I just had raw cauliflower soup and I feel GREAT
On Wednesday I had coffee with the lovely Min Jung. She told me that she recently did a raw food diet for ten days. I was intrigued. I had been wanting to eat more raw food but it had always seemed like such a struggle to me. I would have to go shopping for exotic ingredients all the time and get all these food processing gadgets, and I would have to spend hours preparing food. But when talking to Min Jung, it sounded like no big deal at all to go raw. She said "I just ate a lot of zucchini slices." So I decided to give it a try. I started yesterday and am planning on staying on the diet for nine days, until next Friday.
These days food fills the purpose of not being hungry anymore for me. It was different when I was still working 9 to 5. Then, the purpose of food was consolation. "I sit at a desk all day, so when I go have lunch, I better have something that's tasty and exciting and a lot of it" is what went through my subconscious every day. But now, I'm so happy all day long that I could care less what I eat, as long as it's healthy and fills me up. And a bunch of zucchini slices might just do that.
Yesterday for lunch I cheated and I went to Café Gratitude. But that's okay. I plan on cheating many more times because why the hell not? For dinner I had broccoli cole slaw with pine nuts.
This morning for breakfast I had mushed up bananas with blueberries and walnuts. It was awesome. For lunch I made cream of cauliflower soup. It wasn't very good but once I added sea salt and halved baby tomatoes, I was able to eat it. I'm learning that perhaps pine nuts aren't the best choice to make cream but it certainly was creamy. After a few spoons, I could tell that my belly was very excited, and after I finished, my belly was full and super happy. I could totally feel it saying "Thank you, thank you! Give me more of that kind of stuff." My whole body and mind felt really good. I'm considering that perhaps the way I feel is more important than the way things taste.
|
.: posted by Vera 
|
|
I'm an inspiration!
Being an inspiration to others is one of the greatest feelings in the world. This week two people told me that I was an inspiration for someone they know.
On Monday I ran into a guy from my old office I didn't know very well. We talked for a while at the BART station. He told me that he remembers my good-bye email and that he had shown it to his girlfriend who got very inspired and intrigued. She recently quit her job too and is now figuring out what she wants to do next. He thinks she and I should hang out. Thanks for saying that, Ariel!
Then on Tuesday I talked to my friend Jessica on the phone. She told me about someone she knows who feels stuck in a job he hates. She had told him about me before and said that I quit my job a few months ago and am now a psychic-babysitter-taxi driver-something else. He had responded by saying "Maybe I'll use her as my inspiration." Thanks for telling me, Jessica!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
I have been linked by The Stranger!
My article about Kyle Huff's motive has been linked by The Stranger here and here. Even though I didn't say so myself, David Schmader of the Stranger's blog, knew "Like so many others, Fleischer is knotted up over Saturday's massacre and the mystery of what may have been driving suicidal gunman Kyle Huff." And it's so true. I have been thinking about the murders a lot. As a former raver, I am deeply affected by the incident. I am knotted up.
P.S.: I never thought I would ever call myself a former raver. But there it is!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
I never get any
There was a period in my early teens when I never got any. There was also a period in my late teens when I never got any and one in my early 20's and another one in my late 20's. But we're not talking about those right now. Today we're talking about how I never got any in my early teens.
All I really have to say to make this point is that the first time I kissed a boy was on my 15th birthday. But in addition to never getting any myself, there were multiple times when I witnessed other people getting some. My friends. My friends got some and I didn't, while we were in the same room together! Oh, the horror.
The first time happened when I was 12. One of my good friends at the time was Anja. I adored Anja. She was super funny, super cute and super sexy. We looked similar in the sense that we both had curly shoulder-length bobs. Except that mine looked like a 'fro and hers like Jennifer Grey in Dirty Dancing. Except that hers was blond and mine was brown; I wore glasses and she didn't; I was tall and she was so petite you wanted to pick her up and swing her all around. In short, she was hot and I was not. At some point, Anja and my neighbor and buddy since age 2, Tobi, decided to be girlfriend and boyfriend. One afternoon Anja came over to my house, so that we could go across the street to hang out with Tobi. When we got there I said "Tobi, can I play the insect game on the Atari?" Normally he would have told me to wait until it was my turn, but this time he didn't, so I started playing the game. I played and played and noticed that Tobi and Anja were awfully quiet. I turned around to look, and they were making out. Freaked out, I turned back to my game. I thought "What, they're making out? Already? Without asking me? What if I stopped playing the computer game, what would I do, watch them? Why don't I have anybody to make out with? Why does Anja always have boyfriends and I don't? Why doesn't Tobi ever make out with me?"
About a year later I was 13. I had just made a new friend named Julia, who was 10. She is not to be confused with my best friend Julia--that's Julia L. She is also not to be confused with any of the other Julias I knew. They were, in order of appearance, Julia G., Julia Z., Julia T., Julia P., Julia M., and Julia L. This was Julia T. She was beautiful. I had hardly ever seen such compelling beauty before. Not cute and sexy and perky like Anja but gorgeous, like Alicia Silverstone with brown hair, except that I didn't know Alicia Silverstone then. Julia T. was gorgeous. Any guy in Germany I ever thought was cute would at one point or another go out with her. But I didn't know this then, when Julia was only 10. She was going out with a guy my friend Sandy and I knew, named Patrick. I never thought Patrick was particularly cute, but he did intimidate and insecure me. While I didn't really think at the time that I was ugly and dorky, when I was around him I felt ugly and dorky. One day Sandy, Patrick, Julia and I were at Sandy's cousin's house. Sandy left Julia, Patrick and me in a room upstairs and went downstairs to hang out with her cousin. I was sitting on a chair and Julia and Patrick were sitting on a bed. Patrick, half to express his affection for Julia and half to show off in front of me, started kissing Julia. I was like "He's kissing her! She's only 10! I'm 13 and nobody has ever kissed me!" I shifted uncomfortably in my chair and focused on a spot on the floor. When I looked up a little bit, I saw that Patrick's hand was on Julia's belly. Julia didn't have any boobs yet, so instead of moving upwards, his hand walked into her pants. I thought "Oh my God! He's touching her vagina! She's only 10! I'm 13 and nobody has ever touched MY vagina before! Nobody has ever even kissed me! I have never even had a boyfriend!" When Sandy walked back in, I was never happier to see her. Rescue me from this hell where I don't get any while a 10-year-old does!
A year of no boyfriend, no kissing and no fingering later, I was 14. One weekend I went away with a bunch of my friends as part of this youth group we were all in. We spent the night in sleeping bags in a gym in some other town, boys and girls. Some of us had been drinking, I think. One of my favorite things to do at the time was making people laugh. I succeeded at this often, but I think that when certain tough guys were concerned, such as the aforementioned Patrick and this other guy, Martin, they were actually laughing at ME instead of at my jokes. I have never scientifically proven this but I think they were. Not always, but sometimes. When we were all lying in our sleeping bags that night, Martin was laughing at everything I was saying or doing. I liked it at first, but after a while I started to feel stupid and ugly. My friend Manu and her boyfriend Markus were making out nearby. It gave me a bad feeling in my stomach because Markus was pretty cute and I would have made out with him in a second. Then I noticed that right next to me, Martin and Britta were making out! I was like "Whaaat? They're not even together! I didn't even know they liked each other! Why are they making out? And why isn't anybody making out with ME?" Inbetween make-out session with Britta, Martin made sure to take breaks to laugh at something I was saying or doing. It made me feel awful. I was a clown, a face to be laughed at. I wanted to be a babe, like Manu and Britta, lips to be kissed. Not by Martin, but by somebody.
I wanted to get some, damnit.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
New banner
I updated the grassy banner up there. Maryann took the original photo of me in September 2004. Yay!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
My new favorite school
I want to give some more praise to Flag-A-Cab Taxi School. I'm super impressed and inspired by the way its owner, Bill, and his partner, Mickey, do business. You can tell that they both really love what they are doing by how available they are for each and every one of their current and former students. Bill said that if we ever need help with directions while out there driving a taxi, we can call him. And Mickey will stay for hours after class is over, answering questions. I think he loves nothing more than sharing his experiences as a taxi driver with others. They both are very connected in the taxi bussiness and personally make sure that you get your license and that you get a job. They will keep calling their friends at taxi companies around the city until you have a job. When I went to a job interview on Thursday, Mickey was there too! That's what I call support. Imagine getting an engineering degreee from a university and your engineering professor showing up to your job interview! That's what it felt like.
Bill and Mickey have also put together an awesome taxi school curriculum. On Wednesday we went on a field trip to the airport. Taxis at the airport are its own world with their rules and regulations, and it was very helpful to see how things work down there. We also had many guest speakers in class. On ADA sensitivity training day, a woman in a wheelchair came in and told us how taxi drivers can help her, and a blind man came in with his guide dog and told us the same and took us out to a taxi to show us how to lead him, how to open the door for him, and how to treat his dog. On another day a financial advisor came in and talked to us about taxes, life insurance, retirement accounts, etc. As a taxi driver, you are your own boss, so you have to take care of all of those things yourself. What a great idea to prepare the students for that! Other than that, we learned about the geography of San Francisco, where all the hotels are, that crime on taxi drivers went down by 80% when the video cameras were installed in all San Francisco taxis, what to do about drunk or angry people, etc. One of my favorite exercises was how to get from point A to point B. First we discussed the shortest, most direct route. Then we found an alternative route that is almost as short and might even be quicker due to traffic. Finally we came up with a route to take if for some reason street S is totally blocked and we can't go that way at all, such as Castro Street on Halloween.
One of the things I like most is that Mickey and Bill have a really positive attitude. They told us to always drive slowly, to take breaks to stretch, to eat healthy meals during our shifts, to let go of our ego if another driver cuts us off or a passenger doesn't pay us, to be a day driver if we are a day person and to be a night driver if we are a night person. GREAT advice.
If everybody ran their businesses the way Bill and Mickey do, the world would be a better place.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
I can't believe I did this but I'm pretty sure I did
Last night I ordered a Nikon D50 . I took the quote Let the beauty you love be what you do to heart and am now able to take better quality--some might even say professional quality--pictures of beautiful things. I went from "I love taking pictures" to "I'm a photographer" with a single mouse click. I still can't believe I am spending this much money on a camera, and it even felt like something outside of myself moved my hand to click the "Place your order" button. But I'm thrilled!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
New ear rings
I got new dangly ear rings. Aren't they cute?
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
My psychosomatic obsessive disorder, Part 5 - Coming out of it
Back to Part 4
During the two years in which I had my psychosomatic obsessive disorder, I had several smaller obsessions that I won't mention and don't even remember. But one of them played an important role in me finally getting better. It was the obsession over waking up too early in the morning. I am and always have been a morning person. I usually wake up naturally between 7 and 8am. This became a problem for me when I was trying to diet. On weekends I usually woke up earlier than the rest of my family, and the first thing I wanted to do in the morning was eat something. (I am still like that today, by the way. If I don't eat something within an hour or so of waking up, I start feeling uncomfortably hungry.) So I would get myself something to eat, but then an hour or so later, the rest of my family would get up and have a big family breakfast, and I would want to join them for that. But then I would eat breakfast twice. And since I was trying to diet, that was unacceptable. I dreaded waking up on the weekends out of fear of waking up too early. I started obsessing over my wake up time, and it became like a sport for me. If I ever slept until 9 or, God forbit, 10, I was super happy. Sometimes I obsessed about it the night before, and it ruined my night. I was tired and wanted to go to bed, but I was so afraid that I would wake up too early the next morning that I forced myself to stay awake, but then I was miserably tired. And sometimes I even cried about it. On some Friday or Saturday nights I cried because I knew that I would wake up so early the next mroning that I would end up eating breakfast twice, and then I would be fat.
In the spring of 1988, towards the end of my 6th grade, my family went on vacation in Austria to ski. The second or so day that we were there, I started freaking out again about waking up too early the next day, and I started crying. My parents were frustrated because they were trying to enjoy their vacation. My dad told me that I had to stop crying about something that hadn't even happened yet. He said that if I woke up too early the next morning, I could still cry then. But if I continued to cry about it the night before when it hasn't even happened yet, our vacation was over and he would take us all back home. I stopped crying because I really wanted to stay in Austria and ski.
I don't know what time I woke up the next morning. But when I woke up that morning, I was healed. I could feel that I was happy again. I knew that the mental illness was gone, all of it. What my dad had said to me the night before had shifted something in me. Something finally got through to my head and made me realize that I had a choice to obsess over things and be miserable, or to not obsess over things and be okay. So I stopped all of my obsessing.
I finally started seeing that I wasn't fat and did not need to lose any weight. I did insist though that if I ever did get fat, I would be very upset. But that hadn't happened yet, so I was okay NOW. And look at that, 18 years later I'm still not fat!
The next time I saw Dr. Kammerer I told him that I was healed. He believed me. I saw him a few more times just to be sure, the last one being shortly after 7th grade started. I even brought him a book I had made: My creativity was back too. 7th grade went on to be totally awesome. I made lots of new friends at school and was my old funny, boisterous and energetic self again. I was back!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
My psychosomatic obsessive disorder, Part 4 - 6th grade
Back to Part 3
In 6th grade I wasn't suicidal anymore but I was still obsessed with food and being thin. And my general dissatisfaction with life persisted. And I developed a new obession. It was about wealth. In 6th grade I became aware that the parents of some of my new friends at school were very wealthy. I might have known wealthy people before but I hadn't seen this kind of wealth with these kinds of houses. Angela's father owned a factory. She had her own horse, and her family lived in a huge house with a grand piano and stairs as big as the ones at our school. Maxi's father was a chiropractor with his own practice. They lived in a very big and very stylish white house with a round window, a huge backyard with a pond and a little river, and a swimming pool in the basement. Katharina's father owned an antique furniture store. They lived in a huge house with an alarm system and expensive antique furniture everywhere. My family lived in a small one-story house with no alarm, pool, or antique furniture. Luckily, popularity in our class wasn't dependent on your parents' wealth. But I still noticed that these girls' families were wealthy, and mine wasn't. I also noticed that some of the girls in my class were wearing certain brand names I had never heard of before. Those brands were, in order of importance, Oilily, Esprit and Benetton. I became obsessed with having to have Oilily clothes.
My mom wouldn't have been caught dead buying us Oilily clothes. One of her main goals in life was to spend as little money on stuff as possible. Sometimes she knitted and sewed clothes for us because it was cheaper that way. And now I was making demands for Oilily clothes, which were about three times more expensive than my mom was used to spending.
After much arguing, pleading and screaming, my parents agreed to buy me a beautiful pair of pink Oilily pants, the most expensive piece of clothing I or my mom had ever owned. Maxi had blue Oilily pants and a pink and red Oilily sweatshirt that looked great together. I had pink Oilily pants and a generic pink sweatshirt, but still! I loved my Oilily pants. But I soon wanted more and started screaming again.
My dad said that he would gladly buy me all the Oilily I wanted if he knew that it would make me happy. But he said that he didn't think that all the clothes in the world would make me happy. I would find something else to be unhappy about. I had to admit that he was right. But I still wanted Oilily.
For Christmas, my mom and I found a blue Oilily coat that was on sale. It was still heinously expensive, but it was over 50% off of its original price. Katharina had the same coat in red. I had to have it. My mom bought it for me for Christmas. I was so excited, I took the coat to bed with me that night.
But I still wanted more. I was obsessed. I looked at everybody encountered to see if they were wearing Oilily or some other brand name. I started mentally putting people in the "wealthy" and "not wealthy" categories. I told my parents that I thought they should be more wealthy. I told them I was ashamed that our family wasn't wealthier. I told my mom to get a job so that we would have more money. I'm sure I hurt them a lot.
That year my parents bought us a dog. Her name was Sheila and she was a very cute puppy. I loved her, but I was also wishing that she had been pure bred and more expensive. I think one of the reasons my parents got her is that they were hoping a dog would make me happy again. And it did, for about a day. Just like the Oilily pants.
I complained to my parents that we didn't have a wealthy enough lifestyle. We lived in a house that was too small; we didn't fly on vacation but drove; we had generic store-brand chocolate bars, not the fancy brand kind. My dad took me to a four star hotel for a night, just me and him. I really appreciated the gesture and had a good time, but I still wasn't happy. Our family still wasn't wealthy.
While in 5th grade I was sad and angry, in 6th grade I was jealous and greedy. Jealous of other people's wealth, greedy for my own wealth, and nasty to my family. One time we watched a documentary aobut a heroin addict who was prostituting herself until a rich man fell in love with her and rescued her away from the streets and the drug. She was now married to a rich man. I said to my parents "Maybe I'll do some heroin so I can get rich too." My dad got angry and told me that money wasn't everything. He said that I had a sister and a brother and I should be thankful for that. I said that I would rather have a lot of money than a sister and a brother. He said that I should be ashamed of myself, and I was. I still am. I'm ashamed of the money-hungry monster I turned into at age 11.
I don't know how my parents continued to love me after all that, but somehow they did. I think many times during those two years, they told themselves that the little monster that was living in their house wasn't really me, but my mental illness.
Continue to Part 5
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
My psychosomatic obsessive disorder, Part 3 - Bodies and soul
Back to Part 2
This is what I looked like in the summer of 1986, just a few months before things got really bad.
One afternoon in 1986 I ate a Zwieback with butter on it. And then, just for fun and because it tasted so good, I had another one. My mom said "Watch out. If you keep eating like that, you'll rise like a pancake." I thought "Huh."
Another day, my friend Sandy was over and I told her that I thought my stomach was big. She said she didn't think that it was big. I said that it was definitely bigger than hers. She said "Maybe, but that doesn't mean it's big." I stood up, turned so she could see me sideways, and lifted my shirt. I breathed deeply into my stomach and pushed it all the way out and said "Look! That's how big it is. Doesn't it look like I'm pregnant?" Sandy said "Wow. When you do it like that, it does look a little bit like you're pregnant." And that's when I started sucking in my stomach, and to this day I still have to remind myself not to because it's so deeply programmed, now after almost 20 years.
My friends Sandy's and Mone's bodies were different from mine. I had brown hair; they were both blond. I wore glasses; they didn't. They were both petite--short and thin. I was tall and not really thin. I was pretty much exactly normal, whatever that means. I was by no means chubby or fat. You could call me slender, but you couldn't really me skinny. I was normal. But Mone and Sandy were skinnny. I wanted to be skinny too. I didn't want to be normal anymore.
I tried to diet but I didn't really have enough willpower to go through with it. The temptation of food was stronger than my desire to be thin and it kept roping me back to join the eating masses. I kept trying to stop eating though, just like the real anorexics. I liked the idea of my parents worrying about me not eating enough. I once asked my mom "Are you ever worried that I'm not eating enough?" She said no, she wasn't really worried about that. I was disappointed. I got down on myself for not being strong enough to pull it through. If I really managed to stop eating, somebody would surely worry about me sooner or later.
The truth is that everybody did worry about me. My family was worried sick about me. Not because I wasn't eating (because I was) but because I was just so sad. Around Christmas or so my grandma on my dad's side squeezed me tight against her big bosom and said "We can't have our girl be so sad! It's making us all sad that you're so sad!" She had tears in her eyes.
I cried every day. I had lost all interest in life. I had lost all interest in everything I enjoyed before. I didn't want to play. I didn't want to do art or crafts. I did play the piano though, especially this piece called Püppchens Begräbnis ("The funeral of the little doll") because it was really dark and somber and sad. And I read a lot of books. I read sad books, to be exact. Books about a 9-year-old girl dying from a brain tumor, books about an 11-year-old boy committing suicide, books about World War II, books about kids who were adopted, books about autistic kids, books about girls with anorexia. I loved reading books that made me cry. Crying about somebody else's life felt so good. I could do it for hours. Maybe it was because I wasn't allowed to cry about myself. My parents were always trying to get me to stop. They didn't like it when I cried. Only my grandma on my mom's side understood my need to cry. She had been treated for depression before, and she told me that sometimes she felt really good after crying, that crying helped her. Truth be told though, crying didn't really help me. It didn't make my belly any smaller.
My mom reguarly took me to the library to pick out books to read. I think she was worried that I was always reading sad books. The woman working at the library always had suggestions for me. In her carroty voice she would tell me about The Lord of the Rings and The Little Hobbit, and just how fantastic these fantasy books were. I told her everytime "I don't like that. Do you have any books about children who are mentally ill?"
My mom wanted me to get excited about life again. One day after school, the music teacher from my old elementary school, Frau Wältring, stopped by. She told me that she was leading the girls' scouts in our town and asked me if I would like to join. I said "No, definitely not." My mom came to the door as well. I knew suddenly that my mom had asked Frau Wältring to stop by. I said "No, I don't want to join the girls' scouts." My mom and Frau Wältring both looked said and concerned, and Frau Wältring left.
Mone and Sandy were still my friends. But they admitted that what was going on with me was a little bit weird. They also admitted that they didn't really know how to deal with it or what to do about my sadness. I translated that to them not wanting me anymore. One time early on, when my disease was just starting to surface, I remember being with Mone at a brook in the neighborhood. We looked at the water and the sticks and stones. Mone said something about one of the stones. She felt so innocent in that moment, and what we were doing was so innocent. But I knew that we were growing up, and the older kids were starting to influence us. There was fashion and music and popularity. There were social rules and ways to be cool and ways to be uncool. I could feel all of that encroaching on our innocent girlhood and friendship. I just wanted us to stay the way we were forever, just two little girls by a brook, innocent, childlike and loving each other unconditionally. But I could feel it slipping away, and along with it I could feel Mone starting to slip away. It made my heart ache hard.
I also made some new friends at school. Everybody liked me, really, they were just a little bit concerned because I was always so sad and always thinking about what I was eating. One time I was at a birthday party at somebody's house, and Ramona later told everybody that she had used the bathroom after me, and that she could tell that I had made myself throw up. The truth is that I never made myself throw up. I was too chicken to do it. And I hated Ramona for spreading lies about me. I was trying very hard to be anorexic, yes, but I was not bulimic.
At school we had this box called the "sorrow box." Once a week we would open it to find notes from anybody in class who was concerned about anything. I frequently entered notes that said things like "Nobody likes me" or "Julia Z. gave some licorice to other girls, but not to me." One time at a birthday party, we were having a big group girl talk. I brought up some of my insecurities that I was feeling with respect to the other girls. But I was quickly told that it made everybody very uncomfortable when I did that, so I never did anything like that again for almost 20 years.
Tobi, my elementary school buddy and neighbor, was in the class next door to mine at the new school. He told me that one of the teachers had told his whole class about me and that I was sick and that everybody should be nice to me. I was embarrassed by how public my issues were, but at the same time I enjoyed the attention.
There was a period of time in the spring of 1987 when I actually lost some weight. You have to understand that in Germany, lunch is the biggest meal, and dinner is small and not much different from breakfast. My diet went like this: I ate a normal breakfast and a normal dinner, but for lunch I skipped whatever meat or carbohydrates we were having and only ate a yogurt and whatever vegetables my mom had made that day. Sometimes that was salad or raw cucumber slices or bell pepper, and sometimes it was cooked cauliflower or peas and carrots. I stayed on this diet for several months, I think, and lost about 5 pounds or so. I really liked peas and carrots during that time. My mom knew this and started making peas and carrots a lot. I think it was part so I could actually enjoy my sparse lunch, and part so I would eat more.
In times when I didn't have enough willpower to be on a strict diet, I still kept a food journal and counted my calories. My mom had this little booklet from a magazine that listed the calories for common foods--broccoli, apple, pasta, bread, french fries, chicken, etc. The calories were usually listed for a 100g serving. Sometimes I weighed my food on a food scale, and sometimes I just lifted my pasta off of my plate with my hand, estimating how much it weighed. My sister once asked me why I was lifting my pasta, and I reluctantly and embarrassedly told her that I was weighing it. Sometimes I would ask my mom "How many calories do you think this sandwich has?" She could never give me the right answer, although she certainly did try. If she estimated a low number, I accused her of trying to get me fat. If she estimated a high number, I accused of her not allowing me to eat. My mom sure had a difficult job.
When trying not to eat, my desire for food only grew stronger and stronger. I soon noticed that I could eat and eat and eat, and then I could eat some more. At night in bed I started fantasizing about eating chocolate cake and pudding and fruit gummies and pizza and lots of ice cream and whipped cream and.. One time I bragged to my dad that I could eat more than he could. He said "Oh yeah?" I said "Yeah. I could eat TEN sandwiches." We agreed that I would prove it to him. The next morning for breakfast I ate ten sandwiches. I could have kept going, but the deal was to eat ten. I enjoyed it because it gave me an excuse to eat. And my parents enjoyed it because it gave me an excuse to eat.
I also weighed myself several times a day. And I monitored the status of my belly in the mirror. I either used the mirror in the lobby, a very central location in our house, or I stood on our bath tub (just like I did in the hospital) and used the bathroom mirror. Either way, I would drop my pants to my ankles, lift my shirt and then look at my belly from all angles. One time, my neighbor Tobi asked me "Did you stand in front of the mirror naked the other day?" I lied "No" and was more careful about the windows being covered going forward.
At the end of 5th grade, I went to summer camp again. I was happy again, just like the year before. For the first time in almost a year, I felt like myself again. I laughed a lot and goofed around. Everybody that saw me in camp that summer could tell that I was happy again. But that didn't mean that I was actually better. When school continued in 6th grade, it all started up again.
Continue to Part 4
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
I got Dooce's shirt!
When Dooce recently posted her SXSW 2006 pictures, I noticed that she was wearing a really cute shirt, the cutest I had seen in a while. I also noticed that somebody commented on one of her pictures asking if she got the shirt at Zara because her friend had a similar one. I thought "I guess I'm going to Zara goday!" And I did. And they had the shirt! So now I have the Dooce shirt and I absolutely love it and also bought the same one in green.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
My second painting
My second painting
Originally uploaded by Verabug.
It's a sky with a rainbow but the rainbow is made of circles instead of stripes. Get it?
I like it but I think the circles look a little bit scared. They don't look as proud as I wanted them to. I think it's because I wasn't bold enough when painting them because I was too afraid that the circles weren't going to be perfect circles. So now they look scared. Also, the arch of the rainbow is imperfect.
But other than that, look! It's my second painting!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
My psychosomatic obsessive disorder, Part 2 - Hospital visits
Back to Part 1
After the diarrhea debacle, my family and I didn't know what we were in for. A big dark cloak enveloped our lives in the fall of 1986, the beginning of my 5th grade. (Note to self: Ask my brother to describe to me what this time was like for him. We have't talked about it in ages, if ever. He was only 6.) Elementary school in Germany ends after 4th grade, and you have to choose from three types of secondary schools: Hauptschule ("Main School"), Realschule ("Intermediate School"), and Gymnasium ("High School"). The not-so-smart kids went to Hauptschule, the intermediate kids to Realschule, and the smart kids to Gymnasium. Nice segregation, right? I know. Everybody said I was smart, so I went to Gymnasium. My best friends Mone and Sandy went to Hauptschule. Did I mention how much I loved my elementary school class and my teacher? The only person from my class that ended up in my class at Gymnasium was Andre. A boy! Do you know what this meant? It meant that I didn't have one friend in my new class. Changing from elementary to secondary school was the most traumatic thing that ever happened to me. It was worse than any lost friend, worse than any breakup, worse even than leaving behind my family and friends to move to another country. It was THAT BAD. Going to that new school in a new town was a problem for me, a big problem.
It wasn't apparent at first. It started out innocently enough. I felt I was ready to move on with my life and be a "big girl". A 5th grade High School girl. How exciting! But after about a month, I started obsessing again. I obsessed that nobody in my new class liked me. There was an odd number of girls in the class, and I was the only one who didn't have a "match." I obsessed that my old best friends, Mone and Sandy, who were together in the same class at the school for not-as-smart kids, didn't like me anymore. I obsessed that my parents didn't love me. But most importantly, I obsessed that I was fat. In particular, my belly was fat. My belly was so fat, I didn't deserve to live. I wanted to die. Elementary school was gone forever, my family didn't care about me, and my belly was fat. My life was over.
It was around this time that I first found out about anorexia. I had read about it and seen a film about it on TV. I decided that I wanted to be anorexic. The concept of being scarily skinny and even of being mentally ill really appealed to me. How tragic I would be! My parents would have to take my complaints and crying about life seriously. I knew that you could die from anorexia. "Even better!" I thought. "I'm about ready to die.
I told my parents that I wanted to die. I told my parents that I wanted to go on a diet. My parents told me that they loved me, and that I wasn't fat, and that surely I would make some new friends soon. But I wasn't having any of it. There was nothing they could have said to make me feel better. This became clear when one day in early October, I started raging. My mom went to a friend's house one afternoon and took me with her, but I stayed in the car and kicked the inside of the car the whole time she was inside her friend's house. The next day I screamed and kicked walls and threw things across my room. I broke shit. My mom called the pediatrician again. Again I paused my raging and listened. She asked "Can 10-year-olds be depressed? I think she is depressed." I was thrilled. A mental disorder! That'll show them! The pediatrician told my mom to call a psychiatrist, Dr. Kammerer in Münster, near my dad's work. My dad came home from work early that day, with a serious look on his face, and they took me to see Dr. Kammerer. I noticed that my mom had with her a bag full of my clothes. I asked her "Do I have to stay there?" She said maybe. I was calm on the way to the hospital. It was October 3, 1986. I stayed there for seven and a half weeks.
I talked to Dr. Kammerer every day. I didn't like him very much because he was keeping me in the hospital, but I could tell that he was a nice man. My dad came to see me every day on his lunch break. Thinking about how he picked me up for a walk every day makes me cry to this day. I was at the psychosomatic children's ward. Psychosomatic was one of the biggest words in my vocabulary at that time. I knew it meant mind-body. I knew I had problems with my mind whose symptoms were directly related to my body because I was sad that I was fat. The other children at the psychosomatic ward were between 8 and 16. I was 10. I first shared a room with Britta, the youngest girl there. She always "had to lie." The day I got there, she told us that her birthday was the next day. The next day my mom brought her a present and got Britta in trouble because it wasn't really her birthday. She had lied. Later I shared a room with 13-year-old Anna who always "had to wash herself." See, I wasn't the only one who was obsessive-compulsive. There was also a younger girl named Sabrina. She couldn't eat. Then there were several girls between 14 and 16 who were anorexic. They were all very skinny and I admired them all. I looked up to them. The father of one of the anorexic girls, Katja, worked for the same company as my dad. I admired Katja a lot. She had beautiful handwriting.
I didn't like being at the hospital. I wanted to go home. I wanted to have my freedom back. I threatened Dr. Kammerer that I would run away, and he threatened me with a locked ward. I also threatened him that I would stop eating because I was fat, and he threatened me with a feeding tube. I knew it hurt a lot to have a feeding tube put through your nose and throat. The other girls had told me. He didn't really threaten me. He just mentioned the locked ward and the feeding tube as "alternatives." I didn't like some of the questions he asked me. I felt he was insinuating that I was full of shit. I didn't like being accused of just wanting attention even though that was partially true.
There were several social workers who worked at the hospital. I liked and respected them. They were all in their 20's, the Birkenstock type. But I didn't like some of the questions they asked me either or the activities they made me do. I didn't like them making me play with instruments, do gymnastics, draw and paint, etc. I didn't want to play and be creative. That part of Vera had died when elementary school had ended, didn't they know that? But I did like jumping on the trampoline. Looking back, I don't understand why they didn't just let me jump on the trampoline all the time since I clearly liked it.
One time one of the social workers and I had a play date and were playing post office. I decided to write a post card to my mom. I wrote "Dear Mama, how are you? I'm doing badly..." The social worker asked why I didn't tell my mom that I was doing well. "Because I'm not!" I said. "I'm very unhappy." Then she said that if I told my mom that I was doing badly, she might worry about me, is that what I wanted? Yes, that's what I wanted. I was in the mental hospital, and I was fat and unhappy. My mom had every reason to worry about me, and I most certainly wanted her to. I didn't like that the social worker was insinuating that it was wrong of me to want my mom to worry about me.
I went to school during my stay at the hospital. It was a special part-time school for long-term hospital patients. Only the main subjects were taught - Latin and Math, and I remember being in an art class. I told every single teacher how miserable I was and that my parents didn't love me. I'm sure they thought I was a delight.
I had good days and bad days at the hospital. It was a good day when I stood on the edge of the bath tub and my belly looked flat in the mirror. It was a bad day when I stood on the edge of the bath tub and my belly looked big. On some days I had feelings of total bliss. They were accompanied by thoughts like "One day I will get out of here", "One day I will be happy again", "One day I will have my life back." And on other days I felt hopeless and stuck. I didn't want to be sick anymore and longed so much for everything to go back to the way it was. I wanted to go back to the way things were in 4th grade. But I knew that was impossible. I was in 5th grade now. And I was sick.
One time while I was at the hospital, I obsessed that my mom was going to die. Suddenly the possibility that she might die seemed very real to me, and I panicked. I told one of the nurses that I had to call my mom and make sure that she is okay. A social worker went outside to the phone booth with me and said that I could call my mom only on the condition that I didn't freak out. Of course the first thing I did when I had my mom on the phone was freak out. I started crying and screaming because what if she died? Then I wouldn't have a mom! The money ran out in the phone booth, and of course I wasn't allowed to call again. I couldn't sleep that night because I thought that my mom was going to die. I got up in the middle of the night and told the night nurse that I had to call my mom. But he said no.
Another time, on one of our excursions into town with a social worker and some of the other kids, we ran into my beloved elementary school teacher. She knew that I was in the hospital, and I knew that she knew, but neither of us said anything about that. We talked for a minute or so about meaningless stuff. More than anything in the world I wanted her to take me home with her and say that I could come back to elementary school, and that she would tell all the other kids from our 4th grade class to come back too. But I knew that she had a new 1st grade class now.
I was released from the hospital on November 21. My dad's birthday is on November 23, and he said that my coming home was his favorite birthday present. We all thought that things were going to be better from now on. But they weren't. I was still terribly sick and unhappy. The day after Christmas, I was upset about something--I don't remember what--and I ran out of the house without a jacket. I just took off running. There was a thick layer of snow everywhere. The worst part about this is that my mom put on her coat, grabbed my coat, and ran after me. She ran after me for a good half hour or so, but I was faster. At some point, we passed somebody we knew, I think, first me, than my mom. I don't even want to know what they must have thought. Finally my mom shouted "Vera, please stop! Let's go home, please! I can't do this anymore!" And I stopped. I put on the coat my mom had brought for me and we walked home together. The image of my mom running after me will haunt me for the rest of my life. It breaks my heart to think about what I put her through that day. I feel terrible for many, many things I did to my family during this time.
One day I decided to walk home from school the minute the bus dropped me off there. I had told my mom many times that I hated school because I didn't have any friends there and that I wanted to go back to elementary school. That morning I announced to my mom that I was going to walk home. I walked through snow and ice. It took me two hours and twenty minutes. Around 10am I rang the door bell at my parents' house, and my mom answered the door with a serious look on her face. "Hello Vera" she said with a sad voice. The next day the director of my school called me into his office. He wanted to know what was going on. Why had I walked home from school? I told him that I hated school because everybody hated me there. I also told him that my parents hated me and were really mean to me. I told him that I thought I was adopted because they clearly didn't want me. The director of my school was very concerned and called my parents in for a meeting. Luckily they were able to convince him that they did in fact love me very much, and that, outside of my skewed perception, they were very nice people.
Was I done humiliating and torturing my parents? No. Sometime in late January, I woke up in the morning and started raging again. My rage was directed toward my dad in particular. I don't even remember what I said, but it was something about him being such a horrible and mean person, and that he didn't love me, and that it was all his fault, and on and on. My dad was trying to have breakfast and get ready for work, and I just kept on raging. Finally, my dad hunched over in his chair and started sobbing. Just like that. There he was, my dad, sobbing, because of something I had said. I had made my dad cry. Who was the mean one now? I stopped raging and started crying. I couldn't believe I had done that and felt terrible. To this day, I cannot think about this incident without starting to cry. It is probably the most painful of all my painful memories, and I don't know how the universe can ever forgive me for what I did. I had made my own dad cry, my strong and mean dad. The only time I had ever seen him cry before that was at my great grandma's funeral.
The day I made my dad cry, my parents called Dr. Kammerer, and I ended up back at the hospital. I stayed there for another three and a half weeks until sometime in February. This was my first case of the February Blues, my now almost annual gloomy friend. Some of the kids I already knew from the hospital were still there (like Anna, I think), but many of them were new. There was a 17-year-old guy named Lars, and he was afraid to death of throwing up. He hadn't thrown up in six years and wanted to achieve the world record in not throwing up. I could relate because I was afraid to death of diarrhea. One time I asked Lars what he was writing. He told me that Dr. Kammerer had asked him to write his life story. I asked Dr. Kammerer later if he wanted me to write my life story too. He said that he doesn't usually ask patients as young as me to do that. I was disappointed. I wanted to write my life story, but since I wasn't instructed to do so, I didn't. There was also a 16-year-old anorexic girl whose name I forgot. She and Lars became a couple. Then there was Dominick, 14. He wore cowboy boots. He told me that one of the guys from the locked ward, who rode the bus to the hospital school with us, was in the locked ward because he had killed somebody. Dominick scared me. Later on I would have dreams about him hurting my mom. I never found out what he was in the hospital for. I think he was too cool and tough to talk about it.
I'm pretty sure that this time I had my own room, though I don't remember why. But I do remember that the psychosomatic children's hospital is a sad, sad place to be, except for maybe the love birds Lars and the girl whose name I forgot.
I exchanged addresses with some of the girls, this time as well as the first time. Gudrun, an anorexic girl with a feeding tube who didn't eat but chain-smoked and drank lots of coffee, sent me letters on baby blue paper on which she drew beautifully shaped hearts, one bigger than the next. I once wrote a letter to the anorexic girl whose name I forgot asking her how much she had eaten when she had lost all that weight. She wrote me back with her exact diet and told me not to try this UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. Little did she know that I didn't have the willpower to be truly anorexic. I never did become anorexic. I just had this weird psychosomatic obsessive disorder with no name.
Continue to Part 3
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Photo for my taxi driver badge
I went to taxi school again and it turns out the two taxi school teachers found my blog. Hi Mickey and Bill!
Today I had my picture taken for my taxi driver badge. This is how it turned out:
I like it a lot. I think I look happy, friendly and relaxed and not ugly. And okay, yeah, maybe I look a little bit stoned (even though I am not). Considering how uptight I have been most of my life, looking a little bit stoned even though I am not might be a good thing.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
My psychosomatic obsessive disorder, Part 1 - 4th grade
In 4th grade I was happy as a clam. It was one of the best years of my life, as I remember it. I was getting A's for penmanship, I was popular in my class, and I had a lot of imagination. I was playful and creative, outspoken and funny. I had a crush on a boy in my class and I was pretty sure that he had a crush on me too, although I never did find out. I had my two best friends, Mone and Sandy, who lived on my street and were in my class as well. I had two parents and two siblings, and we lived in a house. There were 22 people in my class, and I knew all of their birthdays, and I loved our teacher, the lovely Frau Dömer-Brink. My life was perfectly in order.
That spring, a hint of neurosis made itself felt. I noticed that under no circumstances did I want to have diarrhea. Diarrhea was the absolute worst thing that could happen to me. This was the only time in my life where I would have rather vomited than had diarrhea. I was afraid to death of diarrhea. I started to obsess over getting diarrhea and how horrible that would be. Every day after school I obsessed about it to my mom, crying and freaking out because what if I got diarrhea? My mom asked me what was so bad about diarrhea. I said "Because it makes those noises!" My mom and dad thought it was funny that I said that but I was dead serious. I didn't think it was funny at all. We were talking about diarrhea after all, the worst thing that could happen to me!
I think what I was so afraid of was not having control over my body. I was afraid of not having control over the noises my body made and over the speed at which my poop came out. I desperately wanted to control those things. I think I was also afraid of being gross, making gross noises and having gross stuff come out of me.
One afternoon, when I would not stop freaking out about diarrhea, my mom called our pediatrician. I stopped screaming and listened. I was fascinated by her action. Hidden in this whole scene was a cry for attention. I don't know why I needed more attention but I think part of it was that my parents never took my "problems" seriously. Nothing truly bad had ever happened to me, so they didn't conceive that I could be upset about anything. Years before that I remember complaining that I didn't like my curly hair and that I didn't like my deep voice. All my mom could say in response to that was "You poor, poor child" in a mocking tone. When I was in the hospital with a neural disease at age 5, my dad, knowing that I had a tendency to complain about my unsatisfactory human condition, carried me around to show me the children in the intensive car unit that were hooked up to hoses and machines. He said "See those children? They have problems. You don't have problems."
Well, that day in 4th grade I was glad that my mom told the peditrician that I had a problem. So I stopped screaming about diarrhea and listened to the conversation. She told him that it was more of a psychological than a physical problem. I was thrilled. I had a psychological problem! The pediatrician told my mom to give me a stool softener so that I would poop already, and if things didn't get better, he would give her the name of a psychiatrist.
I did calm down about diarrhea. I was still deathly afraid of it, but I stopped obsessing and screaming about it. One time I was at my grandparents' house, and when I walked by the bathroom with my grandma in it, I could hear that she had diarrhea. Or maybe she didn't have diarrhea and that's just how she pooped. But I remember thinking "How can she not freak out? Listen to that! I would die if that happened to me. My grandma is a brave lady."
Aside from that glitch, I went on with my happy 4th grade life. In the summer after 4th grade, I went to my first summer camp with all my friends, and I had the time of my life. I got to hang out with all these cool older people. Pretty older girls that wore hairspray! Cute older boys that were really funny! I was in heaven. But I did get diarrhea during summer camp. All my friends threw up, but I got diarrhea when the stomach flu went around. I panicked. And then I went to my favorite camp leader and told her that I had diarrhea and that I was really afraid of diarrhea and asked her if she would go to the bathroom with me so I wouldn't be so scared. She agreed. I went into one of the stalls while she waited by the sinks. I did my business. I asked her "Can you hear anything?" She lied "No." Even though I knew she was lying, I was eternally grateful for it. I didn't want anybody to acknowledge my gross and scary diarrhea noises.
Continue to Part 2
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Something you can't tell just by looking at me
I have spent time in a mental hospital, twice. Story coming soon. It's going to be a looooong one.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Things I would love to do
- translate children's books from English to German or German to English
- facilitate an eating disorder therapy group for young girls
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Antti and I spent another weekend at Mt Shasta, the magic mountain that made us happy last September.
It was a lot colder and snowier this time, but we had a lot of sun nonetheless. This time we stayed at the Finlandia Motel, which we had discovered last time and which has the best sauna in America. The manager there is crazy about Antti because he speaks Finnish. She gave us a hefty discount.
On Saturday we made a little trip to Ashland, Oregon, to walk around in the park there, look at some ducks and stores, and to absorb via osmosis some of the vibes from the Light Body Consciousness workshop going on that weekend, that I would have liked to attend.
Other than that, we ate, slept, drove around, walked in the snow, looked at psychic stores, sat in the sauna, meditated, talked about our childhoods, and laughed. There were two things that Antti said that weekend that made me laugh very hard:
1. "Did you fart already?" after I had announced that I was going to the bathroom to fart but had come immediately back out because I had forgotten to tell him something.
2. "It's not funny." when one of his legs kept sinking knee deep into the snow and I started laughing.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Stamps
I recently ordered a new book of stamps from usps.com, and I have never been this excited about receiving stamps in the mail. That's because when I got my stamps today, I was finally able to mail off my tax return. I'm getting a generous refund, woohoo!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Why I moved my blog
I thought I'd let you all in on the reason I moved my blog from mediasparkles.com/blog to verabug.com. The reason is that I wanted my blog to have its own domain. I have been blogging for almost four years and it made sense to dedicate its own domain to it.
But maybe a more important question is: Why didn't my blog have its own domain to begin with? The answer is that I was trying to keep it secret. Well, not really, I definitely wanted people to read it but I was trying to keep it from certain people in certain contexts. That's why I hid it in a subdirectory of mediasparkles.com and why I never mentioned my full name "Vera Fleischer" anywhere so that people couldn't google it.
Not that I ever wrote anything truly offensive or incriminating here, but I was still trying to hide my blog in a lot of different ways. I was trying to hide it from my employer and potential future employers and potential future clients. I was trying to hide it from potential future boyfriends. I was trying to hide my idealistic self from my cynical friends. I was trying to hide my bitchy and cursing self from my spiritual friends. I was trying to hide my psychic self from skeptics. I was trying to hide my geeky self from people who thought I was a hoop performer. I was trying to hide my hermitic self from my underground party friends. I was trying to hide my lush party self (which has since passed on) from anyone who might judge me for it. I was trying to hide my insecure self from my counseling clients. I was trying to hide my whiny and depressed self from people who only knew me with a big smile on my face.
But I am done with all that! I am done hiding! My name is Vera Fleischer and this is my personal blog. Welcome. And since I am done hiding, I'll add this: I have done illegal drugs before.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Back from LA again
We got back from our "We are both unemployed; we can go on a road trip in the middle of the week" trip around 3:30 am this morning after being filmed and interviewed in director Amy Goldstein's studio in Venice between 5 and 9pm. I think it went well. Philo and I are both proud of our "performances." Philo was his usual charming, flamboyant and fabulous self, and I was my usual serious, shy and cute self. That's right, I am cute! Even though I am serious and shy, I am still cute. They even said so themselves!
Other than the filming, we had Rock'n'Roll Thai food on Monday night, stayed at the Best Western near the Hollywood Bowl, met my friend Lyzz for lunch at Electric Karma on Tuesday, did some practice hooping at Echo Park, and listened to lots and lots of eclectic music on Philo's iPod.
One of my favorite things about the trip was that we listened to lots of Sandra in the car. You may not know Sandra, and Philo had never known anybody else who does. But I know Sandra. She is a German pop singer from the mid 1980's, and Philo discovered her while traveling in Europe during that time. And I discovered her by being a 4th grader in Germany during that time. I hadn't heard any of her songs since about 1988, and it was a treat to indulge in dreamy pre-teen memories while listening to hits such as In the Heat of the Night, Maria Magdalena, and Secret Land. The cool thing about these memories is that back when I first heard Sandra's songs, I didn't know any English, so I had no idea what she was singing about and all I remember is "Blah blah BLAH blah blah BLAH"* with a really catchy beat.
*That one is In the Heat of the Night.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
In other Superstar news
Somebody has hired me to do psychic readings at a Bachelorette party! This is very exciting. After doing the Crystal ball psychic readings at Circo Romani a few weeks ago, I got inspired to offer myself up for hire to come to other parties and events, and put a little blurb about it on Dragonfly Psychic. So yesterday I got the call about the Bachelorette party, and the woman didn't actually find me through my website but through somebody I did a crystal ball reading for at Circo Romani. Word of mouth! Perfect.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Good morning from Hollywood, California
Philo and I are becoming superstars today. We are in Hollywood and will be interviewed and filmed for Hoop the Movie this afternoon. Wish us luck and radiance!
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
New site
Verabug.com is ready. Please update your links and bookmarks and stuff.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Statement of intent
I intend to move this blog to verabug.com. I am going to buy the domain tomorrow. And hopefully everything will be moved within a few days.
After that, my blog will no longer be called The Subastral Lilipad. Instead, it will just be called Verabug, which is shorter and simpler and more universally descriptive of who I am.
Just so you know.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Taxi school update
I went to taxi school Tuesday and Thursday this week. Now I still have to attend class one Monday and one Wednesday to complete the required four days of taxi school. Then I have to take a test, get a license from the city, and get a job at a taxi company. I really want to get a job at Fog City Taxi because they have such nice lime green cars.
Going to taxi school is really fun. The guy who runs it is super nice. May be he is especially nice to me since he is happy to have someone in his school that doesn't match the typical demographic. But I can tell that he is just a nice person, period. He talks about intuition a lot. Taxi drivers develop very good intuition. They learn to predict what drivers in front of them are going to do next, and they learn to read people well. If nothing else, it seems that driving a taxi is going to further develop my intuition.
We get to do these great worksheets in class. Do these two streets cross - yes or no? What is the shortest route from intersection A in the Castro to intersection B downtown? Now describe two alternate routes to get there. I love these worksheets! They remind me of when school was fun in fourth grade.
Yesterday in class I found out that some taxi drivers offer mini tours to tourists. Sometimes those mini tours turn into three to four hour long tours of the city. And some taxi drivers are so good at giving these tours that they have people calling them from the East Coast who are coming to San Francisco next month and want to book a taxi tour. Hearing this made me very happy. I would love to give tours like that. When my sister was visiting me here in 2003, one of my favorite things to do was driving her around and showing her stuff.
I have a good feeling about this taxi business.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
Love letter to a coffee mug
Dear new coffee mug from Starbucks that I bought yesterday,
I love you. You are so cute and adorable. I first saw you on Saturday morning at the Starbucks inside the Safeway on Market Street. I loved the roundness and flatness of your soup bowl shape, your baby blue cheeks, and the soft green polka dots that make your inside so special. I also loved that you were covered in a fine layer of dust; it made me feel like you were a little lost puppy that nobody else wanted and that I could rescue. I also loved that, according to your bottom, you were categorized as a 12 oz. Winter mug and that you were called Tiny Dots Mug. How cute! It was love at first sight, except that Reason started arguing and trying to convince me otherwise. It said Do you really need another coffee mug? Do you really want a mug from Starbucks? It's embarrassing that you go to Starbucks anyway - do you really want to advertise that with a mug from there? Plus, do you really want to pay $7.95 plus tax for a little mug with dots?
So I put you back onto the shelf and left. But the truth is that the answer to all the questions Reason asked me was YES. I really wanted to have you, I realized later that day. I considered calling Antti, who lives near the Safeway on Market Street, and asking him to go over there and rescue you for me. But Reason told me it was silly to hire somebody else to get a little mug with dots from the store, so I didn't. But on Tuesday I set out to find you on my own. I felt called to visit the Starbucks on Kansas and 16th Street, so I did. You weren't there and neither was any sunshine. I asked one of the employees there if she had seen a little round mug with dots inside. She said that she had but that this Starbucks didn't have a very good selection and that I should go to the Starbucks at Laurel Village because that Starbucks had a very large retail selection. I had never heard of Laurel Village before, nor of Locust Street, which was the cross street on California where Laurel Village was located. But since I am about to start a career as a taxi driver, I decided to find this place. The Starbucks at Laurel Village was nice, and I stayed there for a while reading my book, but despite its large retail selection, I didn't find you there. So I decided that damnit, I'm just going to go back to the Starbucks inside the Safeway on Market Street because that's where I had originally seen you. So I went there but you weren't there anymore. The shelf you had been on was now filled with Easter mugs. No more Winter mugs. I asked the employee behind the counter if she knew what happened to the mug with the little dots and the little dust that I had seen there on Saturday. She said she didn't know but that it could well be that it was an older model and that they put it on sale and somebody bought it. My heart sank. But I decided to try one more thing before giving up. I knew there was another Starbucks right next to the Safeway. So I went to that one and guess what! You were there! Complete with the thin layer of dust. There were even two of your green brothers and sisters, but I decided to buy only you, the blue one.
My new coffee mug
Originally uploaded by Verabug.
And now you are mine and you are going to be my new favorite mug that I always drink my tea out of and I'm going to take pictures of you and post them on the internet. I love you!
Love,
Vera.
|
.: posted by Vera
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
