Somewhere to let it all out

Agyness Deyn is pissing me off simply by seeming to haunt me. Everywhere I turn at the moment I seem to be confronted with her 'elfin' hairdo, articles on her 'clones' (the Agy is the new Rachel in terms of hairstyle it seems), speculation about how she got those bruises on her legs, talk of why she changed her name from Laura Hollins (nice enough) to something more flamboyant (pretentious?) and then I turned the tv on at the weekend to check out quite how bad a decision moving the Friday Night Project to Sunday was only to find her singing with the band.

Model, singer, trend setter - she's irritatingly successful. But thats not why I dont like her. Im just sick of people acting like they have never seen someone wear doc martens before just because SHE is wearing them. Ive got 3 pairs and nobody cares. Mind you its probably 10 yrs since I last wore them...maybe I should dig them out....aaaagggh its happening, im becoming a sheep....

Also I had one of those dreams last night that was so disturbing and vivid and played to my every anxiety that I woke up (annoyingly an hour before my alarm was set) completely distraught. It took a good 10 mins to calm down and believe that it was only a dream but any chance of getting back to sleep was lost, partly as I was now wide awake and partly as fear of returning to this dream was too great. Bizarrely, the subject of this dream actually does have the potential to be true. It was my ex (he of previous blogs - estranged husband) and he was calmly telling me things I really did not want to hear. Graphic detail about him and the bitch (due to marry another bloke this month) who interfered and kicked it all off in the first place.

I dont know why my brain does these things to me. Everything ticking along just nicely? Right, time to throw another spanner in the works then. My therapy has taught me that thats just my way of dealing with it but it doesnt make it any easier to stomach when it happens.

I also have a bloke dilemma going on. Now dont get me wrong, im loving living on my own, im liking the taste of freedom and independance for the first time in my adult life...but it would be nice to try dating again, get the nice bits out of a casual relationship...and there are two potentials, both of whom im pretty sure would be quite open to the idea but both of whom present their own complications as below:

We shall call bloke one Clay because in literary terms he kinda reminds me of him (Less Than Zero) in that hes young, a scenester, cool and interesting. I fancy him a lot. He makes me laugh and I can tell he finds the potential of a (slightly) older woman quite appealing. I love the way he still has that passion about music and film that I remember having, there is only 7 years between us but ive seen and done a lot more, he's fairly naive - hasnt travelled much yet. The reason im cautious - I dated his brother years ago when the pair of us were at university, thats how I know him. Ive always kind of held a torch for his brother and we have come close to having dalliances since...and I dont know how much of that dictates me finding him attractive, they look alike, they have similar mannerisms. The older brother - I dont think he would like it AT ALL if I started seeing him. It might scupper the chance of our ross and rachel story having a happy ending....

Bloke 2 - we shall call him Gabriel (FFTMC), couple of years older than me, work colleague - was based elsewhere but as of next month I shall be sharing an office with him, hes the person I get on with best at work, we socialise a lot (hes cooking me dinner tonight) we have both had rough times with relationships this last year, we both enjoy being single at the moment, I have tons of fun with him and he is very laid back. But I dont physically find him attractive. I have tried. I guess he's just not my type in that way - but does that matter? Is personality what it should be all about? Surely there needs to be some sort of physical attraction too? Also there is the issue that if anything did happen it might be awkward at work.

Its been a while I know....been a bit busy globetrotting and furiously busy at work. I spent 3 weeks in australia and feel like I came back having learnt a lot more about myself and what im capable of (tolerating). I also learnt that as much as I absolutely adore my friend I would never be able to live with her, little things become incredibly annoying when you spend so much time together in a confined space, I also realised that you pick up on the things that they say literally about 500 times a day (I will be happy to NEVER hear the word 'absolutely' in response to a statement ever again). And for the record it is called THE INTERNET, not 'tinterweb' as she comically called it once and then annoyingly called it all the time. 

me: have we sorted a hotel for tonight?
her: no but we can check tinterweb back at the hotel.
me: I will be relieved once we have somewhere to stay.
her: absolutely.  

She is one of the most fun, laid back, cool people I have ever known...but she also has this annoying habit of eating at random times so that when it actually IS lunchtime or dinner time she isnt hungry. And her driving is enough to make your hair stand on end.

Anyway, enough of a rant....I also feel like the trip has answered a few questions for me, I know for sure that the life I lead now in terms of job, location etc is not enough for me. I want to explore, I want to try living and working somewhere entirely new. I also know that this 'new' place is definitely not Australia. I loved it as a country, it is beautiful, it is diverse and has some amazing people - but for me I couldnt get past the blatent racism, both against their own indiginous people and also to anyone non-white. I was very saddened to find that people of all ages and educations seem quite aggressively bigoted. Not just racist either but horribly homophobic, I dont want to live in a country with that kind of mindset.

So I now know that my previous intuition that America is the place I want to live has more creedence. Ive spent a lot of time there, I know it and its people quite well, I appreciate the good and the bad - but I DO think I could live there and have some amazing life experiences. For me, 'home' in the states would preferably be California where I have spent the most time, I wouldnt rule out living in New York, New Jersey, Washington, Pensylvania or the major cities like Detroit/Chicago/Atlanta either. In fact in order to get my foot in the door I would live just about anywhere. I feel like now at least I have an idea of which way my path is going - just not what the destination is exactly. Thats half the fun though.

Ive also found myself mellowing quite a lot about what matters and what does not. Ive learnt a lot of hard lessons about friends and friendships over the last few years and now I feel able to say for certain that going forwards I will only put effort into those friendships which I get something substantial out of. I can say no more often and more easily. I also realised that actually I have so many friends (even having dropped a few unexpectedly) that even to keep those ones going is actually like a part time job, my social life is insane at the moment trying to keep up with them all - so if I have whittled them down (deliberately or otherwise) then that has to be a positive thing.

Anyway, off to a meeting, trying to resist the urge to blurt out moving abroad plans to all and sundry including my boss who given our current workload would probably have a heart attack....