{{Two nights ago… (– or, three? Last night?) …I sat on the couch with The Rock, watching Kathy Griffin’s Life on The D List. We were laughing. Laughing hard. Then I did this thing where I laugh so much I kinda cry. Except it was a real cry. A burst of unexpected angst and unfounded sadness. It was like a cloud of free range despair hit me. Ungrounded and grazing desolation that found a willing host, then moved on to another pasture. And it completely freaked The Rock out because three minutes later I was laughing again.

Which brings me to this. I don’t want to write at this time. I need to process. Or not? Maybe not. I need to unthink more like. I want to hermitize. I want to burrow. And escape. And not have you guys judge me because I don’t pen anything insightful or borderline humorous. No, not judge. Just shake your heads sadly and say, “What’s happened to her? She used to be less clunky and awkward-phrasing.”

Also, pray for The Rock and his kindred. As should be evident by now, I don’t handle stress and bodily chemical explosions well, even resulting from something as wonderful as a move to cul-de-sac-atopia.}}

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I’m telling you this PMS is trouble.

Saturday night, I engaged in yet another argument with the Rock, where I broke down crying over some allusion to my mother and because he dragged his feet, I thought hallucinated, over whether to spend some one-on-one time with me Saturday night.

The thing with the Rock and I — we can argue. We’re both opinionated, stubborn, right-fighters, who get wrapped around the axle and don’t let go. We’re working on this, really, truly working on this. But when I’m emotionally unstable, all lessons learned go out the window and no way, no how can you tell me anything if I’ve determined I’ve been wronged.

I still wasn’t convinced it was the PMS. The Rock tried to tell me, but surely, my upsetedness came from another source. I mean, hadn’t I had the PMS now, for what? going on 2 weeks? I need to get checked out.
Anyway, we had the night to ourselves after having dropped both kids off at grandma’s house. And I was pissy because I mistook his suggestion to check out a music venue as hating me and wishing I’d just go away. So I retaliated with silence, because I know he loves it when I do that.

Inside, I’m roiling and thinking, “He just doesn’t get me. We’re not on the same page. Why am I so misunderstood? Is it too early for a steak dinner?”

And I’m DRENCHED in being wronged. And being sad. And missing my mom. And wanting a steak.

I knew it was going to be bad. Because when I get like this, I don’t let go. And I don’t even want to write this, because the Rock reads this and will now say “I told you so!” and then “It’s OK, honey.” Which will make me cry. Unless I’m not PMSing anymore. Which I am.

So we sat in the car and argued. Until he said something along the lines of I keep score and I did it with my mom and then I said, “Don’t throw my blog in my face!” And “You don’t know my mom!” and other stuff such as for example, “You don’t support me!” and then he drove us home.

At that point, the evening is ruined, so I sit in the car and cry, great rocking sobs of being persecuted and alienated.
I decide to sleep in the car and slump on the center console over which I lay my sticky purple yoga mat to cushion the points. Three minutes later, I walk into the house.

The Rock is splayed face down on the guest bed and I leave him there.

I walk upstairs and cry more in the bathroom, until I hear a feeble knock on the door. The Rock opens it and says, “How can I make you feel better?”

So then, of course, that’s the straw. And I heave more sobs and think, “I’d never do that. He’s the hero in this relationship. He always reaches out to me, and says sorry even when he shouldn’t have to, and I’m horrible and awful and no good, just no good. No wonder everyone hates me.”

After I say more crap because I can’t gracefully accept love when it’s offered, we snuggle on the couch while he falls asleep and I watch 48 Hours Mystery.

And the storm passed, for now. But that’s exactly how it is: a cyclone, a hurling frenzy of debris and wind and rain moving in to destroy a town. It whirls, it twirls, it’s unpredictable and dangerous. It’s Mother Nature. But that doesn’t make it OK.

****************

{{P.S. Did I post this once already? And stop sadly shaking your collective heads at me! I don’t need your pity!

Oh OK, hand it over.}}

I got the below line from somewhere and can’t recall from where. Can you imagine a greater treason if you’re a writer? Still, it’s a great prompt starter and I can’t resist, even if I’m unable to give the original author credit.

So please, write a story using the line “Flying through the streets like a trail of fiery rage that quickly burns out of sight . . .” somewhere in your submission, and if you know where it comes from, please do let me know. (But wouldn’t it be great if I made it up and just forgot?)

Meanwhile, please post your submission in the comments OR post in your blog and leave a link to your blog in the comments.

And also — First time to PROMPTuesday? Welcome! Read a bit about this weekly writing exercise here.

(Want to see what’s been written in the past? Catch up on the PROMPTuesdays archive here.)

So, moving sucks.

And I haven’t even done anything yet. But just thinking about it stinks.

Speaking of, I can’t get over the fact that I’m moving into someone else’s space that has (1) Their hair in the drains (2) Their poo ethers in the toilet (3) Their skin cells in the carpet.

I’m obsessing. And so I plan to buy new toilets because I just can’t sit on someone else’s butt imprint. I cannot. It’s a real problem. So bad, I hold my pee when I’m in public. Unless I really really have to go, and then I hover over the seat and close my eyes, because I just don’t want to know what lurks beneath.

So if you know where I can get some nice clean new toilets (not yours), please do let me know. In addition, I am looking for someone(s) to sponsor the following for this move:

• Spousal Mediator. Because The Rock is going to kill me before all this is over.
• Brainwasher. I want all thoughts of other people’s poo ethers and carpet skin cells erased from my mind and replaced with images of strong pine scents and prodigious Lysol clouds.
• Master Life Organizer/Personal Assistant. I need someone to tell me where to put everything I own and keep The Rock from killing me. (This sponsorship may involve tasting all my food before I do.)
• Deal-Finder. I need a new couch, new kitchen table, new patio stuff, new Pottery Barn white train table with paper dispenser for the kids, new skin-cell-free rugs, new light fixtures, new drawer pulls, and probably, a new The Rock.

Thanks for your prompt and careful attention to finding me these sponsorships.

Huh?

What’s in it for you?

How about if I have you over for some tea and crumpets masterfully prepared by my sponsored Life Organizer/Personal Assistant?

I’ll probably be single by the time I move and could really use the company.

Why haven’t bathing suit designers realized that if they’d only lobby against the sale and manufacture of florescent lighting, they’d sell a hell of a lot more bathing suits?

There should be lobbyists on Capitol Hill. Yea, I see it now: shade-walking flabby 30-somethings, sweaters tied around their waists, who never use public restrooms. What a formidable lot.

P.S. I’m pissy this week.

Saturday night was a total fluke, because originally I was to join Jenn at FOUND, but The Rock cast his Father’s Day vote to listen to some music and spend some couples time (poetic license on that last part), and so off we went to a complete dive lounge in horse country where his cousin played the steel guitar, and I loved it like nothin’.

First of all: the music. Such a great country band that played Fender Stratocasters and other kinds of guitars I know nothing of, with road-weary singers and red-haired sirens fiddling violins. Right there, I’m in heaven. Then, the people. Oh, the clientele. What a sweet spot of characterization. I tell you, go to this bar and you will never lack for stories.

Such as the coiffed Latino in the tightest Wranglers you ever did see twirling his frizzy Cougar partner around the dance floor in intricate and choreographed sequences. He moved quite feminine, with flourishes and swoops and she, a matronly 50-something with fried long blonde hair and short shirt barely hiding a flabby stomach, looked like she’d hit the love jackpot. Smoldering looks and suggestive hip swirls and oh my! the Harlequin of it all.

Then: a 60-year-old mullet-headed firecracker in stocking feet and polyester dancing with a stiff-kneed 70-ish man, who was well-dressed and keenly-appointed, also without shoes. I wondered about them as they made their way outside for a smoke or to go to the bathroom. I thought they should have footwear. The silk-shirted man (we thought maybe he was diabetic? or had double knee replacement?) moved awkwardly, but obviously loved to dance, and so asked my friend for a twirl. She said “no,” and I almost stepped in, though he didn’t ask, and he instead danced with the monkey-grinning man sitting alone at the bar. The one who was “sad inside” according to The Rock.

And the hookers! Or so I thought. But, pretty sure they were. Or hopped up on Ecstasy. Accompanied by two limp-locked stringhairs, the two girls (one, a pretty Asian woman in tight black spandex and lustrous waves and the other, a hot-bodied rough face wearing half a shirt), shimmied and gyrated at the the pinball machine for 20 minutes before being escorted out by the greaseheads.

Then, the gangbangers. Two roughnecks sitting by the back door with tattoo’d scalps, hatchet faces and glower eyes. They disappeared early and I was glad. I thought they’d beat us up in the parking lot for liking country.

And you should have stayed until after 10! That’s when the rhinestones entered en masse and the swoop-layered gentlewomen and the drunk fake IDs. Also the server! I think she was the one who was “sad inside” because her jokes were loud, false and desperate. We left her a nice tip.

Next to the bar I spotted a 7-Eleven and Mexican food joint. Our Suburban ground the gravel as we drove away, and I wondered if the coiffed Latino really loved frizzy hair or if she were just a good dance partner.

I’m scared to fly. Best of all and super exciting is that I get to do it next month for my brother’s wedding. In New York. (Can’t you people get married where there’s easier ground transportation? And in a city of closer proximity not necessitating air travel?)

For God’s sake.

At any rate, the whole Air France thing frightened the pee out of me. I cannot imagine anything more terrifying than flying over stormy seas with lightning and thunder in all directions, my plane bucking like a pebble in an avalanche.

Then. THEN, the plane breaks freaking apart. Sweet Lord. It’s my biggest nightmare. And it actually happened to people.

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about those people. What they were thinking. Their terror levels. The families they left behind.

Most especially wonderful is that I can’t get the image of me catapulting through ugly skies to a grey Atlantic death screaming, “I told you soooooooo!” out of my head.

So let me bring this full circle.

For this week’s PROMPTuesday, describe an experience you have never had but have heard about and can imagine. Describe this experience in the first person singular, present tense as it is happening.

Please post your submission in the comments OR post in your blog and leave a link to your blog in the comments.

And also — First time to PROMPTuesday? Welcome! Read a bit about this weekly writing exercise here.

Want to see what’s been written in the past? Catch up on the PROMPTuesdays archive here.

(Prompt courtesy of this place).

If you are asked to showcase your cheap, used thriftwear on another website, shower first.

That’s all I got.

How come you people never tell me to just shut up?

Why do I need to go to my dad for that service?

Because when I called him yesterday, all crestfallen and lame about moving to the suburbs, you know what he said? He said I was a Drama Queen. A Drama Queen!

You know what else?

He said I capitulate to something only after a certain amount of bellyaching, obsessing and worrying. That, I need, need to make a big deal out of things before I accept them. As if I require anticipatory anxiety to function.

He put it like:

“Deborah! Shut up!”

And when I said that I didn’t think The Rock and I were “suburbs people,” he told me that we definitely weren’t “beach people,” so something something something, and “get over yourself,” something something something.

Next time? I’d rather you all rip me a new one. My dad’s got enough on me already.