For all you were

I’m still trying to shake you. I’m still comparing what I have now to what I had then. It’s even at the point where songs I hate are becoming sentimental because they remind me of you.

It’s not like this is the first time. It’s happened a lot before. But no previous experience ever prepares you for the next one. Each is different in its own way. Although it was easier I suppose when I was younger - fewer preconceptions, less to lose. I keep trying to remind myself that I’m using rose-tinted glasses, it wasn’t as good as I remember. I try to remember the bad times, the times where I thought you had given me all you could.  Friends say they will keep in touch, and they do for a while, but soon it becomes too awkward, out of sight, out of mind.

But then I remember the times where I was spit out into the unexpected morning light by some sweaty nightclub and you were there to embrace me. You would swift me along my way as I stared at the floor, avoiding eye contact in case they see the evidence of the night before. But you never judged me. There are times when I may have felt rejected, but never unloved.

The last time I really had to start a new life I was 15. In that prepubescent stage, it was a very emotional time. I felt like my life, which had previously been in turmoil, was finally coming together. Then we moved and I left behind my best friends, my new boyfriend, and a life I had worked very hard to pull together. I remember waiting for the car to pull up, eating Burger King on my bedroom floor as all the furniture had been sold. My 2 friends waved me good bye and I could only just make them out through the haze of tears. I slept the whole way to the airport once I stopped crying. When we got to England I felt like someone had ripped my heart out. Physically, not just metaphorically – it felt shattered.

I don’t feel like that now. But I have a feeling it’s the adult equivalent. I’ve been told that the weather is crap and I’m not missing anything. But I’m missing my friends, my familiarity, my comfort, a whole support network made up of not just the people, but the place. All of my little knick knacks that moved around with me are not here. My pictures of old friends are not here. Part of me is not here. It’s back in Bristol. Don’t take this as regret – I’m on a new adventure and I wouldn’t change it, but it doesn’t mean that sometimes it’s not a struggle. It’s like missing having a boyfriend – I keep looking at friends meeting up in the park or for coffee or for a night out and thinking ‘I used to do that.’ It takes a while to settle into a place, but for now I want to pay homage to Bristol.

Bristol, I miss your:

Graffiti

Night clubs

Cider

Beer gardens

Dubstep

Raves

Crusty hippies

Coffee shops

Westonbirt arboretum

Parks, oh how I miss sitting in the park with friends

Friends

Hippy mentality

Ease of networking

Unrealistic ideologies

BCHF

Walking everywhere

Festivals

Intelligent humour

There’s more, but most of them are steeped in memories. I’ve come to a different place to have a different experience, but first I’ve got to let go. Stop comparing everything to Bristol and appreciate things in their own right. I suppose it’s just hard having a definitive line to mark the end of a particular part of your life. Even though my party animal side started to fade a while ago, this feels much more like the dawn of my adult life. I’m certainly not saying that I won’t be partying anymore, but not as often and not with the same sense of reckless abandon. I’ve always struggled to come to terms with the end of that part of my life, for whatever reason it made me feel special. I also think it was me having to embrace responsibility in some way. But it’s still hard to wave goodbye to a very fun time of life and I wouldn’t have had it any other way, warts and all. So goodbye Bristol, and Seattle, show me what you got!

Back to the City

So, here we are in Seattle, Washington. We've been here for about 2 weeks, well, just over 2 weeks.

We left Idaho at 5:30 in the morning to embark on our 13 hour journey to Seattle. It was a bit sad to see the back of Idaho. For all of my complaints, it's amazing the power of rose-tinted reflection. We did manage to make some friends and settle in a bit. We even had a little leaving do at The Frosty Gator. We were essentially being teenagers again. Living by someone else's rules, living rent free, having people buy our food for us. But as Dave always said, nothing is free. We had gotten ourselves a little routine. This mainly included going out for drives. We both worked in the same place. A place where, I swear, every employee was a stoner to some degree. I found out why this was - it was one of the few places in Idaho Falls that didn't drug test. So all the people who get lumped into the same category as a meth head have to find work somewhere. And admittedly, all bar one were good at their job. I can't believe their lives are going to be so restricted simply for smoking a bit of weed. But I was told of this slogan for Idaho Falls "Come on vacation, leave on probation." Honestly, the whole population were split into 2 groups - Mormon or on probation. I met one girl who was caught shoplifting a lip gloss at 13 and she was put on probation for something like 5 years. This method is merely a way of making money and from what I can see it turns people who wouldn't have gone down that path into more hardened criminals. And yet, everyone seems to drive drunk. I hate this misplaced drug war and their avoidance of addressing the more virulent problem of alcohol. But this is not a soapbox.

Besides, we are in a much more liberal part of the country now. They provide medical marijuana cards for starters. And I feel like I'm back in Bristol as far as the smell of green on every street goes. Our trip up here was fairly uneventful. But as we went through a canyon, rounded the corner and say the landscape around us change from desert to rich greens and browns, we received a magnificent welcome. As spectacular as I see that wide open space, I'm much more a forest kind of person. I'm not necessarily a tree hugger, but I will give them an appreciative pat every now and again. The city itself is nestled in the forest. You just see a little mass of skyscrapers poking out of a little silver pool surrounded by trees. Beyond the trees lie the mountains. Mount Rainier is apparently used in training for Mount Everest. Honestly, the views all around Seattle are stunning. Puget Sound provides plenty of beach area and there are walking and hiking trails all around.

We live just outside Seattle in a place called Lake City. I was speaking to one of the rare staunch conservatives in the area on the bus and she informed me that she wouldn't even drive through our area. As it stands, I've had no problems. On our second day, on a walk to the farmer's market, we passed a recent drive by. But even this had a tinge of the farcical as one of the victims hobbled away, grabbing his posterior and complaining "my arse, my poor arse." We also had a woman who was rather inebriated keep us entertained at the bus stop. Now, everyone likes a complimentary drunk, the only problem is you don't know if and when they will start to sober up and realise we are no where near as nice as we appear and start to pick a fight (all in their heads obviously). But this woman remained in good spirits. Apparently I have a nice smile and a good face structure. Dave has dreamy eyes. We were offered am orgy but politely declined. We were told we make a cute couple though. The poor woman had just found out that she might have breast cancer, so I really couldn't blame her. Ok, maybe she took a bit of crack and meth as well, and was an alcoholic, but regardless, I'd be drunk as hell too.

Our first trip into Seattle was not what we were expecting. We stumbled upon the gay Pride parade, and what a way to enter a city!! The atmosphere was brimming with free abandon. All the gang folk were looking around cautiously - they were greatly outnumbered anyway and their discomfort provided a great source of amusement. It was a great atmosphere, even though it thwarted our attempts to find anything as all the roads were closed off.

A lot of our time has been used furniture and job hunting. We finally found a couch from someone who would deliver (this is another major set back in finding furniture). We took a while workling out the measurements and seeing if it would fit. We decided it would, at a push. Well, push came to shove came to 'wait, no, just try turning it left at the bottom and right at the top' and the walls were getting more bruised than we could fix. A little thought outside the box and we took the couch through bedroom, out on to the balcony and through the balcony door. Fit like a glove! We are still waiting to get a bed - a blow up mattress has done the trick so far.

It was 4th of July a couple of days ago so we decided to hit the fireworks. There was an all day celebration at the old site of a gas works factory. It was crowded but civilised - not what I'm used to! But the fireworks were amazing. Getting home was a hell of a hassle, but we managed it, after stopping into am Irish pub to wait for the masses to clear out.

We also met up with an old high school friend of mine. It was great to meet up with someone you haven't seen in years and we had a lovely BBQ in their garden. However, on the way home, we were told to get 2 buses, and one would give us transfer tickets for the other. We got the first then waited for the second. We showed our transfer tickets but were told they didn't work on that bus. We had no more money, no free cash machine near by and not much clue about the city. An extremely kind girl gave us $5 to get on the bus. We were both stunned into silence. We tried to decline the offer but she would have none of it. We got on the bus and sat again in stunned silence. I went back to her and tried to invite her out for a drink in return, but she just said she knows how hard it can be and that karma will sort her out. I'm still in awe really as no one has ever extended that kind of hand to me. But you can be sure, if that happens to someone else and I have money, the same kindness will be passed on. I think that's more what she would have wanted anyway.

On the other hand, we went to the DMV yesterday. it was a long wait so we hunkered down. There were 2 obvious meth heads there waiting too, they were a bit of a train wreck. The elderly gentleman who was sat next to them went up to do his thing and realised his wallet wasn't in his pocket. He went out to the car to look for it and came back in with his accusing finger ready. She got all defensive and walked out, at which point a quarter of the people in the room jumped up to chase her down and get his wallet back. Well, she gave him his wallet back. But the $500 he had in there was gone. Her friend had the gall to stay around and give the audience a bit of lip. The other girl by this point had run off and as we walked back to the car saw her friend getting arrested. But, it got the whole room talking to each other. This room was pretty much silent and segregated up until this point. Just goes to show it takes very little to bring out the social beast in human nature. Just a shame it takes something like that to break down those barriers.