I saw you and
I know how it feels
I know what it means
What could I do except wait?
I know how long it feels
When the sounds are
Falling all around you
I know how it must have seemed
And I would have been by your side
If giving my entire world would have
Been enough.
But with all the knowledge from our
Past mistakes
That we never carry into
The future
We hide behind pragmatism
Tying ourselves in knots over
Something still
Unacknowledged.
Disaster stood at a locked door
Looked at me through a window, tightly shut
Some restless, beating part of me
Reached out to let it in
The wary heart beside me
Said “Careful,
“Be careful, please”
If you break me, you
Don’t get a second chance
But that restless, beating part of me
Will not be
Still
I thought I should qualify my previous angst-ridden blog post with this one, which should be less so. Perhaps it could even be contradictory, who knows? Future me will know. Hi future me! How’s it going? Why haven’t you turned Las Vegas off yet? That show suxors!
The Killers come from Las Vegas. I always thought their music had a cowboyish quality to it. Not like those old Western movies, but more like Deadwood. The gritty, real, gold-panning, gun-slinging, blood-letting west.
Then I think perhaps that’s more Kings of Leon. Those boys suddenly became all good-lookin’. When did that happen? I saw one of their film clips the other day. They really have metamorphosed into hot rock n’ roll dudes. The lead singer’s soulful, mournful, raspy voice seems somehow out of place coming from that mouth with the head with the deliberately tousled hair.
Speaking of metamorphosing, I’m still haunted by that book. The metamorphosis, that is. Not the animorphs, or the mighty morphin’ power rangers. *cough* rip off! *cough*. Though it’s hardly reasonable for me to have nostalgia for a tv show that I barely remember, I still feel the urge to defend Voltron from all the half-assed successors that kids have been fed over the last fifteen years.
I’m getting tired. I mean, I already was tired to begin with. Now I’m exhausted. Anyone have anything to add? No? Ok, cool.
I haven’t written a blog post on here for a while, and it occurred to me that I really should stop berating myself for it.
I’ve been feeling weird lately, out of sorts I guess. I’m not sure what it is that’s causing this strange mood, it could be a lot of things. I think the base feeling is one of melancholy, and perhaps a quiet boredom. Sometimes I miss the things I used to do, and I wish I had the energy for it but I’m flat out just trying to get through each day of work.
I miss new experiences, new music, new people.
This train of thought is making me feel like listening to my “songs to cry to” playlist, but I also think that it’s not good for me to wallow.
It’s good to cry every now and then. For me, anyway. It’s like a release. Tim and Thomas were saying that crying is a woman’s secret weapon, and it’s always unfair, no matter when they use it. I don’t think it’s a conscious decision most of the time, I think it’s more of a defense mechanism. But apparently, men can’t cope with women crying. Why? It’s not the end of the world.
Maybe because it’s emo? Stupid emos.
I want to go overseas. I want to live in another country. I want to earn my wage in a different currency. I want to be cold most of the year instead of hot (not emotionally, GOSH!). I want to play in snow again. I want to know WHEN this will happen, not just have it be at some unknown point in the future. I want to go on weekend trips to different countries, and hear different languages being spoken around me. I want to try new things, step out of my comfort zone, get lost, have fun.
Oh my god I love doing those things! Here are some skills that I own:
I know there are other things. Life’s decent, isn’t it?
Here is something beneficial to those of you not in the know – Rosie is in the infectious diseases ward at the hospital suffering from a case of meningococcal infection.
There are two types of meningococcal infection – meningitis and septicaemia. Rosie had septicaemia. Or rather, she HAS septicaemia. She’s still pretty sick. Septicaemia is when the meningococcal bacteria infect the bloodstream, and travel all around the body causing the immune system to react with a scary-looking dark red rash.
Rosie was taken to the Emergency Department of the RBWH on Thursday afternoon, about 2:00pm, by her housemate, Jenna. We are all lucky that Jenna was home that day, as she was supposed to be out with her mother, but she slept in and so didn’t end up going out. Rosie had been sick from the early hours of the morning, with vomiting and fever. Rosie had told Jenna she didn’t want to go to the hospital, but by the afternoon Jenna insisted. When she saw the rash on the side of Rosie’s abdomen, she was even more adamant.
By the time Rosie was in the Emergency Room, and being seen by doctors, her temperature was extremely high, her blood pressure extremely low, and she was delirious. I, meanwhile, had been told by Lauren that Jenna was taking Rosie to hospital. Lauren was at work and unable to go anywhere – she was waiting for her boss (and father-in-law) to get back, and for her mother-in-law to get there so she could get a lift over to the hospital. I was at home cooking – Tim’s brother, Matt, was coming over for dinner that night. As soon as I heard about Rosie’s symptoms, part of my mind brought up all the fractured knowledge I had of meningococcal – which wasn’t much. I called a taxi straight away, however, the taxi I ordered never showed, despite assurances from the taxi call-centre that he was “on his way, just five k’s away”. Apparently he wasn’t, because half an hour later, they were sending a new cab my way, with me now in tears at my inability to do anything get over to the hospital any faster. A drivers licence would have been really useful.
I managed to get to the hospital by about 3:30pm. I was told by the triage admin person that Rosie was still waiting in the corridor, and had yet to be seen. I was more than a bit agitated by this news, but it seemed the admin person didn’t know what they were talking about – the minute the doctor had seen Rosie, and had seen the rash, they were treating it as if it were meningococcal, which is the safest course of action. The admin person told me to sit down and wait, and someone would be out to see me soon.
One of the E.R. doctors came out to get me, and once we were in the corridor of the Emergency Room and out of the waiting area, she turned to me and very gravely advised that they suspected Rosie had meningococcal disease. This was the first point at which I had heard any professional opinion on Rosie’s situation. Up until then, I had been hoping that my lack of knowledge of all other possibilities would see my theoretical diagnosis of meningococcal as an over-the-top paranoid presumption. Having my fears confirmed made everything seem that much worse. Images of random nightmares I’d had over the years, where Rosie was hurt, kidnapped, trapped etc, and I was unable to do anything to help her, flashed into my mind. Some of these I had forgotten about. I also remembered I had shared a drink with Rosie the day before, when we had been to a movie together at Garden City. I asked the doctor if that would put me at risk. Not too much, apparently. Still, when I was finally allowed behind the curtain secluding Rosie from the rest of the Emergency Room, I was the only one not wearing a mask (they figured I’d already been exposed to the bacteria, if that was what it was).
When they let me in to see Rosie, I felt prickly hot & cold, seeing her laying in the bed fidgeting and moaning in pain. Her eyes were bloodshot, and she stared at me blankly with glassy eyes. She looked confused and angry. As the blood pressure cuff on her arm started to inflate to measure the faint pressure of blood being pumped from her heart, she became agitated and started to shout at the doctors and nurses around her. “Take it off! Get it off me! I can’t have this on! Get it off!”
I sat quietly beside her, not sure of what to say to calm her, wanting to comfort her and make her feel better, help her feel not so scared, not so angry, not in so much pain. I smoothed the hair back from her forehead, and she told me angrily to stop. I held her hand, at the nurses request, so that she didn’t bend the arm that had a drip in it. She didn’t take her hand from mine, except to swipe at the blood pressure cuff as it inflated again. The doctors and nurses asked her questions, to test how aware she was, how conscious of her surroundings:
“What day is it today, Rosie-anna?” (I’m surprised she answered them at all, considering the amount of times they stuffed up her name). Rosie answered, “Friday.” I wasn’t sure if this was right, because I wasn’t sure what day it was either.
“Who is this sitting beside you, Rosie-anna?” asked a nurse called Palla. Rosie turned and looked at me, and turned back to Palla and mumbled, “my sister”.
“And what’s her name?”
“Cassie.”
“And is she older or younger than you?”
“Older.”
“By how many years?”
“Five.”
The nurse turned to me to confirm this was correct. I nodded, and she smiled. I was relieved that Rosie was still mostly aware of what was happening around her. She knew where she was, after the doctors had told her, she answered each question of, “Do you know where you are, Rosie-anna?” with a quiet and impatient, “RBH”. This was a good sign. Many meningococcal patients fall into comas, and this can lead to brain damage and all sorts of other problems.
The nurses told me Rosie was going to have a catheter put in, to enable them to monitor everything happening in her body. They ushered me out of the room, and I stood in the corridor, against a wall, feeling numb. Various medical staff approached and questioned me on any allergies Rosie might have, has she been overseas recently, has she been around anyone else sick, is she a smoker, does she use drugs, could she have injected herself with anything recently… I was overwhelmed with everything, and so answered the questions slowly, most of the time with a useless, “I don’t know… I’m not sure… maybe?” I was terrified this information meant the difference between life and death, and I couldn’t be any help at all.
Sometime between when I arrived, and when Rosie had the catheter put in (I can’t recall events in sequence), Tim arrived, and some time after Tim, Lauren and Nathan arrived. We were shown to a family room by a brusque nurse, and told that we would be collected by someone when we were able to go back into the curtain room to see Rosie again.
To Be Continued…
Tim and I moved into our new house on Monday 12th October. We had our phone connected the Thursday before, which was done through Primus. Tim had an account with Primus which was created in about July last year, and was a 24 month contract. Initially, it was just for ADSL, not the phone line. When we moved, however, he decided to switch the phone provider to Primus to take advantage of some of the more decent home phone plans on offer when you had both your home phone and your internet with Primus.
We were advised that it would take 5-7 days from the day of the phone being connected at the new place before we would be able to connect to the internet. In this time, we also lost access to the internet at the old apartment, so Tim was basically paying for internet that he couldn’t use, through the fault of Primus and their ridiculous timeframes on connections. But okay, that’s not the real issue. 5-7 days in the digital era is a bit rich, but not entirely inexcusable. Obviously Primus just don’t spend enough of their budget on technicians to get their customers actually onto their network. It’s no big deal to them if someone is paying good money for shit all, they get something for nothing, and isn’t the bottom line of all corporations/companies profit after all?
The time frame from connection of phone line to connection of internet was frustrating, but it isn’t the only thing that has gotten me all agitated and ranting. My real dislike of Primus took hold when I braved their telephone helpline. (If you’re wondering – 1300 85 85 85).
I phoned Primus on Tuesday after Tim had called them and been told that our internet would not be connected until Friday. I’ll list a few more of the issues I had with their helpline after I give you the general idea of what the phone conversation went like:
Primus: Hello, how can I help you?
Me: Hi. We’ve got an existing Primus account, and we’ve recently moved and we’re waiting for our internet to be connected. We’ve been told that it won’t be done until Friday, and this is unacceptable. I would like an explanation for why it’s taking so long.
Primus: Okay, sure. I’ll just have to go to a different department to find that information for you, would you mind holding?
Me: Sure.
Hold music ———
Primus: Thanks for holding, I’ve just spoken to so-and-so department, and the technician isn’t due to come out to your area until Friday, so that’s the earliest it can be done.
Me: Obviously it’s NOT the earliest that it can be done – Friday is the LATEST that it can be done. We were quoted 5-7 days for connection, and Friday is the seventh day since our phone was connected. Therefore, if it is the EARLIEST that it can be done, it is at the same time the LATEST that it can be done, and the SLOWEST time in which it could possibly be connected, because if it were any MORE than 7 days, I would be calling the Ombudsman or the ACCC.
Primus: Well that’s the earliest that our technician is able to do it.
Me: I’ve also been told that we can only expect speeds of 1500 kbps, whereas at our previous residence we were getting speeds of around 8000 kbps. Previously, we were advised that there should be no problem getting ADSL2 at our new place, which does not fit in with 1500 kbps at all. 1500 kbps is practically dark ages.
Primus: Unfortunately, the cables in the area are not big enough for us to get any better speeds there. It’s because Telstra was responsible for laying all the cables initially, so now there’s not enough room for us to get bigger cables through.
Me: how is that my problem? That’s your problem, and your responsibility. It’s not Telstra’s responsibility now.
Primus: I understand that, I’m just trying to explain why the speed is the way it is.
Me: Look, I’m not angry with you, and I’m sorry to sound hostile, but I’m extremely frustrated with this situation, and it doesn’t appear that much is being done in any way to rectify or resolve any of these issues.
Primus: That’s okay, I understand, it’s just difficult when we’re so busy and have so many people wanting to be connected.
There was a lot more that was said, mainly just verification of accounts and my identity etc, but the basic gist of it was that, a) it takes seven days for a technician to connect us to the internet, and b) the internet speeds that Primus provide are not their responsibility. Ha. Ha. Ha.
The reason I was pretty hostile straight into it was because I had been on the phone, on hold, for about 20 minutes by that stage. Also, it had been a shitfight even getting onto them in the first place. Tim had tried calling at 4:30pm one day, and had been greeted with the after-hours voice message that advised “…our hours are between 8:30am and 5:30pm, Monday to Friday…”. So the natural assumption is that they’re operating on Sydney time (eg. Daylight Savings Time). However, Tim also called on the Tuesday morning at 8:00am our time (9:00am Sydney time) when the call centre should have been open a good half hour already, and got the same after hours message as before.
Are we in the twilight zone? Or are they just pretending to run on Sydney time in the mornings, and then they change back to Brisbane/QLD time in the afternoons?
I’m not going to tell you not to use Primus, I’m just putting forth our experience to make others more aware of our problematic they can be. We’ll be looking elsewhere for our internet service from now on.
I’m currently at mum’s place (which is soon to be vacant – this weekend!) sorting through piles of old papers and other things in my old room. At the moment, I’m taking a break (me being an opportunist, I waited until mum had gone to drop Rosie back home before I had a rest).
Even though I’m not lifting or carrying anything, the sifting through old bank statements and birthday cards does get tiring. I find it takes a long time simply because whenever I come across something of interest I stop, read through it, then place it carefully on the ever-building pile of papers to be stored and then sifted through at some unknown time in the future (whenever I get around to it again). I’d love to have a real filing system.
I came across a few interesting things – old photographs from when Lauren, Ruth & I lived in Balmoral, when People and Dinna were just kittens; old christmas cards from people I’m not even in contact with anymore (not deliberately, just through time and continually moving house and workplaces etc); old notebooks (lots of these) with the beginnings of stories in them, old poetry from my angsty days as an angsty teenager…
Probably not interesting to anyone but me I guess.
Settlement is tomorrow!!!!!
I’ll write more later. There are lots of things I need to do an update on – my time off work (over 3 months now), my walking stick, the operation, the process of buying a house…. lots of things!
Oh. My. God. Slowest day in history. Why is today so slow?
I finish early today. Excel is killing my brain right now. One of my formulas (formulae?) isn’t working, and I don’t know why. Waaaaah! 
This evening marks the close to a relatively stressful week for me. Even though it was a short week, and even though it should have been a fun week because it was my birthday on Monday, the other side of Wednesday just seemed to go to shit. (eep!)
Tim left for his holiday today, three weeks in Ireland & Scotland. I got teary when I was speaking to him on the phone before he boarded, and then afterwards, felt embarrassed in retrospect by my own emotions. How very girly of me! I think that my emotions have been stuffed around somewhat by the horrible experience I had last week. I think that perhaps I’m feeling a bit unsafe, a bit co-dependent – not just on one person, but a whole lot of people, and a bit unsure of myself. I think it’s time for me to just start taking baby steps back towards what I perceive as normality in my own life. I miss my independence. I miss feeling safe. I want to take these things back from the person who made me feel afraid to just step outside on my own.
Here are some more blasphemous images. I don’t know why people would care – God told everyone not to make false idols, so what do Catholics do? Plaster them up all over their places of worship! lol!1
This cat is so cute. It’s from one of those Japanese TV shows, where they show the faces of different people up in the top right-hand corner for some reason.
I needed to be sure I was capable of that which I imagined, but never actually tested. My worth is not dictated by those around me. Love yourself first. You will definitely have enough left for everyone else in your life. It will be easier to tell who is deserving of your love also. You are entitled to make a decision as to who is worth your while. That is your decision and yours alone. But by the same token, you can’t change someone else’s mind or affect or manipulate their decision either.
Nothing that I do to try and force a situation, to try to force something to what I believe is the logical conclusion, is ever going to get it there.
This is a fundamental realisation, one which is strong enough to crawl upon and start learning how to stand upright again. It’s simple, but it’s not something that anyone else can tell you. There are so many things to learn about life which other people will try to tell you, but it’s not until you actually experience it for yourself, make the mistake, and learn from it, that you will really understand.
I know this might sound really wanky to some people, especially those who don’t know what I’ve been going through these past couple of months.
I know there’s something knitting and healing inside, and the healing of this still occasionally aches, but I know that this is the process. This is what needs to happen. The pain, sadness, ill-feelings… they don’t just up and disappear when I feel like I can cope with the world again. And really, I’ve been back in amongst the living for quite some time now.
I love me. I love myself, who I am and who I am not. I love my friends, the people around me who accept me and appreciate me. I love my family, who shaped and moulded who I am. I like idiosyncrasies – things that challenge me, that create lessons for me to learn in my own life.
Melancholy isn’t always a bad thing. I think it’s just like that “Wish You Were Here” song by Pink Floyd. That’s probably a really good melancholy song. Another good melancholy song is “Leif Erikson” by Interpol. And no, they aren’t paying me for all these mentions. Get a real job, GOSH!
