October In The Chair

The awesome mirror that I briefly mentioned in one of my recent entries has been located, strangely enough.

The Engineer and I have been on mission to clear out all of my junk a large portion of my junk from my father's basement so that we may bring in his paintings and canvases which are currently residing in a storage space. When he moved out of his apartment and into mine, the art had no home here, so he decided to rent a space to keep them in. This money is far better served in other areas, so I offered up my space in my father's basement.

The majority of my stuff hasn't been touched since it was put down there, unless I was rummaging for books I wanted to bring home, and is therefore extraneous. Over the past several years, I have gotten rather mercenary about possessions in that if I haven't touched it or needed to touch it in over a year, then I most likely have no further need of it. Some things will always be kept out of sentiment: old journals, certain toys, things of that nature. But, I really do not need or desire to keep the rest of it.

Not only are those boxes a giant and looming reminder of my failings as a wife (the boxes, after all, would not reside in the basement had I not left my husband in 2001), but also of everything else I have started with good intentions and went on to fuck up. I don't need them, I don't want them, and the very thought of them gives me anxiety.

We had been putting off getting this job done all summer for one reason or another. Most of the time, we were both just too busy or frazzled to make any effort in planning. But I had recently promised a co-worker of mine all the Hello Kitty swag her young daughter could ever hope to own and I was starting to feel bad whenever I told her I hadn't made it to my father's yet. I also wanted to go through my books and bring home the reminder of what I wanted in my shelves in the apartment and sell the rest. Money's been extremely tight lately, so even if I only get ten dollars for them, it's ten dollars I do not currently have.

So, we girded our loins or whatever one girds before descending into a pit of despair, and drove to my father's house this past weekend to begin the preliminary excavations. My primary goal was retrieving the Hello Kitty swag and any books I could find that I wanted to keep. Any other books would be set aside for another weekend because I don't have any time soon to bring them to a used bookstore and they would be in the way in the apartment.

And even though I am still unable to locate the Best Box of Books Ever (tm), the one I'm convinced grew legs and walked out of there, I was able to find the Second Best Box (tm) and brought them home. So, I am once again in possession of M. Gira's The Consumer and my much loved copy of The Thief of Always, by Clive Barker. I also brought home my antique books because the damp was not being kind to them. The one from 1894 is in shameful condition, with the cover held on by threads, but it was largely woeful when it first came to me. My collected fairy tales printed in the 20s is still doing ok, though.

The Engineer found the mirror in the middle of my bitching to my father from the bottom of the steps, snarking up into the patch of day light he stood in from the kitchen doorway about kleptomaniacs and disrespect. He had walked over to the other side of the basement, glanced up at the top of a shelf, pointed, and said: "Is that it?"

Lo and behold, it was. Someone had put it way up there, above my head, and as everyone around me knows: if something is put above my head, it winks out of existence. Egg on my face, I would reckon. I don't rightly care; I'm just glad to have my mirror back.

As I've mentioned before, it was a wedding gift from a very dear friend who knows my tastes well enough to totally nail buying me this present. It's about three or four feet long, a wall mirror, and is in a silver painted, wooden, hourglass-shaped frame. It is completely me and I adored it from the moment it was handed to me. It fits in well with my bordello leopard print couch and the sweet ass red tile and wrought iron coffee table I bought from the dirt mall (for twenty dollars!) years and years ago.

And now it's mine again. It took me forever to clean it, my father's basement is dank after two hot water heaters implosions and just the sheer basementy-ness leaves everything covered in grossness if left down there too long. But, it's spotless once again and one can now see themselves clearly in the glass, instead of through a sepia-toned thick as linen haze.

I need to find a good place to hang it in the apartment. Wall space is at a premium here, considering our bookshelves and my framed prints and the Engineer's giant hung canvases. I wanted another mirror on the front of the hall closet's door, but the last one leapt to its death and shattered across the carpet. The idea of that happening again does fill me with joy and song.

When I get the rest of the apartment clean to my usual standards, I'll take a picture of it. I've been meaning to photograph the apartment to show everyone how the Engineer and I merged our lives together when he moved in, but I haven't had time for a true deep cleaning. Given that school starts in six days (SIX DAYS?!), I dread the idea that I won't get this time any time soon.

This has probably been one of the crappest days weeks I've had in a long, long time.

( work blather )

All I wanted to do today is come home and get some ferret nose kisses, but as I was leaving work, the realization of Edgar's death finally fell around me. I knew it had happened, after all, I found his body. But, I hadn't really had any time to actually process it.

( Ferret and rat blather )

Depression is seeping in from every angle. The one year anniversary of my mother's death just passed, which feels very weird to me. I'm still not used to it and I suspect I never will be. My car is currently sick beyond belief, though hopefully that will be straightened out soon. The holidays are creeping up, which is never a good time for me. And money is unbelievably tight, which it always is.

( Money blather )

( Hoarding blather )

If you've read this entire entry, I'll be mighty surprised. For those of you who decided to skip to the end, you didn't really miss anything. Just a lot of me working some stuff out in my head that needed to come out.

I got a wild hair up my ass this past Sunday and decided to clean out my bedroom closet, which was largely full of my mother's belongings. Earlier this year, I had donated all of her clothes, but there was still an enormous amount of stuff floating around the apartment that needed to be dealt with, most of it centralized in my bedroom closet.It took me about three hours and numerous de-pressurizing breaks, but it is now finished. And in doing so, I discovered many interesting things.

One of which is that my paternal grandfather was born in 1912. I found the mass card from his funeral, in 1979, stashed away in one of my mother's myriad purses. 1912? Holy fuck! In addition to that, I also found the mass cards for my maternal grandmother and grandfather's funerals, and the one for an aunt-by-marriage who died when I was in my twenties and still living in Philadelphia. They were all found in the same purse, so I'm guessing that was my mother's all-purpose funeral bag.

I also found a photograph of my maternal grandparents, taken when they were young. I'm not sure if they were married at this point, there was no date on the reverse, but they were standing on a porch with another young couple. All of them grinning and laughing into the camera, with my grandfather's arms around my grandmother's waist and one hand held in front of her face. It was strange to see them like that. The entire time I knew them, they had separate bedrooms and seemed like strangers to one another more often than not.

A pair of my baby shoes were in a box, along with several other pairs of what I'm guessing to be the shoes of my brothers. So tiny. And so amazing that they were once on my feet. My big fucking feet that don't fit the rest of my body. Little hands, big feet. 5'3 with a size 9 1/2 foot, who ever heard of that, I ask you?

All of these discoveries were interesting, but the most intriguing of them all was shoved all the way in the back, on the top most shelf. It was a long, thin piece of wood. About a foot and a half, maybe two feet, long and two inches wide. With three dowels placed in a seemingly random pattern and a many folded booklet shoved between the dowlels.

I had no clue what on earth this thing could be until I blew the dust from it and read the words printed on its surface.

Professional Bow Maker

...buh?

Many of you probably don't know this, but my mother was infamous famous for her present wrapping. She fucking excelled at it. All of the paper creases were sharply creased and perfectly aligned. The wrapping paper was immaculately matched to any ribbons involved in the package. And the bows? Oh, those fucking bows. I was always so jealous at how good she was at making those fancy bows.

You know the kind I mean? Big and flowery, many looped and delicate.

She would never let me watch her wrap presents or make those damn bows.

Now I know why!

I laughed, dusted the bow maker off, and put it back on the shelf. I'll most likely never use it, as my own present-wrapping is a rather haphazard affair. Usually done in the wee hours of the morning when I'm half-drunk or hastily slapped together before running out the door. But, I'll keep this thing. And remember.

I decided to tackle cleaning the apartment today (I'm taking a short break right now). Disc one of the Alien boxset is in the DVD player for background noise, I have a full glass of iced tea, my hair is pulled back tightly (and by doing this, I mean business), and I still not brushed my teeth today.

First up on my agenda was cleaning out the refridgerator. The mess in that godforsaken thing is purely all my fault as I seem to be hardwired with OCD in keeping long expired food. Nothing like the Engineer's mother, who I have pulled things out of her fridge that were over a year old (like cheese and deli meats, ick), but still pretty bad. There was turkey leftover from Thanksgiving in there, which made me gag to open up the container. And peas from...I'm not quite sure when. Everything went into the trash and the endless plastic containers were thrown into the sink to be washed up.

I think that this food hoarding thing is a throwback from when I was a kid and we didn't have a lot of money. Not a lot of money resulted in barely any food in the house for very long periods of time. So now that there is a small amount of food, I tend to hoarde it. Even if I have no intentions of actually eating it (and my brother certainly won't because the picky bastard refuses to eat any kind of leftovers other than pizza and spaghetti), it gets carefully stored away.

After that little slice of Hell, I cleaned all the dishes and the containers. Furiously wiped up the counters, like the good little obsessive compulsive I am, and began cleaning off cabinets with a sponge and Target's Method all surface cleaning spray (in pink grapefruit flavour scent.

If no one has tried Target's Method line of cleaning products, I highly suggest one does so. Post haste. This is fabulous stuff. Especially the lemon ginger floor wash. It smells so good, I want to guzzle it right out of the bottle.

Then, I cleaned off the window sill. Living in a ground floor apartment, our window sills get enormously dirty because our actual windows aren't what you would call sealed. At least, not very well. Dirt, real live dirt, comes in from God knows where. Along with ants, during ant season. It does not especially fill my heart with joy and song, but I can't do much about it.

The curtains in the kitchen were taken down, because I hate them, and were replaced with curtains I thought I hated much less. However, after balancing precariously on the edge of the counter and wrestling the bastards into place, I discovered that I hate these curtains even more. My hatred will not be sated, alas, because I have no other curtains to hang in their place and the ones I took down are rather filthy.

All of these fun and games finished, I decided to take on under the sink. This is where we keep all manner of cleaning products and I have been forbidden, by my mother, from throwing any of it away. Up until now, that is.

It would appear that like my own food hoarding obsession, my mother had a cleaning product obsession. I've never seen so much useless shit in my life.

Okay, that's a lie because I did once drive through Ohio. But, there was quite a bit.

Half-empty bottles of Windex that are God knows how old. Cat shampoo that I remember seeing when I was thirteen (yes, the same bottle). Hardwood floor cleaner, when we don't have a hardwood floor. Four packs of sponges, all opened and all with three sponges left. The list could go on endlessly.

I trashed most of it, then rearranged the remaining product neatly.

I swear, that woman bought every new gimmicky cleaning product that came down the road and my happy little hands threw it ALL went into the trash. And people wonder why I turned out so deranged?

Pots and pans were rearranged, as they had magically formed themselves into the Leaning Tower of Pots and Pans.

Next up, I'm hitting the bathroom. I cleaned it last week, but it needs to be done again.

My break is over, for now.

The other night I had come home rather late from work, as I am prone to doing, and my mother had cooked and eaten dinner already. This isn't a problem as I don't expect anybody to wait around for me, let alone her, and to curb their desire to eat because I'm stuck at work. So, I made my own dinner (which was quite lovely, thanks) and put the pans I used in the sink to soak because they were kind of gnarly.

She asked me to clean up the dishes from when she and my brother had eaten, which weren't very many, and I agreed to do it. However, I managed to pass out on the floor shortly after eating because I was so tired, not waking up until around midnight. Getting up from the floor with numerous aches and pains from carpet surfing, I began to go about the process of getting ready for bed.

On my last pass through the living room, I glanced into the kitchen and realized that I had completely forgotten to do the dishes. Damn. A brief flirtation in my brain of just letting it wait until tomorrow, until the little OCD gnome that lives in my skull began shrieking in horror.

So, it's about midnight thirty and I'm standing in the kitchen doing dishes in my pajamas. And it brought back a long buried memory of when I was in high school, I knew this girl that everyone called "Moo". I can't remember her actual name, but no one actually called her Moo to her face and I didn't call her that at all.

But, I had gone back to her house after school, for some reason or another, with a friend of mine who was actually the connection between Moo and I. Moo wasn't really a friend of mine, she was a friend of this friend, and I only knew/associated with her because of that. It wasn't for any particular reason, we just had absolutely zero in common.

We go back to her house and I immediately notice that the hallway is positively piled up with all manner of things. And there's a sheet hung over doorway to the kitchen, blocking one's view from what's in there. Going into the living room, I find that it's a complete sty. There's plates of long abandoned food on the table, empty cans, papers, wrappers, cigarette butts on the floor, patches of ashes from knocked of ashtrays. You name it. I begin to feel vaguely distrustful of sitting on anything in the room, for fear of what may stick to me when I get up from my seat. And you couldn't pay me to sit on the fucking floor, no way.

It was probably the most disgusting place I have ever step foot in, it even trumps the crusty punk squats I've hung out at during my more *ahem* wilder days. As we're leaving, she goes into the kitchen and I managed to catch sight of what's behind Curtain Number One.

Fucking ew.

I can't even begin to describe the horror of what assaulted my eyes. I could only stand there, silent in disbelief that someone could live in such a state.

By no means am I a clean freak. I'm constantly being hollared at for leaving my many pairs of shoes all over the living room, reminded to straighten up my piles of books, and asked to please-clean-the-bathroom-now-and-not-in-three-days. But, I do have an internal gauge on what is acceptable and what is not.

Food being left out is completely unacceptable, especially in my house. We live in a ground floor apartment that has a severe ant problem in the warmer months of the year. Left out food would just be an open invitation for creatures of the more roachy variety to take up residence in our sock drawers and cereal boxes. Furthermore, I have a obscene obsession with keeping the stove clean. I dismantle that fucker once a week and scrub it down, not to mention wiping it down with some form of cleaner after every use (something I wish my mother and my brother would also adhere to). Dusting is also done about once every week or two, mainly because my and my brother's allergies are so nasty. My animal cages are cleaned weekly, including being broken down and scrubbed out in the tub, and the cats' litter boxes are changed every two days. Our bathroom is not full of hair and rings of bizarre, unidentifable sludge.

Of course, there are accidents. Especially with five cats living with us. Especially especially when one of these cats is rather old (going on fourteen years) and the other cats beat him up whenever he attempts to go near the litter box. Our carpet shampoo machine gets a lot of work, to say the least.

The apartment is cluttered, but notslovenly. And I just can't understand how a person could live in absolute squalor, to the point where their guests are afraid to sit on the furniture or on the floor. Unfortunately, I've been that particular guest on far too many occasions and it always leaves me with a sense of pitydisgustwonderment when I exit, stage right.

When I came into work this morning, I moved my keyboard. Underneath of it was a pile of flattened out, shiny, purple metallic wrappers.

eh?

It was a veritable dragon's hoard of treasure and I couldn't, for the life of me, figure out what it was doing under my computer keyboard.

Then I remembered.

I had been saving them from the dark chocolate Hersey kisses I'd bought months ago and eaten over the same time period, with the intent of covering my monitor with them. One by one, maybe five in a day at the most. Some days without eating any. Carefully flattening out the eggplant coloured wrappers (some of them purple and gold checkered!) and sliding them under my keyboard for safekeeping.

Sometimes, I wonder what the hell is wrong with me.

heh.