Weird Mood

My awesome, fuzzy Iron Man cake

    I’m 26 years old.  Ten years ago I got my license.  Eight years ago I graduated from high school.  Eight years ago I moved out of my parents’ house, and seven years ago I moved back in.  I’ve come a long way since then, but as cliche as it sounds, who I became in high school is still a large part of who I am.
    I’m no longer full of unfounded angst against my parents (now I know exactly where it comes from).  I think most of my problem then was that I was angry.  I’m still not thrilled with everything, but I’ve learned to channel it in a more positive way.
    I actually own clothes, and sometimes buy clothes I have no need for.  This definitely stems from wearing a uniform for four years.  Who I am is very much reflected in what I wear, which now consists mostly of t-shirts, but when I first bought clothes consisted almost exclusively of corset-y type things.  I looked good, maybe I should invest in some more.  You know, the fake but still hot ones Hot Topic has.  Nothing that will crack my ribs, don’t worry.
    I’m still a metal head, and I still love to read and write.  I’m still very loyal to my friends, and I’m still tough to deal with when I feel betrayed.  I tamped that feeling down for a long time, but I’ve been embracing it lately.
    I’ve had a weird week.  My birthday (on Monday) was good and low-key, just the way I like it.  But my ex-boyfriend (yeah, the horrible one) emailed me to say Happy Birthday.  I don’t like it, but he’s emailed me several times, and has been nothing but nice, but I’m still on edge when it happens.  And you know what?  It’s petty and lame, but *Eddie* didn’t say Happy Birthday.  I sent him a picture of my awesome cake (pictured above), and he said it was cool.  That was Sunday.  Not a fucking peep since then.  I don’t know why I didn’t expect this, because if a situation can be upside down, my life will make it so.
    For some reason it reminded me of my high school boyfriend, who I stayed friends with after we broke up.  He hasn’t really talked to me since he got a new girlfriend, which is a bummer because the one in between me and the new one was totally cool with us being friends, and in fact was kind of friends with me herself.  I really don’t wish this new girl any ill will, and I’m in no way trying to steal her boyfriend from her, but if he’s been honest with her, and I hope he has, she might think I’m bad news.  We definitely hooked up after we broke up and when I had a new boyfriend.  And a second new boyfriend.  We broke up when I was nineteen and we didn’t stop occasionally hooking up until I was almost twenty-one.  Oops.
    Anyway.  Things deteriorated, obviously, and ended kind of badly, but he genuinely loved me.  We started out as very different people, but for some reason that didn’t matter.  If I met a guy now who told me my music was crap and he’d show me real music, I’d give him the finger and that would be that.  But he said it, and I decided to listen to him, and it’s a good thing, too, because that “real” music was metal, which as I’ve said is a big part of who I am now.
    In the second (and last) summer we lived together, he and his parents had switched rooms, and now our rooms were connected by french doors (which stayed closed before).  Things were obviously dicey, but he still tried to be nice to me.  He could tell I was miserable, and really unhappy with the way things were.  I went back to school that September, but all that summer I was working two jobs, and had hardly any free time.  When he wasn’t being nice to me, he was doing stuff he had to make up for later, like being up late drinking with his friends when I had work in the morning.  This wouldn’t be so bad, except that they were in the next room with all the lights on, and they would come into my room and bug me.
    There was this one song, from The Les Claypool Frog Brigade’s album Purple Onion (both that band and Primus are good shit) called “David Makalaster.”  For some reason that song was really soothing to me, and it helped me fall asleep.  On nights when he wasn’t trying to keep me up, and even some of those nights, he would play it for me to help me fall asleep.  I remember every once in a while he’d sit next to me and stroke my hair while I fell asleep.  That song makes me feel really nostalgic when I hear it, and it’s kind of a bummer that no one since has lived up to that really simple act of lulling me to sleep.
    Which brings me back to why I’m annoyed with *Eddie*.  He damn well knew it was my birthday, and one time a book Les Claypool wrote (South of the Pumphouse) came up, and I said it was written by him.
    “What?” he said.  I asked if he knew who that was, and when he said yes I smiled.  I haven’t read the book, though I want to, and him knowing who that was made me see a little bit of that one way my old boyfriend could show me he loved me. *Eddie* has also been to Bonnaroo before, and so has my old boyfriend.  He’s also kind of squishy like my old boyfriend, whereas two of the three since have been sickly thin, and one had an oddly hard beer belly.  The squishiness makes me feel comfortable.
    So why is this random memory bubbling up, and why is *Eddie* making me feel this weird mish-mash of PG feelings and X-rated feelings, but he can’t fucking say Happy Birthday and my asshole of an ex can?