Plan B
Another outstanding day here in the Crescent City – walked around the bayou with N and Renny this morning and we talked about plans for Mardi Gras – what parades are definite and where to see them. We’ll probably head to our usual spot, which happens to be too close to where I don’t want to be but I’m going to just ignore that presence over there and enjoy myself. In the meantime, passing by the LaLa is now starting to make me feel more endeared to it. Only I try to keep my distance as we are still months away from completion and god knows dollars over what the original cost was supposed to be. The pool has been put on hold or value engineered for the time being – but there has to be a pool – with lots of splashing around – one day.
P is coming in for Mardi Gras and may stay with me – I am perfecting my Electric Slide so I can show him the steps. N is going to work with me on it as she used to be a dance instructor and also has an inherent ability to follow these sorts of structured dances better than me who is free form, wild form, all the way.
L called from California to catch up, said she hasn’t had a chance to read the blog (ha) even though she said she knows a lot of people who do read it – hoping she can visit soon but trying to hold out until I am actually in the LaLa so that we can break the house in together. We spoke girl to girl about the goings on with S and with N and with life in general. She lent a good ear and agreed that all my choices these days are pretty much in line with clear thinking and things just are what they are.
L called from school since I didn’t see him at playdate this morning cause P has the dogs – to ask how I am doing with my withdrawal from N and I told him I am actually quite fine, and kind of calm being divorced from his confusion and L said, wow, sounds like you mean it this time. What? He thought I was going to stay perpetually hinged to a man who is uncertain about his feelings for me – after all we’ve been through? Let’s refer back to the quote Sandee gave me a while ago – I am able to let go of things that don’t serve me and move on rather quickly. I didn’t walk away from a 15-year marriage quickly – but after 15 years I felt like I wasn’t getting what I wanted/needed and was able to make the call to leave even if it was and still is sad. The time invested in N is relatively shorter if not more intense but the past 40+ days have been so fraught with confusion and waves of here it comes again that I wasn’t quite sure on any given morning when I looked out the window if the surf was up or down, and each day became more precarious in its waxing and waning.
Spent some nice chat time with mom who seems to have pulled out of this ludicrous commitment to work the graveyard shift – now she is perpetually tired – falling asleep at the dinner table most every night – it will take a while to get her clock back to normal. The home is using agency nurses to infill and that’s better than a 70 year old woman. I still need to get her out of her apartment but right now trying to deal with my matters first and then hope to be able to address hers in the near future. A small cottage came up for sale around the corner from LaLa but what was going for $170K is now asking $225K in these pre-Katrina ridiculous times where value is meaningless.
Seeing E early evening, then cocktails with S, and then sushi with L. After playdate tomorrow morning the Bean will go on with N and I’ll head out to SF for meetings/dinner, meetings/dinner, meetings/dinner – and so on. The solace of traveling alone for business is sometimes a good place to hide – along with a good book recommended by my buddy B in Boston in tow.
And at the end of the day, you throw yourself into what’s there and hope you find the comfort and joy you seek. And failure we all know is a way of the world telling you you are on the wrong path. Some of us – dumb beasts of burden like myself – take a lot of pounding on the head before the light bulb goes off over our head – but it’s the ones that never get it that are to be pitied, not the slow sick fks like myself.