "i've been left behind" stuff. I was takingit inthe context of "this would be great music to make love to" but now i see that another context would be "great music to lament to". You still got me, best one.

oh andy you are so sweet. god damn it. i think we should go shack up in th keweenaw and make genius babies and have a kitty farm and found a small liberal arts college whose specialty is archaeology, classical bookbinding and gold leaf transfer, toy camera photography, and cooking. send me the disc, please. left behind is right! my fucking band and i had nothing to do wth the disc except helping bernie name some songs! fuck! i feel better than i did a couple hours ago, but i rented a stack of sappy eighties movies, so that might change. i stopped at a store on the way home to get some water and that bloody "...in the world could take me away from you, something that a thousand men on board could never do...blah blah blah africa-ah ahh" song. fuck. that's such a bad song and it made me cry. arghhh! the best thing is those photos arrived today of me with my granny's birthday cake! hooray!!! i need to go on a record shopping binge. it's the only thing that can save me today. AAARGH! my bed is cold and my head is spinning...

mavis, you need to learn how to turn your sadness around. get angry. it feels better that way. be violent. learn how to kick and punch and fight and swear at shoe boxes. at least, that's what i was doing yesteray when i realized that making out with jon drenner doesn't exactly make us a couple. i'm sorry.

I'm sorry Mavis. I think you're a sweet pea.

Don't get too buoyed down with anger or sadness, actually. IT's really debilitating. Just take a deep breath and go on.

hey mavis. fahgeddaboutit. i'll send you some soulfunkmusik that'll clean it all out and throw it away. it'll be like emotional emancipation. trust me. by the way, i lost that e-mail you sent me. lost your e-mail address, too. but i think the answer to your question was "both".

"i hate how you get crazed and have to draw for three days straight and not sleep " i love that shit. make sure the next one does, too.

yeah, i am not really angry at all. when i get angry, i become the most awful useless version of myself... and i'm not really paralyzed sad either. just blah. i'm just wondering where the fuck did i go during all of this? and i'm trying not to kick myself around too much about the whole thing. i mean, it's ridiculous to be angry at somebody else for decisions that i made--i decided to move here, to not play music as much, to work more. it's so weird though. i have felt a big part of me missing for a while. i used to be the cute loony girl with the pink rubber backpack who had to buy a sketchbook a week because she filled them up so fast. i used to play music with anything that moved or breathed. i used to stay up all night gluing small pieces of paper to bigger ones, taking photos all the time, i used to make a zine a week, bursting at the seams with poetry and well-focused ranting, i used to burst at the seams with art and love and glitter. sometimes i feel like just another person on the bus. it's just so deflating...... basically, the end of this realtionship is triggering all this buried stuff about me and it's hard to work through it without my main source of support--i.e. catalyst guy. i liken it to something i read recently about the fear of dying--fear of dying can be the fear and regret of not living the life you want to live. one of my lady pals from portland went traveling and stayed in salt lake city woth some old friends of mine--an old bandmate and his special lady with whom i used to have art parties. when alicia came back to portland she said that she knows a completely different person than the one glade and davina described...she had no idea that i wrote or drew or took dance classes and yoga or any of it. it made me feel so strange, like where did i go? when did i stop doing that? when did i stop inspiring people like that? time to start buying art supplies instead of food again. thank you for you kind words. blindswine: joyce.farr@reed.edu

you sound like you need to pack your bags and go trekking through south america. run away to brazil. hang out in bahia and learn capoeira. that way you can reclaim your creativity, get seriously funky, and kick some major ass all at the same time. i can't think of anything more cathartic than that. anyway, that's what i plan on doing. i'll meet you there.

blindswine- i am already learning capoeira.... and i am a sambista and a surdo player! but not barimbao..... how funny that you said that. i am actually gearing up to run away to lake superior, semi-permanently.

psychic synchronicity. happens all the time. are you learning both the music and the martial art? cuz if so, you could always just hook homeboy up with a beatdown. he sounds like he needs a good wack to knock his ass back into reality. no man in their right mind would leave a woman who cooks indian food, has excellent musical taste, and has the mad rhythmic skills you gotta have to play what you do. you're a bad ass. don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

blindswine! you made my day! i feel like kicking ass again! i know the capoeira songs (vocal parts, amd percussion, but not the barimbao guitar thingee), and i know some of the more "rumpresentin'" moves, that is, fighting with your ass and hips...fending off attacks while lying on my stomach and back. i have yet to master the flying through the air kicking stuff....yet. yeah, it's funny. homeboy is just really into playing tuba and being a hermit right now. he's not into sex and intimacy...and he's been taking my cooking, my power ass-karate, and everything else for granted for a long long time.eevn my super kung-fu art and, um, "marital skills". fuck it, i just have to take my show on the road.

no doubt and without question. glad i could help. if i've said it once i've said a million times: "ain't no point in wasting buttafly skills on muhfuckas with bad kung fu." rock steady.

mavis, don't forget that it's ok to cry whenever you feel like it and wallow in pathetic self-pity for a while and have violent, heartache-induced mood swings. it's part of the dealing process with such a thing, and it's good fuel for writing songs or getting creative. also: Chunky Monkey. consider getting over that whole "i want to be a supportive friend" thing. it's nice in theory, but in a situation like this it might be better for *you* if you just go pound his ass into the sand and walk away.

you're a reedie? student, staff or faculty?

i'm failing to see why everyone wants to pound on this guy. he was straight up, maybe not in the way you wanted, but he was honest, and he didn't sound like he was mean about it. It just sounds like his heart had drifted away.....he sounded a bit cold, but i'm not sure i can see what he did wrong. I'm recalling the Godard flic Contempt. If you have seen it, you come to actually hate both characters, but neither is really to blame, in my opinion. In this case it sounds like the two of you just drifted apart, whether you realized it or not. of course i would gladly take your side mavis and pound him for you......as i think you're a sweetie.

thanks sarah. got the mood swing train rolling down the tracks, thank you very much! going to see richard buckner tonight and cry in some nice dark beer!! cyst---staff.

re: beer and crying - my favorite bar no longer has Stroh's Dark on tap. Weep Ye All With Me.

Stroh's. jeeeeez you're killin' me.

patrick-thank you, i think you're sweet too. yeah, he doesn't deserve a pounding at all, he is a nice person, and is pretty up front about stuff, i.e. i always sort of knew he didn't appreciate me and i stayed anyway. i wish that someone he respected would just say something to him, like, wow, you're sort of dumb for leaving mavis, she's great. what are you waiting for, aphro-fucking-dite? and i wish he had the emotional capacity to understand how much it hurts. he isn't mean or a jerk, that also makes it hard since i have nowhere to aim these FUCKING SHITTY feelings except at another viewfinder or piece of paper. but this guy only flies home to visit his family once every two years, he is just living on a different level than me. i need to forget it! the whole thing is just sad. so i'm gonna go listen to some sad sexy live alt.country music and cry my dang head off. yee-ha.

it's not about blame. it doesn't matter whether or not he's doing the right thing or going about it the right way. mavis is sad and thus i'm empathetically bloodthirsty. i say pound him.

you are one wild ass lady! come to my house and join the team of Wild Ass Ladies as we Swing From Trees and Eat With Our Elbows On The Table! also, Give Boys Ideas!

"The dumpee reserves the right to blame the dumper for everything, both done and not done. Friends and associates of the dumpee must not interfere with this due process and should support the dumpee in all unfounded accusations, as the dumper relinquised all right to sympathy when perpetrating said dump." Rules of Engagement, volume 3, chapter 4 Them's the rules, big boy.

what are the other rules? the good ones?

don't give nate ideas talkin bout perpetrating dumps.

the ass-kicking i was talking about was more philanthropic than therapeutic. whatever. i'm drunk, stoned, and can't spell for shit. you wild ass ladies go nuts with your bad selves. me? i'm going to sleep. wake me up when someone starts kicking some serious ass. i brake for blood.

oh my god i just got home from seeing richard buckner. wow. i feel really really great. that guy rocks a llama's ass with a sock full of nickels!

Got a llama's ass on your mind, Mavis? Any llama we know? (Oh smack me!..hhehehhehehe)

Why did I not decide to even look at this thread until today? Mavis, you ok now? If you want, a wonderful friendly tape of true evil instadeth thrash out destroy stuff kill what annoys you music can be sent your way, asap. good vibes being sent your way, if a little late.

i crack myself up.

thou are a comic no doubt. How the hell are you anyway?

thank you for asking. but the question is, what have you done? me, i've set myself up for heartbreak, naturally. i was just telling heather that, aside from childbirth, the last two weeks have culminated in the most intense experience of my whole life, all 40 years of it. people say to me either "you are amazing" or "you are crazy". and in response to both sides i simply ask the same question: what would you do? and really i dare anyone of any minute worth to do anything but what's right. and so now i'm a mother of three. on friday, in the presence of a court-appointed child advocate, the child's court-appointed lawyer, the CPS investigator, the mother, the mother's boyfriend, and their attorney, the judge ordered that, in the ABSENCE OF ANY FAMILY MEMBERS WILLING OR ABLE TO TAKE HER, i am to have custody of the 8 year old until she finishes the 2nd grade at the end of May 2011. if at that time her mother is still sober and holding it together, the 8 year old will be reunited with her family. if not, the 8 year old will go up for permanent adoption. the state of Texas is giving mom ONE chance to get it right. if she fails, that's the end of that. so, now i'm a mother of three. i have a full time job and three girls, attending 3 different schools. i'm not patting myself on the back or looking for accolades. it just is what it is. and tomorrow we begin down the long road of court-ordered visitation schedules, foster care food and clothing vouchers, and such. and in May of 2011, i fully expect to have my heart broken. i wouldn't do it any differently than any of you would.

aw shucks SaRAH, you ARE the one! I am afraid that somehow I missed all the preparatory remarks here, but anyway, congrats to you. You do the right thing. Just take of yourself and Senor and the children. And your job, and ... have some fun while you are at it... life doesn't get any sweeter than it is right now, at this moment. Suck the marrow from it, enjoy all the creator has given and taken away, and watch the Kaluah, shut the water off when brushing teeth, and give more than you receive. Some change from the Fire Pond and a Hawaaian surf chic? Naw, you were there all the time. Through this tuck and that, thru surf and pumpkins and weird gaddam weightlifting, and now this. What a grand thing you have been asked to enjoy: being a surrogate mommie is not it. You are the mom. Nothing surrogate about it. And a good one I'd bet. Oh, and what I have been doing is a paltry one liner at best. Simply, life is simple. "Our great mother does not take sides Jack. She protects the balance of life." -- Neytiri, "Nature teaches more than she preaches. There are no sermons in stones. It is easier to get a spark out of a stone than a moral." -- John Burroughs And I spent the morning balancing hot and cold in the hot tub. I've had my first good day in over a year, meaning that I felt like doing something Sunday, and cut tree limbs and pulled stumps, and trimmmed the vines in the vineyard, and cut down honey locust thorn trees, 8 of them, and threw a chain on my chain saw, and wrote some poetry, and sent it to no one, otherwise, a normal day of nauseau and vomiting and medicine and a hard boiled egg, canadian bacon, gouda cheese, pumpernickel bread, butter and jelly, and orange juice. What more can one ask? I am happy and I miss my boys... In the absence of WAYD...

Sarah you are so fucking awesome.