The latest encounter that I had was over the weekend. I got in touch with a friend from high school. We hadn't talked in probably 10 years. Mainly because the last conversation that we had revealed that she was a big old homophobe. Which doesn't jive with my world. So I quit talking to her. But then things happened. And the world kept turning. And she ran into my mother, who blah, blah, blah.

So where is this going? Well, funny you would ask. Talking to her raised some of the spirits that I thought were pretty handily dispatched. Mainly the oldest of my resident ghosts. Those of me. They skirt around the edges all the time. But the ones from my troubled teen years are buried deepest, and in the darkest forested edges. I don't want to find the bodies. And I don't want to encourage the possession. If you ignore them, they'll go away. Just ask them nicely to stop breaking the crockery.

She had attended our last reunion. And I had no idea how much of a grudge she held against many of our classmates. I considered myself the resident queen of those- thus I avoided the occasion. Figuring that Miss Bitterness doesn't send her regrets, and there are probably a dozen better things to do on that particular weekend. Plus Kboy and I have this arrangement. But she went. And she got a few shots in. I would've enjoyed that. I suppose. Or I would've been sad. Because after all these years, to still keep it all alive...but then what kind of hypocrite am I, anyway? I nurture this crap. Feed it and keep it all tidy and labeled in file folders.

Just like the assortment of ghosts. They all have their homes, places and times. And I typically enjoy visiting with a few of them on a regular basis. Despite my words to the contrary. It's just so comforting. And so much less lonely. And I think that I can understand why exorcisms became relatively common back in the day. Who the hell wants to live with only your own voice in your head? It's cheery to store a legion up there.

Not to worry, my doves. It's all good. Someone, oh, I don't know who- ME, silly, has been stuck in the house for 4 days with a nasty cold, and is starting to fray around the edges a bit. Echoes of the great unemployed days of yore. So if I were to win the lotto, odds are so very good that I would keep the day job. Just for sanity, more than anything else.

But the combined not sleeping (coughing, ain't that a fun substitute?), and the isolation, make me think too much. And the girls in my head all start coming out of the inbetween places. Just to visit. Just to get a little attention.

I think it's time to go back to work and spread some disease.