What's a wonderwall anyway?

I find myself wondering if how I do things is the normal way. Like does everyone do the I'm waiting for the microwave to ping dance or the sugar stir wiggle into their coffee. I like knowing that I'm not the only one who sings along with the computer as it turns on or employs the shoogle method in times of desperation (and actually use that term, which is odd since I thought I'd made it up). I flounder a little when I don't know if I'm reacting appropriately to something. When you've spent as long as I have being told you're weird, mad and crazy it kinda screws your head up. I'm not very consistent. I was flattered when a guy offered me a VIP ticket to T in the Park free of charge if I slept with him in the tent we'd be camping in but I was creeped out when another guy claimed he'd always been attracted to me. Somehow that seems round the wrong way.

I got up out of bed this morning as Julie was doing her hair and gave her a fright as I loudly declared that I had to pee. I was still quite asleep, I know because I walked into the wall and woke myself up. I don't remember falling asleep. I remember lying in bed being tired and then I walked into the wall and it was morning. I've never slept like that. There's always the agonizing replaying of everything and thoughts bouncing off my closed eyes. It doesn't matter how exhausted physically or mentally I am, I can never get to sleep. I remember being small, I musta been under four because it was in our old house and Julie wasn't there, and wandering around late at night until my dad would tuck me back in and tell me to think of nothing. I crawled back into bed and thought maybe I finally learnt to sleep. No dreams, no pesky thoughts just rest. Not like the night before when the kittens took me to a new bar and we drank tequila and somebody beside me was smoking French cigarettes. I woke up tasting that dark smoke.

Or the night before that when I had the most ridiculous dream about a princess and woke up the next morning to find I'd written it all down. An almighty scrawl of nonsense. I've typed most of it up since part of me obviously felt the need to share it. Once it makes sense in English you can read it and have a laugh at my subconscious writer.

I was happy this morning. Nothing new to mull except hairstyles. But a song plays in my head and I sway as I make my coffee and my mouth opens quite on its own and belts out: Everyday I wake up alone because I'm not like all the other boys. Ever since I was young I had no choice but it's ok to lead me on. I must admit it's not much fun to be led on by such a one as you are. And then I remember the dream about the man but I can't recall his words to me, only my actions. I crack my jaw and pour in more sugar with a wiggle. He was going to change my life. And all I can think is well at least he wasn't made of kittens.

For a minute there I lost myself

"I just want simplicity. No more convoluted situations, no secrets I can hide from some, lie barefaced to others and throw heavy-handed at an unlucky few. I'm tired and I can only sustain selfishness for a short time and then it all comes tumbling down on me and I have to care about everybody else. I do my best to speak plainly, tell people what I think with a degree of tact. Yes, I lie. Yes, I reshape history, omitting certain truths or at most telling them so off-handedly that I think I sound like I don't care. Sometimes I don't remember what is real and what I imagined. In the end what I'm trying to say is when are you going to stop pretending. I am half-sick of shadows."

But the kittens have lost interest and the music changes. Goddamn Radiohead. Sheet music is before me and my beautiful neglected acoustic in my hand. The neck fits so well in my grip and I wrap my body around its own. I remember Em and Am and Bm. You can't play a Thom Yorke song without a hearty dose of the minors. I remember smiling when the other girl thought C was a stretch. I remember being happy there were no bar chords because I was terrible at them. And I remember being glad I didn't have to read tab despite being told that anybody can read tab. It messed me up. I blamed my tutor. He had spent a year and a half teaching me classical fingering. I had just about mastered a Malaguena when he changed his mind and handed me a sheet of chords to learn. I'm gonna brag here and tell you that I was the only girl still taking guitar and I was the only one who didn't mess up the practical exam. My ex boyfriend freaked out and my soon to be current boyfriend fluffed his 2nd song. The music department took care of me. I was the token female guitarist and sound engineer. It meant I spent time in the cupboard with boys who at first tried to feel me up but soon accepted me as one of them. We did things like write Gibson and Fender on the school guitars that had more holes than strings, and folded every piece of paper into an aeroplane. We also shunned the Viking and the wandering minstrel and invented our own tunes slagging off the waster that nobody liked and was the only one who still called me a frigid cow even when it stopped being relevant. The only lyrics I remember are "Why is Glenn standing over there? Because he's a fucking idiot." All of this floated through my head as I sat in the bar full of kittens and performed.

I woke up half-way down the stairs and flinched as I realised I'd been dreaming. I stumbled back to my bedroom and wrapped a blanket around my freezing legs. Maybe Freud could tell me why I keep having conversations with kittens, or people who turn into kittens. The internet (which is much quicker than finding a working flux capacitor) tells me that "To dream of kittens, denotes abominable small troubles and vexations will pursue and work you loss, unless you kill the kitten, and then you will overcome these worries." But the same site tells me that if I dream of "kissing a strange woman, denotes loose morals and perverted integrity" and come on, no it doesn't. If anything it says I have latent lesbian tendencies, durr hey. But the site is the reproduction of a book written in 1901 and I don't care enough to look at others.