Ciao, Bello!

I am going to Italy in December -- Milano during Christmas week. For work. Sounds like a dream job, right?

So why am I so not very excited?

1) I don't know where my expired passport is. I remember finding it, and my birth certificate a couple of years ago, and putting both in a "safe" place. Apparently, they are now both safe from me.

2) Why is my passport expired, you ask? Because I've never really traveled out of the country, other than vacations to Bermuda, Puerto Rico (doesn't count as leaving the country -- it barely counts as leaving New York) and Canada (again, doesn't really count if you don't leave the land mass you were born on). I've always approached international travel from an "I've been to New York City, why would I want to go anywhere else?" perspective, and I'm vaguely ashamed that I am 46 years old and I haven't BEEN anywhere. Not even England or Ireland, where they speak a reasonable facsimile of English as I know it. Hey, I've fucked people from England and Ireland, does that count?

3) I'm so fucking broke all the time, that big travel is just not in my budget now or in the forseeable future. And the prospect of a free trip to Italy should excite me, but the idea that I will be in Milan without possessing an American Express card just leaves me ineffably glum.

4) I don't speak Italian, and I will be expected to communicate important information regarding my job, to Italians. Here's the sum total of what I know how to say in Italian besides "ciao!"

"Chi e quel ragazzo?"

This is a cute party trick when hanging out with my gay Italian friend from Bensonhurst, or if I happened to be single, but for navigating my way through an airport or taxi queue, or checking into a hotel, it's no great shakes and may in fact cause me no end of agita. Wait, there's another Italian word that I know! Agita!

5) I'm secretly terrified that al Qaeda will choose Christmas week to make a statement and blow up an international transoceanic flight, and that the only thing that will be recovered of my earthly remains will be a one-quart Ziploc bag full of hotel-sized Aveda shampoo bottles.

6) Christmas? I gotta travel overseas at Christmas? Then I sort of shrug my shoulders and tell myself, "Oh, well, it's not like I have anything special planned for Christmas," and that makes me sad, like I'm some spinster with a cat and a family who makes her crazy and no parents to call on Christmas Day anymore.

* * * * * * * * * *

And in the meantime, I'm struggling, my bloggy pals, to navigate the unfamiliar shoreline of "being in a relationship," and I swear to God I am having a really hard time with it. Am I just too set in my ways?

I am having boundary issues, as I believe there should be some boundaries, and places that we don't need to go, but this seems to be counter to a commitment made to "openness and honesty and truth."

See, I feel that beyond OH&T, there's this weird no-man's land called, "More Information Than I Wanted or Needed." That boundary is porous, I know, which means it needs to be navigated with extreme care and delicacy. When I express any discomfort with a breach of that emotional DMZ, I then start to feel like a) a huge prude, b) a huge bitch, or worst of all c) some kind pf crazy person when I openly, and honestly, and truthfully say what is on my mind, which may entail some awful Bad Thought, which I immediately assume must mean I'm a Bad Person, and really, people, how could anyone possibly love anyone as awful as me?

Look, I'm a handful, I know, and I've reached a point in my life where I have no interest in playing games, and I really don't have time to be bullshit, but Christ Alfuckingmighty, sometimes the "not bullshit" Aileen is someone even I can't stand to be around.

Plus, someone told me today, in words said out loud, to "shut up," and it hurt my feelings, and now I'm looking around in the shed for a crowbar or a Hurst Tool because as soon as I heard it, something inside me slammed shut with a nearly audible "clang" and I'm turtling a little bit.

Jesus, how do people do this? I'm smart, and yet I can't seem to stop fucking up or holding on the tiller of this boat while navigating it straight onto the rocks.

Because I Loves Me Some Catholic Humor

Random Note Found on My Blackberry

Jotted in the Notes on 6/18/10, after awakening from a nap:

Dream Nap 6/18

I am in CA on business and someone whom I know, but don't know, is there as well (you know how that is in dreams. In the dream you know the person, but in real life you don't know him).

I am checked into a hotel I don't recognize. One of those older hotels that has been remodeled and expanded. I am in the older, lower more motel-like part, the kind with outdoor entrances. Room 202. He has a room in the newer wing, room 502. I can see the new wing from the door of my room, it is in the style of California Spanish. Adobe with a tiled roof.

I need to leave my room for something, and when I return I realize that I have left the door wide open with all of my belongings exposed. My handbag is open on the bed, laptop on a table. Strangely, nothing is touched. The room is exactly as I left it.

The red message light on the phone is blinking, and when I retrieve my voice mail there is just one message. A male voice, and I know it is the voice of the man I know is there. "I am here. I can see into your room from mine." I don't feel afraid or threatened because I recognize his voice. And I already knew what room he was in.

Dream shift and I am sitting in a chair. I know I am still somewhere in this hotel. There is a man standing behind me. It is the man from room 502. His hands are on my shoulders and tangled in my hair and occasionally, around my neck. Again, I am not afraid. Though I try to turn around to look at him, his hands stop me.

"Wait." he says. "Wait. Not yet."

I settle back in the chair, bow my head, and let him rub my neck.

Wordless Wednesday

Tired to Death, Tired of Death, Day of the Dead

Maybe what I need isn't Noble Silence but a couple of days under the porch. Or a night on the jar with some friends.

I know, I know, it's the Day of the Dead, All Saints' Day, blah, blah, blah. I'm supposed to reckon with the dead and tell 'em what's going on, and leave cookies and milk by the Christmas tree for them, oh wait, am I getting my holidays mixed up? Or is this the day when those guys roll back the stone in front of the tomb after three days and yank out a disgruntled rodent? Maybe it's the one where we celebrate those people fleeing religious persecution in England because they brought smallpox-riddled blankets to wipe out indigenous peoples...

Can't seem to keep my bank holidays straight...

Even though today's supposed to be el dia de los muertos, honestly, I'm tired of death. Really, really tired of it.

Just got off a the phone with my sister, who was hysterical because she had to have another one of her cats put to sleep today. This one was really hard for her because he was her late husband's cat, and really her last tie to him. Okay, he was probably the most evil cat you've ever met (his name was Chaos), but still.

All these deaths -- pets, parents, relationships...it just makes me tired. I think if I went home tonight and found one of my plants dead I'd probably kill myself.

All I can say, and I'll say this again, if I'm ever at the point where I'm blind, deaf, and incontinent, make sure there's a needle for me.  NO EXTRAORDINARY MEASURES. There, it's in writing, these are my words, and that's the fact, Jack.

So here's my Day of the Dead shout-out to my Dads:

Dear Dad:


Hope you're doing okay wherever you are, and that there is lots of cold beer and good sprint car racing there. Were you able to take up smoking again? I know you really missed your Pall Malls, even after you had the quintuple bypass and had to quit.


I still miss our phone calls on Sunday morning after all the talk shows. Just in case you don't have cable wherever you are, we did dodge a huge bullet with that moron from Alaska. And don't get me started on the Teabaggers.


Things are pretty good for me right now. Got promoted at work, thought you'd like to hear about that. And oh, I met a guy, and didn't have to go halfway around the globe to do it, like some other sisters of mine I won't mention.  You'd like him. I sure do. A whole lot.


Well, that's all I have for ya, Dad. Hope Mum found you, I know she was always asking where you were after you left. She would even make me turn on the outside lights for you so you would be able to find your way up the driveway. "Where's my danna-san?" she would ask. "He should be home by now."


I'll bet you guys are sitting in some 70's fake-wood paneled room together right now, and she just made you one of those little plates of pepperoni and cheese for a snack, just like you used to like. Am I right?


Hey, Dad? If you're still anywhere around, knock something over or slam a door or something, okay? Your baby girl really misses you.


Love,
AiAi