when i met you i had just returned home, and was getting ready to leave again. we didn't actually meet, but i saw you. and you saw me and we smiled.
so i made you a mix tape and sent you an email and asked for you to make me one too.
our tapes were almost the same so we had coffee. too much coffee. and you made me nervous.
i miss that about us - the cute smiles and shy conversations. these days it's all 'did you get nappies?'
it's been almost 5 years and our daughter is almost 2 and it's been hard but mostly it's been funny and i still love you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74yezssPG3o
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
punks should only date punks
we met at a gig, but i'd seen her around. i had a girlfriend, aly, but things weren't going well with her at all. one night, i was out with her and kristen was staring at me from across the bar. she wouldn't look away. for an hour, just staring. she made a bee line for me and introduced herself;
'hi, i'm kristen'
'oh...i'm ada'
'i've seen you around'
'yeah...'
i felt very uncool.
that night lasted for years. she paid a lot of attention to me. told me my name's hot. she was winning me over, which sucked. i just wanted to be in my crap relationship and deal with all the problems that that presented. i didn't have the energy to be attracted to someone else.
aly and i ended up in a terrible fight and i drove home at sunrise, furious and hurt.
kristen and i had a lot of email contact over the next few days. she asked me "so that girl you were with at ding dong, was she....your girlfriend?". i didn't want to answer. i didn't want to stop playing this game. it was fun. and kristen was awesome.
i had made aly a mix tape for her to take with her on a trip to pakistan a few months earlier. she had retaped it, deleting the songs she didn't like. not cool. she had no respect or knowledge of punk culture at all. she didn't care to learn. kristen though...she knew what the mix tape meant. and she'd already made me one.
'hi, i'm kristen'
'oh...i'm ada'
'i've seen you around'
'yeah...'
i felt very uncool.
that night lasted for years. she paid a lot of attention to me. told me my name's hot. she was winning me over, which sucked. i just wanted to be in my crap relationship and deal with all the problems that that presented. i didn't have the energy to be attracted to someone else.
aly and i ended up in a terrible fight and i drove home at sunrise, furious and hurt.
kristen and i had a lot of email contact over the next few days. she asked me "so that girl you were with at ding dong, was she....your girlfriend?". i didn't want to answer. i didn't want to stop playing this game. it was fun. and kristen was awesome.
i had made aly a mix tape for her to take with her on a trip to pakistan a few months earlier. she had retaped it, deleting the songs she didn't like. not cool. she had no respect or knowledge of punk culture at all. she didn't care to learn. kristen though...she knew what the mix tape meant. and she'd already made me one.
Sunday, May 30, 2010
living with you
It's been over a year since he left me alone with a 4 month old baby and no way of coping. He was gone for 6 weeks. It wasn't long, but the unknown of it was eternal. I never thought i'd be a single mum. But for 6 weeks i was and i was terrified.
When he came back, i learned a lot about what life was like for him. And it took a lot for me to open up to the truth of it. He lives with depression. Depression is considered the 'common cold' of mental illness. This is what we're taught at uni - they send social workers out in to the world to minimise the significance and devastation of depression. But living with depression, or living with someone who has it is full on. There's nothing common about it.
He isn't overly articulate about what it's like for him, but if i open my eyes, i can see. He sometimes seems inauthentic, like he is pretending to have a reaction of a 'normal' person. This is when he's feeling numb. He can't sleep, because his brain wont quieten down. He has his fathers voice in there telling him that's he's a failure. He forgets things, get's annoyed easily, hates certain noises. He's defensive, frustrated, despondent. And none of it is his fault.
For me, living with some with depression is really hard. I find it hard to connect with him, and worry that he over estimates his abilities. I worry that i'll catch him in a bad mood and end up in a fight with no outcome. I worry that he's doing too much, so i'll try to protect him from it and end up exhausting myself. I want to have another baby, but he struggled with me during my last pregnancy and i often felt unsupported. There are a lot of unknowns in our future. And sure i'm scared that he's going to leave again without warning, but i love and trust him and want to support him through this.
Depression is so pervasive and so significant. It is not pedestrian, run of the mill or commen.
It manifests differently in different people and is profoundly underestimated. My family lives with it everyday, as do many of our friends.
When he came back, i learned a lot about what life was like for him. And it took a lot for me to open up to the truth of it. He lives with depression. Depression is considered the 'common cold' of mental illness. This is what we're taught at uni - they send social workers out in to the world to minimise the significance and devastation of depression. But living with depression, or living with someone who has it is full on. There's nothing common about it.
He isn't overly articulate about what it's like for him, but if i open my eyes, i can see. He sometimes seems inauthentic, like he is pretending to have a reaction of a 'normal' person. This is when he's feeling numb. He can't sleep, because his brain wont quieten down. He has his fathers voice in there telling him that's he's a failure. He forgets things, get's annoyed easily, hates certain noises. He's defensive, frustrated, despondent. And none of it is his fault.
For me, living with some with depression is really hard. I find it hard to connect with him, and worry that he over estimates his abilities. I worry that i'll catch him in a bad mood and end up in a fight with no outcome. I worry that he's doing too much, so i'll try to protect him from it and end up exhausting myself. I want to have another baby, but he struggled with me during my last pregnancy and i often felt unsupported. There are a lot of unknowns in our future. And sure i'm scared that he's going to leave again without warning, but i love and trust him and want to support him through this.
Depression is so pervasive and so significant. It is not pedestrian, run of the mill or commen.
It manifests differently in different people and is profoundly underestimated. My family lives with it everyday, as do many of our friends.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
almost a year
it's been almost a year since i last posted. i want to write about all that's happened, and i will.
except that last night i saw the weakerthans play at the northcote social club and i cried. i still feel like crying. i've never been so moved. i can't stop thinking about it. i'm blissed out and in love.
over the next few weeks, i will write to you and let you know what life has done to me. but for now, i will leave you with this: http://www.theweakerthans.org/audiovisual/
except that last night i saw the weakerthans play at the northcote social club and i cried. i still feel like crying. i've never been so moved. i can't stop thinking about it. i'm blissed out and in love.
over the next few weeks, i will write to you and let you know what life has done to me. but for now, i will leave you with this: http://www.theweakerthans.org/audiovisual/
Monday, March 16, 2009
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