Sunday, September 24, 2006

I'll plant my tree in the middle of the spinning world

I kind of feel like the world around me is spinning really, really fast, and I'm standing in the middle of it, all still, just watching it speed past me. You know when you're in a car, and the scenery outside is moving, but you're not, and your eyes try to see what's out there, but you can only focus on one thing at a time, and so you miss things in between? I feel like that...
The fact that this is New Year is just terribly appropriate- new beginnings and whatnot.
By the way, I hope your new year is happy, and I wish you all the best. I got a really nice email from my Chicago cousin- we really ought to correspond more than we do.
I got the job; the one I mentioned before? I'm now a permanent employee of my company, with salary and benefts and real responsibilities and things. It's been a fast two weeks, learning the job, trying to get the hang of things, and trying to get everything that needs doing done, cause having to learn everything from scratch slows me down, so at the end of the day (even if I've learned a lot) I feel like I haven't accomplished much, because project-wise, I only finished one or two things. It's frustrating, but I'm coming along. And I'm really happy about the job thing.
And now I'm looking for my own place to live, which is this whole big thing, and kind of sudden, but that's because of something to do with the Mom I live with, and if she had a blog then you'd read about that there, but I won't put it down here. Suffice it to say, I need me a place to live.
I'll admit it was a little sooner than I anticipated (I know, I'm 25, and shouldn't be talking about STILL living with my mother), but I'd kind of been thinking that I'd have some 'saving up' time between getting the big job and moving-on-up. I think fate is holdning a rug and laughing at me on my ass. I'm okay with the moving out- I am- it's just a little sudden, and I'll admit, I'm not quick with the whole 'giant responsibility' thing. I'm processing.
So, we went out and looked at a few places, and I will say this; this is a bloody expensive city to live in. It kind of sucks. Really.
So, what I can afford is probably a bachelor apartment, an idea which I am not entirely comfortable with, and which, a week ago, I was dead-set against (there have been 'discussions' with Mom; I'm coming around). But I'm thinking now that if I can find something that is marginally more than a box, I might be able to do something with it. It's just the idea that if I invite someone over, I'm inviting them to my bedroom; that wigs me out.
On the other hand, I am liking the thought of having my own place. I told Mom some of my plans- I'm going to paint it blue and beige, there's a chaise lounge at Ikea I'll be buying, etc., and her comment was something along the lines 'aww, you're nesting', which I found rather distasteful and gross. I'm not laying a freaking egg, I just want my own damn house for the first time in my life (I'm almost 26, I figure it's about time).
So those are the two major things that have been chewing my brain, and a good reason why I haven't blogged in so long (a lot of the 'before' part of what I'm writing here had more to do with my mother than with me, so I was censored. BOO!)
There have been other things, though. Hugh's birthday is next week, and for it he wants to get a tattoo, which is something I have been thinging about (on and off, seriously and not) for years. Lauren, too, is up with this idea, and I wouldn't have been (Mom's pretty adamantly against them, her main argument being that when you get old, they sag and it's gross, and also, that you're doing something permanent to your skin that you might not want later.) My response to that is that a tattoo is something you get at one point in your life, and for the rest of your life, you can look at it and REMEMBER that point. Who cares if, when you're sixty, you're not the type of person who would go out and get a tattoo? You can look down at that whatever on your whatver and think of how, when you were 25, you were that type of person. Also, I kind of like the idea (warning, this is morbid) that when I die, and end up on some table in a morgue, that there will still be something there of me. It's like tying something of your self to your skin, which is otherwise kind of empty-vessel-like.
Anyways, like I said, despite all this, I wasn't really up for a tattoo, because I do work in a corporate world, so I'd like to be able to hide whatever I had on me, but I don't like the idea of tattoos that are in private places, because then if you want to show someone, you have to show your whatever, or else you can't show them at all. And I also don't like something like, on your back, because what's the point of getting something on your skin of you can't see it without a mirror and contortions? However, I've thought of the perfect place. It's private but not private, always hidden unless I don't want it so, and even if I was in the middle of the cafeteria at work, if I wanted to show someone, I could, and I wouldn't get fired. The only problem is, it would hurt a lot, and be really, really hard to heal. So, I have some thinking to do. I also have to settle on a design. I'm thinking a tree. Trees are permanence, they are roots, they are growth and life, they are solidity, knowledge, the balance of good and evil...they have a place in (just about) every religion, in every mythology. So, I'm thinking a tree. But, I'm open to suggestions.
There's more to write- we went to Rosh Hashona dinner last night with the Robins, and it was really nice, and their new place (yeah, everyone is moving) is great- oh! and my uncle gave me a piece of his artwork (he does wood carvings), and I am so jazzed about having one, this thing is awesome)...but I'm tired right now, and there's beading to be done. It's Sunday, and I have a great big day of bedsurfing planned. Wahoo.