This Week in the Life of Liz Volume 1 Issue 2 orig posted 7.6.07

This Week in the Life of Liz Volume 1 Issue 2

by Liz Anderson on Friday, 6 July 2007 at 23:56 ·

I am certain that everyone is rushing to the newsstand to pick up the latest edition of This Week in the Life of Liz. As it turns out, this week wasn’t necessarily that interesting.

Monday I was at work. Nothing really that interesting there. Although I did find out that there is a gal on my team that is mad at me because my scheduled moved up before hers even though she’s been there longer. My manager basically told her to suck it up. Always a good sign. :S

Tuesday I was at work again. That night I spent a lot of time on the phone after a nice leisurely (unless you ask Jess who thought it was painstakingly fast) walk. Solidifying plans for the fourth as well as mudding up plans for the rest of the week. I’ll explain in a bit.

Wednesday was a day of sun-soaking, liquor-drinking, river-floating fun. The exception to that was that I really didn’t drink—although everyone else did. I was the DD. Less than two miles off the river, I got pulled over going 54 in a 55. The officer ran my license and thanked me for being a DD. It was exciting and I just about crapped myself. Oh the stories I could tell from the river but perhaps you had to be there… if you really want to hear some just ask. I’ve got everything from sobriety checks to leachy bottoms to people incapable of keeping their shirts on.

Thursday was back to work. I was rather lobster-esque after Wednesday’s expeditions. Went for a truly leisurely walk while discussing the inability for people to act upon what they are thinking. (I miss writing in opaque sentences with hidden meanings so I thought I would drop one in.)

Friday. TGIF. To bad I work every Saturday until I am no longer of childbearing years–or so it seems it will last that long. The systems crashed at work today. That is always a good time. “No unfortunately we do not have an SLA for when the systems will be back up. Technology is aware of the issue and does have a master ticket open at this time. Hopefully it will not be too long. Yes that maintenance can be submitted manually using the XYZ form.”

Saturday I will head back to the J.O.B. 4:30 p.m. I am out the door and off to the lake. It seems that when the weather throws you things like temps close to 100*, you get a bit feisty and decide to leave town for the lake. Bonfire with s’mores and hot dogs cannot really be argued with.

Now I suppose, unless you got side tracked by my wandering conversation I should digress back to the “I’ll explain in a bit” portion of earlier said text. While I have started to kind of date (it’s still in a questionable status) I have just about thrown in the towel seventy-two gazillion times the past two weeks. First of all, please do not tell me that you are a recovering alcoholic/drug addict whose parents threw you into rehab. Especially don’t tell me this on our first date. While it saves me time in slowly drudging this out of you, it makes the date a lot less appealing. Secondly, please do not tell me that you believe in a “higher power” even if you don’t choose to call “it” God. Especially don’t follow that up with yeah I believe there was a guy named Jesus (gee-sus) and if you live in Mexico you probably called him Jesus (hey-suess). Thirdly, I really would rather not know that you have “started many relationships on the physical side” but are trying to stay away from that now. I do not want your STDs.

If for some reason you still think that after three strikes you still might have a chance, here is a good way to lose it. When talking to me a week later, if I say I don’t really have plans for the rest of the week, do not say, “Well let me know after you plan your week. We should do something.” I will be likely to schedule my entire week without you in it and then say that’s too bad when you call three days later to see what I am doing and then you proceed to sound like a kicked puppy when I say I have other plans. Just a thought.

Here is what you should do if you feel that you have the potential to crawl back out from under the fifty ton boulder that squashed any chance you may have had. “Gee I really had fun last week. What are your plans for this week? Really, nothing going on after the fourth? How about we (fill in the blank with any remotely fun, semi public because I still think you might be a rapist who will hack me into tiny pieces and leave me by the roadside activity) on Thursday/Friday. Great, I can’t wait…”

Perhaps then I might thin that you have some balls and might be worth my time.

Oh. As promised I also bought some cherries this week. I know you were wondering.

This week in the life of Liz. orig posted 7.1.07

This week in the life of Liz.

by Liz Anderson on Sunday, 1 July 2007 at 21:40 ·

I have recently discovered that I have stopped talking to almost everyone. This is generally not a good sign. As a result, in an attempt to drag myself out of this stupor of futility I appear to be living in. I have decided to do a few things. First I have decided to send an e-mail to one "long lost friend" each week. Second, if that person responds I will reply. Third I have also decided to post random happenings from my week. And finally, in the event that my friends that I haven't spoken to in a long time no longer want to talk to me, I am going to also talk to one random stranger a week.

So, on to my week..

In the past week I went to Alex to spend some time at the lake. Jess and Betsy went with me and as a result got smothered with love from my family and also got a piece of birthday cake as it was my sister's birthday party. (She turned 30.) Monday I was up late chatting with random individuals (see point four above) and was invited out on a date. So Tuesday I went on a date. I had super hot hair that day by the way... The guy was interesting but... perhaps not what I am looking for. Wednesday I had the day off. I grilled that evening. I had BBQ chicken but also made brats and marinated pork chops for guests. The rest of the workweek was fairly uneventful. I tried to make a cake on Saturday because I wanted angel food cake. However, the work tried is extremely important in the previous sentence, as while I did end up with a cake, it was an extremely black cake. Apparently cake should not bake for and hour and a half while you eat supper and then run to Target and out for ice cream... And finally today, I went to church, then out for bagels and this afternoon I took my niece to Thunder Road. It was fun.

So that covered a bit more than a week (nine days) but I felt my trip to the lake was worth it.

Highlights for the coming week include but are not limited to: a trip down the Ottertail and grocery shopping for cheap cherries. Stay tuned!

And then it happens again.

Sometimes I just want you to want to hang out with me, to talk to me and moreover to listen to me.  I don't want to fight with you to want to hang out with me.  Is that too much to ask? 

If I gave you a mirror would you be just as content?  Would you notice that you were by yourself?  That I wasn't there?  That you were just talking to your own reflection?  Or wouldn't it make a difference because whenever you cared enough to look "I" would be looking too and really that's all that matters?

It doesn't really matter I guess.  None of it does.  Because the next time you have a rotten day and your husband drinks too much and you think you are getting divorced and you just had a pregnancy scare and you lose your job and breakup with that ass of a boyfriend and your kid is sick, I'll still be there.  Because in my mind that's what friends are for.  To be there.  To love you.  And to listen.  Even if it's never been and never will be reciprocated.

Where you belong.

I have packed you into a box. You and all of the emotions surrounding you are in a great big box that I have haphazardly yet meticulously taped shut and put up on the top shelf in the corner of this thing I call life. Out of the way. Out of sight, out of mind.

And this works. It works well in fact. It works well until the room that the shelf is in fills up with emotions and fills up with shit. And as it does I don't even have to try to get to that top shelf because the room fills and pushes me toward you and that damn box where I put you. Where I said good riddance to you.

There I sit with the only decision to be made being do I continue to wade is the literal, figurative and emotional pile of crap or do I break down, climb up on that shelf and reluctantly open the box?

And I stare at the box.

And I know I will never open it.

a true statement

I am a writer. Some of you may be thinking "umm yeah.. you wrote this" and others may be thinking "ok writer, where's your novel?" But I am so much more than that. I am a writer within.

I will speak what I want to write over and over so that the words spilling out of my lips will be ingrained and not lost before they can be recorded.

I may never write a novel but I will dictate my soul.

Non-existant, ever-present

The first part of this was written a few weeks ago ...

I don't even know what to write any more. A topic that has taken my thoughts and notebook for almost two years is null and void. Well not really the topic but the person. The topic is in limbo. I am not looking to date right now. Something about being hurt makes a person shy away from it. Perhaps we had it right last night when we toasted to finding love without finding love. Maybe I need to find something not someone to love - to fill that need for passion in my life. It feels like I am trying to make myself numb - successfully at that. Make it so I don't feel anything. It's safer that way. Sometimes I think it is better to feel nothing than to hurt. And sometimes I think it is oh so wrong.

'Tis better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.
Fact or fiction. -- I'm torn.

To go from love to loss/hurt to void makes me feel empty. (I guess by definition it would.)

He ruined a good thing without even knowing it. Or maybe he did. I understand my aloofness didn't help. But he was the one who walked into my "ridiculously-happily-single" life and turned it upside down. I didn't ask for that. But now I am stuck with the aftermath; trying to pick up the pieces. Trying to fit the puzzle of the life I once knew back together.


-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

But life does go on. Nights get easier and days go faster. There are days when I think it may even go back to "normal" or at least close to the way it used to be - closer to my normal.. I have been working diligently on finding love without finding love this summer.

I am learning to play the guitar. It is therapeutic. Just knowing that I am doing something for nothing other than because I want to. And no one can or will say anything about it. And I have time for it. And I can.

I have rediscovered my spot at the park. My spot where I can escape everything if I want to. Not because it is so "out-of-the-way" but because it is serene - because no one bothers me there - because the river is flowing by - because for a split moment in this chaotic place I can imagine I am in the middle of no where. And that is comforting.

mentally, emotionally and physically. think about it.

When a bird lands on a reed in the ditch and it bows a little too much, is that when it knows it needs to go on a diet?

I went home today to visit my grandma in the hospital. It was sudden, unexpected and unplanned. Three things I pride myself on not including in my life. Though I am learning that perhaps these are some of the best qualities to include.

Sometimes things happen out of the blue. Friends you haven't talked to in years call you just to say hi and catch up. Your sister calls and asks if you are sitting down - only to tell you that you grandma is in the hospital and they don't know what is wrong. People you thought you could never live your life without walk away without a word and you don't find out why until years later - if ever.

Things that seem like a tragedy at the time are often just a reminder of the fleeting nature of life on this earth. A reminder to suck it up and deal, that it probably isn't as life altering as you may have thought because guess what.. Life is still going on all around you. The question then becomes, when are you going to join it again and stop living in your past.

Things aren't perfect. Grandma still has to get some numbers "in check" before she can head home to the farm again. But just seeing her today did two things for me. First, it made me really appreciate all the time I have had with her and all she has taught me, including the value of family. I trust that this is not the end of that time or that learning. And secondly, her sheer determination that she will be back at the farm, not in the hospital, reminded me of a determined self I once knew. A determined self that isn't afraid to pull up the proverbial "big-girl panties" and deal with life as it comes at her.

So here it goes. With one foot in front of the other (or so I have been told), I am stepping out into my now and looking into my future.




When I push with one hand and pull with the other, I just end up spinning in circles until I fall down dizzy.