There are many times I wonder why I have a blog; it often feels so 2004. For the past two years I have been going through the motions, yet my blog has become my place to talk out certain things in my life.
Find out what my disability is, check. Blog about it, check.
Prepare to sell apartment, check……
Spend six months selling apartment, check…..
Buy house, check…..
Renovate house, check….

Decide my birthday present to myself will be ending an addiction, check……

I didn’t know if I was going to blog about this. I know it seems as if I let everything out but I have an entire life never mentioned here and I thought this would be another thing not for public consumption.

I’m glad I did though I obsessively edited it after it was posted as I have a wont to do. Obsessively edited the words but I, Ms Fact Checker made a totally retarded mistake that I freaked about as it was further proof of me losing my mind. I knew Grace Slick wrote “White Rabbit.” I know what she wrote; I know the difference between her and Joplin as well as I know pretty much anything, but in two places in the Internet I found lyrics that said Joplin wrote it. I thought it strange but didn’t think to look further.

I’m kind of upset about that as I’m sort of an expert, in my own mind, on that time and music.

I used to have many readers and when I look at the stats every several months in my CPanel am shocked that people still reading Courting as I do nothing to pimp her.

Courting will be five in August and I was a slave to her the first several years. A blog, unless it’s bringing incredible self satisfaction and/or much money should be the blogger’s slave. It took me awhile to understand that.

I thank you, everybody who commented the other day. It wasn’t easy for me to post and I know it wasn’t easy to comment to. I seem to love to make things difficult.

I’m trying to simplify my life. It wasn’t fun to sell an apartment or to buy a house in 08. The world was going crazy. Blogs and all media had gone from a “I have so much and let me show you how financially successful I am” mode to “I am a great American and won’t spend a dime more than necessary” mode.

I always say I put my apartment on the market just as Bear Stearns imploded and closed just after the fall of Lehman Brothers. I wasn’t sure I was doing the right thing. I wasn’t sure buying a house while the stock market went back to free falling was a good move.

I no longer trusted my judgment. I looked at everything I had done in the past 20 years under a much more critical spectre. I knew I was lucky in many ways; I was financially secure (or thought I was:) Have amazing friends, of many decades, who tell me when they think I’m off kilter.

My closest friend sent me an email yesterday; subject line: how is my crazy friend? I deserved that. The day before was spent on the phone with her–me convinced I was going to go into convulsions at any second though I had no symptoms. Well my muscles did feel as if they were contracting….

Then there are the bloggers. All I can say is thank you. Writing about my addiction and my attempt to get off the pills hasn’t made it more real but putting it down in black & white and having your support is an incredible blessing.

This blog will be continued. As I’m no longer its slave most of my screen time will be spent writing for publication. No excuses.

I didn’t mean for this to be horribly depressing. My life has been good, often great and gets better all the time.
I was just such a presence. Then I wasn’t. Then I was again.
Finding out I had nonverbal learning disorder gave me the strength to change my life completely. This blog has helped immensely. I have great friends and family. I’m truly blessed and would never think otherwise–except when my mood swings were pounding upon my head like the largest waves swelling into breakers.
Thanks Thom for the words.
And one pill makes you small
And the ones that mother gives you
Don’t do anything at all
Go ask Alice
When she’s ten feet tall

The first time I was addicted to drugs I was almost seventeen and formed a fast furious alliance with speed:
tiene usted Dexedrena? do you have Dexedrine? available at any farmacia.

The addiction scared me though wow did I love it. I was so fast; so accurate; didn’t care what people thought; my writing was so dense and filled with acute observations. If only I had been able to understand my handwriting. The entire addiction and withdrawal lasted three weeks. I knew it was bad for me and I knew I wouldn’t be able to easily find Dexedrine or its more mild spin-off Dexemil in New York. I was a suburban high school student…..

The second time? That was legal.

A prescription handed to me rather easily by a doctor when I was suffering and truly needed medication.

Who the hell would have expected me 21 years later trying harder than I have ever tried anything to get off it. I’m not known for being lazy. Slow at times. Balance and walk off kilter, always.

The medication that once relaxed me now leaves my foggy. My “memory of an elephant” as it’s called by several generation of New Yorkers seems to be deserting me. Sometimes I think I have become sort of stupid and much less insightful.

I had never been depressed before I began this med for anxiety. Sometimes it is like entering the darkness. Other times, I have mood swings that I watch and think “this is frigging absurd” and am able to control.

This med isn’t known for weight gain but I gained a bit after going on it–I was very skinny so it didn’t really matter.

About nine years after first going on the med I found myself gaining real weight. My metabolism, once fast and hyper, had slowed down. I was sluggish and always tired so I drank mega doses of caffeine. At first and for a long time I put this down to “normal aging.” In my heart I knew it wasn’t.

I could control the depression and mood swings through changing my thought patterns–I excel at practicing cognitive therapy on myself. I practiced cognitive therapy constantly and began to think that I shouldn’t spend so much time pumping myself up.

I would become agitated–that I couldn’t control. Nor could I control the middle of the night panic attacks that felt as if my heart was attacking my chest. It wasn’t. I did have that checked.

Yes a med prescribed for panic attacks was giving me them. But it took me a long time to understand that.

Most of my normal panic attacks now happen when I’m in a stadium and have to go up the bleachers or in a very large group of people such as the picnickers at the symphony in Central Park two weeks ago. They’re easy to control now that others understand that I can’t measure space well. I always knew that but doctors laughed at me.

Slowly I realized I was on a med for panic attacks and anxiety when my problems had become all about the meds. The only thing I truly became anxious over was getting Klonopin.

A doctor I used to see called me, rather dramatically: “a legal drug addict.” The dosage prescribed only kept the addiction from becoming a horror withdrawal story and this drug has many horror withdrawal stories. To feel the physical calmness I would have to take more pills.

I went off it too quickly–but in the two weeks since lowering the dose I have felt calm. Real calm not a physical drug calm. I have had no mood swings. I have had an ongoing stomach ache which I liked at first as I was losing weight rather rapidly. I have never had hot flashes or night sweats. The past week I have woken myself up sweating. I like that as I think it’s getting the toxins out and really I shouldn’t be using a winter comforter and chenille blanket during the summer.

I have never been on a large dosage. Still it’s harder than hell to get off. I plan to be off it or on a very small dose within the next three months.The drug store I patronize has upped the price considerably. The generic has never worked for me. Usually generics are just as good or better but Klonopin’s different. It’s out of line pricey everywhere. Even if I wanted to continue with Klonopin I couldn’t afford it I’m not insured for anxiety or any similar problem.

I want to live a long and happy life with a good mind and body. Already my memory is coming back. I don’t stumble over myself trying to remember words. My mind has been feeling lighter and free from problems. I’m a bit hyper, but it’s the good kind of hyper. Productive hyper that doesn’t scare me.

Supposedly you’re supposed to become more anxious and have more of any problem Klonopin once controlled while in withdrawal.

I’m afraid I lowered the dose too much as yesterday I began to not like the way my body feels. I don’t want the worst side effects. That was two days ago. My muscles no longer feel as if they’re contracting. (That might have been in my head as it stopped when I would do things.) The worst might be over. I don’t know. I’m trying not to up the dosage as I do feel good, but scared. Not of the drug addiction but of my future. I began this med when in my 30′s and in someways feel I’ve never grown past the age I was when I began it. I wonder how many things I screwed up because my mind was foggy? Did it exacerbate instead of help my nonverbal learning disorder? (NLD; my NLD is mostly of the motor skills kind)

And yes I’m afraid that at any moment I will have convulsions and seizures as they’re so often mentioned as side affects. Do I have any symptoms of that? No, but you never know…..

This is the first post in what I hope will be a success story. I won’t let myself weaken.
I feel absurd posting this but that’s never usually stopped me

If it’s scattered I apologize. Next July I turn 60. Hard for me to believe but. (Seeing this in print panics me, but not in a need med kind of way.) I want my 7th decade to be as prescription drug free as possible.

Please understand I desperately need medication when I began and wasn’t using this as a crutch.

I can’t go back to a larger dosage. I’m beginning to feel free. As in free at last….

i just returned from New York and had some life changing experiences so forgive me for getting the expression wrong. It is “bless your heart” Why bless my heart I can’t even get a stupid expression right–but am in such a good mood I don’t care. And love the newest changes to WP 2.forever.
“Why bless you, Miss Pia, you look divine”
Shit, I really need to lose an incredible amount of weight, get work done on my face, whole body, a new hair stylist. Wait it’s my hair stylist’s mother, who not so coincidentally happens to be my nail technician, telling me this.

“Why thank you Miss Edna” I don’t have the whole “Miss” thing down. I don’t think I’m supposed to say it to her as she’s nine years younger than I am but looks nine years older so…

I’m beginning to get true Southern lingo down. Any woman who says “bless you” to you is really politely dissing you especially when they belong to the Church of Harley Davidson. That’s not true. I just like the sound of the last part of the last sentence. They’re dissing you when they’re not-so-true Church ladies with no time for anything but Church and gossip.

I do love it here. Loved my ten days in New York and plan on writing about them but am oh so happy to be home. And this is home now. It really is. For some reason I find that one fact awe inspiring.

If my nail technician happens to read this for some ungodly reason please know that I adore you. You have never said anything like that but do worship at The Church of Harley….and by the way I don’t know how to tell you I can’t afford you. $60 for a mani/pedi no matter how great, and yours are to die for, is just too much. In New York, you can get them at any street corner for $19.99. It’s one of the two more expensive things here and I forget the second.

I unpacked my last two suitcases yesterday. Then I remembered why they were still packed. (I still have about four boxes–Mexican things, cd’s, dvd’s, and books–no shelves to put them on.)

The bureau which was supposed to come immediately has been back ordered four times. The items I didn’t need and were supposed to be back ordered came immediately.
I received an email stating that the bureau was being shipped on a certain day and should have arrived at least two days before I called customer service. This was the fourth email referring to a new delivery date.

The customer service rep assured me that this is normal and she knows not only the furniture business but retail in general, the Internet, and all customer service a lot more than I do. (She said this with no knowledge of who I am or what I do or have done in my life. It struck me both funny and sad that a person would make assumptions so readily.)

Obviously I should understand that they didn’t mean what they said in any of the four emails. She actually stated that and then stated that she understood this process so much better than I ever could.

I don’t expect to be treated as a total idiot. If a person is lucky enough to have a job right now, they damn well better treat every person who calls with dignity. I have no idea why the bureau was back ordered so many times nor why I got an email saying it was being shipped when it wasn’t being shipped, and neither did the customer service person.

I furnished my entire house off the Internet and didn’t have one other problem. I don’t do ebay or Craigs List but I’m kind of an expert on finding things in a store and buying it on the Internet. I usually save much in shipping and taxes that way plus any extra “internet only” sale–and there usually is.

When I was in New York I went to “high end” (as they call themselves) lighting stores and noticed that they all used the same catalogue. That catalogue’s even larger on the Internet–over a thousand pages. It took three weeks of three hour days and three days of eight hour days to find the simplest lighting in the world.

It took five minutes to find the perfect dining room pub table, chairs, and sidebar–and two days of looking in stores and two days of looking online–just to make sure.

I kept the pivotal furniture from my apartment in Manhattan–the couch is in the study; the coffee table in the guest room and the bed, uh, in the bedroom. I haven’t furnished the sunroom yet–just stuff from my apartment and I used furniture from Kroger’s for the downstairs deck. I want both the room and the outdoors to be truly special and haven’t figured out what I want yet.

An all white sun room. OK I ran out of steam and can’t stand the thought of paying anymore money for anything here.

In the suburb I come from the worst, very worst thing you could say about somebody is “they have no furniture.” It implies and infers a world of things. Here I can tell people are confused by how sparse I keep most rooms. I like bold colors. I like collecting things. If I could live without furniture I would. This is all in defense of “I know how furniture stores work and I sure know how the Internet works.”

I no longer get angry when I speak to stupid people. I ask to speak to their supervisor who in this case asked whether I wanted a store credit for $75 or a credit on my credit card for $57. I chose the later as a store credit is meaningless.

That still doesn’t solve the problem. My bureau hasn’t arrived and I have two densely packed suitcases of clothes in the washer, dryer or waiting to be placed in one. Fortunately I have huge closets and a former night stand with six drawers that’s in the bedroom walk in closet. Unfortunately I find organizing closets on a par with going to the dentist.

I just began the litigation process over my plumbing problems. This isn’t the way I wanted to begin in a new town. Fortunately I have bought built up a lot of good will here. I don’t feel as if I’m doing it just for myself (or I would never do it) but on behalf of single women everywhere who have the audacity to upset what some men and I guess some women believe is the natural order of things and buy a house.

Having to be in litigation depresses me. I really would rather forgive and forget which is why I invented the “this isn’t just for me” excuse. I believe blogs were invented so that I could get whatever is bothering me out and go on with life.

In this case I can’t–then I remember that I was denied full coverage in health insurance though pay as much as somebody who has full coverage. I couldn’t work on that because just then I got a notice from the IRS stating I owed them my life and spent three and a half weeks finding obsure information so that my accountant could send the results to them in a timely manner. Then I found out he forgot to send it…I always thought he was a good dependable accountant. His letter to the IRS made it seem that both of us were working on it for months as it was so complicated and so wrong in so many places. No I worked on it for three and a half weeks.

I know you’re thinking any person with a modicum of intelligence could have worked on the IRS notice and the pre-existing conditions at the same time. I couldn’t work on two tedious things, one (the health insurance) that was set up so I couldn’t answer their questions properly. It just angers me so much that I’m willing to pay–and I know I’m being selfish in only looking at the “me” aspect of this. But one major sickness and everything I have….

I try to stay healthy so I won’t have to be denied claims. I refuse to feel stressed as that could lead….so if I whine into my blog please excuse it. I do feel stressed. I try not to bring up the disability I suffer from, as I have accomplished so much despite having it. It’s another unsolved problem and there are times I just want to bury my head in the sand.

This is a fascinating “obit” for Robert S McNamara.
Here’s Paul Krugman on health care. I’m getting real sick of hearing about Michael Jackson and Sarah Palin.
The humidity’s so thick I want to pick and hold it. Last night, I think, it rained. I think because when it’s dark I close the blinds in the kitchen, living room, and upstairs office (or all rooms that look to the front or side of the court). When I lived in Manhattan I never had to do that. Manhattan can be an oddly private place.

I was recovering from a wonderful weekend. In a world where almost every woman I know didn’t become a mommy until her mid-late 30′s (if she became one) CLo was a mommy in her late teens.

I always treated her daughter as a little adult because I haven’t really met a kid who wants to be treated as a kid. Consequently we became friends when she grew up.

Niece Kelly and a Gay family friend, Roberto–not Hispanic, were in for the weekend. I only bring up the Gay part because it’s a long time since I had one–mine all died and I remembered why I used to like Gay men so much. I kind of specialize in straight male friends but Gay men make me laugh easily and forget that the world has problems.* Niece Kelly and Roberto are Black and if we ran into people I knew I was planning on introducing them as my niece and nephew. I choose to think most people aren’t racist but too many people have said things about Black Bike Week…

Friday night we had a BBQ at CLo’s and W’s. Saturday night I made a BBQ–salmon marinated in V8, horseradish, onions, lemons and garlic–I developed this recipe one rainy day as it’s equally good roasted or poached. I sauteed onions, three types of mushrooms, peppers, and grape tomatoes in a bit of olive oil and when it was two thirds cooked added vinegar–any kind is good. It reduces the sauce and the vegetables can be a side dish or a sauce. I do that with chicken breast that I cook in apple cider, and fishes. I just don’t want it said that I have never given a recipe here.

I made a salad of course, and bought a coconut custard pie–deserts aren’t my thing. But everybody in the CLo&W family loves good pie (and are all in perfect shape anyway) and we’re sort of in competition to find the best. When I saw this one, I knew….and there wasn’t even a slice left over.

CLo & W are on dog with lung cancer duty so CLo drove us a block away from the fireworks and we walked onto the beach with our beach chairs, found a good spot and waited for the real fireworks to begin. They were magnificent. I had been a bit upset the NY fireworks were going to be on the Upper West Side–and I kept getting reports from New York on how they found the perfect spot etc. Of course they left at five PM, were the first people on the closed West Side Highway and the whole evening was devoted to fireworks.

The fireworks here were that way overused word, amazing. I sat there and thought “there’s no place else I want to be, and had I been in New York, I would have missed this.” We sat for awhile after the fireworks but people began setting off homemade ones and we’re citified enough to be scared of homemade ones.

W picked us up and we went back to my house where we sat in the side deck (the one that used to be toilet of Pia but is now all decked) looked at the sky and talked for hours. The house punch (I decided every house should have one) went quickly–firefly sweet tea vodka, stoli vanilla vodka, one quarter more limeade, and seltzer with cinnamon–basically because I add cinnamon to seltzer and don’t care what anybody thinks! The punch works.

I have loved the idea of long languid Southern summers since I first began to read and see movies. The sitting home and relaxing without feeling guilty or thinking “I really should be doing this…” The whole concept is new to me and I love it. I have rediscovered my inner cook and hostess.

If I didn’t have to walk my garbage three blocks to the nearest dump life would be perfect and that’s just a minor inconvenience. North Myrtle does have pick up services but you can’t leave the garbage in a trash can and possums do have a habit of tearing into the garbage. Eventually everybody is going to be issued a “roll” can and a recycling one. Since I tire of asking people if they could drive me and my garbage….

*This isn’t the time or place for a diatribe about AIDS, government inaction and how I lost two thirds of my friends and became very suspicious of “new people.”

I thought at the fireworks and after “this is it. This is the night I have begun to turn into a Southerner.”

I love that America celebrates it birthday in July. Yankee Doodle Dandy being my all time favorite movie–and both James Cagney and George M Cohan claimed 7/4 as their birthdays. So did the author of my favorite song “What A Wonderful World,” Louis! (No last name needed, really.)

I love everything about summer except for the mosquitoes, and flies on food in Little River, the next town over. It’s on the Intercoastal with many good restaurants each having their own live music on Sunday nights. In summer it’s best to sit on the benches next to the Intercoastal and The Crab Catcher and listen to some great music.

I was reading TC’s post on the wonders of summer in Madison, WI. She made it sound so appealing that I was ready to hop a plane….

Then I remembered I’m from New York–and have written extensively on summer in Manhattan. And now I live four blocks from the ocean and am such a beach snob at least once a week I go to a beach that doesn’t resemble Coney Island or Jones Beach. My friend CLo actually calls 6th Street South beach “field six” and she hasn’t lived in New York for 30 years. Field six is the parking field at Jones Beach closest to the beach. You have to get there very early in the morning or after 3PM.

The beach near my house is the main beach for North Myrtle and secretly I do like it. I’m a New Yorker and can find solitude in crowds. It’s also safer–if I venture into the water and somehow get caught in a riptide–well that didn’t happen last week in Cherry Grove but could have and I felt a bit scared. The week before that didn’t happen in the part of Huntington State Park without lifeguards but again it could have….The tide was so low I couldn’t even swim–just float. I thought about going out further but I wasn’t sure how to define “further.” I am such a mass of neuroses.

Yesterday I was melancholy because I felt obligated to go to the beach when all I wanted to do was hang out on one of my decks. That felt so sybaritic. So I wrote that post, DVR’d some shows on HGTV (I can’t believe I’m admitting to that), went out on my downstairs deck–where toilet of Pia used to reside, and played with a chaise lounge until I found the optimum place for moon and star watching.

Today I explored “downtown” Myrtle with a friend. As I’m from Long Island, strip malls are my middle name. Really even Manhattan is one giant one now.

In early evening I went to a soul concert on Main Street. Just about five blocks from my house, an older couple began dancing to Marvin Gaye and then the group Soul Connection put a “Black” spin on some Stones music. As the Stones were originally influenced by American Black musicians, it felt that something had come full circle.

I love North Myrtle for many reasons. One big being its emphasis on music. The Ocean Drive area where I live is all about music. At Mayfest I knew I had moved to the perfect town when Chairman of the Board played. CLo who is never impressed by anything was awed. (Check out their website. I’m impressed and…)

North Myrtle’s about music, the beach, and people having a good time. It’s different than the places I have lived before.

Simpler yet savvy. I almost dread visiting New York next week as I know many people are going to have a two subject conversation–the economy and how to make back money.

I said I might work at Wal Mart to somebody in New York. Most friends get what I’m saying. I’m half joking and half serious about a no stress job that will pay just enough so I can pay my bills. This friend began fighting me. I’m a professional. I’m a New Yorker. I’m from Jericho. I’m….. I told her to relax but she just couldn’t.

I don’t have that same need to accomplish I once had. No that’s wrong. I want to accomplish–but I have lost the need to have status button. Moving from New York allowed this and I’m still moving backwards some of the time.

I live in a place that has seasons but summer is a year round state of mind. Life isn’t about trampling over the next person to get to somewhere, anywhere.

In New York I dreamed of summer the other nine, ten months. Here summer is hotter, summer has more free things to do, summer is sitting on the beach and going into the water not just walking on the beach.

The economy is horrible. Many people are out of work. But the tension level is so much less than New York’s.

I’m learning that I don’t have to stress over everything. It is an adjustment process. I have always wanted to carry over the mental vacation summer always bring. Here the weather might be in the 20′s but it’s endless summer.

Happy 233rd birthday America! 33 is my favorite number. This has to be a great year. (I can be totally irrational when it comes to numbers.)

I have always been my own muse. This solves a lot of problems such as the weekly pay check Bone demanded. (Kidding, he asked nicely.)

As my own muse I have always been conscious of the quality of my writing. Lately it doesn’t meet my own pitiful standards.

Is it because I have always refused to go to BlogHer? It’s always on the same weekend–my birthday–one of the few weekends of the year I insist on being with people who love me as I think birthdays are to be celebrated not spent trying to impress hundreds of strangers almost none of whom know or care that once this blog was well something more than most blogs. And I can’t blame them for not caring.

I do think Blog Her should have a revolving summer weekend policy as I’m sure other bloggers have birthdays, family birthdays, reunions, vacations–and yes somethings are more important than blogging. Summer fun being paramount.

This makes me sound flaky and not serious but anybody who knows me knows how important writing is too my life. Blogging’s something I became caught up in and now am addicted to and it’s a better addiction than heroin so….

This hasn’t been an easy year. I’m establishing a new life in a new city. A friend from New York called my move “drastic.” It is very different and perhaps I’m in denial when I say that it can’t be drastic as I go to New York often. I have homie or go to friends here. But really how many times a week can you see the same friends? We have our assigned dinner seats at each house; games we only play with each other–both real and head ones and….CLo’s daughter Niece Kelly and a friend of theirs–a funny Gay male (are there any others?) are coming tomorrow night. We’re all in a tither to entertain them. I have known Niece Kelly since she was a wee thing and like her mother she adds a lot to her surroundings. That’s a compliment though it sounds weird to me. See what I mean about not being able to write?

I’m making new friends. That’s both easy and difficult. Nobody can replace my best friends. They have been a part of my everyday life for longer than some of my blogging friends have been alive. I need the easy familiarity of being able to look at somebody and know what she/he is about to say. I need to be able to just look at somebody and burst out laughing….

I don’t feel sad that my blogging muse has dried up. I feel horrible that I can’t seem to write a coherent sentence unless it involves a complaint about a plumber in which case I did the lawyer’s work for her–the tech writing gene never leaves.

more than most people I know how difficult it is to make it as a writer. I need no lectures on that. I do need a cheering squad–and that’s the horrible thing about blogging and once having been rather well known. It makes you feel “you deserve,” when you deserve nothing that hard work doesn’t bring.

I’m willing to do the work but the words don’t seem to come out and I keep reading how you should never take things from your blog though I think I began a damn good memoir about me and Jeffrey or me with Jeffrey as the background

I was doing a writing exercise and that helped but about five weeks ago I read a comment complaint in a blog about people who write more than one screen and want comments. The author of the post emailed me to tell me that was about me and wow!!! I haven’t been able to write since. I know an excuse when I write one, and it might be that I have had much company, that the weather’s finally sultry and great for beach going–though I try to write every day from 9AM until 3PM.

If somebody could define a screen for me I would be ecstatic. There are screens on Blackberries. Then there’s my 24″ Imac. I know people who use 40″ or even 56″ high def flat screen TV’s as their Internet screen. So what’s a screen?

And why do writing exercises seem to favor poetry? They say prose is acceptable but when four fifths of the posts are poetry it’s a poet’s site, and anyway poets know what a screen is.

I’m being silly I know. In part because in nineteen days I enter the last year of a pivotal decade and while I don’t fear the decade coming up I do fear the next or the one after that. I’m a bit confused on that subject too.

Oh lighten up Pia!!!!!!!!!

This isn’t a complaint about blogging. It’s just become real difficult for me to write and I need to blame something as I can’t stand the thought that maybe I really am too old or something