Journal 5/25-5/27/02
Well, I'm camping. Mom was right; garçon stupide
thrives on confrontations. He came very close to losing a wife today.
We woke up late, and of course it was my fault. Unbeknownst to me, I was supposed to wake up at 7am and get everything ready to go, because poor little garçon stupide had to work until midnight last night.
Now, mind you, I spent last night packing everything and getting everything together. The only things that had to be done were the actual packing of the truck (and remind me not to crawl on my poor knees on the truck bed ever again) and getting the perishable food and the ice into the coolers.
But we woke up at 9am. I did turn off both alarms this morning; I was up until almost midnight so I didn't see any reason why I should have to get up early. And garçon stupide had not bothered to tell me what time he wanted to leave.
Hold in a second. I'm going to get the suitcases.
Okay. I'm back. Figured I'd better get my tea too, so I could have something to drink.
Anyway, so I woke up at 9am. Normally, my wake-up time is 8 or 8:30, so I was rather surprised I had gotten up so late.
And of course, it was all my fault.
"It's going to rain!!" he exclaims. "We're late!! You're stupid!! You're an idiot moron!!"
"garçon stupide, there is no reason to get pissy because we woke up late. Let's get everything together, and we'll be fine."
"It's going to RAIN!!! We might as well not go!!!! You're so stupid!!!!! We'll be putting the tent up in the RAIN!!!"
(as a slight aside, I'm sitting here in our tent while garçon stupide and his Dad go to WalMart for stuff. It is quite sunny, warm, and humid. It hasn't rained yet.)
"Look. If you're acting this way when we sleep in late, how are you going to act when we're putting the tent up and something goes wrong?"
"It's going to RAIIN!!!!! You are so stupid! You should have been up hours ago getting everything ready to pack! You should have been dressed and showered and breakfasted!!"
"Could haves, would haves, and should haves do not 'am now' make, garçon stupide. We woke up late. Big deal."
"I'm going to be ready to go in fifteen minutes. If you're not ready to go by then, I'm going to leave without you."
"Then perhaps I'd just better not go. Because if you're acting like this now..."
"I'm going to be ready to go in fifteen minutes... etc., etc."
A half an hour passes.
I'm ready to go. Everything's ready to be packed in the truck. garçon stupide is upstairs, lying on our bed, (you guessed it) watching TV. It is now 10:15. So far this morning, I have checked my email (but not replied to any yet), checked my blog and read the comments from last night, eaten one piece of cinammon bread for breakfast (while being yelled at; I threw the other piece away after eating half of it because I was crying too hard to chew), brought the air mattress from the basement, gathered up pillows and sheets, packed both coolers (thanks, Mom and Dad!!), showered, got dressed, and remembered to pack my deoderant. So far this morning, garçon stupide had woken up mad, yelled at me while I was checking my email and blog, yelled at me while he went to the bathroom, yelled at me when I insisted on eating breakfast, yelled at me while I was loading the coolers, and yelled and pushed me while I was attempting to get the things checked off on my list. Hmm. I am not amused.
At least he is dressed, I think. But my fury has a slow boil. It's just about there.
"I'm ready to go. "
He looks at me, raises his eyebrows.
"I thought you were supposed to be packing up the truck while I took a shower and got dressed."
He flips the channels.
I turn off the TV. He turns it back on.
I say, "Okay, who's addicted?" and stand in front of the TV.
He is silent, pretending he can see through me.
"I think you need to get your ass downstairs and grab the bags and get going. You're so worried about rain; let's go."
I take my bags and go downstairs.
Silence from above.
Yes, a slow boil. But I'm about to boil over, I am. I have a limited amount of patience. My patience is just about at an end.
"garçon stupide, you'd better get your ass down here!"
Silence.
"Okay, fine. I'm going to go camping with your parents. I'm going to take the tent and my bags, and have a nice weekend. See you later. Hope you like watching TV."
(My vocabulary also deteriorates the angrier I get, at least verbally.)
He comes downstairs. He is radiating anger. But you know what? I don't care. If he doesn't see that his behavior is destroying what chance we had at having a loving relationship and marriage, then he is completely and utterly blind. Of course I've suspected that for a while.
Here we go again...
"You're not taking my tent!!!"
"Yes, I am."
"No, you're not!"
"Okay, I won't take the tent. I don't care. But I'm leaving, and I'll sleep in the back of my truck."
"You're not going to take my tent!"
Duh, dumbass, I think, but I don't say it out loud.
"garçon stupide, you need to control your anger against me. You really need to get counseling. I don't care where you get it from, but you really need it. Because if you don't get it soon, you're going to lose yourself a wife."
"Then go. Go! And don't come back."
"Okay. I will." So I pick up my suitcase, my bag, and my tea. "See you."
"Where are you going to go?"
"I'm not going to tell you."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't want you to know."
"Why not?"
Incredulous stare. Gee. You figure it out, buddy.
So he pushes me towards the door. And I'm standing there, thinking, you idiot, you don't realize what you're doing, do you?
His fists are clenched, he's breathing hard, and I try one last time. "garçon stupide, get the stuff, we'll pack up, and go camping with your parents."
He advances.
"Give me an excuse," I say.
He slaps me.
I walk out, get into my truck, and drive around the block.
My cell phone rings.
"If you don't come back here, I'm going to break your computer."
"Wrong answer," I say, and hang up.
My cell phone rings. "If you don't..."
I hang up.
I drive around the block again. He is watching me from the doorway. My cell phone rings.
"Please come back."
"And?"
"It's all my fault."
"And?"
"You were right."
"And?"
"I shouldn't have yelled at you like that."
"And?"
"Or slapped you. I'm sorry."
"If you ever do that again, I'm gone, garçon stupide. I'm dead serious. This is your last chance."
And being the patron saint of last chances lately, I mean what I say.
"Bring the truck around front. We'll load it up and go camping."
So I do.
And it's hug and make-up time, of course. And we load up the truck and we're off.
On our way, I tell him about resigning my position at Forward Motion. He says that if I'm not getting paid for a job and if the job has nothing to do with my Goal, I shouldn't be doing it. I can agree. Once upon a time, Forward Motion had quite a bit to do with my goal, but that deteriotated over time along with the climate there. When I told him about the Nazi reference, he agreed. He said, "You can't have a community and expect everyone to agree with you." I explained the living room reference. He said, "Yeah, but you can't expect every person you invite into your home to have the same values and stuff that you do. And you certainly can't tell them to shut up or keep them silent if they don't agree with you."
Thus vindicated, we tried to move on.
We made it to the campground without any blowups. We set up the tent without any blowups. We sniped a bit, and I told his Dad to see if Walmart had attitude adjustments, and if so, to buy garçon stupide one.
Here's what I figure:
We drove my truck. Therefore, if things go bad, I have a way out.
He brought his fishing pole. I brought my Visor and my swimming suit. I don't have to spend any time with him if he's being an idiot again.
I can always sleep in the truck if I have to. But I will stand by my convictions.
I have a limited amount of patience. It ran out this morning.
More later, hopefully. I think I'm going to go sit out on the picnic table and write for a bit. (Feed my addiction, of course.)
Later:
Well, I'm not at all sure I'm allowed to be here, considering I had to walk under a fence to get here, but I'm sitting on a tree currently, being buffeted by wind. There is no wind at the campground, btw. It's fairly hot there. But here... heaven. I'm going to write a bit. Still haven't decided who gets the next chapter, though. Must flip coin.
Lucas and Althea? Well, considering the rest of my POV characters are with each other right now, I guess Lucas and Althea it is.
More later. :)
5/26/02 morning (cold!!)
Well, it didn't end up being Lucas and Althea, but just Althea. And I managed to figure out what's going to happen next. I'm not sure if anyone will die, but Althea's going to try her best to commit a couple of murders, at least.
Last night, it rained. Quite a bit, actually, and there was wind, and lightning, and basically a spectacular storm. It was over within 45 minutes, but we could see our breath in the air afterwards. (That was more of a humidity thing than a coldness thing, but it was still kind of cool.)
They predicted another storm on its way, but it never arrived.
This morning was coooold. It must be about 45 degrees, and Very Frigid. Unfortunately, I neglected to pack winter clothing. I did pack one long sleeved shirt for me, and a pair of jeans, but that's it. Oh well. Such is life.
I'm not going to church with everyone this morning. In fact, I haven't made a concentrated effort to go to church since I moved to Columbus and realized that I was going through the motions more than anything, and had been for a while. I still believe in God, of course, and we have many long conversations to and from my way to work, but I just can't see going to Mass when I don't feel comfortable there. There are a lot of things I agree with regarding the church and a lot of things I disagree with. When the agrees outweigh the disagrees,
perhaps this will pass and I will return to the church again; I'm leaving that option open. But for right now, the best option seems to be for me to talk to God on my own time, in my own way.
So, with that in mind, I'm going to stay here, wait until the showers are free, shower at my leisure, and get dressed. I will eat something for breakfast, and sit and commune with Nature for a while, I think.
Actually, garçon stupide is going to church with his family. So maybe the Word of God will help him a bit.
(Needless to say, he's been fine since yesterday evening.)
More later...
Now later...
Just got back from a bit over two hours in a paddle boat on the lake. I brought a book (Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett, which I'm rereading for the umpteenth time) and garçon stupide brought his fishing pole. My legs hurt. We got the paddle boat because it was the only kind left that we could afford. It was nice, though, but I'm sitting here in the tent now. I think two and some odd hours on the lake with the sunlight reflecting and beating down on us is rather enough for one day and one person.
I dropped garçon stupide off to fish some more and came back here. Now I'm writing, obviously. I'm also trying to ignore the siren song of a Drumstick (Ice cream, of course!) I might end up going to get one anyway; I need chocolate.
The lake was nice. The paddle boat was nice. We cooked hot dogs and brats over an open fire for lunch. I'm having a rather relaxing day so far.
Oh, and just for the record, I did not attempt to back the truck into the parking place. I'm not that good. Not yet, at least, with that cap on the back of it. :)
More later. I have a chapter I'd like to write that is close to pinpointing the rest of the book, I think. We shall see.
Later, 9:40pm according to the clock on the Visor. I'm tired. I've probably walked five miles today if you count the paddle boat. I took a long walk earlier before supper, which was rather nice, but my legs ache. I have sunburn right above my knees too, which is weird. I even had sunscreen on. But it's not that bad.
We're leaving tomorrow. We shall see how things go packing up-wise.
Right now, I'm really tired, so I'm wrapping up the last of the weekend journaling and perhaps writing a bit more on the chapter I'm not quite finished with yet.
Things be progressing.
I will probably wrap up this journal tomorrow when we get home.
5/27/02
This is going to be one long post, let me tell you. We will see if BlogBuddy chokes on it.
Well, we got home. Cleanup wasn't bad, but Mr. garçon stupide got snippy when he asked me what I wanted to do this evening. Okay... I thought, geez, we just got home and you want to go back out? So I said I wanted to stay home and maybe order in a movie, but the stupid movie thing wasn't working. So then, at 2:15, he asks me what I want for supper. At that point, I had no earthly idea, and told him so. So he gets all pissy and mad and I go upstairs. Now he's asleep.
The weekend wasn't bad. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad. Of course now I come home to the bills and etc., etc. *sigh* Sometimes I just wish I could walk away from all of this crap. :(
Oh well. I'm posting auctions for the rest of the afternoon/evening, five day auctions, I think.
Well, I'm camping. Mom was right; garçon stupide
thrives on confrontations. He came very close to losing a wife today.
We woke up late, and of course it was my fault. Unbeknownst to me, I was supposed to wake up at 7am and get everything ready to go, because poor little garçon stupide had to work until midnight last night.
Now, mind you, I spent last night packing everything and getting everything together. The only things that had to be done were the actual packing of the truck (and remind me not to crawl on my poor knees on the truck bed ever again) and getting the perishable food and the ice into the coolers.
But we woke up at 9am. I did turn off both alarms this morning; I was up until almost midnight so I didn't see any reason why I should have to get up early. And garçon stupide had not bothered to tell me what time he wanted to leave.
Hold in a second. I'm going to get the suitcases.
Okay. I'm back. Figured I'd better get my tea too, so I could have something to drink.
Anyway, so I woke up at 9am. Normally, my wake-up time is 8 or 8:30, so I was rather surprised I had gotten up so late.
And of course, it was all my fault.
"It's going to rain!!" he exclaims. "We're late!! You're stupid!! You're an idiot moron!!"
"garçon stupide, there is no reason to get pissy because we woke up late. Let's get everything together, and we'll be fine."
"It's going to RAIN!!! We might as well not go!!!! You're so stupid!!!!! We'll be putting the tent up in the RAIN!!!"
(as a slight aside, I'm sitting here in our tent while garçon stupide and his Dad go to WalMart for stuff. It is quite sunny, warm, and humid. It hasn't rained yet.)
"Look. If you're acting this way when we sleep in late, how are you going to act when we're putting the tent up and something goes wrong?"
"It's going to RAIIN!!!!! You are so stupid! You should have been up hours ago getting everything ready to pack! You should have been dressed and showered and breakfasted!!"
"Could haves, would haves, and should haves do not 'am now' make, garçon stupide. We woke up late. Big deal."
"I'm going to be ready to go in fifteen minutes. If you're not ready to go by then, I'm going to leave without you."
"Then perhaps I'd just better not go. Because if you're acting like this now..."
"I'm going to be ready to go in fifteen minutes... etc., etc."
A half an hour passes.
I'm ready to go. Everything's ready to be packed in the truck. garçon stupide is upstairs, lying on our bed, (you guessed it) watching TV. It is now 10:15. So far this morning, I have checked my email (but not replied to any yet), checked my blog and read the comments from last night, eaten one piece of cinammon bread for breakfast (while being yelled at; I threw the other piece away after eating half of it because I was crying too hard to chew), brought the air mattress from the basement, gathered up pillows and sheets, packed both coolers (thanks, Mom and Dad!!), showered, got dressed, and remembered to pack my deoderant. So far this morning, garçon stupide had woken up mad, yelled at me while I was checking my email and blog, yelled at me while he went to the bathroom, yelled at me when I insisted on eating breakfast, yelled at me while I was loading the coolers, and yelled and pushed me while I was attempting to get the things checked off on my list. Hmm. I am not amused.
At least he is dressed, I think. But my fury has a slow boil. It's just about there.
"I'm ready to go. "
He looks at me, raises his eyebrows.
"I thought you were supposed to be packing up the truck while I took a shower and got dressed."
He flips the channels.
I turn off the TV. He turns it back on.
I say, "Okay, who's addicted?" and stand in front of the TV.
He is silent, pretending he can see through me.
"I think you need to get your ass downstairs and grab the bags and get going. You're so worried about rain; let's go."
I take my bags and go downstairs.
Silence from above.
Yes, a slow boil. But I'm about to boil over, I am. I have a limited amount of patience. My patience is just about at an end.
"garçon stupide, you'd better get your ass down here!"
Silence.
"Okay, fine. I'm going to go camping with your parents. I'm going to take the tent and my bags, and have a nice weekend. See you later. Hope you like watching TV."
(My vocabulary also deteriorates the angrier I get, at least verbally.)
He comes downstairs. He is radiating anger. But you know what? I don't care. If he doesn't see that his behavior is destroying what chance we had at having a loving relationship and marriage, then he is completely and utterly blind. Of course I've suspected that for a while.
Here we go again...
"You're not taking my tent!!!"
"Yes, I am."
"No, you're not!"
"Okay, I won't take the tent. I don't care. But I'm leaving, and I'll sleep in the back of my truck."
"You're not going to take my tent!"
Duh, dumbass, I think, but I don't say it out loud.
"garçon stupide, you need to control your anger against me. You really need to get counseling. I don't care where you get it from, but you really need it. Because if you don't get it soon, you're going to lose yourself a wife."
"Then go. Go! And don't come back."
"Okay. I will." So I pick up my suitcase, my bag, and my tea. "See you."
"Where are you going to go?"
"I'm not going to tell you."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't want you to know."
"Why not?"
Incredulous stare. Gee. You figure it out, buddy.
So he pushes me towards the door. And I'm standing there, thinking, you idiot, you don't realize what you're doing, do you?
His fists are clenched, he's breathing hard, and I try one last time. "garçon stupide, get the stuff, we'll pack up, and go camping with your parents."
He advances.
"Give me an excuse," I say.
He slaps me.
I walk out, get into my truck, and drive around the block.
My cell phone rings.
"If you don't come back here, I'm going to break your computer."
"Wrong answer," I say, and hang up.
My cell phone rings. "If you don't..."
I hang up.
I drive around the block again. He is watching me from the doorway. My cell phone rings.
"Please come back."
"And?"
"It's all my fault."
"And?"
"You were right."
"And?"
"I shouldn't have yelled at you like that."
"And?"
"Or slapped you. I'm sorry."
"If you ever do that again, I'm gone, garçon stupide. I'm dead serious. This is your last chance."
And being the patron saint of last chances lately, I mean what I say.
"Bring the truck around front. We'll load it up and go camping."
So I do.
And it's hug and make-up time, of course. And we load up the truck and we're off.
On our way, I tell him about resigning my position at Forward Motion. He says that if I'm not getting paid for a job and if the job has nothing to do with my Goal, I shouldn't be doing it. I can agree. Once upon a time, Forward Motion had quite a bit to do with my goal, but that deteriotated over time along with the climate there. When I told him about the Nazi reference, he agreed. He said, "You can't have a community and expect everyone to agree with you." I explained the living room reference. He said, "Yeah, but you can't expect every person you invite into your home to have the same values and stuff that you do. And you certainly can't tell them to shut up or keep them silent if they don't agree with you."
Thus vindicated, we tried to move on.
We made it to the campground without any blowups. We set up the tent without any blowups. We sniped a bit, and I told his Dad to see if Walmart had attitude adjustments, and if so, to buy garçon stupide one.
Here's what I figure:
We drove my truck. Therefore, if things go bad, I have a way out.
He brought his fishing pole. I brought my Visor and my swimming suit. I don't have to spend any time with him if he's being an idiot again.
I can always sleep in the truck if I have to. But I will stand by my convictions.
I have a limited amount of patience. It ran out this morning.
More later, hopefully. I think I'm going to go sit out on the picnic table and write for a bit. (Feed my addiction, of course.)
Later:
Well, I'm not at all sure I'm allowed to be here, considering I had to walk under a fence to get here, but I'm sitting on a tree currently, being buffeted by wind. There is no wind at the campground, btw. It's fairly hot there. But here... heaven. I'm going to write a bit. Still haven't decided who gets the next chapter, though. Must flip coin.
Lucas and Althea? Well, considering the rest of my POV characters are with each other right now, I guess Lucas and Althea it is.
More later. :)
5/26/02 morning (cold!!)
Well, it didn't end up being Lucas and Althea, but just Althea. And I managed to figure out what's going to happen next. I'm not sure if anyone will die, but Althea's going to try her best to commit a couple of murders, at least.
Last night, it rained. Quite a bit, actually, and there was wind, and lightning, and basically a spectacular storm. It was over within 45 minutes, but we could see our breath in the air afterwards. (That was more of a humidity thing than a coldness thing, but it was still kind of cool.)
They predicted another storm on its way, but it never arrived.
This morning was coooold. It must be about 45 degrees, and Very Frigid. Unfortunately, I neglected to pack winter clothing. I did pack one long sleeved shirt for me, and a pair of jeans, but that's it. Oh well. Such is life.
I'm not going to church with everyone this morning. In fact, I haven't made a concentrated effort to go to church since I moved to Columbus and realized that I was going through the motions more than anything, and had been for a while. I still believe in God, of course, and we have many long conversations to and from my way to work, but I just can't see going to Mass when I don't feel comfortable there. There are a lot of things I agree with regarding the church and a lot of things I disagree with. When the agrees outweigh the disagrees,
perhaps this will pass and I will return to the church again; I'm leaving that option open. But for right now, the best option seems to be for me to talk to God on my own time, in my own way.
So, with that in mind, I'm going to stay here, wait until the showers are free, shower at my leisure, and get dressed. I will eat something for breakfast, and sit and commune with Nature for a while, I think.
Actually, garçon stupide is going to church with his family. So maybe the Word of God will help him a bit.
(Needless to say, he's been fine since yesterday evening.)
More later...
Now later...
Just got back from a bit over two hours in a paddle boat on the lake. I brought a book (Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett, which I'm rereading for the umpteenth time) and garçon stupide brought his fishing pole. My legs hurt. We got the paddle boat because it was the only kind left that we could afford. It was nice, though, but I'm sitting here in the tent now. I think two and some odd hours on the lake with the sunlight reflecting and beating down on us is rather enough for one day and one person.
I dropped garçon stupide off to fish some more and came back here. Now I'm writing, obviously. I'm also trying to ignore the siren song of a Drumstick (Ice cream, of course!) I might end up going to get one anyway; I need chocolate.
The lake was nice. The paddle boat was nice. We cooked hot dogs and brats over an open fire for lunch. I'm having a rather relaxing day so far.
Oh, and just for the record, I did not attempt to back the truck into the parking place. I'm not that good. Not yet, at least, with that cap on the back of it. :)
More later. I have a chapter I'd like to write that is close to pinpointing the rest of the book, I think. We shall see.
Later, 9:40pm according to the clock on the Visor. I'm tired. I've probably walked five miles today if you count the paddle boat. I took a long walk earlier before supper, which was rather nice, but my legs ache. I have sunburn right above my knees too, which is weird. I even had sunscreen on. But it's not that bad.
We're leaving tomorrow. We shall see how things go packing up-wise.
Right now, I'm really tired, so I'm wrapping up the last of the weekend journaling and perhaps writing a bit more on the chapter I'm not quite finished with yet.
Things be progressing.
I will probably wrap up this journal tomorrow when we get home.
5/27/02
This is going to be one long post, let me tell you. We will see if BlogBuddy chokes on it.
Well, we got home. Cleanup wasn't bad, but Mr. garçon stupide got snippy when he asked me what I wanted to do this evening. Okay... I thought, geez, we just got home and you want to go back out? So I said I wanted to stay home and maybe order in a movie, but the stupid movie thing wasn't working. So then, at 2:15, he asks me what I want for supper. At that point, I had no earthly idea, and told him so. So he gets all pissy and mad and I go upstairs. Now he's asleep.
The weekend wasn't bad. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad. Of course now I come home to the bills and etc., etc. *sigh* Sometimes I just wish I could walk away from all of this crap. :(
Oh well. I'm posting auctions for the rest of the afternoon/evening, five day auctions, I think.
