Well here it is Thanksgiving and I haven't written in my journal the whole time I have been here. There hasn't seemed to be time for it though I am not sure where all the time goes. But to start with I am very thankful to have the opportunity to be here. I have wanted to have a relationship with someone who took me out of myself, out of my head, and into my depths, as well as sharing himself on that deeply intimate level too. It seemed like something I would never have though I have had some wonderful relationships that gave me friendship and love. I have certainly learned a lot from all my relationships. However, this one, at this time in my life, takes me deeper than others have. I am learning a lot about myself, and the depths that I am capable of. I am grateful for that. And I am very thankful for this man in my life, the incredible pleasure he brings to me, the way he loves me, and the way that I am able to love him and express my love and pleasure with and to him.
I am also grateful to my husband for accepting this, for facilitating it, for making the effort to grow and adapt and change because of it, for paying for my ticket out here, and putting up with my being gone from him for long periods of time, for sharing in the ups and downs of my other relationships, listening, advising, and loving me.
The Gods have been good to me in my life and I am very thankful for the many friends I have accumulated, the many people who have cared about me, and for the padded two-by-fours they have used when helping me to get a clue. I don't know where my life is going from here. It seems that many of the things that I am involved in are in flux: relationships, job situation, financial situation, my church. What it will all look like a year from now is anyone's guess but it is a fascinating ride for all of that.
I arrived here last Thursday and F. was waiting. It was so good to be with him again. They had opened up the parking lots near the airport so we didn't have to take a shuttle bus way out to the far parking lots. That was very nice. We had a few hours to reconnect before he had to go to work. I was too tired from the long day/flight to take advantage of the late night hours without him so didn't do my exercises, get my computer connected to his cable modem, or do much cleaning. I just slept. It was cold though and I ended up in long underwear and a bathrobe to get warm. I thought this was CA!!! not the Midwest.
Friday he had to work at the Psychic Eye so went in for about 5 hours. I stayed home and got connected, did some email, settled in. But I missed him. And of course he had to get some sleep before his night job. As it turned out though he only slept about two hours. He was so tired that his emotional reserves were very low.
Saturday morning the same thing again, an hour of sleep, then off to the Eye for the day. I went with him though and he dropped me off at a Laundromat so I could do his laundry for him. His time has been so tight that he just couldn't get it done. It took about an hour and a half, then he came back to pick me up. We went to get lunch, then back to the Eye for the rest of his time. I took my laptop with me and he called the owner in an attempt to get me set up doing Astrological consulting through them but nothing came of that. I did sit and give a consultation to the store manager - really just a quickie but it was a lot of fun and she seemed to find it quite helpful. I also did a bit with one of the other people who work there but didn't pick up any clients from it. It was fun, though. Back home we were kind of tired and ended up going to bed very early and sleeping for about 9 hours.
Sunday was F.'s long day at the Eye. We had discussed my going in with him since when he wasn't doing readings I could hang out with him but I pulled a muscle in my thigh, which was quite painful. I stayed home and took, like, a two-hour hot bath and Ibuprofen every 4 hours all day. Tom and I talked for a long time on the phone. F. had said a couple of things that bothered me and I realized I was going to have to tell him so. We really haven't had any tiffs or anything and I was very worried about how it would go. The more I thought about it the more bleak it seemed. I was feeling very disconnected from him by the time he got home from work. Poor man. He walks in the door and I have to talk to him right a way. But I couldn't let it go and have it affect how I interacted with him. That would just have blown it up even more. He apologized but told me that he usually just says what is on his mind because if he waits he forgets what he wanted to say. So he doesn't know that he can wait for more appropriate times to come out with things that are more critical but he will try.
So it was rather anti-climactic after all but I just didn't feel reconnected. I went up to bed and he said he would be up shortly. But instead he called a friend that we had been trying to connect with. She told him she needed him to go over to her house. So he came up and told me he was going out. I wasn't happy about it at all as I still felt the lack of connection between us and it was very painful to me. I needed to deal with that. But he chose to go out. He said he would not stay the night there but be home in a few hours.
I woke up at 3:30 am and couldn't go back to sleep. After a while I started to cry on and off. I got up and did email but that didn't stop the crying. I got very chilled and took a hot bath but couldn't seem to warm up or stop crying. He finally called here at 8:30 am to tell me they weren't done moving her. (Apparently she had been given two or three days to get out and she was trying to do that and needed his help to move. If I had known that when he went I could have gone with and the deep emotional misery would never have happened.) Anyway he didn't get back until something like 3 in the afternoon and I had been through just about every conceivable emotion from anger to despair. I seriously thought about leaving early despite the $100 to change the ticket. But by the time F. got home I had gotten through it all and gotten down to the one thing that mattered the most to me about it all - that I felt disconnected from him. And I tried to tell him about that and he took care of it. He spent some very focused time with me right then - not much talking but it certainly worked. And we have been fine since then. I do find it just a little freaky though that he can do that. I am used to processing issues verbally for hours, if necessary, to go through it all. He just cut right through that and it worked.
Since then though, my period started, which I am both annoyed with and relieved about. I hate the idea that all that emotion was basically hormonal pre-menstrual stuff but on the other hand I would rather that was what it was about since the incident itself didn't really warrant all the intensity of feeling or the disconnect. Arghhh!!!
Wednesday we had a day of errands. We went to a building that houses the headquarters of where he works as he wanted to change his deductions into his tax shelter. They are located in downtown LA and we had to get badges to go up to the offices. Really they just labeled us with the floor we were going to and an authorization. Once up there he discovered that despite what they had told him before he needed to go through the agent of the company that his shelter was with, not through his employer. Sigh… but at least they did give him the paperwork for it. We stopped and had chai with soymilk and a bit to eat then we went to his bank to change how some deductions were handled from his paycheck.
We took a break from errands and went out to Chinatown again so I could do some shopping. It was fun. I would actually like to do some more shopping there but I can't do too much of it at one time as it gets to be too much, very quickly. I wish I had taken a Yule list with me so that I could have gotten more of that done, though I did get something for my two nieces, Tom's sister and brother-in-law, and my parents. But there are several more people on our list and it would have been really nice to get something from here. It would make a change from the usual stuff. Hmmm maybe I should see if I can get Tom to make a Yule list of all the people we exchange gifts with and send it to me. I have another week out here so it is possible that I could still get some more of it done.
We also stopped at a statuary store. Wow! They had some beautiful things, full sized statues of Goddesses, naked women and semi-naked women in various artistic poses, lions, and dragons, and my all time favorite - a slightly larger than life one of the Three Graces for only about $6,000, not including shipping. I want it.
We went to the Salvation Army antique store and F.'s favorite antique store and I had a lot of fun looking at everything. I especially liked the fiberglass? Flock-covered huge tiger on a pedestal that must have been from a circus. It was way too big for indoors but I thought it would make a nice entryway statue:)
This morning I finally got a hold of my relatives. Apparently the number I was using had two digits transposed in the area code. This is odd though as I checked the number with my cousin. Wouldn't you think that he would have known his mother's phone number and mentioned the discrepancy? Oh well. They invited me to Thanksgiving Dinner but since F. is still in bed and has some plans for a movie today I didn't feel comfortable about agreeing. And I don't know how they would have felt about having a total stranger there too. It would kind of be a stranger of a stranger as they don't really know me either even if we are related. But I am also relieved to have an excuse as that seems like a little much for a first visit. I will see if we can stop by one afternoon soon though. She said to just see what works for me and call her back, that they are very available.
Copyright © 2001 Kyril Oakwind