Firstly: Thank you everyone who sent me the wonderful birthday wishes last week in the form of messages or as gifts in your journal. It really meant a lot to me, and made turning 46 a lot more fun than I'd anticipated. It was a lovely, low-key day: my sweetie took me out to the new Thai restaurant in the area we'd recently heard about; and she bought me a tin of one of my favorite teas from Harney and Sons, "Bankok" (green tea with lemongrass, ginger, vanilla and coconut flavors.) A cup of that before bed is now my nightly ritual.

If you posted birthday wishes or a gift on your journal and I have not thanked you yet, it means one thing: LJ is SCREWING UP notifications and I don't know about it. (I've gotten a grand total of one notification in the last 30 days.) I thought it was just me until I just happened to see that velvetwhip posted a complaint about it on her LJ, just happened to find a lovely birthday message and graphic that she posted for me; and then just happened to see comlodge make a remark about having trouble posting a gift banner (which is utterly gorgeous) she'd made for me, and I'm thinking, "What? What is this gift we speak of?" Then today I just happened to see kikimay's birthday graphic for me with a cap of Buffy receiving her umbrella in The Prom which gives me so many feelings, as well as several other times she name-checked me, and that's not counting the times other folks like eilowyn or kwritten have name-checked me, etc.

Folks, I'm all for "happenstance" and "serendipity" - but not on a social networking site. Not when people are making me gifts and wishing me happy birthday, or giving me free PR by referencing my posts. I want to know about this stuff because to NOT stop by and say "THANK YOU" is just plain damn rude, IMO. That said, I know that children are starving in Africa - starving all over the world in fact - and I'm sitting her whining like a priviledged American white gal. (Which I happen to be, but nevermind.)

If kerkevik_2014 hadn't PM'd me about a completely charming and sexy Tara/Faith drabble he wrote for me, I never would have known about it. Sweet, sexy, taking-command Tara is pure catnip to me - and being the gentle guide for a suddenly-shy and insecure Faith? OH YES PLEASE.  It's easy to forget that Tara possessed a core of strength and confidence even if we rarely saw it before S6. Remember, she is the one who pursued Willow - NOT the other way around. I was a just-out lesbian in the '90's, just before the show came on tv and I know how much courage that would have taken at that time (and probably still does.)

SO - if you've mentioned me or have made a prezzie for me, or just something you think I might like to see, please don't be shy about PM'ing me until this notification nonsense gets straightened out.

SECONDLY: comlodge told me that the aforementioned Buffy tribute banner she made for my birthday was inspired by my recent "happy birthday Buffy" post and that in itself is the best present. If I can make someone else see Buffy and her world through my eyes even a little, not by shouting or arguing or arm-twisting, but simply by loving her and sharing what she means to me, then that makes me incredibly happy. comlodge's banner reflects what so much of what I love about Buffy - the girl, the woman, the warrior; daughter, sister, friend and lover. Her's is an incredible journey.

Speaking of incredible journeys: kwritten posted an insanely gorgeous Buffy, Anya, Willow, Dawn/Faith fic, "Oh, You're Here Too?" set immediately post-Chosen. Anya offers Buffy friendship and solace after the battle. Not AU. She wrote it for a prompt from kikimay but it reflects so much about how I see Buffy in that immediate period about 1000X better than I could hope to. It's a short story but it takes the reader on a complete journey that feels novelistic, in a series of short scenes: from Buffy's trauma and dissociation, the fatigue and inability to process everything after the battle in the Hellmouth, to a place that feels "warm, (un)finished, (in)complete" as Buffy contemplates the "the unknown future" before her, in the company of beloved friends and family.

What the title says, basically. ("That she refers to herself in the third person is especially troublesome - psychiatric help is recommend".)

I'm typing this on my honey' s iPod and I honestly don't know how the rest of the world manages with these things. (Note to self - schedule that overdue eye exam.). How are we NOT be becoming a world of blind people, stooped and hunched over like Chinese rug makers at their looms?

Bifocal lenses ahoy.

Also. I am left handed but can type on this fractionally better with my right hand.  There's something about the design that feels as though it's meant to be held that way because the designers presumed such. (I am not making this up btw - I had to get rid of a vegetable peeler for that reason, and I'm slightly ambidextrous to start.)

More proof that lefties are discriminated against when it comes to product design and engineering!   ("Subject displays increasing signs of an anxiety and paranoia....")

And why are the symbols upon which my Internet life depends - * < > _ =  , et cetera located three keyboards deep? What about MY needs?

On the upside (have to look for that, right?) there are also symbol for pounds and euros = £ and € respectively. Also a ¥ symbol. Whatever the heck that is.

*****
My downstairs/down the hall neighbors argue very loudly quite a lot. Right now in fact. They sound like my mom and stepdad #1 when I was a little, burying my head beneath the bedcovers to block them out. It never worked. Living  in houses or flats with just one neighbor really spoiled me.

Now I know why The Powers That Be invented radios and gramaphones.

Or rather it would ensue if I wasn't so freaking exhausted. But it's sent off and done. (the contents list was actually my partner's thing that were destroyed in the fire and covered by her renters' insurance, but I was doing the work on it while she goes off and earns a paycheck, bless her.)

I know I didn't get everything on their but they only pay so many anyway and there just comes a point where I couldn't. COULDN'T get it all on there.

My sweetie just called and said we'd go out to dinner to celebrate, yay. And I'm still in my pajamas.

In other news: way way behind on fic, vid and other recs for y'all, so I plan to resume after the weekend.

The second honeymoon we were enjoying in this apartment of my partner and I sleeping together (in a double bed) for the first time in years has ended already: I snore and it wakes her up too often and then she's tired at work. I admit I cried a little. So it's back to separate beds for us. I'm on an inflatable this time in our erstwhile office, which feels like I'm a visitor here. The upside is I'm in the room with the laptop and can stay on after she goes to sleep - given the fact that I stay up very late reading fanfic, that probably isn't such a good thing after all! And, I miss the cuddling. I love her, I do, but god I'm human. We hadn't cuddled every morning like that in almost ten years. It does a number on a girl.

And I miss the comfort brand new down mattress and pretty duvet cover, a rare luxury (and necessity) for us. I know there are millions of people in the world who don't have a bed to sleep on and I keep reminding myself of that!  But, only human here.

Last week we finally got the gas stove (burners etc) in the new apartment fixed and approved for use, and I made the first dinner since the house fire that I was proud of: Chicken breasts rubbed with a little balsamic vinagrette dressing from a local restaurant  (to which I'd added a little more oil and maple sysauteed in the cast iron skillet in a slick of olive oil, with chopped leeks, mushrooms, garlic etc; seasoned lightly with salt, pepper, and then just a dash of balsamic vinagrette dressing from a local restaurant (to which I'd added maple syrup) poured in at the last minute or two. Making it felt like coming home on some small level: this is ME, this is who I am. It felt familiar, and "familiar" has suddenly become very precious to me.

And yes, I do know children are starving around the world and women have to walk ten miles to get water and I've never been raped and I'm not mutilated or dead so stop whining and be grateful. No, I'm not joking, this stuff really goes through my head. Although when my landlord pulled out the "at least you have a roof over your head" line I wanted to tell him to stuff it.

So it's been little things, grasping for the familiar comforts and rhythms, while being aware somehow that the "old normal" doesn't exist anymore and never will; that a new sense of "normal" is establishing itself, while the old patterns elbow their way in.  Or perhaps it's the other way around? Whether that "new normal" is comfortable or desirable is too soon to tell. The old normal was comfortable; but was it actually desirable?

So I can still light a fire in the Weber grill with wood I've gathered myself and grill a steak or burn documents without hesitation. The fire and smoke don't bother me because I've mastered this activity and it's "under control", safe and contained.

But I'm hyper-aware of fire truck sirens in the streets, and I startled at unfamiliar noises in this new apartment, the slight ones coming perhaps from outside on the stairwell, beneath the floor or through the walls; in fact I'm not sure where they come from most times. I freeze and wait for a second until they pass. Sounds, not sights or smells, seems to be the main sense in which my recent "trauma" (let's just call it PTSD, shall we?) expresses itself. It wasn't the mattress in flames that terrified me, or the smoke filling my eyes; it was the awful sound of my sweetheart's high-pitched, hysterical scream as she tried to fight the fire. Running up the stairs I thought for an awful moment I'd find her engulfed in flames, burning to death.

No one should have to hear that sound, although many people do, and worse. I know.

But written words can have an effect as well. I had to stop reading beer_good_foamy's recent post re: Night Vale when I read this quote from the podcasts: "The world is awful. And on fire. And beautiful." A month ago I would have loved the elegant and evocative language. Now I run away from it because I want to cry. And I am not liking this state of affairs one little bit. Not at all. But there it is. (Note to BGF if you're reading it: don't change the title of your journal on my account, ok? That is NOT what I'm saying at all.)

It is always unpredictable and never within my control. Perhaps that's what is really setting me off lately, and not the triggers themselves. That may explain why I have a hard time lately bearing my partner's moods when she arrives home. She might be exhausted, in pain, angry about work, hyper-focused on some obsession or project that must get done, throw herself into a frenzy of activity or barely be able to move. She's no different in fact than she's ever been but now it feels very heightened to me. The fact that she speaks aloud constantly, says everything she's thinking at every moment she's thinking it, or thinks and obsesses in patterns and circles, is nothing new. The fact that she wants me to "respond" to her, but automatically know when she's talking to me and when she's just thinking aloud isn't new either.  We've been together 17 years, she's always been that way.

It used to be irritating, frustrating; now it feels like nails scraping my skin to be in the same room sometimes. And other times, she leans into me and I stroke her soft hair and forget all that for a moment, until the next disagreement and we're off to the races again.

My primary solace, lately, or methods of trying to hold onto "normal" have included being here with my friends on LJ and chatting for hours while ignoring my must-do list and procrastinating like a champ; and carrying a notebook with me everywhere I go so I can write when inspiration strikes - again, always when I'm supposed to be doing something else "more important".

And lately I'm writing Buffyverse fanfic. After announcing a year ago I would NOT write fanfic because 1) my previous efforts in another fandom sucked which 2) made me decide I'm really a non-fiction writer plus 3) there are so many good writers in this fandom that I could never compete or say something really new and therefore, 4) I was going to write meta in this fandom instead of fic.

( I'm writing Buffyverse fanfic. Be very afraid.... )
In other news, my sweetie and I are going to the Cape tomorrow, to Truro, MA just south of Provincetown; she's taking a painting workshop that was planned and paid for back in May. We've been to the Cape just once before on a weekend trip and loved it. ("Off-season" is the way to go on a strip of land that has only one road going in and out.)  I don't know if I'll see the harbor seals this time, but I am taking the laptop along.

And my notebook. Much cheaper than therapy, with none of the nasty side-effects of antidepressants.

My lady-love and I are still camping in the front yard; hopefully we'll start the move into a new apartment on the 2nd (when the other tenants move out.) I put up a tarp over the tent to protect us from the rain BY MYSELF for the first time - and it's lasted just fine, thank you *pats self on back*

Counting blessings: Today I was finally able, after many hours of frustration, to get ahold of someone from the state Department of Social Services about some benefits I'd been receiving that had been cut off at the beginning of the month - and within an hour she determined that my benefits had been cut off without cause, and restored them. Every once in a while someone restores my faith in humanity.

Have been listening to some new-to-us cassette tapes while I clean house during the day in the aftermath of the fire. I cannot tell you HOW MUCH I've missed having internet access - to bitch, to snark, to squee, the whole nine fandom yards. Listening to music makes me feel at least a little human again, especially Joan Armatrading. I've played her over and over the last couple of days: "Me, Myself and I," "Willow" "Love and Affection" but especially "The Weakness in Me." She just hits the spot every time.

But today I put on Nanci Griffith's Lonestar State of Mind and during the last song "There's a Light Beyond the Woods (Mary Margaret)" I started sobbing and I have no idea why. Is it the notion of a life-long friendship since childhood which the song describes and which I've never experienced? The intense lonliness of this experience after the fire, even if I'm experiencing it with someone else? Disappointment at a life unlived (mine)?

Or perhaps my sweetie got it right when she said "Maybe it was just time to cry."

I miss being able to just check out and have a little fandom fun here on LJ to take my mind off things. And I miss chatting with my friends here and keeping up with everything that's going on. (People say LJ fandom is dead? Try going away from it for several days involuntarily then realizing the amount of stuff you'll never be able to catch up on - it doesn't looks so very dead from that perspective!) Oh well....This too shall pass.