Anywho, here’s a little story for you. I had been looking for a long time for either the China Glaze Crackle Glaze collection, or the OPI Shatter polish… calling every Sally Beauty and ULTA store in a 50 mile radius to see if they had any in, if they were getting any in, etc. Disappointed and still American (by which I mean, desiring immediate satisfaction or else), I went on ebay and overpaied for a bottle of OPI Shatter.  A week and a half later, I walk into ULTA, and they have a whole damn table full of it.  Ok, fate… lesson learned.

Being sad and bitter about my impatience doesn’t keep me from enjoying the hell out of this polish, though.

OPI Shatter and China Glaze Turned Up Turquoise

While the crackle effect happens within seconds of application, I’ll be damned if it doesn’t take forever to fully set. As a matter of fact, I think my (forever ago old) Cover Girl crackle polish had the very same problem. Which might be why I didn’t use it as much as I wanted to at first.  The difference between then and now, though, is that I am a little more patient than I was as a child.

But only a little.  Still American, after all.

Does anyone else have any of the crackle polishes yet?  OPI?  China Glaze?  Old school Cover Girl?  What colour combinations do you go for?

I got thinking about this as I was sitting out on the back porch, enjoying a choice, high-grade smoke (Marlboro) and talking about the glaring lack of plans we have for tomorrow. Not like I care. I don’t think I’ve ever had a New Year’s celebration to go off well for years. Last year was pretty much destroyed by breaking up with the ex. The year before was riddled with panic attacks in the wilds of Scotland (Aberdeen — dude… “wilds” is fitting on New Year I MEAN LIKE NO JOKE LULZ [huh?]). Before that was the fantastic experience of blacking out and coming to with some dude fucking me while I just silently prayed he’d get off, go away, and I could pretend it never happened. Year before that, my first and last experimentation with smokes beyond tobacco, which was a huge paranoid catastrophe. I think the New Year before that was fairly good, though. So it isn’t always fail.

And I can’t imagine this one being fail in any capacity. I mean, honestly? For real? I’d be perfectly content getting all jacked-up on sugar and caffeine, and crashing on the couch all snuggled-up and comfy. But that’s all I ever want to do any night. Sugar. Caffeine. Cuddle.

But this isn’t about what I want to do next year. This is about what I’ve done last year. And… well, yes, one thing dominates the whole handful of months: meeting Kev. He has been the most amazing thing to happen to me… all strutting into my life with his finger up his nose, eyebrow cocked and a sly-as-fuck smile breaking across his face. My god, how he lights me up. I can honestly feel myself glowing whenever he’s around. He doesn’t even have to do anything… just a look and I’m all ablaze with love and happiness. Just a smile. Just watching him sleep. Even watching him help his mom out with something makes me want to hug his face off. And then back on again.

I never knew how much I was missing out on until it arrived. How little I settled for. How starved I was for affection. I never knew I could be this happy with someone. Never knew I could be myself with someone, and not be afraid of being called stupid or insane. Never having to shut parts of myself down because it was better to hide than be hurt. Never having to feel like there was something horribly, horribly wrong with me. Never having to hear “normal people don’t do that”.

All that I had hoped for before, and expected before, but lost over the years. Feeling cheated by Hollywood. Feeling cheated by my parents, too, for having stayed together from the start… living the impossible dream, and making me feel like I could do the same. Like I deserved the same. I lost that. I lowered my expectations and my value. I let myself get cheated on, screamed at, blamed for everything that ever went wrong. I bowed my head and fucking took it, thinking now that my expectations were too unrealistic, and this was just how things were in reality.

And then this year happened. Like finally waking up, bye-bye ‘Wonderland’, shaking your head and going “boy, that was some FUCKED UP SHEET, YO”. Things always were as I thought they should be, after all.

Other things about the year, I suppose, was getting transferred to UK.  I’m somewhat frustrated about how plans changed there.  I did honestly see myself transferring overseas, so I didn’t look ahead at UK’s USPs, so this whole plan of getting my basics done for cheaper turned out to be fail in the long run, as I’m having to go backwards and take basic classes that the University required, tacking on an extra year.  The only way to make the time even itself back out is to keep my grade high and squeak into their one-year Master’s program.  Which, I suppose, is what I’ll do.  It’s what I’ve said I’m doing, anyway.  It just depends on how desperately I want to stay at UK.  Or leave.

The year was definitely not without loss.  Moses, my dear furry friend since second grade, passed on.  He gave it a good fight, bouncing back briefly with much gusto, and holding on just long enough to meet Kev over the summer.  I still have a hard time with that, honestly.  I miss him so much…

My resolution for 2008 was a pretty good success: To grow a backbone and unleash my inner bitch.  To stand for myself, and not only that, but know that I can stand on my own.  The brief period of singleness at the start of the year did bring me to that point.  By Valentine’s Day (aka “Singles Awareness Day”), I figured out that I was totally content to be on my own.   I was actually looking forward to not having to please or impress anyone but myself.  I was chuffed to have the chance to be entirely selfish and free from attachment.  Then… yeah, SOME DUDE had to come along and mess all that up. But if you ever hear me growling about that, it’s likely a norty growl.  Please you to be turning around and not perving outside the door.

Minor things: I has car; I lost 25lbs, gained 15, lost 5, gained 5, lost 5, FUCK!; finally saw Radiohead; voted for change; started really learning German for real.

And.. I guess that’s my 2008 in a nutshell.  Hey! As for the classic thing of writing out resolutions… yeah well, I have none this year.  I’m cool with myself and my life and where things are going.  I guess all I can say is that I’m looking forward to next year.  Did a tarot reading that said it’d have a bit of a rocky, stressful start, but that all in all it’ll be peachy.  We’ll see

Tomorrow is gonna be a busy one, too.  Last minute details.  Oh, how I hate those last minute details!

Something a bit more worthy of noting, though: I ran into someone I knew last weekend while I was having dinner with Sylver (by “having” I mean “I watched her eat”). I didn’t even recognize her, and didn’t believe her when she told me who she was… but yeah, we started talking, and she explained to Sylver that we used to go to the same church with all the rich kids and blah blah blah about how we never fit in cos of sweet country bumpkins.  My initial thought was to laugh at her, because I remember occasions where she got in on the “Everybody Make Fun of Becky” campaign… but thought otherwise, because perhaps what she said was true, and she was only doing it to try to fit in with a crowd that wouldn’t take her in anyway.  In that instant, I felt for her.
Felt even more when she commented how funny it is that most of those kids now are leading pretty miserable lives, and we’re actually happy with ours.  It’s rather nice to have someone from my youth recognize this…
Then retracted when she said she had six kids.  Two from her past, two from her husband’s past, and two together.  “We’re like some kind of Brady Bunch,” she chuckled.  “Not quite what my mother would’ve wanted, but that’s just life these days.”  I couldn’t help but smile at that.  “I do enjoy the chaos,” she admitted.  No speech about how motherhood is great, her calling, her one true joy in life.  She just remarked on the chaos and smiled a simple, genuine smile.

I’m just pleased to know that some people from the tribe managed to come out of their youth with some brains left to their name.  May not be my cuppa, but her happiness was as genuine as mine, so I couldn’t knock her path if I tried.  Rare thing ’round these parts.  ‘Round the world in general.  I’ll have my little Catcheresque moment and spit at how entirely fake people are, smiling in public but praying for death every time they close their eyes… selling their lies to you to convince them that yes, they really are happy — happier than you, even –  leading people into believing that this MUST be the way to live… never realizing how big of a lie it was until they step through that door and figure it out for themselves.  Pretty painted-up misery that breeds with every false word and forced smile.

But there are some good people left… there is still reason to hope.

The horrible thing about the Internet, however, is the ability to find people, quite easily, and be given the opportunity to reestablish contact after what might have been years of silence.

I never know how to feel when people I knew from ages ago come up and throw me a “Hi, how’ve you been?”  My initial reaction is “what the fuck do you care, years after you slagged me off?”  Then I calm down and remember that life happens and the circumstances were rather unusual (as they tend to be for dropouts).  Sure, they could’ve picked up the phone, but what is there to talk about when you never shared anything but the daily experience?  With that gone, there’s nothing to talk about.  Give it a few years, and there’s bound to be something worthy of discussion.

But the awkwardness remains.  And I would much rather not be bothered by these people, just to avoid that awkwardness.

And now here I sit, looking up people from THE PAST on facebook, wishing I could get back in contact with them, but knowing I shouldn’t, considering just how damned awkward it would be after everything that has went down since last we spoke.  Awkward because they were his friends… and although I grew to genuinely like them in our brief meetings, regardless of who they were to whom, I don’t know if I was lucky enough to have that genuine liking returned.

But I miss them, and I regret not getting to know them better before.  And I regret the thought that I might never have that chance now, with all the bitterness that remains in THE END.  I hate the thought that his incessant whining and smack-talking and “I Can Do No Wrong” -isms may have blown whatever chance I had to still call them “friends”.  I hate to think that they might actually think that I’m the delusional one.

There’s no way I can just randomly say “hi, how’s life been?”

And so I sit here, their names and faces on-screen, wishing we’d all met in a different way… or maybe not at all.