are you listening?

2003-01-24 - 11:20 p.m.

i'm listening to a lot of love songs lately, especially goddamn jimmy eat world. i keep wavering between making a mixed cd called 'love rocks' and one called 'love suxxx.' maybe i'll meet in the middle and make a cd for masturbatory purposes. 'songs for self-luvin'’ or perhaps 'melodies to masturbate to.' or maybe i'll just call it 'the good touch.' but then all i can think of putting on it is 'closer' and 'i miss you.' the remix, not the original.

tonight i was shopping in target, as you do, when i came across a black crushed velvet pimp robe that i wanted back in october. yes, i did just write 'came across a black crushed velvet pimp' without blinking. so back in october it was $27.00. tonight it was $6.74. holy shit, thought i in glee. so i pulled off my black coat and purple duster and pulled on the velvet robe over my red plaid pants and sid vicious t-shirt. then i ran around in circles looking for a mirror, all to no avail. in desperation i ran to the dressing rooms, saying that all i needed was a mirror. the woman working the desk looked at my outfit and laughed then pointed to the mirror beside her desk. so i stood there looking at myself when i heard a little girl talking to her mother behind me. in a soft voice, this little girl (who was surely no older than 5 or 6) said, 'look mommy, that girl has purple shoes!' for indeed i was wearing my purple docs, for how can one rightfully wear a sex pistols shirt, or any punk shirt for that matter, without docs? 'yes, i see,' said her mother. 'i want purple shoes,' the little girl said. 'if they sold those shoes here i would buy them.' i grinned. a kid with taste. i continued to preen. 'look, her nails are purple, too!' she continued. at this i turned around. 'purple's one of my favourite colours,' i said to her, noticing her purple shirt. 'it's mine too,' she replied. 'purple and pink.' 'me too!' i exclaimed. 'actually, i'm really into red and purple, but pink is still way up on the list.' and i grinned at her, then with a quick wave i scampered off.

what a cool motherfuckin' kid.

life has been full of little moments lately, like snow and velvet robes and vaseline foot treatments. like dreaming of hanging out with devon last night and having her call me this afternoon. it's that connection, you know. did i mention that she's a gemini?

speaking of geminis...work socializations have been pretty weird and wacky lately. or perhaps wild. or maybe just fucked up. last saturday night i went to kathryn's apartment and got drunk with my coworkers for the first time. i've watched them drink twice already, and this time i actually joined them. that part wasn't fucked up. we listened to music and drank and laughed and watched the boys perform some greco-roman wrestling. natalie forced me to sing my favourite song to sing when i'm drunk, 'laid' by james. after that we decided to work on our band in kathryn's bedroom, so we snuck off, shut the door, and sang...i don't remember. tori amos, i believe. 'caught a light sneeze.' and perhaps something else. i don't remember. all i remember is that we sang. that wasn't fucked up, either.

after a little while others drifted into the bedroom, then everyone suddenly drifted out except for me and the gemini. later i found out that it was natalie who shut the door on us, leaving us alone together. he was hovering near my feet, so i offered them up, not really expecting a foot massage. but by god, he did indeed give me a foot massage. a really slow, deep, concentrated, make-yer-knees-quiver foot massage. and i just lay there in bliss until mary anne opened the door (goddamn it, i thought) and the gemini switched over to giving her a back massage as thanks for her taking over his morning shift the next day. i lay there half asleep, sort of hating mary anne because she's blonde and leggy and has a boyfriend already and i don't get motherfucking foot massages every damn day but not being able to fully hate her because she's so nice. don't you just hate that?

so i lay there half asleep all through their massage session. after a while she finally left the room and it was just me and the gemini again. and gods bless the boy, he went back to giving me that weak-in-the-knees foot massage! then we just sort of lay on the bed, and he got reeeal close to me, and he said, 'you know, i never got to kiss you that night.' that night being the night that everyone made out with everyone else except for me. and i was all, 'no, you didn't.' and was all coy smiles. and a million thoughts were swirling through my half-soggy brain, thoughts of how cute he is and how good he smells and how long it's been, and thoughts of that blow job that he got from jen and him kissing everyone else at the table that night and how i don't know where he's been but mostly just that i don't know what it would mean because it's been so long since i've been kissed that my lips have sealed back together as if i had just emerged from the womb, before my first infant breath, so the next person who kisses me will have to mean it because i've grown tender and new again. 'not like this,' i thought. 'you're beautiful and here but drunk and what would this mean tomorrow? i want someone to kiss me because they want to kiss me with every fiber of their being, slow and sober and passionate, not because they're drunk and i look good in candlelight.' i've done the whole make-out-at-drunken-party scenario, and i'm tired of it. i don't want that anymore.

and so i rejected his advance. i don't exactly remember how, i just remember turning away coyly, trying to lightly refuse his lips (as if that were possible). deep down i kept thinking that if he truly liked me he'd try again, maybe not that night but some other time. i do remember him saying, 'oh, i've been rejected!' and smiling at me. and i kept stumbling for something else to say. 'no, you've not been rejected!' i said. 'just...not tonight.'

then justin came in and said, 'hey, um, kathryn doesn't want you guys having sex on her bed. just so you know.' i was shocked, having had skanky roommates screwing around in my room before. 'i would never do that!' i protested. then scott came in and lunged for my feet. the gemini tickled one lightly as scott picked up the other one and alternated between biting and sucking them. like, seriously deep tonguing my toes, sticking whole appendages in his mouth. scott gave me a full-on toe job. i felt many things then as well, such as embarrassment (wondering how clean my feet were and hoping that my toe nails weren't too long and jagged) and delight (scott, rhymes with hot, cutest boy at work, is sucking on my toes!) but mostly i just screamed and giggled a high girly wail because it tickled like hell. and i hate it when i'm reduced to my primal girly screaming state. the gemini kept saying how cute it was, but i kept wriggling, half trying to get away, half trying to keep myself from being unbearably turned on.

the rest of the night wasn't nearly so exciting. kathryn is one of those depressed drunks, so we sat around and listened to this one throwing muses song over and over and over again while kathryn sang softly and looked forlorn. the song began to wrench at my stomach, too, and i haven't even had a relationship that's turned so sour. just people that i miss, people from the past. i curled up on the rug and fell asleep wishing desperately for some spooning. other people get drunk and long for sex. me, i long for chaste touches, tight and fully clothed embraces. i can get myself off any day of the week, but i can't sleep with my arms wrapped around myself. and even if i could, it wouldn't be the same.

the next day i wondered how the gemini would act around me, how much he would remember, if he would write off his behavior as drunken tomfoolery or what. all he did was give me that endearing little grin of his when i saw him. it was only after a few hours that he said, 'hey, i tried to kiss you last night, didn't i?' 'oh christ, here it comes, the "i was just drunk, i didn't know what i was doing, let's not be weird around each other" write-off,' i thought. 'yeah,' i said, as if it were no big deal, as if people tried to kiss me every night and i was just turning them down left and right. 'hey, i'm sorry about that,' he said. 'yeah, you're sorry, you're sorry that you got drunk and horny and came onto me is what you're sorry about. too bad the leggy blonde left the room too soon,' i thought bitterly. out loud i said, 'no problem.' but then i thought, fuck it, i'm just gonna come out and say just a bit of what i feel. 'and it's not that i rejected you,' i added. 'it's just that when people are drunk i don't know how things go and what things mean and if it's just because you're drunk or what. so it wasn't you. i would have turned down anyone in that situation.' and he nodded. 'i understand,' he said. 'see, when i'm drunk, i feel like i'm just more free to be myself, you know?' i smiled softly. 'yeah, i know.'

god, i fuckin' hate that gemini. i really do. he twists my insides to jelly and jumbles up my butterflies and my mind. i wish that i just despised him. and that he was unattractive, at least to me. and sometimes i do despise him, such as those long conversations we have where he does all the talking, and when i talk it seems like he's just waiting to talk instead of listening. he really likes me because i listen to him, he's told me so, but it's very unreciprocated, i feel. and as much as i like to listen to other people, i need to talk sometimes as well. i need witty banter and conversational skills and two-way streets. i can't just be awesome and continually just listen to one person talking, only speaking to offer advice and comments on what the other person has said. and he can be so insensitive, like the day that i found out that my mom's best friend was being shipped off to the middle east for a year. scott gave me a huge, wonderful hug, not letting me go even as i cried and shook. what did the gemini do? sure, i was much calmer by that point, but when it came up, he paused for one moment, said, 'woah,' then related it directly back to himself, wondering aloud if his own friend in the reserves had been called. and i don't know what that is. it can't be a boy thing, because scott actually converses with me and listens back and responds without linking it all back to himself. it can't be a gemini thing, because i could not have had such strong bonds with all those geminis over the years if everything related back to them. in fact, all of the geminis that i've been really close to have been extraordinary listeners. and if they have related things back to themselves, it's usually much more subtle. it can't be a 21-year-old thing, because almost all of my friends are 21 and they aren't like that. so what the fuck is up with this kid?

the funny thing is, i used to be all about casual sex, group sex, non-monogamous relationships, the works. not that i ever participated in that sort of thing (much), but in theory i was quite the swinger. now i'm faced with an actual situation in which i could feasibly be involved in group activities of a sexual nature, and all of them casual, and i find that i simply don't want to do that.

i'm all about monogamy. who the fuck knew?

certainly not i, miss never-in-a-million-trillion-years-will-i-ever-get-hitched. sure, it went against my libran nature, but i've never seen a marriage actually work out. i can't help but see pretty much all marriage as a mistake, and divorce as inevitable. not that i was against people getting married, per se, just that i always wondered why they were so shocked when things didn't work out. 'but things never work out,' i would think. 'i knew that. didn't you?'

'why tie yourself down?' i would wonder. 'why not just fuck around and have fun and not get attached?' and here i am, all no-i-can't-kiss-you-because-it-won't-mean-anything. shocked the hell out of me, i must say.

i just want one person to fuck. who knew that my relationship needs could be so simple? just one person. they can fuck before me, and they can fuck after me, but they must not fuck around with anyone, and i mean anyone, while they are fucking me. that's the only thing that i can imagine really upsetting me. you wanna fuck someone else, go ahead, be my guest. but just let me know first, because i only want to fuck one person and have one person fucking me at a time. wanna end our fucking? fine, great, grand. i have no problem with that. just let me know, them go off and fuck other people. otherwise things just get sloppy, and i'll get pissed, and no one wants that.

i want monogamy. the thought still blows me away. not marriage, just short-term monogamous fucking. that's it.

one at a time, please. the line forms to the left.