Ever since I started my new job everything in my life has sped up.  Even when I am ‘doing nothing’ I feel like I just stepped out of the whirl for a second but it is still going on around me, I can still feel it, and when I jump back in everything catches up and crashes around me again.

I’ve needed to find a way to literally push pause.  I think i’ve found it in painting, strangely enough.

For whatever reason putting a brush in water to blocks of colour to pads of paper relaxes and clams me and somehow stops the spinning and chaos.

They aren’t great.  They are exactly what I feel in any moment.  But I cherish them, so i’ll share them.

One year ago I worked for a politician, I lived with a friend and was essentially squating in his spare bedroom, I was lost and bored and moonlighting at stampede.

Tonight I am essentially a politician, I live in the basement, I’m still lost, but I have no time to be bored.  I’m constantly playing catch up or run away.  I am not where I thought I would be.  I think more about others and their problems then my own.

I’m thinking about love tonight.  Love has been constantly on my mind lately.

I love him; he doesn’t love me; he should love me; I shouldn’t love him.

We live such a ridiculously intricate life.  I’m not even 30, and yet i’ve had more boyfriends and sexual partners than an entire family might have 100 years ago.  I don’t know what it has to do with love except that the concept of love is a luxurious one.  It is a concept that is for the wealthy- who else has time?  who else would consider marriage as anything other than a business arrangement and contract?  It used to be a choice as you marrying someone who would offer you security, protection, and comfort through your life.  It makes sense.  Marriage as a business contract makes perfect sense- choose someone you are compatible with and who has good qualities and traits you will need to get to the later parts of your life.  Love has no place in those sorts of decisions.

I still seek love.  I suppose i’m a fool.

- I took a cab home rather than the train and paid using a fifty and told the guy to keep the change (it was a 25 dollar fair)

-  I may or may not have sent a memo to one of the minister’s office that had the word ‘message’ rather than ‘massage’.

-  I bid on an item at a silent auction that I have no use for and don’t really want… but still have to pay for.

- I have made a full 10-cup pot of coffee every day. and drank it. myself.

-  I started crying when the little bakery didn’t have the garlic and cheese bread I had a craving for. 

- today I opened a can of soup for lunch and promptly poored it into my coffee cup.

sunday night is going to be about sleep.

On the train home tonight a guy with his guitar played for all us weary stampede-ers.  He started with Johnny Cash which went over really well, and then into some melow versions of well-known songs.  He didn’t have a hat or anything for money, just playing to entertain.  It was awesome.  I got the chance to talk to him after and it turns out he has plans to make that a regular thing-playing on the c-train that is…. he feels it would be beneficial to learn more country, while I think he should play what he likes.

Found out I get free coffee from a little vendor on the grounds.  excellent.  truly excellent considering i’m working first thing tomorrow morning. boo.

immature people suck.[that's all]

Rain makes people drink more.  especially on fair grounds when they’d normally be walking around:

”what do you want to do?”

“I dunno, lets go to the saloon/beergarden/corner of a lot/bar and wait out the rain”

“excellent, much better than going to a show or something… plus afterwards we can wander around in the early afternoon wasted and annoy those who are sober!”

So J and J are two boys I met five years ago while working as a carny for the first time.  I went with the crew to Edmonton for their exhibition and ended up sharing a hotel room with the boys. [edit: they met each other in highschool] they are friends from highschool and pretty hilarious.  I had a crush on one of the J’s.  But in my defence it was hard not to!  he was tall with fringed hair, played the guitar and had a quietness about him that was awesome.  Five years later he hasn’t changed much… except that he has a handle-bar mustache at the moment and looks like a 70′s porn star.  Or the guy who plays a pilot on the tv show ‘swingers’.

Yesterday they didn’t really see me, so didn’t really remember me.  Today I was working on the big ride, the expensive one, and both guys saw me and grinned from ear to ear wanting to know how i’ve been and about my life.  It was kind of cool to get that reaction actually…

In other news I sent a post card of the stampede to scotland.  I always wonder how many times a post card is read on its journey.  I hope lots and lots of people read the one I wrote… I even added a little haiku.

I have some pictures to put up, but right now I need to sleep as I am crashing fast and hard.

After work I ran on the bus to the grounds taking a deep breath and waiting to fight with some kid over not paying for sneak-a-peek because I was going for work.  But alas, I made it before five and they just waved me in.

I found out the two guys I bunked with while in Edmonton are still working for the company four years later. Also, the company apparently now hires children, I am supervisor material and will spend the next ten days keeping 14-16 year olds in line (sound familiar?)

JFT is in town, apparently asked to march in the parade.  He came to the grounds and we got trapped in the rain, skipping down the streets in a downpoor laughing and teasing each other and getting soaked.

Also, apparently I set him up with a co-worker as well… i’m just a little matchmaker.

The rain is soothing and lovely and makes everything wonderful.

that’s all… happy week!

Here’s the thing… i’ve thought about this, not a lot, but enough that I am confident in my own opinions.  My problem is that I can’t wrap my head around grouping addicts, obesity, anorexia and bulimia under the same umbrella as Multiple Sclerosis, Cancer and Aids.  they are so incredibly different to me.  And here’s the part that always gets me in trouble- addicts are to blame for their condition.  It isn’t that i’m not sympathetic and compassionate.  I am. I get that people don’t choose it, but neither do those with MS, Aids, or Parkinson’s.  I hate that society has started to excuse inexcusable actions because now we can classify what people do while on drugs as ‘disease’ related.  I hate that there is huge amount of funding going into finding cures for addictions, treatment centres, and life-reconstruction when a lady who worked hard for three quarters of her life, working with MS in a wheelchair until she could not physically function any more gets the same amount of disability funds as a person who performs an act in injecting, smoking or ingesting their disease.

Our discussion (argument) ended at a stalemate and an office full of tension.  Her parting shot was ‘if you knew anyone who went through addiction you would feel differently’.  I don’t know. I just don’t.  I can empathize, and i’ve seen addiction… first hand actually. Not by someone I love, but one of my cousins’ has been an addict for as long as I’ve been alive, i’ve watched it affect my [great] uncle and aunt.  I’ve watched him deteriorate as i’ve aged.  I just saw him on my last trip and i’ve never seen death cloak a person like with my cousin.  It seemed to settle over his body and make itself known at every turn in the way he walked, talked, dressed, smiled, ate and drank.  I know his history and family, I know a lot of the choices and events that led to his addictions.  He is family, I know that my aunt and uncle have spent a small fortune on getting him clean, they would give any amount for him to be clean, healthy and normal.  But as heartless as it sounds, their money probably would have been better spent on anything else including cancer research.

I hope I never see it in someone I love.  I hope that I would handle such a situation with love and compassion and all the support I can muster.  But I know that i’d never be able to look at them with the same compassion as a little girl with leukemia.

Seriously… it was beautiful, I slept in, I managed to see my soon-to-be disappearing roommate once before he leaves tomorrow, I walked in the sun, sat in the sun, laughed really hard, watched the new Transformers, and collected a few new books for my TBR list.

What I want to do is put my favourite songs of the day on here, but itunes wont let me… ah well, it makes as much sense for you to create your own I believe.

I will say that I downloaded a whole bunch of Michael Jackson tunes… his music always speaks to me of another time and place, but I discovered that since the demise of my old ipod my library is woefully empty of Mr. Jackson.

Tomorrow I was supposed to be seeing some amazing up and come’ers bash the ball at Sirrocco…. but alas, my ticket was given to a more deserving individual aparently.  I’ll live… perhaps walk around and take pics of Fish Creek, listen to music and try and tan my legs.

I’m going to soak in as much lethargy as possible this weekend since i’ve committed to working the next two dawn til dusk.  Calgary Stampede is coming, and I figure I can work 11 days straight and sleep when i’m dead.  Maybe I will manage to buy a new car this summer and pay for school after all!

New word of the day- scoobies.  apparently also represents leftover feelings brought into inappropriate situations.

But as I flipped through the really-well done pictuers I came to one of me standing beside my boss.  It was full length with our arms around each other.  I litterally gasped when I saw it.

My boss is a very petite woman whom I thought I towered over, but in flip flops and her in golf shoes we were more even latterally.  I can’t say the same horizontally speaking.  I look massive.  My legs and arms fleshy and bloated, the skin not a nice tanned colour but pale and veiny.  the strps of my dress looking too small, my hair a mess.  All in all a horendous shot.  and I am mortified.

I can say all I want that I am happy with myself, my body image and wardrobe…. but i’m not.  especially not with this picture where I don’t look healthy at all.  I’m only 25 but look a million years older.

He stares at me all day, seriously… when he isn’t eating or giving himself a massage with the roots, he stares at me.