I'm in the USA!!!

I am here in Georgia with my friends Jimi and Ken and Ilse, at Ken's unit in Atlanta (well he keeps telling me it's Kennesaw, but as far as I am concerned it's part of Atlanta!) I had a pretty good time of the travelling (on the longest Friday ever), with one experience that made it less enjoyable - it took almost 3 hours to clear customs and immigration in Los Angeles, so I missed my connecting flight to Chicago, but despite a few minutes of panic I was booked, by United Airlines, on to a Delta Airlines flight directly to Atlanta... thus alleviating an excruciating flight to Chicago worrying that I might miss my connecting flight at that airport on account of a 35 minute period between my Los Angeles flight scheduled landing and my Atlanta flight departing! This way I actually arrived in Atlanta about an hour and 20 minutes earlier than I had expected and of course this meant I arrived an hour and 20 minutes earlier than my friends expected too! I hadn't had time to contact Jimi in Los Angeles (as I had to run to check in for the aforementioned flight), so after I had collected my luggage I found a phone card kiosk and bought a $10 card which allowed me to phone him and let him know I was already in Atlanta! I settled in to wait, but in no time Jimi, Ken and Ilse (who arrived from South Africa the night before me) were there with Bill who is also a native of Atlanta and who recently joined the 76th battalion! (the Firefly/Serenity tribute battalion of which I am a founding memeber and I am marching with them at their inaugural appearance at Dragon Con on Saturday 1st September!)

We squeezed into Jimi's car (Jimi is 6' 6" & Ken is 6' 1", Ilse, Bill and I were in the back) and drove back to Ken's place... Ken lives in a hotel style block of rooms each with a mini kitchen and bathroom and he arranged for Ilse (who's also known as Canter in case I refer to her as that) and I to have a room just upstairs from him. Jimi stayed with Ken and we got settled in and caught up! My Tim Tam's (chocolate filled 'cookies' with chocolate coating) appear to have travelled unscathed which I consider a minor miracle... so far we haven't found a broken one at all!!! And they love them here!! For a country where there is an amazing variety of foods available it is such fun to find something I can bring which is unique and a new experience for my friends here!

Bill headed home and at about 2am we decided to head to bed, but of course Ilse and I had showers and talked and talked - we're both in different time zones to what we're used to so we were wide awake and suddenly we found it was 5 am!! I lost count of the number of times I said "I'm in America!" and it became a bit of a catch cry between us today!!

On Saturday we woke up around 9.30 and by 12 midday we were at a place called 'Cracker Barrel' where we had breakfast! The food was amazing! I had 'biscuits' (lighter than scones but more like scones than anything I can think of) With gravy - which was thick and chicken based... it was delicious! It's a bit Southern thing to have biscuits and gravy for breakfast!! Ilse and I are learning that a lot of American culture revolves around food! Most of it fried or covered in gravy or served with so many sauces you can't decide which one is most delicious!! You are offered Coke or 'sweet tea' most of the time - Atlanta is the home of Coca-Cola and sweet tea is actually iced tea - they look at you funny if you don't know this - but in this heat it's actually very refreshing and I already getting a taste for it! (especially as it isn't fizzy...) The shops are already filling with Halloween and 'fall' themed items - and the things here seem so inexpensive - you have to remember that the exchange rate isn't awesome though... better than it was a couple of years ago - but not awesome!
We went to Wal-Mart this afternoon - I bought a few essential items I either forgot or hadn't anticipated! (My toothpaste was confiscated as hand luggage on account of it being a 'liquid/gel' in a container that held more than 100ml!!!) The food items I recognised were mostly in a variety of flavours hitherto unimagined - like s'more's flavoured breakfast cereal or peanut butter and chocolate flavoured 'buds' to be added to 'cookies' or desserts...) or available in such enormous quantities we couldn't use them up in 5 years... let alone have enough space to store them!! The other thing about the USA is that everything is BIG!! I mean HUGE!! or... tiny miniature!! I have the tiniest shampoo and toothpaste you could imagine but milk usually comes in 4 litre bottles - a two litre bottle is small... nothing smaller unless you really look for it!! Weird... huh?

After heading 'home' to unpack and refridgerate things, we headed to another supermarket, Public, this time to meet another 76th member, Stevie (PVT Dae) - there is a photograph of this occasion which I will add here if I ever manage to work out how to upload/post them!!

We went to this amazing place for dinner that night, Williamsons Brothers BBQ, and met up with Tom and Laura... it was much better than I was worried it might be... I felt a little weird but fine with all my wonderful friends around keeping an eye on me! I talked with Laura a lot, mostly about stuff not to do with the 76th or anything... and Tom became an uncle yesterday when Kriste and Doug had a baby boy named Richard Grayson! My wombat, kangaroo and koala soft toys were passed on with many thanks from 'Uncle' Tom and it was fine. Weird... but fine.
I have now met 8 members of the 76th in all! Cindy/PFC Vex (who visited me in Australia recently), Jimi/SFC Alexander, Ken/LT Zephyr, Ilse/CPL Canter, Bill/PVT Birddog, Stevie/PVT Dae, Tom/COL Tristan O'Tearney and Laura/SGT Wendt. (In case you're wondering I am SFC Magda Martin. )

On Saturday night we also watched the newly released US special edition of 'Serenity' with the commentary on... it's Joss Whedon, Nathan Fillion, Adam Baldwin, Ron Glass and Summer Glau talking about their recollections of making the movie! It was so much fun to see and hear it with these friends, I will always remember that my first experience of watching it was with these precious friends from all over the world!

I reliased something about my journey, one of those things that catches my imagination... on Friday, whilst travelling around the world, I set foot in 4 Olympic cities in 24 hours... I don't suppose there's a lot of folk who can say that!! I shall also visit another one before I return home to Australia too!

Oh, and I will update my blog along the way as I can!

procrastination...

Why do I procrastinate so badly - it's like I self destruct or something... here I am with about a million things to do and I am sitting here writing a blog that I really don't have to write... but it hit me that I could and it seems like a good idea...

I was going to cook some goodies for my party tomorrow night... but I ate half the biscuit dough and now I feel slightly ill...

I was going to have a shower and wash my hair so I don't have to in the morning so I can later in the day and be all fresh for my party (see, som ethought went into that plan...) but now I am feeling so sleepy and I don't want to go to bed with wet hair...

I was going to write some emails to folk whom I love and am thinking of, but now my brain is in a muddle (probably from all the biscuit dough I ate) and I don't even know if what I'm writing here is going to make sense...

I was going to start making some little thank you card for friends who come to my party and for those who have already sent me cards and gifts... but I can't get any good ideas on what to make with the materials I have here...

I was going to finish my costume for tomorrow night... but... now I'm not and I can't even think clearly enough to have a reason for that so... *sigh*

I think I'll go to bed...

after I think of something else that will prevent me from doing so...

goodnight!

Life...

Life has been... well, interesting lately

When I last posted on this blog I was so happy - I was in love and felt loved and cared for in return - I was losing weight and with good motive too, I was going to meet someone really special and wanted to look my best for him. I had a friend whom I could tell anything, and everything to, and I was certain he felt the same way... not only from the things he said to me, but from the things he said to others.

Then he dropped his bombshell.

How did he expect me to react, knowing (as he did, as he had aknowleged) that I was in love with him and that I couldn't wait to spend time with him in his home town, meeting his friends and family, spending time just getting to know the little things about him that our intense correspondence and phone conversations couldn't convey. How could he not see that suddenly and casually announcing he was in love with someone else would shatter me and the fact that the person in question was not only 16 years younger than me, but knew how I felt about him and was aware of our plans together in September, only made me feel more betrayed and helpless and rejected...?

How could he not understand my confusion and hurt? How did he manage to twist my emails full of insecure 'begging for reassurance' that I mattered as a friend if no longer as a lover, into 'attacks', as I hear he has accused me of making. How could he reject my friendship after I had shown again and again that I was loyal to him, and cared about him as a friend more than any potential we had as lovers or partners?

Why, when I thought we were going to be the 'precious friends' we had talked about, did he suddenly turn on me? Since his new 'love' was staying with him at the time and he implied that she wasn't happy with me, I had to assume that he turned on me and made rambling accusations that did not reflect me or my behaviour in any way, on account of her insisting he have nothing to do with me. I was more shattered at that point than at any other... I almost cancelled my trip to the US because I couldn't picture myself having to meet someone I had loved so much for so long who had turned on me so viciously and without explaination.

I made a throwaway comment to the effect that I tried to be friends but his new 'girlfriend' had demanded we have nothing to do with one another - I tried to clothe it in cute, fairytail teminology so that I could let my friends (who both cared about me and were concerned about how things were going in this area of my life) would know that we weren't on good terms but that it wasn't my choice. He saw what I said and was ruthless in his reaction. I can't tell you how much I have cried over the last few weeks on account of my own error in making that comment. I have never hurt at anyone elses hands as much as I hurt on account of my own stupid comment which seemed harmless enough at the time, but which apparently was unforgivable. I will have to live with the knowlege that I have had a hand in destroying something that was so precious to me just a short time ago.

I don't know what else I could have done to show him that I honestly wanted his friendship. We turned to one another in difficult times, and he fell in love with me before I allowed myself to fall in love with him. I finally let myself feel something I have resisted for years, and it was wonderful for a while. Now I don't know if I ever can feel that good again... it is too hard to let yourself be that vulnerable to the actions of another person. I want to fall in love again so much, but I am afraid of the hurt and bewilderment (which I don't deal with very well) happening to me again.

How does one just 'decide' that you can't be with the person you profess to 'love and adore'? How does one just switch to someone else and expect the other to be happy for them without hurt or pain or suffering? How could I have reacted differently? I tried so hard to show him that I wanted to be friends. Now I don't know if I can even meet him. I have to if I am to keep doing other things I love doing, and if I am to spend time with friends I love and who's friendship means the world to me... but it means being in contact with someone I have told my deepest desires and most closely held secrets to, and who now prefers to be in the arms of someone who betrayed my friendship and trust. Someone who is young enough to be my daughter (if I was a 16 year old slut of course... but none-the-less, it hurts to know I am considered too old for him...).

In the last few months I have put on weight, not caring what I look like with or without my clothes on... I have lost part of my desire to travel half way around the world, though I am still longing to meet other friends who have been amazing and strong and loyal and caring and understanding and I wouldn't miss the opportunity to hug them for all the world!! In the past few months I have cried more nights than I have not... and I have found my bed more empty than ever... I have slept alone for 7 years now, but for several months there was the promise of someone snuggling up to me and telling me that he adored me... I had hope that I wouldn't have to be alone for the rest of my life... but it turns out that I was mistaken.

It has been really hard not to give in to depression during all of this. I have written other blogs in my MySpace profile... and I have written a million emails to friends and talked about my feelings with my friends, family and even myownself (you get a good hearing that way!).

So how do I feel about this man? I honestly don't know. We are trying to be friends becuase not being friends is just not an option with the committments we've made to the 'project we started' and the friends we share in common, but he is shallow, cold and apparently doesn't want to know where we went wrong... so I still feel rejected and completely uncared about. I am trying for the sake of the group we started - his vision and my encouragement & passion for his idea which got it off the ground. It has taken on a life of it's own - but I treasure the memory of our conversation in which he mentioned this idea. I treasure the moment he asked me to join him as a part of the dream - I was literally his first recruit. I treasure the friends I have made in the group since it started to blossom and take on a life of it's own.

Sometimes I think I might still be in love with him a little... I don't know if that's habit or residual feelings... sometimes I think I love him as a friend, but I do love most folk I know to some degree so that's hardly amazing or incredible to realise. I can't really tell until he starts being open and honest with me, and for that to happen he will have to be honest with himself and I don't know if he's capable of that. I only know that I have lost something that was incredibly precious to me and that I will miss it for a long time to come. The tears still pop up when I least expect them. The feelings are less overwhelming, but they are there and at moments I am vulnerable to them...

I know he will never read this blog. But if he did I guess I would want him to know that I do still care for the friend who used to tell me everything - and I mean everything! I do still care for the vulnerable man who could tell me things that most men wouldn't. I do still care for the sensual side of him in a way... but less than I did. I guess I would give him another opportunity to show me I mattered to him - but I would be far more cautious and it would take something extordinary for me to trust that he cared for me at all... as a friend or anything...

If I could go back would I? I honestly don't know. I was happier knowing his love and feeling my own for him for those few months than I have been in over 10 years. It was a cruel and hard blow to lose that love, but it was more cruel to lose his friendship and trust. If I could do one thing differently I wouldn't have posted that comment that I thought was so inocuous at the time, but which was written from the deep sense of hurt and betrayal I had experienced.

If I could have 'a miracle' I would have him feel what I felt when I wrote to him throughout those confusing and devastating days and weeks after he 'replaced me' with someone who was still in college.

I am turning 40 in just two weeks - I was really looking forward to this, but now I am feeling like my final opportunity for love has passed me by. What is the point of looking forward to the best years of your life when you don't have anyone to share it with... I mean I am looking forward to many, many things... but I would have loved to have a soulmate to talk things over with, and share my thoughts and feelings with, and know he was there to return to at the end of the day... Right now, I don't feel like I will ever be able to try to trust someone with my heart again - but I hope that will change in time. For now I just have to keep hoping this wonderful man I was once in love with will grow to understand how wrong he was about me and learn to accept people in his life with love and trust rather than with resentment and defensiveness.

Damn - now I have to clean my glasses again - these stupid tears have salt in them!