The Detritus of 2010

by Rasmenia Comment Closed
"For last year's words belong to last year's language And next year's words await another voice. And to make an end is to make a beginning." - T.S. Eliot ◊ The year of 2010 just didn't go according to plan. Then again, looking back, I can't recall a single year of my life yet that has. That'd just be spooky and weird if nothing unexpected happened. Not to mention boring, eh? For the two residents of the Rasmenian Nation, the year of 2010 began with chaos, anger and the frustration of international and cross country travel in the dead of winter. Indeed, our last days of 2009 and first few days of 2010 were spent engaged in family squabbles, re-routed Greyhound buses and bumming around airports. Oh... and I was fucking sick, choking on and snorting my own phlegm, which is just as sexy as it sounds. But, we summoned every bit of patience we had and made our way There & Back Again. So, we eventually made our...
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What I Am is What I Was

by Rasmenia Comment Closed
“I live in that solitude which is painful in youth, but delicious in the years of maturity.” -Albert Einstein“In youth we learn; in age we understand.” -Marie Von Ebner-Eschenbach◊ Ok, here's the thing about me and blog tags: I usually ignore them. On the rare occasion that another blogger writes a post about something and then "tags" me to tackle the same topic, my normal response is to read it, possibly comment on it and then go about with my daily scowling and mocking. However, I have been known to play along when the topic is interesting enough, if I think that I might be able to have fun with it, the planets are in the proper alignment. It also helps if I'm kind of drunk. So it was that my friend Stephanie, on her blog, called me out when she wrote a rather cool post in the form of 3 letters - to her past, present, and future selves. So I said, "giddy...
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Annoying Americans, Volume 4 – Expat Bloggers

Annoying Americans, Volume 4 – Expat Bloggers

by Rasmenia Comment Closed
American expat bloggers... well, yeah - it's true that with my little blue passport, Wordpress account & carte de séjour, I meet all of the criteria.  But, just wait... hold back your fist-pumping, cries of "hypocrite!" for just a moment.  I might get around to making a point... eventually. Before I moved to France, I spent a great deal of time scouring the internet for information on the place that was to be my new home.  It was a big move, going from Loveland, Colorado to Paris, France.  I was planning to get married to a French man soon after my arrival - I was nervous, excited, stressed-out & elated.  I was doing this alone, with only my faithful feline sidekick.Even though I had already been to France a couple of times already, I wanted to find as much information as I could, so that I could get a clearer picture of what in the hell I was getting myself into. Some...
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A Town Like Paris

A Town Like Paris

by Rasmenia Comment Closed
Author Bryce Corbett – wait a minute. I hesitate to even use the word “author” here. These days it seems like any jackass who can sit himself upright behind a keyboard likes to refer to himself or herself as an “author”.I wouldn’t refer to Corbett as an author – more like a blogger gone pro. Each chapter of “A Town Like Paris” reads like a long-winded blog entry, riddled with references to his friends & outings as if the reader actually cared enough to keep track of Corbett’s lifeless & bland ancillary characters.“A Town Like Paris” is an attempt at telling the story of an Australian expat living in Paris. While I am an American living expat living in France who spent more than two years living in Paris, I wondered with each turn of the page where in the hell Corbett’s Paris could be located on the map, because I had never seen the place.The...
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Insanity of the Recluse

by Rasmenia Comment Closed
…I can't go out there. Someone might see me. They might stand too close to me. Then what? Then it all begins all over again. It all unfolds again. The rapid heartbeat, the stomach churning perspiration, the nausea…I need a cigarette…jeezus. Wondering which words are the lies. Wondering what it might be like to be some microscopic explorer…wandering around, lurking and crawling in all of their hidden caverns…wondering what sort of magical or repulsive truth may be hidden there. Sometimes, I don't want to know. Sometimes, I don't want to explore. Sometimes, it's just better to hide…to crouch in the darkness where they can't touch me can't hurt me can't tell me any stories, no, no, no…nice and safe and I'm ok here….and I have a pen…and this brand new notebook – no one can touch me here. No one can tempt me into pretending that anything is real because I know that here in my shadows it's all real…all real and...
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