The Significance of Tabs on Cans

“I feel like I’m losing you.”
That’s the text message I got from Trace at 9:47am.
I still haven’t responded.
My first reaction was annoyance (yes, this has been a common emotion when it comes to Trace). I think those words would have meant more spoken than sent via text. Preferably in person, but I would have taken a phone call.
As I thumbed the keypad on my phone trying to think of how to respond to something like that, my annoyance faded to guilt.
I feel guilty. I have no idea why.
What is there to feel guilty about?
The only explaination would be if… well, if he really is losing me.
But how can you lose someone you live with? Someone you see everyday? Someone you’re in a relationship with? It’s not like I’m a sock or an earring.

Unless…
I don’t even know.
I haven’t been this confused since Trace came crawling back to me after cheating.

Ugh. I’m not enjoying this sudden change in feelings toward Trace. I hope it fades.

In better news, Jaime’s band’s single hit #10 on the charts a couple days ago. His tour manager decided that their little break from touring is going to end in about a week. He wants to book them shows with bigger bands in bigger venues.

I couldn’t tell what Jaime truly thought about this as he told me. He seemed somewhat excited, but not nearly as excited as I thought he would. It didn’t reach his eyes… I don’t know. I asked him about it and he shrugged and just said he was tired.
Tired of what? I don’t know. Did he mean he was just tired when he told me and that’s why he wasn’t excited or tired of touring? Tired of the band? Who knows.

Trace went out with his friends Friday and Saturday night this past weekend.
Although he invited me – he seemed to really want me to come – I chose to pass.
I never could stand him when he’s drunk. And that’s all he seems to be doing with his friends, but for the first time in our relationship I really don’t care. I don’t care that he goes out and gets drunk with them anymore. It doesn’t hurt anymore. Maybe I’m finally started to fully trust him…
Or I’ve come to terms with the fact that if he does do something stupid, I will finally be able to let him go. I won’t be made a fool.

I never wanted to be the clingy-type anyway.

Instead, I attended Jaime’s band practice with Tricia on Friday. We have so much fun with the guys, just hanging out at the studio – playing video games, talking and listening to their music.
Jaime and I had The Ultimate Battle of Galaga that went on until midnight – after everyone left. Tricia just cheered us on and occasionally played.
The three of us laid around on the couches talking for a good hour and a half after that. It’s so easy to talk to them. While Tricia rarely agrees with me or understands where I’m coming from – she still sympathises. Jaime, on the otherhand, truly gets it. No matter what I say, he’s right there with me.

One day I’m afraid he’s going to tell me that he thinks I’m a nut case and never talk to me again. It’s like I have no filtering system when I talk to him. I blurt out things that I never in a million years would tell anyone. I must seem like such an emotional freak.

Saturday afternoon, for example, I was on my way to pick up Jaime to go to the beach. We were meeting Meg, Tricia, J, Brandon, some girl that Brandon brought, Glen and Talia.

I was on a pretty busy high way when I noticed a car stopped in the middle turn lane. As I got closer, I saw an older looking man holding a garbage bag, trying desperately to pick up all the cans he spilled in the middle of the highway. He had garbage bags piled on garbage bags in the bed of his car. One of the bags must have slipped and emptied it’s contents in the middle of the road.
I felt so horrible and embarrassed for him. I have no idea why. I wished I could have turned around and helped him, but I was already going up the bridge. I debated with myself several times on whether or not to turn back, but decided not to.

I guess Jaime picked up on my mood when he got in the car because he immediately asked me what was wrong. I told him it was really stupid, but he convinced me to spill the beans anyway.
He didn’t make fun of me as most of my friends would have. He actually suggested that we drive past again and if he’s still there, then he would help me help him. I admitted that part of the reason why I didn’t stop was because I would have felt embarrassed which made me feel worse. But I knew if Jaime was there it wouldn’t be so bad.

The man wasn’t there anymore and he had gotten most of the cans. Jaime asked me to stop anyway, and I did out of pure curiosity. He told me he’d be right back and he ran out and grabbed a couple cans, then came back to the car.
I watched as he pulled the tabs off of the two cans he grabbed and stuffed them in his pocket.
Of course I asked him why he did that, but he just shrugged.

For some reason I didn’t ask him. I had a feeling I would find out at some point.

I did. The next day we met up to go over some stuff for the website at Barnes and Noble and I noticed he had put the tabs from the cans on the shoelace he found at the bookstore the day he met me. I didn’t say anything, but for some reason my chest hurt when I realized it.

The beach was actually a lot of fun. We ended up staying almost all day. I usually get bored with the beach, but I had a lot of fun with everyone there. We played volleyball, football, tossed around a beach ball in the water.
When it started getting dark, we walked around the boardwalk at all the people selling things.
Talia and I bought these ridiculous shell necklaces for $3 each.

Jaime talked me and Talia out of getting a characature for $25 each, saying that he would draw one for us and it wasn’t worth the money.

We all had dinner at Crabby Bill’s on the beach, then I took Jaime home so he could shower and change before we all met back up at the movies.

Well, everyone but Brandon and the girl he brought. (I never did figure out her name)

I made Jaime promise that we’re going to hang out as much as possible this week since they are flying back to California the middle of next week for the beginning of their new tour. We’ll see how that goes.

Cinderella is a Dumb Blonde

I think it’s my turn to be cynical today.
I’ve been dealing with angry, moody people since Sunday. Ok, if I was being honest with myself I would admit that it’s been since I moved in with Trace. And it’s not people – just him.

Why all of a sudden is he really starting to get to me?
I’ve been angry with him, sure. I mean, he’s cheated on me a couple times before – of course I was mad. But I’ve never really been annoyed. I was angry then because I was hurt, now I’m just annoyed. What changed?

This week, apparently, has been stressful for him at work which inevitably puts him in a bad mood. He goes through these phases at least once a month (male period, maybe?) where he is really moody and since I’m the one who is always around considering our living situation – I get to be the brunt of his PMS.
It’s never really bugged me before. I would just be extra sweet to him, but now just thinking about taking the extra effort to please him when he’s done nothing to deserve it makes me nauseous. Now all I want to do is not be around for it. This makes him even more angry and, to be honest, I don’t care. For the first time I really, truly don’t care if he’s upset with me.
It used to bother me to no end when he was angry with me and I would always try to mend things, but since Sunday I’ve made no such effort.

All Sunday he was in one of his moods, which made this coming week completely predictable. I hate predictable – especially when it’s bad. Predictable is boring.

Trace text messaged me Monday afternoon, as he usually does, and immediately started complaining. I chose to ignore him, so instead he called me at work. He told me he wasn’t going to be home until late because his “idiotic boss” wanted to keep him late. I never understood why he stays at a job he hates, then it occure to me that no matter where he works, he’ll always find something to hate about it. It seems this goes for everything in his life.
Anyway, he tells me he won’t be home for dinner and he won’t be able to go grocery shopping as we originally planned since we couldn’t go Sunday since it was Easter.

This means that I had no food in the house to make myself dinner since it’s his turn to buy the groceries and he hasn’t.
So, I met up with Jaime for lunch (he showed me the logo designs – I love them all! But we finally landed on one. Now we’re working on the website.) and told him that I would probably order more than usual for lunch since I’d be going without dinner for the night. He invited me to dinner with his band since they had practice tonight. I guess they usually buy pizzas and have it delievered to their rehearsal space. I asked him if I could stop by earlier because I wanted to be out of the house before Trace got home. He told me to meet him at his place when I got out of work.

And I did.
I didn’t even go home to change or anything, I just drove straight to his house. I text messaged Trace and let him know I, too, would be home late. And he went off on this tangent about how I have to work the next morning blah blah blah. I told him he wasn’t my father and I could stay out all night if I wanted to – then I turned off my phone.

I’ve never turned off my phone on him before, but I really did not want to deal with him.

Jaime’s apartment is so… Jaime. I don’t know how else to describe it. It’s a small, but somehow spacious studio style. His sparse decorations and knick-knacks all look like they were found, not so much picked out. As if they found him. Kind of like his choice of jewlery. In fact, most of his furniture looked that way. He has the most comfortable counch I’ve ever sat on. Complete with oversized cushions.
He doesn’t have any pets. This, he says, is only because he sometimes isn’t home for months when he tours. I thought about how much fun Sukkah would have in Jaime’s apartment with all the potential hiding places.
I spent a good hour walking around his small apartment, looking at everything.
He asked me if I was always this intrusive when I first go to someone’s place or if he was just special. I laughed and told him that if he wasn’t so interesting that he wouldn’t have this problem. He shrugged and told me it was no problem – that he was glad that I was invading his privacy. It made him feel important. I told him he was an overconfident a-hole ( really said a-hole, I don’t like cursing.) He burst out laughing and told me I was hilarious when I’m in a bad mood.

Jaime has a huge Dali painting hanging above his couch. I, of course, had no idea it was Dali until he told me. I never would have guessed it was Dali unless he told me because when I think of Dali, I think of melting clocks and floating knives, not… Jesus.
The painting looks unfinished. It’s used with simple tans. It’s a view of Jesus on the cross that I never saw before – looking down on him – bird’s eye. It’s a very powerful piece. I fell in love with it.
When I asked Jaime what religion he was he admitted he was agnostic, but the story of Jesus always moved him , whether he believed it or not.
We agreed that the Bible contains some of the best stories ever written. Chuck Palahnuick, BC.

I’ve made a mental note to re-read the Bible – only look at it as a very original fiction novel.

After I thoroughly gave myself a tour of his apartment, Jaime made the best tea I ever had (he won’t give me the recipe) and we sat on the couch, talking.
I asked him why he didn’t draw on the walls like Jude does in Across the Universe. After asking me to stop comparing him to Jude, he told me he thought about it, but decided against it since he’s only renting. He says that once he gets a house of his own he definitely wants to have at least one room that he can muralize (is that a word? It is now.).
Directing the subject back to Jude, I told him I loved the drawing he made on the wall in his apartment. The one that said “Just Passing Through” and it had a picture of a girl flying through a guy’s chest. Jaime agreed that he really enjoyed that, too. I told him I wished they sold that poster-sized so I could hang it on my wall – even though Trace would hate it and probably tear it down. Jaime started laughing, but wouldn’t tell me why, so I kicked him and got more tea.

I had a lot of fun at Jaime’s practice. We drove there together. It’s this small recording studio about 10 mins from Jaime’s apartment. They had already ordered the pizza by the time we got there and they were already drinking.
Luckily Talia was there so her and I sat on the couch in the studio talking. I vented about Trace and continued until the pizza was delivered and everyone joined us. Jaime squeezed between Talia and I.
I went off on this tangent about how I, for once, would like to read a novel or watch a movie that shows what happens after the couple falls in love. I want to see how they work through the husband’s bad attitude and the wife’s PMS. I’d like to see how Charming Prince Charming actually is after a bad day at work. Chances are Cinderella would be scrubbing the palace’s floor while he stayed working late.
Talia – along with pretty much everyone else – started laughing when I was through with my rant.
Brandon goes, “So the good ole boyfriend is working late, huh?” I said yes and he just says, “Yeah right.”

Talia hit him, but I just shrugged. I said with all the honesty I felt at that point, that if Trace really was cheating on me I didn’t even care anymore. Everyone else laughed, but Jaime looked at me in a way that made me feel totally exposed and asked me if I was serious. I said I was and that I didn’t expect him to understand because he never felt the way I had before. With the same serious look on his face he said, “Yes I have.” And I immediately knew what he meant. He meant his exgirlfriend whom he had the ‘generic’ relationship with. The girl he dumped to find someone better. To find someone and something that I’m positive does not exist. Fairytale love. Cinderella and Prince Charming love.

I wonder how long it will take Jaime to realize that there is no such thing.
To be completely honest, I hope he never does. I hope he lives the rest of his life thinking that love is out there somewhere. I think it makes him who he is. I think it defines him.
I would give anything to have that kind of faith in love anymore.

Coming home to Trace after having such an entertaining evening out was nothing more than a let down. I put off going to bed as long as I could. I even took a shower which I never do at night and flossed. Trace was already in bed and I kept my fingers crossed – hoping he was asleep as I crawled in. When he put his arm around me, I cringed and resisted the urge to push it off.

I hope this doesn’t continue. I hate feeling this way toward someone I have to live with.

The Beatles Revisited

I found this website called Deezer.Com. It’s kind of like Pandora, but you can listen to whatever song you want. You just type in the artist or song name and it plays it for you.
I’ve been listening to The Beatles.

For some reason they remind me of my childhood. My mother was a huge Beatles fan. She had every record they ever put out, so I grew up listening to them. Any time I hear She Loves You or Twist and Shout it reminds me of dancing around in my PJ’s with my two brothers. They would toss me back and forth and spin me around while we sang and danced. It would drive my dad crazy, but my mom would often come and start dancing with us.

I think what started me on this Beatles kick again was hanging out with my brothers this weekend.
It’s usually very hard to get my brothers to come out, but they both actually did. They joined us at The Lounge on Saturday night.

Meg, John (Meg’s hubby) and Tricia met up at my apartment before we left for The Lounge. Tricia gave Trace crap for not coming, but it’s nothing new. He rarely ever goes out with us and he rebels against The Lounge because it doesn’t play heavy metal.
Kel and Caleb (my brothers) promised to come out with me Saturday night when I saw them Friday night at my parent’s house. (Barbeque for Easter – I know, but it’s Caleb’s Spring Break and he had plans for Sunday) They ended up meeting us up at Jaime’s show. Both of them thought the band was pretty good. Tiff was there even though I didn’t invite her. It was pretty awkward because neither of us invited the other one. Apparently she’s “seeing” Brandon.

Jaime hung around after he put his drumset away and met everyone. Everyone immediately got along with Jaime as I suspected. He got along especially well with Kel and Caleb – which surprised me. Neither Kel nor Caleb were big into the whole “rock” scene, but apparently Caleb has been listening to more lately. Neither of my brothers get along particularly well with Trace. They are constantly making fun of him behind his back , but they’re nice enough in person. (It drives me crazy).
Jaime was giving Caleb a lesson on Rock Bands that were required listening and him and Kel immediately hit it off when Jaime mentioned that any guy with a girl’s name automatically makes you awesome. (Kel’s real name is Kelly – he sometimes lies and tells people it’s Keller)
Kel is a programmer, so they were talking about websites or something. I didn’t really understand.

Anyway, we left the bar around 11pm and made our way to The Lounge. Jaime promised to meet us there after he went home, showered and changed.

I rode with my brothers. The entire drive they hounded me about Jaime – saying how much they liked them and how much cooler he was than Trace. You would think that this would upset me, but it is rare that my brothers upset me. I’ve gotten so used to them and we fought enough as kids that now nothing they do gets to me. I explained to them that although he is really fun, I would never in my life date anyone in a band and espcially not a drummer. Kel caught on, but Caleb didn’t understand what his being the drummer had to do with it. I told him that most drummers were about as good with monogamy as he is. Caleb immediately understood. He takes the fact that he is a player as a compliment.
Kel, being the typical oldest, lectured me on how I needed someone like Jaime as opposed to Trace – minus the drummer thing. I just brushed him off and told him he doesn’t even know Trace. He said, “I know enough.”

I was only slightly relieved when we finally got to The Lounge. Meg, John and Tricia were already inside by the time we got there because Kel drives like a granny.

We hadn’t been in the bar for more than 10 minutes when Caleb had disappeared with some girl. I asked Kel if Caleb was still seeing that blonde I met a few weeks earlier – Kel just laughed and nodded.

FYI – No one can drink like my brothers.

Both of them went away to the University of Florida – Caleb still attended – and they learned their drinking habits from the parties up there.
I visit Caleb a couple times a month, as I did Kel when he went, and let me tell you – no matter what night – there is always a party somewhere.

Tricia, of course, decided she wanted to attempt to keep up with the two of them, as did John. Meg and I stayed away from that. Meg had learned her lesson the first time she went out with my brothers and I.

Jaime showed up about an hour after we did. He looked absolutely adorable! He was wearing a button up black shirt that was just a size too small, his studded black belt and black work boots. His hair was still wildly sticking up in all directions even though he was dressed up.
The first thing I noticed was his necklaces. He always wears several necklaces, but one in particular stood out. It was a stainless steel simple chain with a small old fashioned key and a rust-colored heart with a lock on it. He was also wearing a steel chain with a guitar pick on it and one with a shell.
When I asked him about it, he told me he found the lock and key seperately – months apart in two different states – yet the key fit the lock perfectly. He said he always knew it had to mean something – he just hadn’t found out yet.

Apparently he found the key first in some rural state in an old hotel they stayed in while on tour, so he kept it. He said he tried it on a few locks around the hotel, but it didn’t fit anything. He told me he secretly hoped it was a skeleton key, but it wasn’t. I told him, knowing me, I would have thought of an entire backstory for that key. He told me I should write it and send it to him sometime. I told him I didn’t write.
The heart was on a broken keychain that was hidden behind other keychains in a store he went into at the mall. He said he was looking through keychains when the heart fell. For some reason he decided to check and see if the key fit in the heart – and it did. He bought it immediately.

I told him I wished I had some type of jewelry like that. He just shrugged and said that it’s not that hard to find. He said he found the shoelace he ties around his neck at the bookstore the night he met me. I joked and said that was gross, wearing a dirty shoelace around your neck. I was secretly jealous.

Jaime was so much fun. When I told him I didn’t drink, he said that was the single coolest thing he ever heard. I never thought it was that amusing, but he went into how it builds character – to be able to go out, have fun, dance and talk to people without taking a sip of alcohol. He said he’s going to start.

And he did. He didn’t have a sip of alcohol the entire night, yet he danced with me and my friends whenever we asked him to.

Kel, Caleb, John and Tricia were completely wrecked by the time The Lounge closed. Meg had to drive Tricia home and I had to drive Kel’s car to drop off him and Caleb. Jaime, bless his heart, followed me so that he could give me a ride home afterwards.

I have no idea why I didn’t drive since I never drink. It just didn’t occur to me.

On the ride home with Jaime I was all keyed up. We were singing along to Beatles songs at the top of our lungs. We both admited to each other that we had the worst voices in history.

Jaime and I ended up talking until close to 5am when we got to my apartment. We walked around the apartment complex and the lake that I usually jog around.
We got onto the subject of love, inevitably. I ended up telling him the whole story of Trace and I. I said that’s when I finally realized that the storybook love doesn’t exist. All there is is the generic, painful, sometimes dull but fulfilling love. Jaime immediately disagreed. He’s the first male I ever met that honestly believes with all his heart and soul that fairytale love does exist. He says he refuses to settle for less. He even dumped his last girlfriend because it was that generic love. He said although he was comfortable and probably loved her in some way – it wasn’t soul shattering love. There was nothing intense about it. The way he described their relationship reminded me of Trace and I. He ended up breaking up with her when she wanted it to become more serious because he didn’t want to attach himself to someone when there could be something better out there.
He told me that after that mess, he refuses to even date anyone unless he knows it’s the head over heels love because he doesn’t want to hurt anyone the way he hurt her.
I told him he may have made the biggest mistake of his life, letting her go. He said he’s heard that a thousand times, but he knows that there is love out there like that. I asked him what if he never finds it – even if it does exist (which it doesn’t). He told me he’d rather be alone than pretend. He said he’s content within himself. He’s busy and has close friends – he doesn’t NEED someone there.

I told him he was brave.
He disagreed and said that I was. He said that I was brave for staying with Trace and making it work.
I told him it would never be as easy as it was before I found out what he did, but I was in deep with him. There was no point in letting go when he’s obviously trying so hard to make it up to me.
Jaime didn’t say much on the subject after that.
We talked about his family for a little while after that because mine was brought up. Apparently his mom and dad split up a few years earlier because his mom fell head over heels in love with some lawyer. So, his dad, in rebellion of LA moved to Florida. He never remarried, but I guess his mom is happily married living in a mansion with her husband and apparent love of her life. I realized that’s where Jaime got the idea that fairytale love exists. I wondered what type of relationship they REALLY had that Jaime doesn’t know about.

I finally got tired enough to go inside and said goodbye to Jaime. Trace didn’t even notice when I got home.

Tragically Flawed

This morning on my way to work, as I was pulling out of my apartment complex, I noticed a car roll to a stop a few feet away from me. I was confused at first until I realized that the reason they had stopped was because there was an overweight woman on one of those motorized wheelchairs in a slouched position in the middle of the IN entrance to my complex.

She was fine, but I immediately felt guilty for not noticing her. She looked at my car as I pulled away and I think she thought I was stopping for her, too. I didn’t.

This made me wonder how often I must pass by things in life without even noticing them. What have I missed being so trapped in my own thoughts? If only there was a way to rewind life – not so I can change anything, but so that I could see what I missed.
I hate bringing this up, but it got me thinking about when Trace cheated on me. I wonder if the signs were all there, but I had been so caught up in my head that I missed them all.

This eventually had me thinking about tragic flaws in different characters in novels I’ve read. I started thinking about my tragic flaws and I realized that thinking too much was one of them. I’m extremely unobservant, but at the same time I am. I notice insignificant things sometimes and get caught up in them – completely missing out on other things. Maybe unobservant is the wrong word. Maybe I tend to focus too much on things, so much so that I block out everything else.

I think I have a problem. I think I think too much.

Monday night was spent with my two wonderfully hilarious girlfriends: Meg and Tricia. They are both polar opposites of each other and of myself, but I think that’s why I adore them so much. It was nice to have girl time when I spend so much of my time with Trace.
Meg is married to a really sweet and hard working guy who I loved the first moment I met him. He’s really short – unlike Meg who is two inches taller than me. The first thing I noticed about him was how he always has his hands shoved in his pockets. He also does this thing when he talks, he rocks back and forth on his heels. His mannerisms make him seem shy, but he isn’t in the slightest. I always thought that was interesting.
Meg is moody. That is putting it nicely. Normally, I don’t get along well and can’t be around people who are cynical, but she is in a very amusing and funny way. She’s not a mad moody, she’s a light moody. Maybe moody is the wrong word, maybe not. I’m not very good with words. Anyway, Meg is probably one of the most beautiful creatures on this planet without realizing it. I’m not just saying that because I’m her best friend, I would label her the same if I had just met her. Anyone would and does. She’s the type of person that people stare at when she walks through a mall, but never approach her. She’s not at all approachable so she doesn’t buy it when I tell her how attractive she is.
Tricia is addictive. She is the type of person that can talk to anyone, anywhere, anytime and instantly make you love her. I’ve always felt privaleged to be one of her best friends. Tricia is the one who gets approached when we go out because she is constantly smiling (now you understand why I adore her). I wouldn’t say she’s technically good looking – and I can admit that because I’m her best friend.

Anyway, the three of us made dinner (they drank wine – ick) and watched a couple Jane Austen movies. We updated each other on what was going on with our lives. Meg and Evan (her husband) are trying to have a baby – it hasn’t been going well, but it’s only been three months. Tricia started “seeing” someone she met at a grocery store. I told them about Jaime and how great I think he is. I told them they absolutely had to meet him – I knew they would all love him as much as I did. I even hinted to Tricia that she may want to hook up with him, but she’s currently infatuated with grocery guy.

We made plans to go to The Lounge – our favorite weekend hang out – on Friday night. I promised to invite Jaime.

Beyond that nothing more really has happened this week. I spoke to Jaime on the phone for a little while last night. He asked me a few things about the logo and website and promised to have it done by Sunday. I invited him to The Lounge. He said he’d try to make it.

Tripping Over Peaceful Dead Birds on a Morning Run

I know, weird title, but that’s what happened at 5am this morning during my jog around the lake by my apartments.
I was running, listening to some Beatles song (I grew up listening to those guys. Thanks, Mom) when I nearly stumbled over a dead bird.
I know nothing about birds, so I couldn’t tell you what kind of bird it was. There was barely any light this morning, so I couldn’t really see the coloring.

You know how most birds, they look twisted and uncomfortable when you see them mangled on the side of the road?
This bird didn’t.
He looked peaceful. As if he was flying along, landed and decided to take an everlasting nap on the pavement.
I debated on pushing him from the middle of the sidewalk to the grass, instead. So no one would step on him.
But I didn’t.
The photographer in me didn’t want to disturb his pose, plus there was a grease stain on the sidewalk in the shape of a heart next to his left wing.
I wish I had my camera, but jogging with a camera would be terribly uncomfortable.
I was all nostalgic (not sure if that’s the right word) after that.

I barely got anything done this weekend. It was so jam-packed.
I got up extra early this morning to do laundry during and after my run since I did zero cleaning this weekend.
Luckily Trace will be out of the house tonight, so I’ll be able to do some serious cleaning without having to listen to the TV. I like cleaning to my own music.

I suppose I should recap this weekend. Not that anyone reads my blog but, like I said, I want to start recording events in my life. Sometimes even the most insignificant of events can cause fateful changes later. It’s good to know how I changed my fate in the long run if that is the case.

Friday evening I stopped by my apartment to grab some clothes and hair and makeup supplies, then made my way over to Tiff’s house to get ready for Jaime’s show.

Let it be known that I did invite Trace, but as I predicted, he refused because the music is not heavy metal.

I have to backtrack a little bit here. Jaime emailed me right before I left work on Friday and gave me his cell number to call so Tiff and I could meet up with him before the show. I hadn’t noticed before, but he doesn’t have his number on his business cards. I had to laugh when he gave me the reasoning for this:
At one point he did have his phone number on his cards, but somehow some fans got ahold of it and started calling him. They apparently filled up his voicemail box, so real clients could never get through. Now he only give out his cell phone on occasion to “trusted parties.” He told me I should feel privilaged. I told him he was full of himself.

But as we all know, most drummers are.

Ok, I honestly can’t say that I think Jaime is conceided in any way. He’s actually one of the most down to earth people I’ve ever met.

Anyway, I had to give him my phone number because otherwise he wouldn’t know who was calling him. That’s the excuse he gave me anyway. I told him that was a slick line and that he should use it sometime on someone he actually likes. He told me he already did.

I told this story to Tiff as we got ready at her apartment. She took over my hair and makeup and I’m sure if I let her she would have dressed me as well. I don’t mind, I’ve never been an expert at either.
We left around 7pm for the small bar/venue. Jaime told me to meet him there at 7:30 because they went on at 9pm. They were the headlining band, but they only had one opening band.

Tiff went straight to the bar when we got there. I just got my usual Shirley Temple with extra cherries (I don’t drink alcohol). Tiff kept bugging me to call Jaime, but I didn’t see him walking around and I didn’t want to bug him in case he was busy doing band stuff. She somehow wrestled my phone away from me and called him herself. When she hung up she told me he was backstage and that he’d meet us at the bar.
I felt nervous for some reason, I don’t know.
Anyway, I don’t know what I was expecting Jaime to wear, but it wasn’t what he was wearing. For some reason I invisioned him in leather pants with a ductape shirt or something completely outrageous, but he was just wearing his normal tshirt and jeans. The only difference was that he was sporting one of those mailman hats.
Tiff immediately fell all over him. He seemed slightly uncomfortable with how forward she is. I made it a point to apologize for her.

After Jaime introduced us to the rest of the band, Tiff had moved on to falling all over the lead singer. His name is Brandon and he’s the stereotypical lead singer. He definitely had presence and he seemed to be soaking up Tiff’s advances.
Jaime and me along with Glen and Talia (the bassist and his wife) all decided we were craving bad bar food, so we ordered some nachos and sat at one of the tables in front of the stage. I immediately fell in love with Glen and Talia. Glen is very soft spoken, but Talia is very loud and opinionated. You would think it’s the other way around. She’s the kind of person that most would love to hate. I just loved her. And I adored how Glen adores her. You can see it in his eyes when he looks at her.

Tiff and Brandon disappeared backstage. I decided to apply the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy to this one.
The rest of us had a pretty interesting conversation, while eating nachos, about the pros and cons of Michael Bay films. Jaime and I agreed that Transformers was good enough to override the mistake that was Pearl Harbor. Glen probably would have agreed with us if Talia didn’t vehemently disagree.

Glen and Jaime had to go hunt down J, the guitarist, halfway through the opening act’s set. (I’m not even going to elaborate on how horrible the openers were.) At this point Talia took the opportunity to tell me about how great and wonderful Jaime was. I informed her, halfway through her telling me about what a great and wonderful personality Jaime has, that I had a live-in boyfriend named Trace and that I was sure Jaime wasn’t interested in me like that. She rolled her eyes and said, “I don’t see a ring on your finger yet, sweetie.”
Normally I hate it when people give me pet names, but I didn’t mind it so much when Talia used it. It somehow gave the statement evenmore of her personality.

Tiff never reappeared from backstage, even after Jaime’s band played, so I spent the entire set dancing with Talia.
There weren’t as many fans as I expected, but there were enough gathered in front of the stage. Talia and I opted to stay near our table.

Ok, in hopes that Trace never sets eyes on this blog, I will say this:
I had butterflies when I watched Jaime. It’s stupid and messed up, I know. And it was probably a fluke brought on by a drumset, but there was something about how he smiled while he was playing that made my fingers tingle. I couldn’t help but smile, too. Granted, I’ve never really watched any drummers during a set, this would be a first, but Jaime seemed to be uniquely animated while he played. He made funny faces at me (or maybe it wasn’t at me, but the girls in the front row taking pictures of him) and smiled a lot.

I’m a big fan of smiles. A big fan.

Anyway, the butterflies, I have since decided, were friendship butterflies because I could never see myself with a drummer (or any other member of a band) nevermind leave Trace. There is just way too much history there and I have a tendency to want to delete all traces of exboyfriends.
Plus, Trace and I tried braking up once and it didn’t work out too well for either of us.

Wow, I just reread that last paragraph and it sounded really bad.
I love Trace. I really do.

Great. Now I’m thinking about the breakup. That’s never good.

After the show, which was actually very good. (I bought the CD from the merch girl) Tiff finally appeared from backstage with Brandon who, along with everyone else in the band, was bombarded by fangirls. Talia and I laughed as they signed autographs. I asked her if it bothered her at all that Glen had a lot of fans or if she ever questioned his loyalty. She rolled her eyes and said that Glen wouldn’t have the balls to cheat on her. She then, in a not-so-inconspicuous way told me that of all the guy in the band – even Glen – that Jaime was the one who was the least involved with the groupies. I didn’t tell her that I didn’t buy that for one minute.

Anyway, I finally decided to pull Tiff out of the crowd so we could go, but both her and Jaime begged me to hang around for awhile.
Awhile turned into until the bar closed and then another hour hanging out in the back parking lot by their van.

I do have to admit, although both Brandon and J are alcoholics – they were quite funny. Talia was obviously getting pissed off at them, but Glen and Jaime seemed to be used to it.

I think the worst part of the night was when Talia decided she was going to ditch me and “hang out” at the hotel with Brandon and J. I asked her how the hell I was supposed to get home. She told me to have Jaime take me home.

Let it be known that I would never ditch my friend for some guy. Never.

But Tiff and I aren’t that good of friends to begin with. Mostly aquantences from work. That’s what I get for carpooling with the desperately single.

I did end up catching a ride with Jaime. He drove me home, then took Glen and Talia back to the hotel before going home himself.

Little did I know that coming home at 2am would be such a big deal until the next morning. Trace decided he was going to throw a fit and be pouty the entire day Saturday because I came home two hours later than he did. I overreacted and told him that living with him was worse than living with my parents with the curfew and left the apartment in a huff.

Of course I had no idea where I was going to go. So, I went to the only place I could think of that would relax me – the bookstore.
I called Jaime to see if he happened to have any of the designs done and if he wanted to meet up to show me some. If I was being honest with myself I would admit that the reason I called him was really because I needed to be around someone with an optimistic attitude to help mine out a bit.

Jaime said he didn’t have them all done yet and that he wanted to wait until he was finished with all of them before showing them to me. I guess he noticed I sounded a little disappointed so he asked if I wanted to hang out anyway.

We ended up meeting at this temporary used bookstore that was at an abandonded warehouse. I was so excited about it and greatful that he informed me of it.
Jaime and I wandered around the bookstore in silence together. Something that would have been altogether impossible if I had been there with Trace. He would have either complained about how bored he was the entire time or talked my ear off. But Trace and I just walked up and down every aisle, sure to read the title of every book.

I spent $20 on 6 hardcovered books. Normally a hardcover book is $20 alone. Thank you, Jaime!

After we bought our books, we ran across a six-lane highway to get to the McDonald’s across the street, only realizing afterwards that it would have made more sense just to drive there.

Jaime played the good-listener and lent an ear while I rattled on about how upset I was about Trace. He didn’t say much or give any advice, just listened. It was surprisingly helpful.

There’s something I noticed about Jaime while we spoke that I decided I really liked about him. It made me want to take a picture of him with black and white film and leave it out in the sun awhile so it would get all yellow and pretend that him and I had been friends forever.

When he talks, he smiles a lot. There are very few people that I know who do that. Very few people my age still have the ability to smile with both their mouth and eyes while maintaining a conversation. Usually it comes in spurts, but never throughout an entire conversation.
Jaime’s smile never leaves his eyes, even when his lips aren’t participating.
That and he talks with his fingers. Not in the way most do – waving their hands around and all that, but he draws while he talks with the tips of his fingers.
If there is a table in front of him, as there was in McDonald’s, he’ll trace outlines on the surface while telling a story. If there isn’t, he’ll draw lines in the air. It’s actually kind of interesting to watch.
And, like I said, it made me want to take a picture of him. Or a series of pictures.

I don’t know why I found that endearing, but I did. I really wanted Trace to meet him. I really felt like they would become good friends and maybe Jaime would rub off on him a little. Give him some advice on being a little bit happier sometimes. (Instead of the perpetually angry metalhead)

Jaime shrugged and said that maybe they would meet sometime, but I didn’t put much stock in that response. He asked why I suddenly wanted him to meet my boyfriend and I had to confess.
He started laughing and told me that he noticed my little quirks, too. This surprised me, I didn’t think I had any quirks, not as interesting as his, anyway and he told me that I definitely did.

I never really noticed until he told me, but I have a fixation with my hands. I am either always sitting on my hands or have my fingers entwined as if I’m praying. I admitted that when I drive, I must always have one hand between my legs (not there, perverts! He thought the same thing and laughed at me for a full five minutes!).
I’m the same way with my feet, whenever Trace and I are sitting on the couch together or even laying in bed, I have to stuff my feet under his legs or anywhere I can fit them. He hates it.

Jaime also says that I am the best physical listener he’s ever met. I asked him what he meant by that and he told me that I listen with my whole body and it’s extremely obvious when I’m uninterested because of my body language. When I’m into something someone is saying, I lean my whole body toward them and stare at them – I observe them.
I was embarrassed and covered my face, but he told me it made him feel like the only person in the world and that was a good thing.

I wish Trace would say things like that to me. But one thing I’ve learned from being in a relationship is that the need to compliment eachother fades. That’s what friends are for or new people you meet.

When I got home, I apologized to Trace and he apologized to me. Like I mentioned before, our relationship has gotten a lot smoother. Our little fights never last too long.

On Sunday I wanted to go to the beach because it was really warm and breezy. The perfect beach day. But Trace hates the beach and most of my friends were working. I debated on calling Jaime, but decided I didn’t want to seem too… I don’t know. I had seen him Friday and Saturday night already, so Trace and I used our Bush Garden’s pass and went there for the day.

Everything was fine until we got stuck on one of the rollercoasters and I started having an Anxiety attack. It was the worst I’ve had in a long time.
I know it makes Trace really uncomfortable while I’m having one, so I was trying to keep it from him while still trying not to completely lose my mind.

I’ve since decided to never go on a rollercoaster again.

This leads me to today. Nothing much as happened yet, except I’m late for lunch! I better end this here.

Let’s give this a try…

In an attempt to somehow keep a record of my life and at the same time get a little better with the computer, I’ve decided to start up a journal – and what a great time! So much has happened lately, this week in particular…

 I’m not even sure where I should start.

How do these blogs work anyway? Do I start from today and go forward? From the day I was born – I’d have a lot of catching up to do if this were the case.

How about a little bit about me?
There is a small blurb about me on my profile page, but I don’t even know how to view it, so I’m just going to start here.

My name is Skyla. I heard it’s a bad idea to post your last name on public internet blogs, so I’m going to skip that part.
I’m 23 years old, just turned last month on the 13th. (So close to valentine’s day!)
I’m currently going to school part time for photography. I’m not a professional photographer yet, but I hope to be someday, if only part time. I do little jobs here and there, but nothing fancy. My portfolio is building slowly. I don’t have a website yet or even a business card, but that is in the making (more on that later).
I work full time at a dentist’s office as a receptionist. I get to deal with people all day, which normal people would probably hate, but it doesn’t bother me too much. Rude people amuse me more than anything.

Ok, I admit it, I do get annoyed with perpetually rude people, but most of the time I just try to blow it off.

Anyway, I have a boyfriend of 2.5 years named Trace. We just moved in together a little over 7 months ago. He’s my first real boyfriend, my first love, my first first and my first heartache.
He’s a pretty cool guy with a lot of quirks that I’ve learned to either deal with or love. He’s not a bad looking guy either, about 6′2, blonde hair and brown eyes. He’s a big metal head and refuses to wear shirts of any color except black.

I used to tolerate metal until I moved in with him and now I can’t stand it.

Our relationship is at it’s best, in my opinion, right now. Of course we’re past that stage of thinking that the world revolves around each other, but we’re content. We had a rough patch for a few months. Did I mention he was my first heartache? Let’s just say he wasn’t loyal (that’s putting it nicely) a couple times early in the relationship, then again about a year ago.

Go ahead and think I’m nuts for taking him back, but he’s proved himself for about a year now. He doesn’t put himself in situations in which he can get into trouble anymore. My trust took a little while to earn, but it’s back full force now.

I think that whole ordeal made our relationship a little more realistic. We all know that those earth-shaking romances live only in books and movies.
It’s nice to know I’ve found the down to earth kind of romance.

Anyway, to put it short: Trace is a metalhead dork who drinks too much, but loves me more than any other male in my life (who I’m not related to. I have two brothers whom I’m pretty close with).

The other man in my life (besides the bro’s – I’m getting to them!) is Sukkah, my ugly cat. I call him ugly with all the love in my heart. That is why I bought him – because he was so weird looking.
He’s missing a tail (don’t know how or why), he’s got two different colored eyes (green and blue), a flat face and scraggly fur, but he’s the sweetest little cat I’ve ever met. He’s extremely affectionate and playful and I love him with all my heart.

Did I mention Trace can’t stand him? He thinks he’s weird. Trace wants a pit bull, how stereotypical.

I have two more hours of work to burn, so I’m going to go ahead and recap my week. (For some reason the doctors here love me and let me bring in my lap top – I love my job)

Let’s see, the beginning of my week was pretty uneventful up until Wednesday.

Wednesday night after work, I decided to hang out at Barnes and Noble. I had gotten paid last week and decided it was due time for me to spend some money on much needed books.

As a rule, I always stop by the Starbucks in the bookstore and get myself a grande decaf carmel macchiato. (I know what you’re thinking – decaf! what’s the point?! Here’s the thing, I’m prone to anxiety attacks and caffine does NOT help. I’m addicted to the taste of coffee, so I had to find an alternative.)

Anyway, so I get in line behind this young guy in the cafe. I have to hold in a laugh when he orders the exact same thing as me. I mean EXACT. Down to the decaf and all.
When it’s my turn I just have to say, “same as him” instead of saying “grande decaf Caramel Macchiato please. Yes, decaf. Yes, I’m sure. Thanks.”
So, I grab my beverage and make my way over to the magazines (always my first stop) I like to browse the photography magazines – see what’s new, etc.
Guess who is standing there looking at some type of computer magazine? The same guy. I immediately felt self concious, so I grabbed the first photography magazine that caught my eye and walked over to the other end of the magazines. I didn’t want him to think I was following him.

When I was done looking through the magazines (I never buy them, too expensive and not enough pages) I put it back and moved on to the journals. Like I said at the beginning of this entry, I really wanted to start journaling, but when I found out how much journals are, I decided I’d put my computer skills to use and write in a blog instead. I figure as long as I don’t post my last name this journal will be personal enough.
But guess who is three feet away looking at the sketch books? You guessed it. Coffee Guy.

After deciding that I wasn’t going to spend $20 on a book that had no words, I moved on to the fantasy/romance/fiction section. I had finally lost the Coffee Guy. I picked up Chuck Palahnuick’s newest book – Rant. I also picked up Sleeping with the Fishes by MaryJanice Davidson. I read her Undead series and fell in love, so I decided to start this series. I also picked up Jacob (The Nightwalkers, Book 1) by Jaquelyn Frank because I recognized it from my wishlist on amazon.
After I browsed the cookbook section and picked up a Semi-Homemade Cooking book (yes, I’m addicted to the Food Network) I quite literally *almost* ran into Coffee Guy.

I probably wouldn’t have said anything to him if he wasn’t holding two amazing books in his hand (along with a sketchbook and a magazine). Of course, he said something at the same time, we laughed, then he asked me to go ahead.
he was holding Stephenie Meyer’s New Moon and Twilight, the 2nd and 3rd book in her series. The Twilight Saga is my all-time favorite series.
I asked him if he knew that Twilight was the first in that series and he said that he just finished it and immediately ran out to get the next books. I told him I was surprised that a guy actually read those books (I thought maybe he was gay, then ruled that out later.) We talked about how great those books were for awhile and how the next one is coming out in August – yadda yadda yadda.

Eventually I asked him what he was going to say and he said that he was going to tell me that Rant was a really good book and Chuck had another book called Snuff coming out in may. That started us off on a whole other tangent on how great Chuck is. His favorite book was Fight Club, mine is Invisible Monsters.

I was during this conversation that I realized who he reminded me of. Jude. From Across the Universe. Spittin’ image, I tell you! He’s a little taller, I think. Not as tall as Trace, so probably 6 foot. He had the same shaggy brown hair look with the 6′oclock shadow.

Thinking that he looked like Jude was a mistake because I have a huge crush on Jim Sturgess. And Coffee Guy (I found out his name is Jaime, so I’ll call him by his real name from now on) had the most adorable smile I’ve ever seen. It’s nothing magnificent, kind of small – I don’t know how else to describe it – but very bright.
And he had the coolest color eyes. they were so dark green they almost looked brown. When I complimented him on them, he mentioned that most people think they are brown and I was the first to guess right.

Have you ever met someone and within the first 5 seconds knew that they were going to be a really good friend? Me either, this was a first for me too.

Anyway, I think the thing that I really adored about him was that he was so, I don’t know, happy? But not annoyingly happy, just upbeat, you know? And he was pretty laid back, and for goodness sakes we had almost everything in common!

That is except for music. We eventually made our way to the entertainment section and he was pointing out and talking about all sorts of bands I had no idea about. I found out later that he’s a drummer in an up-and-coming band from LA.

This is going to sound bad, but I was extremely relieved to hear that he’s a drummer in a semi-famous band. Why? Because drummers are bad news. Why is this good? Because otherwise I may have been attracted to someone who wasn’t my boyfriend. This immediately changed my attraction to platonic. I could only imagine the following someone like him would have, being a drummer AND adorable.

I didn’t tell him this, of course, that would have been rude.

Anyway, in between talking about great and horrible movies and bands, he invited me to his show on Friday (tonight). I told him I’d go if I could get someone to come with me. I asked him what kind of music so that I’d know whether or not to invite Trace and he reluctantly compared them to Lifehouse. (This is the part where I knew he wasn’t gay – when I told him I had a boyfriend he got that shocked/disappointed look on his face. Sorry! No potential groupie here!)

Our conversation followed us out to the parking lot where we got on the subject of careers. I told him about how I was an aspiring photographer. He said he’s a free-lance graphic designer and he works part time at a print shop his dad owns here in FL. (Somehow the band is based in LA, but he lives in FL? I didn’t get a chance to ask him about that…) Anyway, we got on the subject of websites and I told him I definitely needed one at some point, so he gave me his card. I also mentioned I had neither a logo or card and he said he could take care of that, too. He told me to email him some samples of my work and he’d come up with a logo, then we could meet sometime over the weekend and he’d show me some sketches.

How excited am I?? New friend, new logo, new card, new website all in one shot!

So, needless to say after I cooked Trace and I dinner – while he was watching TV – I emailed Jaime some samples of my work.

Yesterday in the morning at work, I checked my email and Jaime had sent me one saying that he was up all night working on logos and that he had about 20 sketches he could show me whenever I had time. He sent that email at 2:30am. Who is awake on a week night at that hour?

Anyway, so I’m overly excited and email him back immediately, telling him that I go on my lunch break at 12:30pm.
Around 11 he finally emailed me back asking where I wanted to meet and I told him about the little cafe that I fell in love with across the street from my work.

I just walked over to the cafe on my lunch break and almost walked right past him. Luckily he started waving at me otherwise I would have kept on walking. He was wearing a short sleeved shirt this time and I noticed he has a 1/4 sleeve tattoo on one arm and a design on the inner side of his forearm on his other arm. He’s definitely a drummer. It was only then that I realized how much of a musician he looks like. He practically has it written on his forehead.

Although Trace dresses in black all the time, you can still tell he’s not a musician, but Jaime reaks of it. He wears the tight (but not girl-tight) pants with the big black belt and fitted T-shirt. I think I saw a bandana poking out of his back pocket, too.

So, as soon as we sit down I beg to see the sketches.

Can I just say.. They were ALL brilliant. They emenated my style. I honestly had no idea how I was going to pick just one.
He asked me what my top five were and I told him I couldn’t possibly choose. Eventually he chose for me, but not before making fun of my indecision.

I ordered my favorite house salad and he got grilled cheese and fries. Who gets grilled cheese at a restaurant?
Jaime and I talked a lot about really random things. We laughed a lot, something that I love to do. I found myself really hoping that he wasn’t just being nice to gain a fan and some business because I would really like this guy as a friend.

Anyway, Jaime offered to walk me back to my work. I guess he saw me walking to the cafe, so we walked back. Tiff immediately asked who he was as soon as I sat down. I told her it was just some guy I met at Barnes and Noble. She said she’d have to start hanging out at Barnes and Noble.

Oh the hilarity of the desperately single.

I invited her to the show tonight. She said she’s coming. Trace passed, of course, it’s not metal so he would hate it anyway.

I’m nervous. I hope they are good. I think I’d have to lie to Jaime and tell them the band is good even if I don’t like them.

I better go now. I’ve written a novel. Maybe I should change my career path and become a novelist?

Maybe not.