Not So Sweet Dreams

Good morning, everyone! I trust you are all well. I don't really have that much to say, which is odd given my prolific bent as of late. The world is kind of as it should be, I have a coffee, my hair, now washed, still looks okay, but not as good when the woman took 20 minutes to blow it out nicely (I have about 300 metric tons of hair on my head). I still like it.

I just joined a gym this week, after anguishing about how much fucking money it costs around here to join one. When I was with the Whatever, we'd planned on me joining his gym, which cost about forty bucks a month. Because it's in Dedham. I was going to join my roommate's gym, which is also downtown and was much cheaper than the one I ended up at, but it's a tiny basement gym in Downtown Crossing, which is in the opposite direction from my office. So I joined one in Back Bay, and will shell out seventy bucks a month for the next year to work out.

I'm not too upset about it, because the last gym I went to was in Brookline, but it was a teeny gym, and when they raised the rates for their shit gym I quit. It was a pain in the ass during baseball season to wait for a T I could cram myself into, ride out to Brookline, work out, then get home. So I decided to keep it in the Back Bay, which gets expensive. It sucks to pay so much, but I'm not one of those girls who joins a gym and never goes. I do enjoy working out. I feel more energetic, and while I don't lose much weight, I am more toned and feel better about my appearance in general. I also hope to stave off the arthritis that my Mom has just about everywhere in her body, so I can keep any joint replacement surgeries off until I'm actually elderly.

I joined a co-ed gym, which has it's pluses and minuses. A major plus, as Stephanie pointed out, is that you know guys who work out at a gym are at least making an effort to take care of themselves, so it's a good place to potentially meet people. I don't really dig the weightlifter physique, but I like a guy who's toned. I do it, you can do it too, gentlemen. No need to be an iron man, because God knows I don't look like a model in Shape magazine. But I try. A minus is feeling the need to not look like a complete schlub while exercising. When I went to a women's gym, I kind of didn't care what I wore. Now I have to at least try to match my shirt to my pants. Also, a lot of the girls at the gym with the dudes are Shape models. Oh well.

Anyway, what I'm getting to is that regular exercise has a huge effect on my mood, I'm realizing. This fall, I would fall asleep early, not wake up at all in the night, and wake up feeling tired. This may have been due to the drama with the ex, but I think if I was in shape I could have slept less and felt more rested. Then when I started exercising again (about a month ago) I started needing less sleep, and remembered my dreams more. It's bizarre, but I've been able to wake up and remember them with much more clarity. Which is good, when it's a dream that helps me sort something out or is pleasant. It is not good when it's a sad, scary dream like the one I had last night.

I dreamt that the boy and husband in the family I babysit for died, along with my brother. I don't remember how, but I remember being really upset about my brother dying (of course) and talking to my Mom about how he never really got started in his life, how he never got to do whatever it is he wants to do. I have dreams about my brother dying sometimes, and it always freaks me out. In college I had a very vivid dream about him dying, so vivid that I called him up the next day and told him we were hanging out. We went to the mall and had some Indian food, all stuff Sam likes, and in the course of the day he told me his toe was "weird." Turns out he had a severely ingrown toenail. Which isn't fatal, but if he'd let it go it would have been much worse. So I guess I've got to call the little brother later.

The most vivid thing I remember from my dream last night was walking into the kitchen of the Family's house, and seeing the kids' mom sitting at the table with her head in her hands. I told her I would do anything I could to help them out, and she just kind of half-smiled and said she'd be fine. It was so sad, and I remembered it as I was getting ready for work. To me, these are the most terrifying dreams–– the ones that seem like they could actually happen.

Anyway. That's all I've got for now. As you were.