Dear Near-sighted

One thing I really hate about taking out my contacts at night is how blind I am when I wake up in the morning. Well, blind is an exaggeration, as I can see without my contacts, but not well, unless I am right on top of the object I wish to view. I am near-sighted. Things close to my eyeballs are seen, everything far away is a blurry mess.

My vision is the polar opposite of paintings by Monet.

Everything is fuzzy and undefined for me without some sort of vision enhancing aid. I have been wearing glasses or contacts since I was in the second grade. I prefer contacts to glasses and I would sleep in my contacts every night except that I did that a few years ago - sleeping in the contacts each night for a few months - and ended up with an eye infection. I couldn't wear my contacts at all so that meant I was always wearing my glasses, which I do not care for because if it rains, droplets on the glasses. If it is cold outside and then you go inside, the glasses fog up. And there is always that corner on the side where your glasses are not that you cannot make out anything. Also, you cannot wear sunglasses on account of the eyeglasses. I just hate glasses. Even when I try to find really sweet frames, I still hate glasses. My most favorite pair I lost on an airplane. I like contacts. So wearing the glasses for a month because of the eye infection made me annoyed. I learned my lesson from the terrible eye infection, so I now take my contacts out at night.

Nearly every night.

Some nights I do still sleep in them because of the afromentioned hatred of waking up blind.

But last night, I was not so lazy. I took out the contacts. I went to bed. I woke up fuzzy-eyed and took the glass of water next to my bed to the kitchen to put in the refrigerator so I could drink said water later but cold, because, you know, cold water is refreshing.

A few hours later, after I had put my contacts in, I reached into the refrigerator for said water and saw that there were two ants suspended in the now icy cold H2O. My un-contact-ed eyes did not see the ants when I chilled my water and the thought that I could have sipped it and drank it horrified me. I mean...there were ants...just...and I just iced them?

So, I guess no more water by my bed at night. Unless I procure a sippy cup. I hate ants. Stupid contacts.

Dear LaMontagne

Have I ever written about how much I love Ray LaMontagne? Like. I. It's. I love him. I LOVE him. I. LOVE. HIM.

It's not like a crush, where I think it would be sweet if we got ice cream cones and took a stroll by a creek, though, if we did that I wouldn't be mad. Annoyed, maybe, as what the HALE are we doing outdoors by a creek when we could be doing pretty much anything else, but I would choke that annoyance down in the sheer presence of his being.

But it's not a crush.

It's like a reverential awe. The kind of awe wherein if we were on the afromentioned creek walk and he was all, "Listen, Ms. Liantonio,"-because my first name ain't baby. It's Sherry. Ms. Liantonio if you're nasty, which he probably isn't-so he would probably say, all soft-spoken and whispery, "So, Sherry. I want to be honest with you and tell you this isn't going to work out, because while this walk is lovely, and this dairy treat is delicious, I just like you as a friend. But here are free concert tickets for life, or like, the next few years or something.....Uhm, I am not sure if you are crying now because of heartbreak or because of your life allergies, but either way, let's sit and I will sing you Forever My Friend."

And I would say, "I totally get it, Mr. LaMontagne. You are the smartest ever. No other things would have be right."

And I wouldn't even be that upset. It's that kind of sick, desperate, unabashed adoration that will not die no matter what. In his first album which is just so depressed sauce, I fell in love with him wholeheartedly and did not look back. I know no other love like this, except perhaps for olives. I love my olives with such adoration that nothing, NOTHING, will make me give them up. Even after I hurled last week with the full knowledge that the last thing I'd eaten 12 hours prior was olives. I just turned off the bathroom lights and shut my eyes so I wouldn't have to see and give up my one joy.

I did love a person in real-life the way I love Ray. He was a TA I had in College. And I adored/loved him, adore-ved him, if you will. Oh my that man. I didn't want to date him, either. I more wanted to build a shrine to him in my roach-infested apartment, giving me another justification to leave the lights on at all times. It would keep the roaches away and add to the natural glory of that man. I called him the beautiful TA the entire time I had him as an instructor until he told us he'd gotten his PhD. Then I called him, Beautiful A, Doctor of the Language of Love.

Oh, memories.

Anyway, Ray is the best. His lyrics are amazing and he is PHENOMENAL in concert. Like, his voice is even better in real life than on the CD and that almost never happens, you know? I'm looking at you, Coldplay.

The first time I saw Ray in concert, I expected to be disappointed, frankly. I loved his first CD so much and thought there was no way, he could really sound like that and then he started to sing, and I was mesmerized. His voice was more powerful. You know how people say a voice is soulful and you want to throw up because that is lame? His voice, really, truly is soulful. I wanted everyone around me to shut up and just let him play and sing because it was so amazing. His entire band was amazing and being there felt, like, almost sacred, to me.

I know, I know. I don't care. I adorve him.

So, now watch this, so you can love him too. And if you decide you don't adorve him, I do not want to hear it. Because that will break my heart. And then I will have to go back down by that creek.

Dear W

I feel like my life is a constant re-enactment of that Sesame Street game where they sing, "one of these things is not like the others."

I want my insides to feel calm, not raw and throbbing. I want peace. I miss peace. I miss feeling certain about hope. I miss feeling certain about what I knew. I missing feeling certain.

It's the W, right? The W is the thing that's not like the others?

And I know that isn't wrong. I mean, even though it's not a 2, we need W. Without it, how would we differentiate between strappy sandals and wedge ones? Look at how many words in this post require  a W!

The W knows that even though it's not a 2, it has a purpose. It's not of less worth than the two's. The comparison between the letters and numbers is to teach you about them both. It matters even though it's alone. And probably when the W is surrounded by like-minded consonants, it remembers what it's there for. The W has the why.  Hi yo!

Sometimes, everything you once learned you have to learn again, so you can see the other side of what is also true.

Thank you, W. Now, I need a why.

Dear Lyrics

If "the love you get is equal to the love you make," then that explains my whole life.

Dear Bat Paranoia

The following is a list of things which mimic the sound of a bat loose in your apartment (particularly late at night about the time one would like to go to sleep):

curtains rustling
pages turning in a book
fancy shower curtain brushing against plastic shower curtain
sheets/blankets moving against the mattress or floors
any movement in a bed
someone knocking on the door
the door itself being opened
the door itself being closed
lights being flicked on
lights being flicked off
the sound of a hand against a lampshade as one turns a light on or off
neighbors walking above you
neighbors moving below you
TV being shut off
TV shifting after having been turned off because it might be too heavy for the shelf of entertainment center on which it rests
wind blowing outside
people talking outside
car doors being opened or closed
faucet dripping
anything in the sink on which the faucet could drip
my own breathing

all other noises

Dear Insides

The last few weeks have pretty much rotted.

Rotted? Been rotten? I think it's been rotten.

The last few weeks have pretty much been rotten.

That's better.

Anyways... there has been a lot of crying accompanied with a lot of swearing, both by me. I had a very lovely day in early January and then things deteriorated.

I know a lot of people are depressed in the wretched, evil, dreadful winter times. I detest the Satanic snow and that makes me very sad, but I don't think it's the winter and lack of sun. I couldn't really put my finger on what the problem was. Which just made me feel worse.

In the last day or so, though, the fog has lifted a bit and there hasn't been as much despair. Just as inexplicably as it came, it is leaving. There have been some things to contribute to it, I am certain:

I finally broke my weight loss plateau.  My new three P's of weight loss: perseverance, perspiration, poverty.

I have a new life goal that I am finding to be absurdly fun.

February is next month and that is supposed to be the best time to apply for jobs teaching English in Italy and since that is my new life goal, I am excited to apply with tutta la mia mente e la mia anima for the chance to be somewhere else, doing something else.

Those things have helped to make me feel a little less burdened.

I also realized recently that this is the time of year when my parents separated. I wonder if my insides remember and hold on to that, and if it is part of the reason the sadness descended and then lifted. My insides keep track of the things I don't even recall consciously: the odd silence. The feeling of knowing something but not knowing anything. Of being told. Of feeling relieved and uncertain all at once.

I don't remember a lot from life, frankly. But I am grateful that my body does. I mean, I wasn't grateful for the crying, but I am working on not fighting it as much. I am working on feeling the fear, pain, panic, or memory, and welcoming it in.

I used to be all: "Hmm. This is a feeling. A terrible, dreadful feeling. It is going to kill me. I will not survive it.You cannot stay feeling. You are uncomfortable and I don't know what to do with you. There must be something else I can do so you will go away."

Now, I say: "Hello, awful feeling. Here is a seat right next to my heart. You can stay and we will work it out so I don't have to keep being surprised by you. I get it now. You are part of me. You both do and do not belong here. We will work it out."

Some days are better than other days, but I guess that is all part of it. We are all trying and we are all deranged and at times, there will be a little something that will help you get through. For me, there are always olives. I love me some olives, even in the accursed snow.

Well, as long as I am inside eating them while it rains down hell in the form of white flakes outside.

Dear List

The following is a list of things I understand: