Day Ten

Most people can't just go out and run a marathon. There are a select few that are able to do it without training hardly at all, but we all love to hate them for it, don't we? I preach that we need to "respect the distance" whether I'm referring to a marathon or some sort of huge life event. You can't just dive in and spin out like Superman in a telephone booth.

That's how I feel about writing in this blog. So badly, I want to write about what I learned TODAY from the people closest to me. I want to talk about what I'm going through RIGHT NOW. But I can't, because it wouldn't be fair to pillage the privacy of my life and hang it on a line to dry. Yet. I need to keep it safe for a while first. I need to respect the distance.

I can, however, tell all sorts of past stories. I remember when I first smoked a cigarette, I was with Hailey Stewart and I was 13. That same night I also stole lipstick from Shoppers Drug Mart (and, later when I was in my 20's I went back to that very store and upon confessing my crime, paid for the lipstick and then bawled my eyes out all the way home).

I remember when I first said "oh my God." It was at Denise's house and it felt so unnatural, as if I was trying to swallow a ruler sideways. I licked a frozen telephone pole in sixth grade, and my tongue stuck to the frost and I didn't feel the pain because I was too hopped up on all the attention I was getting from my classmates.

I hated my grade five teacher, "Mr. Wood." He once called me a bitch, and then when I kicked Wes deJager in the balls for calling my best friend Jacquie fat, Mr. Wood gave me a lecture on boys' private parts and I hated him for that. So I threw Wes's gym strip into a pile of sawdust-covered hallway vomit. I felt better.

When I was newly married (at the ripe age of 12, it seemed...), I tried to cook pumpkin soup for Jason and I by scooping out the pumpkin guts and seeds and boiling it all in a pot.

I don't like dogs because they're needy and pathetic and smothery. I like cats because they're nasty, and I sometimes quite like nasty things.

Our pasts help mold us into the people we are today, and sometimes our pasts are just moldy.  I want to write about a few of each--maybe by day 29 I'll be brave enough!