8:08 a.m. - Tuesday, Feb. 07, 2006
MsLeslie in the dumps... no, the REAL dumps!
Purple Katy sits in the back yard, holding in her bed the first of many loads she will carry for me. The load is comprised of old insulation and broken sheetrock; The product of last night�s demolition of the ceiling of my little playroom.
I�m not sure I like the demolition phase of any project. Instead of getting better, my room looks decidedly worse. Now when I go in there, I can look up directly to the underside of my roof. There is a lot of work yet to do before this room is made new again, but tearing out the ceiling is now a sure commitment that I will get through it somehow. In the meantime, it�s really really ugly in there.
Today I�ll drive Katy to the nearest dump. I�ll get in line with the monster trucks that parade in and out of the site and hope they see me and that none of them run over my little truck. I have never used this dump before and so the mere newness of it makes the trip a great challenge for me. I guess I can admit it here; I am growing weary of new things; Weary of stressing about them, of the necessity of scouting them out, and weary of the anxiety I will feel as I go about learning �how things are done�. I feel so out of place when I go somewhere new.
And yet there are rewards.
I do so love it when I go into my regular nail salon and all eight or so Vietnamese-American girls look up from their work and chirp �Hey MsLeslie!�. It�s even better when I show up at a munch for our local BDSM group and every person there feels the urge to get up from the table and form a line to hug me. I am different and I�m special, and while I have few actual friends, I do enjoy a lot of recognition and attention. People like me from a distance.
So after a few trips to the dump, I expect I�ll become a regular visitor. Will the clerks in the office, the ones who tell you where to go with your load, remember me and smile when I come with my trash? I am guessing� and hoping.. they will. There can�t be many middle-aged ladies, clad in coveralls and a colorful scarf, who turn up there with a pickup-load of trash. I think I am going to stand out.
Later today, after my appointments with my psychiatrist and electrologist, I�ll demolish at least two walls. I need to gut the entire room, including the small attached laundry room before I can begin the rebuilding phase. The completion is so far in the future, I can�t see it, but I can see two walls stripped to the studs. I can do that and then look at the next little step�. Two more walls.
Speaking of which� I�m sitting here trying to think of more thing to say, which can only mean I am out of things to say. At this point, I am only delaying the challenge of going to the dump� and that is not acceptable.
I�ll tell tomorrow how it went.
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