so says the straw hat

I was going to write a post about how creepy permanent make-up is because I seriously imagine it giving me a Lady McBeth moment at the sink every morning, just me scrubbing furiously at my eyes in an attempt to get rid of my bad choices, becoming a stranger to myself, a shell of who I used to be...but instead, this: My husband, sister, brother and other-sister are all going together in Canada and they get to see D and Timmy and Ems and I am so jealous of the magic. I hope all their pretty little hearts get compressed straight away into tiny diamonds. A collaborative performance piece that combines the wonder-galloping poetry of Derrick Brown , the musical talent supreme of Timmy Straw and Emily Wells and a dance performance by the Dutch contemporary dance company Noord Nederlandse Dans. It is going to be magnificent. If you are in Vancouver CA or near Vancouver CA, you should go!

In your brother's old bedroom there was a hole in the wall or a giant faded painting or writing.  Something I never really saw and you explained it once but I can no longer hold the story in my hands. We watched Animal House late one night in your bedroom when you used to sleep upstairs. It wasn't the version you usually saw on TV. I think the boobs made you feel uncomfortable when I was sitting right next to you. I don't know how late it was when I left. We were in high school then. When I turned 19 I stubbed my toe really bad in Canada on my first ever drinking binge. I remember ice cubes. You bought me a ring. I don't know if I got sick or not but the next day I didn't want to eat anything at all. We were supposed to leave but I decided I wanted to stay. When you dropped me off at my house in Bothell I wouldn't let you kiss me goodbye. When you moved downstairs I showed up once, 4am, pouring rain. I had a habit of doing that to you. Showing up just when...

You know how when a relationship ends, there are certain roles played out? For example, sometimes the girl becomes very proactive about getting her life together while the dude goes out and sleeps around and eats too much. OR vice versa. Sometimes the boy suddenly has everything going right for him--he is working out, eating right, girls are falling off his biceps, while the girl sits at home with a pint of ice cream watching too many Rom Coms on repeat slowly growing fat and zitty. Ugh.  All of this to say that I am very close to my sister. Very close. Freakishly close. She is my best friend. And being so many miles from her for so long feels sort of like a slow motion break up. In this scenario--she is the one with the rippling biceps and the shit together. I will call her up and her voice message will be something like "sorry! I am busy training for a marathon while running my dog so that I can go to my professional job and still have time to go out with my f...