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Les Miserables
May. 6th, 2005 04:48 am
Since I've figured this out, I've been a recording fool. As a result, tho, I have to listen to these tapes. Contrary to what I've read, MusicMatch doesn't recognize tracks on recorded cassette tapes. Oh well.
Anyway, so tonight I'm home alone for the first time in I don't know how long, and I'm paranoid & nervous, jumping at every little noise. I've cleaned my bathroom & the kitchen thoroughly, even mopped. Hel, mopped nothing, got down on my hands & gingerly on my knees & scrubbed places by hand. Cleaned some cabinets. Spring cleaning kind of crap. Pulled all the knobs off the stove, the burners & burner plates... poured vinegar all over the sink & made some headway w/the hard-water deposits. Utterly mundane stuff because as long as I'm moving & there's water running, I feel more secure than when I'm just sitting here. I've got the television on, almost all the lights on, and I'm still not fully comfortable. Trying to take a shower was an exercise in willpower. It's funny, I can take a shower here by myself in the early evening, like when Rob goes to get fast food, but after midnight & I become the Psycho chick in my head. I've been going to bed w/Rob around 2 or so (basically when 'Big O' ends on AdultSwim) but it's almost 5am and I am not even sleepy. Not by a long run. I've been trying not to take any Ambien, so as a result I'm wide awake & I can't stay asleep once I fall asleep. I've been cleaning in an attempt to wear myself out, burn off some nervous energy, but it's a no-go. How can I sleep when there's a configuration of fake logs in the fireplace that looks like Pazuzu? Tomorrow, Rob's gonna have to reach in there & rearrange things for me.
One of the few commercial tapes I have left & haven't upgraded, for whatever reason, to CD already, has been my Les Miserables tape. I think it's a sentimental thing. I had such an amazing time when I went to see it at the 5th Avenue theatre in Seattle, way back when. 11th grade Drama Class trip. It was soooo cool. And I completely got sucked into it, too. They had the battles set up so it seemed like cannons were shooting over the heads of the audience - the first time one went off I ended up in one of my classmates' laps, three seats away. He was understandably appalled, but arranged it so I could sit next to him & grab his arm every time the guns went off. He had fingerprint-shaped bruises for a couple of weeks afterwards. And it got worse - first Fantine died, and I sniffled. Valjean died at the end and I was in hysterics. I couldn't be consoled at all. It was horrible. And now every time I listen to the tape, my chin starts wobbling, my eyes well up, and I'm bawling. Even when I watch the show on PBS whenever it infrequently shows up (usually when they're doing a telethon), I start crying. Crying to music or something like that is clean crying, tho. You're all emotionally caught up in something completely disconnected from your own life, something that isn't even real. It's cathartic, but not painful. I feel washed out afterwards, but not ugly. I think a lot of what overcame me in the theatre was from being so caught up in the emotional bullshit of my life at the time & not being allowed to express myself naturally, and the fact that I was once a hopeless daddy's little girl. Valjean reminded me a lot of my own dad, even the actor playing him looked quite a bit like my dad, only shorter. (at 6'6", everyone was shorter). I think I've recovered - mostly. (The only possible exception would be Amistad - I felt not only ugly, but violated by the truth in that particular movie. I don't think I could ever watch it again, mainly because I cried so hard & so long that I scared myself. The ending is a triumph, tho. What Dreams May Come was another scary crying jag - that one I couldn't stop). I'd love to go see Les Mis again, but I think I'll probably just have to settle for the DVD.
So here I am, fresh out of tears, waiting for the night to end so I can get some sleep. VH1's Insomniac Music Theater is on behind me. I'm not too fond of Gwen Stefani's solo stuff - I don't know what the song was called, but it involved her dancing around a high school w/an all-girl posse. The drumbeat was nifty - too bad it wasn't in a Snoop Dog video.
I heard something relevant on the Simpsons tonight. Homer asked Bart & Lisa if they were upset about his having to undergo a coronary bypass sort of surgery & they told him no because they were part of the MTV generation... no highs & no lows. Homer asked, "How does it feel?" & Lisa shrugged one shoulder & said, "Eh." I know that feeling. No highs, no lows, just this sort of median-line complacency. The fear & paranoia is getting to me, tho. I don't know how to combat it on my own. It just builds & builds. I've either got to get out of this house or somehow make it mine. I don't see the latter ever happening - to me, it will be the m.i.l.'s first & the scorpions' second. It will never be mine. I'm starting to wonder if there's an anti-anxiety drug out there that would actually mitigate these feelings somewhat w/out a lot of horrible sex-drive-killing side effects.
My arms ache. Nerve damage sucks.
Anyway, so tonight I'm home alone for the first time in I don't know how long, and I'm paranoid & nervous, jumping at every little noise. I've cleaned my bathroom & the kitchen thoroughly, even mopped. Hel, mopped nothing, got down on my hands & gingerly on my knees & scrubbed places by hand. Cleaned some cabinets. Spring cleaning kind of crap. Pulled all the knobs off the stove, the burners & burner plates... poured vinegar all over the sink & made some headway w/the hard-water deposits. Utterly mundane stuff because as long as I'm moving & there's water running, I feel more secure than when I'm just sitting here. I've got the television on, almost all the lights on, and I'm still not fully comfortable. Trying to take a shower was an exercise in willpower. It's funny, I can take a shower here by myself in the early evening, like when Rob goes to get fast food, but after midnight & I become the Psycho chick in my head. I've been going to bed w/Rob around 2 or so (basically when 'Big O' ends on AdultSwim) but it's almost 5am and I am not even sleepy. Not by a long run. I've been trying not to take any Ambien, so as a result I'm wide awake & I can't stay asleep once I fall asleep. I've been cleaning in an attempt to wear myself out, burn off some nervous energy, but it's a no-go. How can I sleep when there's a configuration of fake logs in the fireplace that looks like Pazuzu? Tomorrow, Rob's gonna have to reach in there & rearrange things for me.
One of the few commercial tapes I have left & haven't upgraded, for whatever reason, to CD already, has been my Les Miserables tape. I think it's a sentimental thing. I had such an amazing time when I went to see it at the 5th Avenue theatre in Seattle, way back when. 11th grade Drama Class trip. It was soooo cool. And I completely got sucked into it, too. They had the battles set up so it seemed like cannons were shooting over the heads of the audience - the first time one went off I ended up in one of my classmates' laps, three seats away. He was understandably appalled, but arranged it so I could sit next to him & grab his arm every time the guns went off. He had fingerprint-shaped bruises for a couple of weeks afterwards. And it got worse - first Fantine died, and I sniffled. Valjean died at the end and I was in hysterics. I couldn't be consoled at all. It was horrible. And now every time I listen to the tape, my chin starts wobbling, my eyes well up, and I'm bawling. Even when I watch the show on PBS whenever it infrequently shows up (usually when they're doing a telethon), I start crying. Crying to music or something like that is clean crying, tho. You're all emotionally caught up in something completely disconnected from your own life, something that isn't even real. It's cathartic, but not painful. I feel washed out afterwards, but not ugly. I think a lot of what overcame me in the theatre was from being so caught up in the emotional bullshit of my life at the time & not being allowed to express myself naturally, and the fact that I was once a hopeless daddy's little girl. Valjean reminded me a lot of my own dad, even the actor playing him looked quite a bit like my dad, only shorter. (at 6'6", everyone was shorter). I think I've recovered - mostly. (The only possible exception would be Amistad - I felt not only ugly, but violated by the truth in that particular movie. I don't think I could ever watch it again, mainly because I cried so hard & so long that I scared myself. The ending is a triumph, tho. What Dreams May Come was another scary crying jag - that one I couldn't stop). I'd love to go see Les Mis again, but I think I'll probably just have to settle for the DVD.
So here I am, fresh out of tears, waiting for the night to end so I can get some sleep. VH1's Insomniac Music Theater is on behind me. I'm not too fond of Gwen Stefani's solo stuff - I don't know what the song was called, but it involved her dancing around a high school w/an all-girl posse. The drumbeat was nifty - too bad it wasn't in a Snoop Dog video.
I heard something relevant on the Simpsons tonight. Homer asked Bart & Lisa if they were upset about his having to undergo a coronary bypass sort of surgery & they told him no because they were part of the MTV generation... no highs & no lows. Homer asked, "How does it feel?" & Lisa shrugged one shoulder & said, "Eh." I know that feeling. No highs, no lows, just this sort of median-line complacency. The fear & paranoia is getting to me, tho. I don't know how to combat it on my own. It just builds & builds. I've either got to get out of this house or somehow make it mine. I don't see the latter ever happening - to me, it will be the m.i.l.'s first & the scorpions' second. It will never be mine. I'm starting to wonder if there's an anti-anxiety drug out there that would actually mitigate these feelings somewhat w/out a lot of horrible sex-drive-killing side effects.
My arms ache. Nerve damage sucks.
