i wanna be sedated

Funny how when we find ourselves super busy we pray for a break and a little of nothing to do, while when we're bored and have nothing to do we become all hyper and look for something to do.

Right now I'm the latter.

What is more disturbing about the matter is that I could be doing a million more productive things, like reading, studying, learning, building something. Instead, I’m sitting here writing in my blog.

So bored that I can't think of anything to write. Maybe I should take a sedative and wake up in a while, perhaps the day will be over by then.

Nah.


Oh!


I had a bit of a blue moment last night.


One thing I've never shared in my blog is what happened right after I returned to pooradise from the north.

I had a very good life over there for so many years, but it ended in a slow and cruel fashion. If I think about it, it was a rite of passage for me. Seems that everybody in my family goes through it (moving to another country around the age of 20 and coming back to this nightmare of a country); everybody, all the way from my great-great grandparents and my grandparents (both sides) through parents and my brother and I.

I went there a 19 year old child and came back a fully fledged 24 year old man, in a matter of speaking. I love the place and really loved living there, the freedoms I had in that place I haven't experienced anywhere else. I took it for granted of course, you don't know what you have until you lose it, and it always applies.

Weird thing is that I knew I would lose it eventually and thus gradually prepared myself the event. The last year of my stay there were a bit sour due to my psycho ex, who wasn't my ex back then, but she is now. But otherwise life was awesome.

My last 2 years were awesome in many ways, but above all there was my roommate, Charis. I moved in with her in June 2003. I found her through a posting on the housing message board at school.

I was looking because I was sick and tired of my former roommate, a girl also from pooradise. She was just nasty: chain smoker, heavy drinker, partying all the time, people over all the time, noisy, nosy, lazy, and dirty and she justified all this by telling everybody that she is epileptic, which she really is; all the more reason shouldn’t have held such a lifestyle. I haven't spoken to her since the day I moved out so I say was, as I don't know if her lifestyle has changed at all.

I saw the posting for various apartments that day and called a few. Some were taken, some were too expensive. I picked a Friday to go see a few of the places I thought were ok. First I went to see a nice penthouse in a building in a quiet, secluded area of the city. The place was nice, the price was right and the guys were nice, but transportation would have been an issue due to distance to school and I wasn't too fond of the idea of living with 5 guys who happened to be party animals and hosted parties in the penthouse every Friday night. I thanked the boys and moved on. Then, I saw a room in a house not too far from there but to tell you the truth the place was a royal ghetto hole. I saw a few more places I couldn't afford for the hell of it and I went to charis' place last.

As I entered I found 4 mildly drunk women in their 30's, asked me to come in, they showed me around. The place was nice, tastefully decorated, wood floors, newly refurnished kitchen and a nice big bathroom. The room I was to live in was considerably larger too. I asked how much and the price was $415 per month, about $100 less than where I was living with nasty girl but about $50 more than the penthouse which at the time was the other option I was considering. But then I realized the building had a late night convenience shop right downstairs and a whole bloody mall right across the street with a supermarket, clothing and a couple of restaurants. Another fact that was well worth the extra 50 was that I would only need to take a bus and then the train that left me smack dab in the middle of the university. The party animal place I would have had to take 3 buses to reach school, buses which were very crowded and not very comfortable. The train on the other hand was nice and comfortable and never crowded.

So on May 31st, exactly 3 years ago, I moved into the apartment with charis. She was away in another city for that weekend, but she left some instructions and an order to make myself at home and enjoy. She has two cats: Frankenstein, a black long hair sock and Barbie, a white shorthair sweetie. I met them and quickly became friendly with both.

As I got to know Charis I found that she's one of the most interesting people I've ever met. She's in the army, a Corporal back then, I think she's been promoted since I left. She is much older than I am, almost 20 years older and veteran of 2 failed marriages. She had a strong but kind personality and we shared a passion for good liqueur. She has lived in one of the coldest places on earth, and done tours of duty in the deepest of the Canadian north, well inside the arctic circle. She became my friend quickly and soon after she was my best friend.

In February 2004 she had an offer to move to subsidized military housing, to which she agreed and asked me to move with her to the house which was located in what remained of a former military base near the airport of the city.

And there we lived for 1 year in absolute harmony. But as all good things must end sooner or later, I graduated from university and it just so happened that my student visa would cancel itself 90 days after I graduated. I got my school papers on February 20th 2005 saying that I was officially a biologist. And then time came to pack. That must have been one of the most painful experiences I've ever had to live through, especially because when you pack up you find some many memories of all that makes your life in the place a good life, and also because you must leave a lot behind. My school notes, my papers, my books, MY SKATES, my friends, my life. All behind.

I returned to pooradise with a few of my most prized possessions (a couple of textbooks, pictures, a few gifts, some other books, my computer, my electronic devices and some other stuff) and clothing; that was all.

I came here on March 8th 2005, and went into a deep, chaotic depression. It's unbelievable how I feel sad by even remembering it, I guess I haven't worked through it completely. It was a miserable time for me, 2 months of nothing. I didn't feel like doing anything and there was little reason to do so. I found that after one is gone, no matter how many emails or msn chats you have with people, you lose your friends anyway. I was left with 2 friends who helped me a great deal, one is a girl I grew up with and consider to be my baby sister. The other is my current girlfriend whom I fell in love with gradually and now know she's the one for me.

I returned to the north on May 2nd to finish up some unresolved business and to haul over some more stuff. Came back to pooradise once again in a haze of sadness and self pity, on May 14th 2005. I spent a long time trying to deal with all the feelings of loss and sadness. Not having a job or a social life, only my dad to yell at me 14 hours a day, didn't help either.

But my girlfriend pushed on and finally managed to get me out of the cycle and now I’m relatively happy, compared to back then anyway.



What happened last night is that I saw a movie, Under the Tuscan Sun. I know, total chick flick, but the views of Tuscany are truly amazing and it's a very relaxing movie. I'm not into chick flicks but this one I particularly like because of the views and Diane Lane, whom I might add is smoking hot for a woman her age (38 back then, 41 now). She plays a woman who loses everything and builds a new life in another country. In a way that reminded me of my situation. The movie ended and while in a sleepy state of warm fuzziness, I stupidly went to open my much dreaded box of memories, that damn box that contains all the stuff that reminds me how great my life in the north was. I'm so afraid of that box that I keep it well hidden in my closet and last night was the first time in 7 months that I open that box.

My philosophy is that if you want to keep moving forward, you mustn’t let memories slow you down and look back. In a way that is the reason why I keep it out of sight, to prevent any sudden urges to remember the good times.

Those memories bring such joy and such pain. And the pictures where my ex is featured brought me anger.

The emptiness that those memories generate led me to meditate and reconsider a bit about my life, which kept me reconsidering until 4am.

I concluded that I have gone through a lot, I have a family that supports and loves me, a girlfriend that is crazy about me and I have a decent, well paying, boring job. I can't complain. Other than living in this shit country, my life is awesome.

And I bitch too much about my coworkers. They're all nice really, aside from chemistry guy who's a bit dry and whom I’ve had friction a couple of times, everything is good here. School's almost over so I’ll have them out of my hair for 2.5 months.


Life's great, don't waste it whimpering.