I didn’t expect to do another entry today, but I thought I’d jot down some feelings that are weighing rather heavily on my mind.

First, though, people have been asking me lately why I hate the number 4 so much. Well, it not only has been associated with some rather unpleasant events in my life, but some cultures also believe it’s an unlucky number, the Japanese in particular.

I was born on the 4th and a lot of my life has sucked.

In the projects I was in that caused me to have a breakdown before I left New England altogether, there were 4 kids next to me who helped drive me to that breakdown during the 4 months I was there.

In those final years before I quit smoking, I would often wake up 4 hours into my sleep with an asthma attack. The one that nearly killed me was on the 4th floor when I lived in apartment #14 in a building in Springfield, MA.

In our Phoenix house, a Mormon family moved in next door. They also had 4 kids and they also drove me out of my fucking mind.

Two years later they moved. Then on March 4th of 1996, even worse neighbors moved in.

Three years later on June 4th, we got yet even worse neighbors.

In 2004 we lost our home in Arizona. That was on Lot 40. Our lives were horrible at this place, and yes, there was a 4 in our address there.

A few months later we lost our parcel of land in Oregon before we could build a dome house on it as planned. That was Unit 4 of the Klamath Falls Forest Hills Estate.

When we moved into this trailer, which once lived in a real trailer park, there was a ‘4’ on the side of it. It bugged me, but Tom assured me it was meaningless. Then he got laid off and our lives got progressively shittier. I made him chisel the evil number off and slowly things got better.

In the end, I’m just so glad I wasn’t born on 4/4/44!

Thoughts of both my sister and Maliheh have left me with some seriously mixed emotions. The emotions I feel where Tammy’s concerned are very different than what I’m feeling for Maliheh, of course.

With Tammy, it’s simpler. I don’t want to get too close because I don’t want to be burned again and it’s just not easy getting over the past. Getting someone in jail in the past, then trying to do it again is HUGE. So as I told her (when I replied to a message she sent letting me know she had some health problems), I’m here but will be keeping my distance. Sometimes people get along better that way. And as I also told her, due to the age difference, the distance and not knowing each other very well, we should leave the kids out of it, more or less. That way we don’t get into the he-said-she-said game. I wish them the very best, but I’m no “aunt” to anyone any more than I’m anyone’s great-grandmother. And I’m ok with that and accepting the areas in life in which I fall short. I gave her an update on our lives, wished her well and that’s pretty much it for now. I think her youngest is a mean little bitch and I just don’t want or need the drama.

I was telling Maliheh, who can’t wait for the Christmas show she and her students are putting on to be over with, of my problems with Tammy and asked for her advice. Then she told me that while she had an ok childhood, her father checked out later on in life while she was in high school and she came to really hate him. And while she pretended to love him and let him die thinking she did, she laughed at his funeral and spit on his grave. She said “family” is the other F word, and because she was adopted, maybe that’s why she sees family differently. They never even cared to help her when she was homeless, though she refuses to do the same. That means that she took care of business when her dad died and she helped make sure her mother was ok. She said that just because she was my sister didn’t mean I had to love her, but that’s just the cold-hearted bitch in her.

This was when I thanked her for being the same cold-hearted bitch I am and told her that I laughed when I read of Tammy’s problems. Yeah, maybe karma does bite my perps on the ass, though just not always as hard as I’d like. I guess the doctors (if she’s not being a hypochondriac as usual). I guess she’s got lung problems and is on disability and on oxygen. She’s going back to Yale to have a “pain pump put in her abdomen,” whatever the hell that means. It’d be nice if she died so there’d be just 2 of us to share the inheritance (if there is one) and not 3, but I couldn’t get that lucky.

On with Maliheh. I realize she’s more responsible than I thought she was. I pictured her dumping every woman she was ever with as soon as they pissed her off and not believing in working things out and unconditional love and all that. But she said no, she’s the one that got dumped by the few she ever cared about. They cheated on her and it hurt so much that’s why she never did it herself or believed in physical abuse. She said she wanted to try again, but they just kept cheating and then they dumped her. She said she’ll stomp, moan, bitch and scream, but who doesn’t say mean, hurtful things every now and then when they’re pissed?

This leaves me to wonder – is she ever sorry that we didn’t work out? Does she ever wonder if maybe I’d have been the one and I’d have been good to her and we might still be together if she’d given me a chance? I wish she had some regrets just like I do, but I don’t think she does. Especially since she said she enjoyed our chat, as usual, but likes it when we talk about the way things truly are and is happy I have Tom. In other words, she’s glad I have him because she still doesn’t want me.

I have really come to like the person she is. I like the fire within her and her honesty. I think men make better “quiet” types. I’ve come to see that we have some things in common and that she’s not what I thought she was all about. And while I know and accept the fact that all we can and will ever be is just friends which is certainly way more than I ever expected, I’m not going to sit here and lie about my feelings either. It hurts that we’re not into each other in the same way. It hurts that she’ll never come out and tell me she’s attracted to me. It hurts that she’ll never tell me she has feelings for me. It hurts knowing that if I was suddenly single and in her town, she would still only want to be just my friend. But I’m very glad to have her as a friend and a part of my life just the same. I just wish it wasn’t so hard on me at times and so frustrating. I’d never want to change the way my life is or give up Tom, but I’m sorry we didn’t work out or can’t be more than friends right now. It sucks loving things the way they are but also wishing they could be different if that makes a damn bit of sense. I would have been good to her and not cheated or anything like that, but I just wasn’t the one for her. Never was, never will be. I just hope she meets her Miss Right unless she prefers going solo. I would feel a tinge of jealousy, yes, but I would be happy for her just like she’s happy I have Tom.

So that was pretty much what we talked about before she went to bed saying that while she does love Christmas carols, if she never hears “Jingle Fucking Bells” again, it would suit her just fine, LOL.