Glen Coco, Walk with Me

Have you ever heard a song, and you swear that it seems to fit every situation for a while?  Like, you can listen to it for weeks and it never gets old?  For me, that song has been Born to Die by Lana Del Rey.  Go listen to the song, but skip the video as it's kind of disturbing (yet beautiful).  Sometimes, you'll hear a song like that and the lyrics are just vague enough.  Heartbreak with every step, pleading to not be made sad or to cry, the road getting tough for no freaking reason.  Alone on a Friday night, confusion, each human's ultimate destiny, trying to have a decent life despite it all.  Deep stuff we've got here.

Jumping right in here, my family and I moved into a lovely apartment the day after I quit my job at the bakery.  The whole story relating to that is another half novel on its own and I might write about it someday, but not yet.  For six days in October, I was happy and things had meaning again.  Six days of clarity out of almost a year of struggling to restart and rethink, making return trips to the freshly blank drawing board.  For six days, my priorities were straight and I felt as if the clam holding my pearl was finally opening.  But my road got tough and I didn't know why.

Fast forward two months.  I'm still looking for a job and I leave the house about once a week, maybe.  I take care of myself, shower and clean, organize and unpack.  I feel very sleepy most of the time.  Creativity still eludes me and although I managed to write the other day, it was the result of a small manic episode brought on by being awake for twenty-nine hours.  I wrote and I worked on a friend's Christmas gift.  That same friend happened to ask me out during those six days I mentioned earlier.  We're dating now and not to get too mushy, but he's been my silver lining.  But even in the whole "dating" thing, the past two months have been challenging, whittling down what I want versus what I need.  Cue me ripping my face off in frustration.

Are you noticing a theme here?  It sounds cliche, but as of late I have been desperately trying to take the good with the bad.  Road's long, we carry on, try to have fun in the meantime.  Sometimes you have to play old-timey prospector and pan for the good in things.  It's been pretty rough, but there have been smiles.  For example, I love our new home.  There's a freakin' window in my closet for no reason but it's mad dank and I dig it like a shovel.  I have a sweet place to put my eggplant collection in the kitchen.  My dad and stepmom and even the cat are so much happier here.  We have a baller mantle in the living room to put pictures on and we have an elevated toilet.  Not to mention, the neighborhood is nice and our neighbors are cool.

Thanksgiving was a blast.  I got to make Oreo balls for my boyfriend's cozy five-people-and-a-dog Thanksgiving dinner.  I've come to appreciate and love those "oh snap I'm meeting people" jitters.  Makes me feel somewhat normal.  I also found out that a twelve inch flatbread with grilled chicken, bacon, avocado, and oil and vinegar is my favorite sandwich forever and ever, amen.  Makes me feel somewhat sandwichy.

Also, at the time of this writing, I've been antidepressant-free for a little over eight weeks.  Too bad no one makes a pill for randomly quoting Twin Peaks or Mean Girls out of context.

River of Feels

Things have been interesting lately, to say the least.  In fact, I'm not really sure where to start.  I will say that I've been attempting to detach, depersonalize, decling, let my feelings and everything else just flow and run their course.  Let me explain in a lovely, long-winded, detail-filled fashion.

While this might sound like I'm trying to become a psychopath, I can assure you my life hasn't been that exciting since my last update.  The biggest thing going on right now is that my family and I are moving.  We'll still be in Portland, in pretty much the same neighborhood.  Nothing bad happened; the guy who owned the property decided he would like to renovate it and he's been nothing but kind about things.  This of course occurred in the middle of a fantastic financial domino scenario, just one more brick in the ever-collapsing chain of events.  To put a popular internet saying in more polite terms, excrement became tangible.

After the initial shock and rush to find a new place began to wear off, I realized it was becoming harder and harder to get enthused about much of anything.  Things just always seemed to hurt.  I began to hate hearing news about places my family found, and where things were located, and how close it was to work.  Terrible as it sounded, I just didn't want to hear it.  I didn't want to be reminded of how poor and desperate we were.  I felt bad for thinking this and tried my best to approach it with the same puppy-dog enthusiasm.  I just concentrated on work, but even that reminded me on a daily basis that while I try to help us all even when there's none left for me, it still won't amount to much.

As I said, I felt guilty for not being yippy-skippy.  Truthfully, my family probably wasn't either.  However, my dear dad has a wonderful talent of being positive no matter how dark or even downright apocalyptic the situation is.  For that, I am so very thankful.  Although I tried to maintain an air of optimism  it was merely a front, which I felt bad for having, thus setting off the vicious cycle.

And now, my point: don't feel bad for having a particular feeling.  Don't delay your hurt, anger, or sadness, but instead acknowledge it.  Don't distract yourself from it with ice cream or funny movies.  Detach but let your feelings run their course.  A very wise and helpful friend once told me that the only control we have over our emotions is how we react to them.  You can't put a bandage on a huge boil and expect it to be gone just by ignoring it.  It has to be treated properly, and the skin must take its own sweet time to heal.  Weird analogy.  Again, bear with me.

It's late and I've been having back aches which have been interfering with my sleep.  This does not a happy combination make.  If this is making no sense, I apologize.  I felt like writing for once and badly needed to update my blog.  In happier news, we're getting major help with moving into the place we found.  I'm not sure when the exact move-in day is, but it should be in the next week or so.  And you bet your pantaloons there will be pictures.

Lessons from the Bakery

So, I happen to spend most of my time in a grocery store bakery.  Not complaining; I pretty much adore my job.  However, a lot of people seem to think that all I do is stand behind a counter and write stuff on cakes.  While I do both of those things sometimes, that's really only a tiny fraction of it.  And like with all jobs, there's a fair amount that you only really learn when you actually get hired and have been working there for a while.  Without further ado, here's a few of the little things I've learned while working in the bakery thus far:

1.  Cake frosting makes an excellent hand moisturizer.
2.  Cake frosting will also mercilessly stain your hands.
3.  You can glance at a cake and know what kind of filling it has.
4.  The bread slicer is not a slot machine.
5.  There's a difference between French bread and baguettes.
6.  The sprayer above the sink is a thing of terrible beauty.
7.  You will warn people about the difference between chocolate chip and chocolate chunk cookies.
8.  You will be able to get over a dozen loaves of bread into two bags in under two minutes flat.
9.  People will often comment on your excellent willpower when it comes to being around sweets.
10.  You will be able to memorize flip chart numbers, and sometimes they'll show up in your dreams.

Extra points if you dream about the numbers in Spanish.

The Doll's Eye

After being in a terrible creative slump for the past few weeks, I finally feel like I'm bouncing back.  I took a look through the last embroidery book I got and was like, "Omg, have to make this, NOW" instead of being all like, "I should probably do something with that at some point...  Maybe."  And all of this started because of an antique doll's eye.

First off, let me explain that I don't have some kind of weird obsession with eyeballs.  While eyes are in fact the windows to the soul, and some eyes can be remarkably pretty, I've never collected them.  To each their own, but that's a little weird.  I was walking home today when I went into this cute little craft store about a block over and down from where I live.  I've been in there several times and thought it might be nice to browse their selection of supplies and books once again.

Right in front of the register, there's some little bowls of tiny glass jars, itty bitty plastic charms, pencils, and some other fairly small crafty items.  One little bowl was filled with small antique doll eyes.  At first, I was taken aback and kind of horrified.  You mean there's dozens of old dolls out there with one or both eyes pried out?  Sounds like the making of a bad horror movie.  The more I looked through them, however, the more I realized the creative potential.  I picked up one in good condition with a swirly blue iris.

And then it hit me.  Put it on a black triangle of clay, maybe add a border, bake, then apply varnish.  Bam, instant necklace.  It's hard to explain, but weeks of being troubled by the amount of unused craft stuff lying around my bedroom began to dissolve.  All by one little idea.

This may seem unrelated, but lately, my dear stepmom and I had a wonderful talk.  She's so very intelligent about pretty much everything in general and I most definitely trust her advice.  One of the pieces of advice she gave me was "tread lightly."  While I understood what she meant, I never thought it could be applied to the things I make and the process involved.  Tread lightly, start small, start slow.  Even if you were once way up high and now you're scraping the bottom of the barrel, tread lightly and build it back up.  You'll get back to the top.  You'll get there and it'll be okay.

As many of you could probably tell, I was in a funk there for a while.  I've always thought of creative ability (and other parts of life) as a plant, and if you don't feed and water it, it'll wither and eventually die.  That thought hurt me.  Instead of lamenting about it, I'm going to try to concentrate on the good part, which is that I am at least experiencing the normal ups and downs of life.  Some people cannot and that's unfortunate.  Some people can't tell the difference between the ups and the downs and for some there's no such thing as "up."

My advice to you is to start small.  Make that weird necklace.  Try that new cookie recipe and make a tiny batch just for your best friend.  Be as slow as you want with things.  Let your ideas percolate as long as you darn well please and then let them explode out like a jewelweed plant.  Or slither out slowly like a funny little snake.  Rejoice in and celebrate your ups and realize that the downs will end.  Most of all, tread lightly, and remember that you are loved.

The Not-So-Good Bits

I've been putting off writing this post for a while now, mainly because people don't like to blog about the darker times of their lives.  Or maybe they do, if they're into that kind if thing.  Admittedly, I'm not, but this blog is for posting about my life and all of its ups and downs, not just when I have good things to talk about.


The past two and a half years have been rough to say the least.  I was going to describe them as being "a nightmare of the most fantastic kind," but there's been good points.  Times when I've felt like somebody, more than a pale shell that can magically talk and make food.  Times when I actually possessed some creative ability and felt feelings like I used to.


Creatively, I'm dead, or very close to it.  I no longer derive any kind of inspiration or initiative from anything, or so it seems.  This is disturbing.  I make stuff because it's what I do, and I can't.  No amount of artistic coaching can seem to lance the horrific boil that's holding back all of my ideas and creativity.  I supposed that line was pretty creative, but it's been in my head for quite a long time now, so it doesn't count.  People tell me to just do this or just do that.  It's like watering a dead plant; nothing's coming back.  It's sad seeing the heaps of polymer clay on my desk.  I've tried my best for almost two months now to make something, and all that's come from it is a little pendant with rainbow flowers on it.  And it gets uglier the more I look at it.


My surroundings for the most part have not been, as Carl Sagan would put it, benign or malevolent.  Merely indifferent.  I don't know how much of that statement is true, seeing that the weather's been nice.  People in public are nice.  My employers, coworkers, and customers are always telling me what a good job I'm going, despite the fact I feel like an out-of-place, quiet little mouse.  I trust their judgement more than I trust my own, however, so I'll take their word for it.


I would say I'm just constantly trying to make it through the week or month or whatever, but I have no idea what I'm working towards.  I've basically given up on everything and said to life, "Fine, do what you will.  Jerk me whichever way you need to."  I'm not suicidal and this isn't some kind of weird death post (Sylvia Plath Blog?  Splog?).  I just felt the need to be more honest with my readers, not just post when I'm feeling good and motivated.  Ever notice how little I actually update this thing, as opposed to how much I should?  Yeah.


I guess this is all just a healing process, or a toughening-up process.  Maybe this will only make my spirit and creativity stronger.  Maybe one day I will wake up and actually have a spark of motivation or inspiration or just something that isn't along the (seemingly constant) lines of food and sleep.

PB & Kitty

I've recently come to one of those realizations.  The ones that you think about and it's like the clouds part and heavenly choral music starts blasting from huge, randomly appearing rainbows.  I was letting my mind wonder one day when I sudden came upon the realization that those who preach that, in order to be a writer, one must write every single day are either writing for a living or don't write at all.

Most people out there probably disagree with me, and that's fine.  I'm sure some people need to write everyday.  That's great.  But some writers just can't, try as they might.  This totally includes me.  I have to let my ideas incubate until they're ready to be written and I can't just slam out some sentences and say I've written enough for the day.  It just doesn't feel right to me.  Perhaps I'll change, perhaps I won't.  Just wanted to get that out there.

The twenty-eighth of June marked two months I've been working at my current job and I'm still enjoying it.  It's like every other job, with ups and down and things I don't really like all that much and things I love.  Being a bakery clerk isn't all that complex, so I'll skip the vivid descriptions of baking break and putting items on the markdown rack.  Earlier in June (the seventh) I turned twenty-two.  It doesn't feel much different than twenty-one, but I think I do feel a little older.  My boyfriend and I went to Hawthorne and browsed all sorts of neat shops and had lunch at Fred Meyer.  He also got me a sweet card and a totally killer embroidered yellow purse.

I've also been working more with polymer clay and figuring out I can make to put on Etsy.  The Methodist church a few blocks away had this amazing craft sale and I scored big time.  Like, tons of polymer clay (Super Sculpey, translucent Sculpey, the granite-looking Sculpey, a brick-sized block of plain white, about two dozen little packs of the colored kinds; it was just obscene), some push molds, and a few other little craft thingies for thirty bucks.  Also included in that list was a large plastic jewelry case chock full of little jewelry findings, so I have no shortage of those.  I've just been staring at the fruits of my crafty conquest, trying to figure out what to make.  Definitely jewelry, but I'm not sure exactly what.  Maybe some neat little rose earrings, or some random pins with eggplants or something on them.  If anyone has any suggestions/requests, let me know and I'll see what I can do.

Oh, and the cat apparently loves peanut butter.

The cat really ties the room together.

Is it just me or do people in general have this weird habit of stating facts and information that everyone already knows?

For example, whenever I bring up that I like Van Morrison, I can bet money on the fact that someone will pipe up and say, "He's the one who did Brown-Eyed Girl."  Or when the chemical tryptophan is discussed.  Someone always, always mentions turkey.  Cue the "you don't say" meme.  I have no idea why, but this annoys the crap out of me.  Straight up.  Maybe it's the odd feeling I get of someone assuming I didn't know something like that.  Like, that I wouldn't know what one of my favorite artist's most popular songs was or that I had never had a class in chemistry.  I doubt those were their intentions.  I don't know.  Just some way I feel, maybe.  Just a thought.

In other news, my job has been going well.  Distinctly job-like.  Everyone at home is doing alright.  We got a new rug for the living room and the cat loves it.  We found it on the curb along with a sweet box of craft stuff and some pots for plants.  I might get some herb starters from the store, or some succulents.  Maybe even some ferns or flowers.  As for the box of craft stuff, among the various items there was a really nice general craft book and a bag full of decorative corn husks.  I've always wanted to try my hand at making corn husk dolls, so that may happen in the near future.

So, I got out of the house the other day and went to this tiny bookstore down the road.  It was alright, but they seemed to have more Nora Roberts, Harlequin romance, and old copies of National Geographic than anything.  Why walking home I passed the legendary candy cane house, more formally known as Keana's Candyland.  I went in and it was crazy murals and candy stuff everywhere.  I got a free cookie for going in, too.  Perks!

Time for coffee.