[two for one]

I've been in weird spots today. Since Monday, I've been living my life as two different people. There's the person I've always been, who spends her evenings off at her apartment, watching netflix with The Boyfriend and playing with the kitties, thinking about laundry and dishes and blogging. Then there's the girl I've become again this week. The studio girl. The girl who enjoys the occasional 'terrace break' and pitcher of beer at Froggy, who relishes in the new arrival of dozens of bags of smalti and multiple varieties of grout all the while listening to DC101 and talking art with Geelite. It's a strange union of things to leave work early on Thursdays @ 1:00 p.m. to head to class at the studio only to return to the office on Friday morning with a whole day of office and an evening of waitressing ahead. A strange balance, indeed.

There's also the weirdness that comes with knowing I will be running 6 miles tomorrow morning with Running Guru Fred and knowing that I have enjoyed some beers and 'breaks' at the studio this week. It's like the completely focused and healthy, organized and athletic persona meets with the bohemian partying art chick and the two seem to have no way to communicate with eachother. They don't really mesh. Can you go out for some beers and have a smoke and then go run the next day @ 8 in the morning? It is wrong? If I can physically do it, should I? There's a constant state of guilt that I usually exist in and it is especially strong right now.

I am good at rationalizing and I like to look at the situation as this, as pointed out by The Boyfriend. I have a good month in the studio. I should live it up and enjoy every minute of it. Geelite will be heading out to Pompeii to dig up history and I will once again be left to my regularly scheduled programming. What's even stranger is the fact that tracie is kicking ass and if you check out her blog today, you'll see just how f*cking out of control IN CONTROL the girl actually is. Nothing like extremes to make you feel confused as hell. I am two people rolled into one right now...but it's a kind of oil and vinegar relationship. I'm tied to the person I have been since I graduated, who is healthier and happy to spend time at my apartment - and to the person I was, who spent hours and days in the ceramics studio, drinking beers, partying, indulging in the occasional 'terrace break', making solid artwork, rockin' out to some classic rock while floating around in a mini world that is the ceramics bubble...the place that changed my life....the place where I found my groove...where my life became more clear...where I met The Boyfriend...and The Artist Formerly Known as Mentor...and my brain expanded to see things differently...

I am two people struggling to live within one body and one life with one right and one wrong and no in between.

On a side note: Last night The Boyfriend and I watched 'The Postman Always Rings Twice' (the 1981 version with Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange).

...That probably didn't help.