She got a new apartment, it's out on the escarpment; and in the glove compartment are my songs.

So, I have an apartment.  I'm sure I've mentioned this before.  I will, eventually, invite you all over for a housewarming party.  I'm hopeful that this will happen before the end of the year.  Probably.  Okay, so I'm not that hopeful.  I'd love for you all to come over now but I don't have blinds, or curtains, or a lot of furniture for people to sit on.  I don't have art on the walls or a well organized kitchen.  It's embarrassing. 

See, when I lived with Andrew I had a bunch of stuff.  I bought tons of crap for the house to make it organized, and pretty, and ours.  I thought that if I put enough stuff in it, he would stop seeing it as his, and start thinking of it as ours.  That he would see that I could make him a home.  That it would make him want to be with me.  It was never any of those things, and I (obviously) didn't accomplish any of those goals, and now I regret all the money I spent trying to make it a home when I was the only one committed to that endeavour.  But that's kind of besides the point.  The point is, I have an apartment.  It is all mine.  I can paint it any colour I want and buy any furniture I want cook whatever I want in it.  (Or I could cook whatever I wanted if I didn't have an Easy Bake Oven for a stove.  The thing is hobbit sized, I swear.)  And the bitch of it is, now that I have that freedom, I have no idea what I want to do with it.  The whole place is a blank canvas I'm afraid to fuck up.  Can't decide if I want to paint, where I want to hang my art, or where to store my big mixing bowls.  But I'll figure it out eventually.  And then I'll just do it.  Because I want to.  And because I can.

I was always very afraid to live on my own before.  In fact, when my parents used to leave me alone for the summer to go to the trailer, I'd go and stay with Andrew so the big bad boogey man wouldn't eat me in the night.  And now they've probably read that and shaken their heads in a disappointed fashion.  Or looked at each other and exclaimed, "I knew it!"  Or maybe they won't read my blog.  Yeah, that's probably what's going to happen.  I continue to be pretty scared sometimes.  Especially since watching Paranormal Activity and having a conversation with a friend about how that would work in an apartment building.  And because I have an over active imagination.  I should REALLY know better by now, but here we are. 

I know I've talked before about my #grownupgoldstar list.  I was able to check the apartment off before I knew it was on the list though.  I've never felt so confident in my own survival skillz before.  I'm sure I'll hit a snag at some point, but there is a very simple joy that hits me sometimes when I think about how I'm not relying on anybody else to live.  I pay all my bills and chip away at my credit card debt just like a real grown up.  And I make plans with people and carry them out.  I come and go as I please.  I've never felt this kind of freedom before and I wouldn't trade it for the world.

Do you ever feel so paper thin? Like a house of cards, one blow from caving in?

I'd like to share a little story with you guys.  There's this bar I go to every week to sing karaoke because I'm an attention WHORE.  The bar is super sketchy, but it might also be the best bar ever.  For those who know the geography of Hamilton, it's at Barton and Sherman.  It's a great place to get raped.  I don't go there alone. OBVIOUSLY.

So my friend and I are there, sitting, drinking our beer, waiting for our turn to sing a song when I notice some drama unfolding behind my friend.  So I start narrating for him.  Here's what happened.

There are two guys and a girl who appear to be there together.  We called the woman Tits, because she had some, and when she walked, she lead with them.  Hammered.  The two guys we called Glasses, because he was wearing some; and the other, Shaggy because he needed a haircut.  Both SUPER hammered.  I'm just not that creative when I'm drunk, deal with it.

There is also Mr. Creeper.  Mr. Creeper is a regular.  There used to be a Mrs. Creeper but she hasn't been around lately, we're assuming she's in small pieces in the freezer.  When they came together, they'd try to pick up women, now that Mr. Creeper comes alone, he tries to pick up women.  Neither scenario had much success.

Oh, and by the way, I'm going through a manic phase right now guys.  Just a heads up.

The final two characters are Wibbly and Dibbly.  Wibbly is a nice, sorta handicapped looking woman.  When you can understand what she's saying, she's very pleasant.  I've never spoken to Dibbly.  I think they live in the apartments above the bar.  (Oh yeah, some of the regulars literally NEVER have to leave the bar, they just go upstairs.)

I think that's everyone.

So Tits tries to dance with Shaggy.  But Shaggy is very drunk and can't get up.  So Tits sits there all huffy.  So Glasses tries to dance with her but she's pouty and doesn't want to.  So he goes and dances with Wibbly.  At which point, Tits gets up and tries to fight Wibbly because Wibbly danced when Tits did not.  Wibbly tells her to screw off (I assume, I can never understand her) and so Tits decides to shove her.  So Wibbly knocks her arm away, which results in super-hammered Tits falling on the ground for the first time. 

So she decides that it's time to try dancing with Shaggy again.  He makes it to his feet but can't maintain verticality and has to sit back down.  So Tits dances with Mr. Creeper.  Eventually Glasses and Shaggy get fed up and leave together.  Like together, together.  Leaving Tits all on her lonesome.  So she tries to fight Wibbly again.  And is pushed down again.  Thankfully, Wibbly takes Dibbly upstairs for some alone time.  And I proceed to stop making eye contact with Tits.  I'm afraid, she'll start picking on me next.

But she doesn't.  She decides to hit on every single guy in the bar.  She manages to fall down about four times during this mission.  There are about 35-40 people in the bar, most of them male.  There was a whole group of black guys who did not enter the bar together but decided to bond over the repeated attempts at flirting.  It was really special.  Not a single guy in the bar took her up on it.  Even Mr. Creeper's response was, "You're nuts, Lady.  La, la, la, la, la."  Things are sad when Mr. Creeper is turning you down. 

My friend made the analogy that it's like she was that one Mii you have on your Wii that when they walk up to the general crowd of Miis, they all disperse and group up somewhere else.  I almost felt bad for her.  He also made the analogy of Pepe La Pew, from Looney Tunes.  Ah, ma cherie, let us go to ze casbah.  Smooch, smooch, smooch. We can make beautiful music togezzer. Smooch, smooch, smooch.  Drunk!Nikki found that very amusing.

So the whole point of me telling you this story was to make you feel better about yourself.  Because this shit ALWAYS makes me feel better about myself.  I often hear people telling me that they're unhappy with their job, their relationships, their general satisfaction with life.  That they thought they'd be somewhere else when they hit 25 or 30 or whatever.  I fall prey to this mentality at times myself.  But then I go to the bar and see something like that and I wake up happy that I am NOT Tits.  I may not be reaching my potential right at this moment, but at least I'm not Tits.

I maintain a certain level of functionality that she is clearly lacking.  My life may be boring and my company may be underpaying/utilizing my talents, but I'm still functioning.  I may have gone through a few months of therapy to get my head back on straight last year, but I'm okay now.  I may be living paycheque to paycheque but I'm okay with that.  And as petty as it sounds, I don't want people like Tits to try harder.  Like most people, I'm occupying a middle ground on the ladder of humanity.  I'm not brilliant or wealthy or especially pretty, but I'm not Tits.  And having people like her around makes the rest of us middlings look better.  Makes us feel better about ourselves and our station in life.  And maybe you think that sounds elitist.  Maybe it is?  I don't think it matters, because we all have a person, or a place, or something in our lives that makes us feel better about ourselves.  For me, it's a sketch bar with super hammered sluts.  So thank you, Tits.  I'll buy you a beer next time you show up.