Texting Coversation With Ramon

09-20-2007:

Ramon: Sorry i missed your call. Love you.

Cerise: Love you too honey. On my way home. Shit day. PMS!

Ramon:
P.arade of
M.uggles
S.treaking?

This is why you and I fit so well, Monchis. [blows kiss]

Cerise

The Devil and Cece Winans

I was almost home the other night and was standing at the crosswalk waiting for my light. Traffic, as always, was pretty busy - at a standstill, actually - and you can always hear an amazingly wide assortment of music drifting from commuters' windows. You could do a whole study on the crazy shit people like to listen to to get a day's work off their minds. I heard some kicky music coming from the farthest-away car waiting at the crosswalk and as I started across the street I realized that I know that song! It was "Better Place" - the last track on Cece Winans' self-titled album from 2001.

[Sidebar: Cece is one of the Christian artists that I've never expunged from my listening library. True, you have to listen to unabashedly fundie lyrics, but the music's solid and she has got the chops. Other CCM artists that will never lose our love are, in no particular order: pre-Beyond-Belief Petra, Mastedon, Charlie Peacock, pre-(See Inside) Out of the Grey, Imperials, Wendy and Mary, 2nd Chapter of Acts, White Heart, King's X (they would probably object to being classified as CCM in the strongest terms and Matt's just going to kill me), pre-Go-bloody-West-Young-Man Michael W. Smith, etc. AND, when I really want to piss Ramon off, I put on David Meece's Odyssey album real loud and rock the fuck out.]

How random is it to be walking across the street in Seattle and hear Cece Winans, right? Since dancing in public is one of the sure signs that yet another Seattle-ite has gone over to the crazies (talking aloud to oneself and screaming at red-light-runners are others), I fought the urge to bop in the crosswalk, but I did lock eyes with the older gentleman in a PT Cruiser who was crankin' my girl. He was getting down - how could you not? The song's about how you're to keep your head up, 'cause god's going to come on down and take us all to that great smoothie spa in the sky - and when he saw me grinning at him he put his thumbs up and man-squealed "Yah!!"

This is when the whole thing gets...well, it's just typical of my interactions with the general and unsuspecting populace. I put up my horns and crowed, "Cece Winans, BABY!!" and walked the last 1/2 block to my apartment building with a bright smile on my face. But wait. Looking back, why did his smile falter just a bit as I turned away to finish crossing the street? Because, Dear Reader, to a man who loves Christian music and is so chuffed that he's headed for Paradise (soon, by the look of it) that he'll shout his joy at innocent passerby, the "rock on!" horns are actually...[ominous silence]...the sign of Satan! [Dun. Dun. Dunnnnnn.] I had completely forgotten.

It's subtle, but sometimes, friends, but the hand-signal for "rock on!" or "hook 'em horns!" is sometimes confused for the secret "I worship the Dark Lord (not Voldemort)" sign. Comme ça:

Rock on!












Hook 'Em Horns!












I worship the Devil











No, no, just kidding. I'm sure our President doesn't worship the great Satan. But think how alarming it must've been for this old guy when I flashed him the sign of Lucifer! He thinks to himself: "OK, she's clearly a Christian because she knows who I'm listening to, but she also indicates that she's a devil-worshiper. Wait. IS Cece a Christian artist? What if she's not? What if Cece worships the devil? What if ...[puts hands to mouth]...what if Cece IS the devil? It figures that the Devil's female...am I listening to The Devil or one of her minions?" Or maybe he thought I'm a UT alumna and he supports Texas A & M. We'll never know. But for him, either way, our cheery interaction didn't have a happy ending.

(sigh) Cerise strikes again. That song will never be the same for him.

[Did anybody notice that I posted this on the 13th? Oooh. Keep your eyes peeled for lightning bolts...]

Unwrinkled By Time

Friends, Madeleine L'Engle, second official Blower of Cerise's Mind (here's the first), has died today.

Rest well, good friend, and I hope that what you find beyond death is even more wonderful than what your words concocted in my 10-year-old (and 32-year-old) head. Love to you.

Cerise

Bleary and Irritable

Wow, that title really makes you want to read on, doesn't it? You're like, "Oh, yeah, a new post from Cerise - and the title indicates that it'll be one of her whiny, narcissistic posts with shit writing to boot! Reading ON, my friend."

Just kidding. So I woke up after apocalyptic dreams about an alien planet accidentally about to crash into ours, planes falling out of the sky, aliens milling around trying to communicate with us, orange/black sky with roiling end-of-days clouds, and people stuffing themselves on buses because there's a last thing they need to say to their loved ones. Cheerful. Oh, and somehow the planes/buses/spaceships crashing here and there are turning groups of humans into ravenous zombies. [note: perhaps Ramon's and my journey through season 7 of Buffy and the fact that I'm reading "Silence of the Lambs" right before bed are contributing factors...] So, yes, waking up after that and wandering semi-blindly around the apartment and bumping into undone housework (argh) has put me in a right lovely mood. Playing different angry hypothetical life scenarios in my head on the walk to work. I'm SO not telling you about any of those. I want people reading this to think I'm, you know, not crazy all the time.

What was I saying? Right...bleary and irritable. Focus, Cerise. Uh - hey. Hey. What...I'm feeling a lot better. What the hell? I wrote out one of the angry scenarios, read it and laughed, deleted it, and now I'm feeling kind of normal. I'm still not sharing it, though. Sorry...

Cerise

P.S. I stalked into work and turned on U2's War album (and thought about Ash, who will be so very pleased and will, I think, agree that there's a U2 album for every mood) straightaway. It's got the perfect balance of 'fuck this all' and youthful hope for better things. Feeling even better.

Driving Myself Insane

[I'm am NOT going back and looking at the last time I wrote something. I am not. It must be so long ago and the fact that I've neglected this poor blog for however long it is is very, very upsetting and so...I'm not going to find out. Anyway, the last thing I really wrote is this, the following. I never finished it. Written in late July.]

Isn't it amazing how much we can wind ourselves up? Up until about an hour ago I was having one of the most unpleasant days I can remember. It started out badly; Ramon and I moaned ourselves out of bed, blindly reached for the french press to make coffee and then - sin of sins - tried to sort out our schedules for the next two days before ingesting sufficient amounts of caffeine. Here's what we had facing us:

8-ish to 5:30-ish - work

6:00 party at Ramon's work (where I will meet all his artistic, bohemian, funny and terribly intelligent new co-workers - no pressure)

After the party - possibly have a couple over for wine and cheese

5:00am Saturday - get up and drive to Federal Way for one of Elizabeth's triathlons (no preparation required - besides extensive yawning and eye-rubbing)

10:00am-ish - birthday/post-Tri breakfast with Elizabeth, Nathan, and Oz (still hadn't bought a gift for Elizabeth)

Rest of the weekend - free as birds, Ramon and I

So. This morning. Pre-coffee. Still with me? We had to 1. buy something to eat for the party (my mind instantly seizes up with dissatisfaction because I prefer to make something for parties), 2. buy food and drink (different from what we bought for the party, naturally) for having the couple - who I don't know - over, 3. buy Elizabeth's gift (she would be horrified to part of the must-buy lineup and would prefer that I just forget about it, being the sweet person she is, but on this point I will not compromise). All in a small, small space of time - we're both over 30 now and sleep is not negotiable.

Anyway. We were both in Organize mode, both trying to keep things as easy for the other as possible (definitely a plus more than a minus in both our choices for life partner, but the trait - especially both of us having it - does get in the way when we're trying to bloody DO something), and it ended poorly. We were both confused, frustrated and went into our respective Bad Places: me chattering angrily like a very large, very pompous squirrel, and Ramon shutting completely down and looking grieved. God...

For the rest of the morning I was talkative (in the angry way - so great for the workplace) and petulant and succeeded in having at least 3 interactions with people - people that I like and admire very much - that made me feel guilty, crazed, and very, very lonely.

Crazed isn't the even the word, friends. I knew that my unsatisfactory conversations with people were my doing. On my bad, bad days (Not flat tire days. I mean my crazy, angry days. Like today.) every request is a profound irritation. Every sentence uttered by the other is a flattening commentary on my own deficiencies. I get really, really twitchy. They don't happen too often, but when they do I sit at my desk - my comfy, lovely desk surrounded by work that satisfies me - and fume about how insane I am and how I can't seem to get a handle on myself.

Enter my angelic Mum. She called for no other reason than that she was driving to a church camping trip - alone, since Dad was in the woods cutting firewood for the congregation - and feeling sleepy. Dear Momlies. Just a little talk with her reminded me that I'm a good person who loves her mother. I wish I could explain how much better that made me feel. It gave me a little light at the end of my tunnel - knowing that this insane state of mind isn't really me. Or at least it's not me in my normal state.

[Back to the present. The work day ended and I've had a month's worth of not-crazy work days since. The party after was wonderful - Ramon's co-workers liked me and I liked them. I also liked my first-ever glass-of-Crown-Royal-with-an-ice-cube very much. I bought something beautiful for Elizabeth and she loved it. And buying the beautiful thing, on my lunch break that horrid day, calmed me down more than anything else had. Good old retail therapy, right?

Thanks for reading, if you're still here after my interminable hiatus. More stuff to come...]