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When I was about Two I forgot to eat snails. I looked down at them, and where I once saw food, I only saw snails. I guess I ate other things instead.
When I was Five and starting school I forgot that I liked the colour blue. I'd always known that I'd liked it, but suddenly I stopped liking it, and started liking pink instead. Just like that.
When I was Nine I forgot that I knew anything at all. It seemed that all knowledge was relative and nothing was fact. Ever since then I've been forgetting to forget this, only to forget it again for fleeting, clarifying moments.
At 11 I forgot how to throw temper tantrums. Sure I could still rant and scream, but the old days of 'stomping' and 'bellowing' were over. My desire to reason my way into getting what I wanted forever after trumping my raw emoting.
I woke up one day and forgot to that I'd been supposed to be scared in the night. I'd just slept peacefully through till morning.
When I was 13 I found a resilience I never knew I had, and a fierce sense of protection for my individual family members. Getting these cost me the knowledge that my parents were faultless, but I guess that always had to go sometime.
In my late teens I forgot that I was beautiful. There was always something very noticeable to remind me that I wasn't. Usually my nose, or otherwise my hairy legs or my knees or some other innocuous body part.
At 19 I forgot what it was I wanted to do with my life, my one grand plan dissolving and leaving only hints and hunches in its wake.
When I was 23 I lost all my romanticism and trust on the corner of Little Lonsdale and Exhibition streets. I just bundled myself into a cab, smeared away my tears, and didn't think to check for them until it was too late. The great thing about my romanticism and trust is that slowly but surely, they've been finding their way back to me. I could probably help them out a little more. HALLOO THERE. I'M IN NORTH FITZROY!
Last Sunday I forgot not to eat potato gems twice in one day. Them's the breaks.
I am at the office on a Saturday, and feeling a bit bummed about it until I just realised a moment ago that I can burp really loudly and no one will know.I did a nice big juicy one, and immediately feel much better about being here. Who knows, maybe I'll undo the top button on my pants later?..
Sometimes I just wish I were a puppy. I would get fed everyday, rubbed down every morning, and in hot hot weather I'd get to run around the park at night with a bike light strapped to my collar like a Disco Puppy!
For the last week or so I've been wanting to write about the return of the truly excruiating period pain that I used to get as a teenager, and which hit me like a drunk on King St again last week. But to be honest, I couldn't summon the energy. During the actual pain I was very inspired to write about the whole experience, and afterwards I was both tired and also over it.
To clarify, I wasn't interested in cataloging my pain, more the conundrum of feeling like it wasn't 'done' to be able to own it frankly. So I found myself hiding it, while at work anyway, to save others the awkwardness of having to acknowledge my imperfect endometrial system. Anyway, the short of it is that I begrudged this. But it also led to some misunderstandings. It was clearly quite obvious to a few of my workmates that something was wrong, they'd ask if I was sick and I wouldn't know how to explain that I was unwell, but not sick, and there was nothing to be done.
Because menstruating:
- isn't illness, it's symptomatic of something quite normal and natural;
- isn't contagious, and doesn't need to be quarantined (the only thing worse than being at work while in period pain is being at home, bored and panicked about missed work while in period pain);
- is going to keep on happening to me for a large part of my exisitence; and
- I'll be fucked if I'm going to miss out on anything (work, fun, anything) because of it.
That said, I would like a little leeway to:
- go to the toilet at 45 minute intervals without sneaking;
- wear a heat pack across my navel;
- curl up on the floor periodically, as necessary (I would be more than happy to stay late at work to absorb all floor-curling time); and
- the basic ability to acknowledge it, since it's perfectly goddam normal.
There. That is my rant about menstrual pain. A bit gross, and a bit depressing, but true. And now let us sit back and think about Disco Puppy, racing her little red light into great whirling streaks around and around at the park.
Okay, so I just wrote that last post, then went checking some of my favourite blogs and comment streams. A comment I'd posted on my friend Nattie's awesome blog had required that I type the word "sperm", which I naturally thought was fantastic, so I'd included this info for the delight of others in the bottom of my comment. Mel commented below and also added her word verification "broslato" which she imagined as describing a particularly manly Italian dish. And then I had the brainripple (let's not call it a wave) of compiling a fake dictionary of word verification words and their meanings.
If anyone is even slightly taken with this idea I ask you to please do one, or both, of the following:
a) tell me your thoughts via the comments in the usual fashion; or
b) tell me your word verification and what it means.
As a childhood lover of the game Balderdash I anticipate that this shall be both amusing, and a good insight into how many people ever read my blog. I'm hoping for as many as five!
Leith - accusingly, to me:
"You shook your goodies at Flava Flav."
Leanne - hypothetically, then again moments later to Isobel:
"You have a mad rack, don't you."
Leith again - post triple-fried donut incident:
"I regret everything...and nothing!"
Dion - pondering the deep-fryer:
"Tash! Tash! KFC, Tash!"
Brendan - as Public Enemy announce they are going to perform It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back in its entirety:
"Oh. My. God." (accompanied by a slightly hysterical facial expression)
Also worthy of inclusion in this list is Nat Graf's resolution to grow two inches. He didn't specify where...ladies...
Dearest Bacon,
There's no point pretending: I'm writing to say goodbye. I want you to know that this isn't easy for me. Over the years you've always been there for me, with a greasy salty kick on a sleepy morning that would turn my whole day around. Your presence makes even the most boring risotto or pasta or potato salad so much more exciting. I'm smiling now just thinking about you.
I don't think I can easily explain why I need to do this. It's about ethics, and pigs, and the state of the world, and a whole bunch of things that I don't expect you to be able to solve. Forgive the cliche, but it really isn't you. I'm not sure that it's me either. Perhaps it's life, it's a shitty circumstance, it's not fair. I'm sorry.
Don't be sad, Bacon. I will never forget all the good times. And I'll try not to be jealous when I see other people enjoying you (although, you know me well enough to know that I'll be fighting a white hot anxiety - but I promise not to let it show). You are so scrumptious, I know there will be dozens of girls just waiting to wrap their mouths around you as soon as you're available. But I will always cherish what we've had, and I hope in time you will remember us as special too. But I feel that this parting is the right thing to do.
I'm sorry I didn't let on this morning, as I enjoyed you for the last time. It was selfish of me I know. You were just so delicious, snuggled in next to my tomatoes, I had to have you one last time. I wont be so weak again.
I wish you all the best, my King of Meats,
Natasha
P.S. As for your brother, Salami, my fantastically dirty stick o'meat, don't even get me started. Late nights will never be the same.
I've already lost track of which day of the week it is. Everytime someone asks me what my plans are later/tomorrow/for the holidays I reply "Dunno. Don't really have any." There are vague plans involving gardening, cooking, reading, possibly cinema. Hannah and I have scheduled in a sewing day for Monday which I am looking forward to. There's talk of a swim tomorrow. But mainly I am following my whims. It turns out that my whimsy is fairly lethargic and there's a lot of reclining on my bed flicking through recipe books and singing along to Billie Halliday and Peggy Lee.
Despite experiencing my first paid holiday in some time, my imminent tax bill and credit card debt mean that I am living very frugally. And in a strange way I'm finding it quite liberating. I'm very housebound. I'm not rushing anywhere because there's nowhere to rush to. The house is clean. I have ample Christmas presents to potter around with. It's so warm.
I will go to the supermarket later and get some noodles to make a stir fry for dinner, and I am also having thoughts about a slurpee. I ran this morning and have been sweating ever since. I sat at Ray with Andrew, who is going overseas tomorrow, and usual suspects Leith, Brendan and Casey, and my brother turned up by chance as well, as the odds might have suggested he would.
I ambled home, buying myself an apple at La Manna, stopping in at Sugar Dough where I've heard Emma Uttinger, an old workmate, is now working, though she wasn't there. I looked in a vintage shop, promptly bought a skirt (though only $12 it was about $11.50 more than I could afford), and then removed myself from further temptation by riding home. I tended to my tomato plants, watered the garden with the shower water that had cooled sufficiently, using Donald, my handsome new blue watering can. I ate some toast.
I might read.
and I love to sit so pleasantly, in this life of luxury
