frequentandmany

[frequentandmany]

In a few months, I’ll have been doing this for more than half my life. I’ve done it over a hundred times and I’ll do it time and time again for years.

It’s odd, sometimes, to stop and think about it. I’m bleeding out and acting normal. I’ve lost pints of blood and all for nothing. I’m vacant. Nothing is growing there and I wouldn’t want there to be. One day, something might, but until then all this does is leave me sitting on my own blood for days at a time.

I know there are ‘better’ ways, more ‘efficient’ ways, but I’ve tried them and I can’t make them work. So I bleed and bleed and bleed. Over eleven years, and I’m still overflowing, still find blood on my legs when I wake up from if I moved in the night, still stand up and feel woozy, still double over with needless stomach contractions sometimes.

But I’m no stranger to pain. It’s an old friend.

I rate sanitary napkins two stars.

[frequentandmany]

Of all the small purchases I make for my peace of mind, the chief among them has to be the plexiglass screen protector.

Phones are expensive, even if you buy them refurbished and not new. I’m not sure why, but my father has always cautioned us against owing anyone money. We buy cars used to pay the full cost upfront, we buy phones cheap or refurbished, we work and save up to not take out loans in college (though it seems likely my younger brother and I may need them due to my father’s unemployment). I have nothing against this life philosophy, and I do in fact continue it myself. I hate owing people money. My phone may not be the newest or the best, and honestly it might be for the best for me to replace it with a newer model, but I can do that at any time. I like having choices. I like knowing that at any moment I could sell my car without getting a bank and a loan involved.

I know I’m extremely lucky and privileged to be able to live like this. I would never try to say otherwise. It’s a way that, going forward, I’m not sure I’ll be able to keep living.

But the screen protector. Paying $13 (or when I bought my most recent pack on sale for $6) is little compared to the $500+ that I would pay for a new phone. I can drop my phone over and over with (so far; knock on wood) little consequence. Peel off the old one, put on a new one, rinse and repeat.

I like the second chances of it.

I give plexiglass screen protectors four and a half stars.

[frequentandmany]

The only time I’ve ever noticed my ceiling fan doing anything is when I was already too cold. When it’s too hot, the fan does practically nothing. I wake up in the night kicking blankets around in a state of deep dissatisfaction.

There’s the noise, of course. Some people find it soothing. It takes me a while to get used to, personally. The constant hum while I’m trying to sleep is jarring after the long winter of silence. Of course, there is the flip side: when it gets too cold to turn it off, how do I sleep without the buzzing? How do I remind myself the world exists outside my brain?

And what if it falls down? It isn’t directly over my bed but the destruction of my small room would be significant and costly. Not even to mention the irony of using an electric object that will burn resources to cool off a room that the overuse of those resources has warmed?

All in all, I give ceiling fans two stars.

[frequentandmany]

I rate self-motivated projects zero stars.

[frequentandmany]

a brief note:

given the general path my life is currently on, it is more practical for me to write and post about the previous day than the current one. So from now on, expect a retrospective note from yesterday instead of today.

thank you.

[frequentandmany]

One of the things I miss most is being with someone in the companionable silence of watching a movie together. I can make a silly or banal comment here or there, but there is no pressure to speak unless I don’t want to. It’s a very simple way to show affection. I am comfortable with you in my silence. I feel no need to fill it with empty words or keep you entertained.

Nothing can be done to replicate the feeling of our feet tangled together in the middle of a couch, or the way a blanket is warmer when you’re under it with me. There is no way to replace how I accidentally left my drink on your side of the coffee table, would you hand it to me please? No way to tap-tap-tap your leg when something funny happens and I can’t control myself.

But we can replicate the silence. The silence and empty chat box offers, of knowing you’re on the other end, that we’re living together in the moment no matter how far apart we are.

There’s no word in the English language that covers the same emotions as a frantic keysmash, no way to verbally convey the same thing as ‘!!!!!!!!!’ Actually crying does not share the intention of a ;-; and there is no practical way to make an ‘uwu face’ in real life.

With every decision, something is gained, and something is lost.

I rate screen-sharing co-watching services three stars.

[frequentandmany]

In one way or another, we’ve been transporting infants since the dawn of time. Especially with hominids, wherein most children are born not fully developed. A newborn, a six-month-old, even a one-year-old can’t fully care for themselves or travel long distances. So the caretakers of these children – whoever they may be; parents, relatives, friends – carry the young on long journeys.

Across both distance and time, there have been a myriad of ways to carry a child. In some places, special carriers were made to strap a child safely to a horse. In others, a long strip of fabric would keep a child of almost any size safely strapped to your back. Woven baskets that strap over the shoulders and slings that strap a child to the chest all keep to the same principle; “come on, little one, we have places to be and things to do, and I would like to show you.”

Once a child is big enough to support their own head, there is of course the ubiquitous image of a person carrying a curious toddler around propped on one hip, cradled in one arm. “I have things to do, you’re coming with me, have a good look around while we’re here.” The carrying-in-arms can also be far more spur of the moment. “We need to leave, now.”

In social environments, baby wearing leaves the adults hands free but allows the child – if frontward facing – to be able to see the surrounding faces with ease, getting them used to social interactions early.

Anyone who has cared for an infant for any amount of time knows that one of the easiest ways to get a child to sleep is to walk with them. They would also know that children – especially children who are asleep – are heavy and just get heavier as time goes on. Strapping a child into what one might call the modern American baby carrier and taking a stroll outside with the baby cuddled to your chest accomplishes many things at once. Stomach to stomach, you can feel each other breathing. With their ear against your chest, they can hear your heartbeat, a constant, thumping, whooshing lullaby. Most of these carriers have a way to rise over the child’s head, blocking out light. It’s easy to duck your head down and kiss their hair. Their feet hang out on the sides at an easy height for holding.

It’s less bulky than a traditional stroller; after all, it’s just a foot or so added to your front. If it’s chilly or rainy out, you can zip them inside of your own jacket. An older child can face front and see the world just inches below where you do.

There are downsides, as in all things; they put pressure on the lower back or hips, the straps dig into your shoulders, if it’s hot out you both sweat through any clothes.

Despite these detractive factors, I give babywearing and baby carriers five stars.

[frequentandmany]

Target is a dangerous place. There’s just so much there. So many things that it reminds you that you need, things you’ve put off or forgotten about until this very moment. You go in for one thing and come out with five.

There’s just so many things, things of all kinds. Helpful things, gift things, beauty things, clothing things. Funny things and necessary things and comforting things. Things I want to buy and things I know I shouldn’t. It doesn’t do to dally or stray beyond the path.

The best strategy, I’ve found, is to only buy that which you can hold in your arms. Baskets are dangerous and carts moreso. You blink and it’s filled up.

“Just one little treat,” you tell yourself. And one thing turns into four and you’re suddenly way over budget.

I’ve never been good at self-control.

I rate Target two and a half stars.

[frequentandmany]

If there’s one thing I hope we keep with us going forward post-pandemic, I hope it’s video calls. I love being able to text my friend and ask a question and instantly be able to see their face. I love being able to lay on my bed and know I have a friend beside me even if it isn’t physically.

There are downsides, of course. It’s hard to take any meeting seriously from your kitchen table, and my brain can’t focus on a screen within a screen for too long. I always worry I look weird on camera, or that I’m washed out. My hair is never at its best virtually, and a lot of my personality comes through how I carry myself which doesn’t come across with just my shoulders.

But it means I’ve been able to hang out with friends thousands of miles away with ease. It means I can do virtual happy hours and baby showers, view weddings and funerals I otherwise could not have made it to. It means I’ve been able to see my friends' faces as they laugh, not just know they are from the other side of a screen. With a trick of perspective, I can lean and kiss their forehead.

I give video calls four and a half stars.

[frequentandmany]

I forget to eat breakfast a lot. I sleep through my alarm all the time. It’s ironic, considering I can’t fall asleep most nights. As someone terrified of being late but incapable of leaving early, ordering ahead for a grab and go has always been my best option. 

I run late so often that this entry is a day late itself. 

It’s a smart business strategy on their part: you can only pay in a minimum of $10 increments, so there will always be a little money left on the card, so you have to fill it up again. But I think it’s worth it for the convenience of being able to part, dart inside, grab my order, and get back on the road. 

It’s a little nice, also, to spend a little money on myself. ‘Treat yourself.’ ‘You deserve it.’ It’s nice to reassure myself in a small way that I deserve small moments of happiness, that even if the world is dark I can still find little stars of joy. 

I give the Starbucks mobile app three stars.

[frequentandmany]

I love spending hours at a thrift store, looking for everything and nothing. The excitement of not having any idea of what you might find, not knowing who first bought this and why, why they got rid of it, what they wore it to or used it for. Wondering what you might use it for.

Finding new ways to present yourself for under ten dollars, loving a dress but putting it back because you would never wear it, and a dress that nice deserves someone who will. Finding your new comfort clothes, the things you reach for when you just want to exist in a state of total relaxation.

Looking at books and records you can’t play or VHS tapes of movies you only half remember. Finding mugs and plates and lamps and paintings, imaging how you would use them to decorate, where you could put them.

Of course, sometimes they can be crowded, sometimes it can be frustrating to spend three hours in a store and leave empty-handed, or get home and find something was in worse condition than it first appeared or that it doesn’t fit at all.

There’s something funny about finding clothes you donated on the racks, something warm inside when a stranger picks it out, a little piece of your life that you loved and gave away so someone else could love it.

I give thrift stores four and a half stars.

[frequentandmany]

There is something that is particularly both funny and hellish about having no idea what state your body will be in when you wake up. A rollercoaster you never signed up for and can never get off.

I didn’t have work today and was therefore supposed to go help my grandparents with something, but I woke up with a blinding dizziness upon moving upright and promptly fell back on the bed so as not to collapse on the floor.

My tone might seem overly formal and detached, but at many times I feel so detached from my own body that this clinical discussion of it, as though it is not happening to me but rather a subject of study, feels more correct. You’ll have to forgive my propensity for five dollar words and perhaps overly-extended sentences.

Once I’m awake and aware of the pain my body has decided to inflict today, I try to take stock of where it lies. My ankle. My knee. My hip. There’s one spot in the middle of my back – where one sideways curve of my spine ends and another begins in the opposite direction – that I’ve never figured out how to stretch. My eyes, the crown of my head, the base of my skull.

Some pain is hot. It burns with both movement and stillness, a result of overwork or normal movement or nothing at all. Some pain feels like it would just be easier to do without the limb. It is soothed by cold, an ice pack to cool down muscles to feel like flames.

Some pain is cold, makes my muscles freeze up and lock or cuts off all the feeling in the rest of the body it’s attached too. This is helped by heat; coaxes the muscles into untensing and smoothing out.

A phrase I read once that sticks in my head is thermodynamic equilibrium. I don’t know where I read it or why or why it’s still in my head.

Some pain is so hot it’s cold, or so cold it’s hot.

Some pain isn’t either, it’s just pain. It exists in a way that has no comparable metaphor, no similes I can make to try to make people understand it if they haven’t experienced it. The kind of pain that hurts to the point of instigating the desire to sleep through the entire thing, to lose awareness of my body just to make it stop. This type of pain is the worst of all, and it was the pain settled behind my eyes today.

In theory, the design of the eye cover ice pack is quite simple: the front, which is filled with some substance that can get and stay cold, and the back, an elastic strap to keep the front pressed to the head. It’s ideal for me, a side sleeper, because it prevents gravity from intervening.

I say ‘behind my eyes,’ as if that is all the pain I feel, but it’s not. Other parts of me hurt but in less pressing ways. Over my years in this hellish little body, I’ve learned that the best course of action is prioritize prioritize prioritize.

I have nothing important due today. I’m going to lay in bed until a time my body forces me out with a more pressing need than pain.

My eyes cover ice pack is broken. I have to lay on my back.

Due to concept and previous experience rather than individual execution, I rate the ice pack eye cover three and a half stars.

[frequentandmany]

When I graduated high school, my older brother gave me a five year journal in which the conceit is that I write one sentence a day. Anyone who knows me knows that my thoughts on any day are far too long winded and sprawling for me to sum up any given day with a single sentence, so the journal has gone largely unused to my great distress and guilt. I know my brother still keeps his, and writes in it every day – or at least he seems to try to – because every time I see him overnight it’s somewhere by his work computer with a pen tucked over the cover. I can’t remember who gave it to him. 

Give me a second; I’ll text him to ask. 

While I wait for his response, I’ll tell you some of the things I’ve written in mine. 

Firstly, I stand corrected: it was my first day of college. Due to a hiccup in his transfer credits, my first semester at the community college was his last semester there. He had a car – my father offered the car in exchange for going to a school he (and later I) could commute to, so as not to pay room and board and a meal plan – and we spent many mornings and afternoons in that car. We have what would be generously called antithetical music tastes – country music and Christian rock vs oldies, showtunes, and Taylor Swift. I don’t remember what we ever talked about, but we probably talked. This blog is named after a quote from the note he left: “here is to the good memories. I hope that you find them frequent and many.” - 8/23/2016 

My first entry, Sept. 3rd, 2016: “Finally finished my winter soldier cosplay! It was a lot of hard work, but it was worth it.” On the first day and I’ve already broken the rules. That’s two sentences, honey, not one. 

Sept. 5th, 2016: I feel it’s important to mention I did not have a driver’s license, only a learner’s permit. My brother would let me drive, sometimes, to practice. I remember moving the seat up. “Gerry said my driving was good and Rachel came over. I like Rachel.” 

Sept. 9th, 2016: “Got to watch the Shrek: the musical DVD. Not nearly as cringey as I thought it would be.” Most things aren’t as bad in hindsight as they feel in the moment. 

On September 13th, I flunked a French test, but was able to retake it.

On September 18th, I wondered if it was donuts or doughnuts. I still do not have an answer. 

On the 30th, I finished a months worth of assignments in three hours. “Do I regret it? Yes. Have I learned my lesson? No. Will I do it again? Yeah.” Unfortunately.

I know I was talking about a French assignment, but reading that on October 19th, 2016, I “did well on listening,” still made me laugh. 

The final entry is October 23rd, 2016. A classmate broke up with her boyfriend. My history midterm went well. 

My brother’s current girlfriend gave it to him, probably before they were dating. I feel guilt when I look at this notebook, and simultaneously completely unmotivated to do anything about it. An Oroborus problem. In review of my own entries, I’m sad to report my handwriting has not improved. 

I give sentence a day five year journals one star.