March

March has not been nice to me and I am glad it is almost over.

Short list:

1: I realized going out is not what I am into.
2: One of the last times I went out I was put under investigation for DUI (scariest experience EVER)
3: I have finally cut off my transgender-female-lesbian in a man's body brother-in-law
4: Work stress
5: Son stress

After getting my taxes done and paying down my credit card, paying one off I am in a good place regarding debt.  I wasn't in a bad one, but I'd really like to see myself totally debt free by my next tax return.  Especially because my accountant let me know year after next things will change. 

I finally went to California Care to go through the process getting insurance.  I had it through Kaiser for a while but the high rates made it impossible for me to keep it.  I'd avoided going to the California Care site long enough.  At the end of the process I had the pleasure of finding out I am poor enough to qualify for MediCal.  I am not okay with this.  I feel ashamed I haven't made better choices in my life...that whole stuck thing.  It's now sunk to a whole new level.  I'm signed up now, but haven't received any of my paperwork yet.

Going out.  I started going out to, I guess, start living again.  I like live music.  I want to meet new people, start trying new things... at first it was fun, particularly if I had a drink or two.  I don't really like drinking very much and every time I went out there was something that would take the shine off. 

I wouldn't feel well the next day.  No hung over, but unmotivated...or more unmotivated.  There would always be some uncomfortable moment, a creepy guy.  The last time really just did it for me.  I went to see a few bands play and after I went to drop my girlfriend off at her car.  A police officer decided to roll me for a DUI.  I blew all zero's but the whole process really stressed me out. 

Mainly because it highlighted how alone I am.  How much responsibility I have.  All I could think was I am going to point on the breathalyzer, I'll get arrested/released (they just give a ticket now known as arrest and release), my car will be impounded, thank god I have a credit card, I'll have to go to court, how will I get my sons to school?  Myself to work?  The shopping done?  Who can I call as a sober driver to get me home now?  Oh my god I can't think of anyone... that fucking drink was not worth this!  I don't even fucking like drinking and it is certainly NOT WORTH THIS!

I blew zero's.  The officer looked a little disappointed.  The other officer had been talking to my girlfriend.  I thought they were going to test her too, they didn't. 

Thank God it's over.  My response.  No more drinking, ever.  I need to start working out, get my body and mind healthy.  And no more fucking swearing. (my exactly thought)


My brother-in-law.  Well he is a bag of cats, and this has nothing to do with his being a transgender-female-lesbian in a man's body either.  He was always a supreme asshole before, now it is just so much more layered.  Before he treated me like I was someone to be tolerated.  Then he wanted me to help him.  Then he was just the neediest, most high maintenance person I have ever had to deal with.  I was trying to be supportive for my sisters sake.  Before it was easy because he was never around.  I could go to their house and he'd stomp around for an hour then go to work.  Then he was there, ALL the time.  He'd either make us feel unwelcome, or later... dominate while I was there with his female needs.  And then my sister got a pigmy goat.  It isn't pinned, poops everywhere, urinates everywhere, smells awful, and tries to nibble everything and everyone. 
He really burned his bridges with me last week.  The three of us went out of town for a concert.  He was Awful.  Selfish, pouting, high-high-high maintenance.  I'm done.
My sister has been managing all of her friends...telling everyone slightly different versions of her reality.  I get it.  Well, she finally told her best friend about our concert trip.  She still softened the details but she said she'd going to give it six months and then she's leaving.  I hope she does.  If she doesn't he'll leave her with nothing. It is so much worse than what I am describing but it's not my life.  It is hard to watch my sister go through it though.  He's got cancer now.  It's looking like Hodgkins Lymphoma.  He's such and ass the best oncologist in town fired him after handing him his results.  He'll have to find another doctor with in the same offices.  I am writing this so you understand, this person is just Rude to highest degree.  My sister is giving it six months because she finally realizes the consistent negative factor is Brian.  She's going to help over the next few months to get settled with a doctor then she will begin extracting herself.  She's lucky.  She has a support group just waiting to help her. 


Work.   State Board came in and some people got fined.  Including the owner.  Everyone has been upset and uncomfortable.  We had a meeting Saturday night.  The owner is not wanting to pay her fine.  Well, no kidding...no one wants to pay a fine.  It's been a good wake up call though.  I pretty much slept all day yesterday off and on just from the stress leading up to the meeting and post meeting.  I hope everything gets resolved.  I don't want to change salons and I realize I need to go back to school.

My son...ADHD and just being in junior high.  He's been lazy and flaky and when asked or confronted lies or gives me the deer in headlights thing.  He's a slob...blahblahblah

I feel more peace now, after sleeping all day yesterday.  I think my subconscious worked out some of my stress from work.  It is what it is and I Need to make moves to figure out what I can go back to school for.  I get anxious thinking about it.

I am comfortable and at peace with my decision to not have anything to do with my brother-in-law.  I'm sorry for his difficulty, but I feel no responsibility toward him.

Things will be okay with my son.  He's very intelligent and as my older son got past junior high I know my youngest will too.



March, you can march right out.

                                                                                                                                                                

I UnderWhelm

I like to believe I'm unaware because somehow I have become so good at avoiding eye contact, or having a poker face when I do.  I don't catch that lingering look anymore, unless some stupid POS guy is wasted, or pushed off onto me by my married friend when he tries to dance with her. 

Maybe I am just so tuned into assholes I can't see anything else.

I know a few times I have looked for one specific idea of someone, someone real.  He has a name that escaped parted lips years ago.  Adam.

Just a candied thought, no substance.  It's clear the universe is in the way of that one, in the way period.  Always a lot of static in-between.

The static being the creepy guys described above.  I feel like I exist, and don't.  Like I am corporeal but on another plane, in another dimension.  I can see and touch the one I slip through, but for others I don't register.

It is Odd to go unseen.  To be this transitory thing I feel I have become.

It's lonely and frustrating.  It actually feels like something is acting as a barrier.  Is this normal?

Other times I am grateful, looking around I see nothing much I want to see.  Even for one such as myself, one that likes to watch the organism pulse and drive itself to its violent splitting off in pairs and eventual dissipation and reassembly. 

There might be one person I'd like to talk to.  One person that triggers a spark of interest.  It is quickly extinguished though for one reason or another.

I'm in a weird place.

I don't want to under appreciate it, but I am sure, sure as hell is a dark and cold place, I don't want to occupy this place for much longer.

Any suggestions on how to get out? 

I Want You To Disappear

You, the one that would place me next.
You, the one that kisses with his tongue
And not his lips

I am left starving
I am left wanting
An intelligent conversation

Talk me out of myself
Into you
No, not YOU

I Want You To Disappear

You, the one just doesn't get it
You, the one with no plan
But what my panties might taste like

If you paid attention
You might learn I rarely wear panties
They creep up my ass like you do

I am waiting for Him
The one that knows
What his lips are for

Lips to capture me
With conversation
And a mind that captures

Mine

I Want You To Disappear

So that I might breathe
So that the world can be
Uncluttered by your utter lack

You who would starve
Because the net you cast
draws in only old fish
full of worms

I'm wearying of thinking
Around you and wondering
What the fuck is wrong with me

That only you
With fingers numb to anything
But your own pleasure

Ears only tuned
To your own voice
Wagging tongue and unhinged lips

I Want You To Disappear

Listening to Fred

Today I'd gone to a family birthday party for a friends brother.  I am friends with the birthday boyo's brother and sister.  My friends come from such an extensive family they have first cousins they've never met.

After the presents were opened and the birthday cards read and the photographs taken of generations of men, of women, of family and friends Fred told me I reminded him of his wife that had passed.  That seeing me stirred things up in him.  She was a red head too, 5'8", blue eyes.  We sat together as the full moon came up behind us and the sky turned a little violet and the mosquito's began to rise up and feed.

Fred is 70 years old and could pass for sixty.  He has grey hair combed back, facial hair, big ears, and a long multi-banded ponytail.  When he was young he was a powerful man and not just a little bit dangerous, but maybe a lot.  He told me he boxed.  He said he wasn't particularly good looking but that he knew who he was, had confidence.  He isn't as powerful anymore but he is still strong and healthy and sharp.
 He began talking to me at length, something I'm not sure he does with just anybody.  He said he thinks of her often, as the days go on more and more.  He described their relationship of twenty seven years.  He was not an easy man.  He acknowledged he was a hard man in the early years, unappreciative of the gifts in his life.

He came to embrace them before it was too late. He took care of her in the end.  It was brutal what he described. 

The way he detailed it all...the way he spoke of how a man should love a woman, the way he loved his wife, brought tears to both of our eyes.  I actually excused myself for a moment, and came back so we could resume.  Those left behind were too loose to see the depths Frank and I were treading.

I think I reminded him enough of her he felt at ease and spoke frankly, freely of the man he'd been, the man he became.

He made me think of John so vividly, good and bad, I had to press my index finger into the pad of my palm so I could hold back that choking feeling in my throat and keep myself from crying...
Frank's memories causing mine to surface.

He's still a strong man.  Strong of mind, and strong of body.  He understands life goes on.  He understands she's gone and he's living.  He said he'd be fine to have another woman in his life to enjoy doing things with, a companion.  This was a little eerie, if felt like permission for me to do the same (not a play, not a hint on his part)...like a message in bold to be honest.

I think he's waiting for her.  I think if she came for him he'd go. 

He told me he knew, he just knew when they met she would be his.  He knew it might not be that night, that week, that month.  He just knew, at some point it would come together for them.

He said she came in, red hair, bluest eyes he'd ever seen, long legs, big rack and he knew.  He said he always knew with a woman.  He wasn't talking about just sex, he meant they'd belong to each other.



It was lovely listening to Fred.  He mentioned a few times he was worried he was boring me.

This is one of those moments I like.  To end up somewhere I didn't think I'd be, listening to someone tell me their story, maybe reminding me of my own.

Reminding me why I am where I am and through their sharing.  Reminding me my own story is nowhere close to over.

I figure this must be true.

Frank said he was a good judge of people.  He said he thinks I am woman with a good heart, a gentle heart, a kind heart.  He said I have a bit of barrier up (thank god, I've been working on it).

He isn't the type of man to share like that and he shared himself with me.

A pretty red head that reminded him of his wife.

 

Right Now, Right At This Moment

I greatly desire the simple intimacy of having a partner, a lover, a mate...

Someone next to me that would get up and take my coffee cup, kiss my neck more than briefly, and bring me another cup of coffee while I sit here in bed, with my laptop, writing.

Someone that would watch tv next to me while I let my fingers move over the keyboard.  Someone that would be content to just spend another half hour being lazy on a Sunday morning with me.  The feeling of them moving next to me in my life.

What Do You Say, For Yourself

I have always loved Cities, though I have been to few.  I love the anonymity.  I love how such a big and crowded and busy thing can have in every place, every moment of what it is...singular moments, oasis's, vignettes.  Each and every thing it's own story.

It would not surprise you I often love movies, books, and photography that highlight such.

I have just discovered a photographer and painter named Saul Leiter.  He produced work in the 40's and 50's which are saturated in that feeling I get when I am able to be lost in a big city.  A few of his photographs are posted above.

I have not had the opportunity, or perhaps taken the adventure on, of  seeing many places.  I've been around California, the state I live in.  I have been to Texas, Hawaii, Washington, Puerto Vallarta.  I am not a fan of Nevada.  In each and every place I soaked in as much as I could.  Taking photographs in my mind.  Sadly I do this instead of actually taking photographs.  I hate having a camera to my face, or held up before me.  It probably seems ridiculous to you I write that because it would make more sense at least to me, if I did have a camera as an extension of myself.  I always wanted a view camera.  Held at the center of me and gazing down into the view-finder.  Unobtrusive, silent clicks.  I wish there was a digital version, I can honestly say I'd become a photographer then.  I suppose we all have the tools we'd prefer to work with.  And our excuses for not producing when we don't.

My favorite place, the place I fell in love with, Seattle.  Point of truth, I fell in love as I came off the plane at Sea-Tek.  The City itself a very brief and intense affair.  I think of going back all the time.  I remember vividly the jazz club, Pikes Market where I bought the very best jasmine tea I have ever brewed.  I horded it, however, it is gone now.  I can recall the feeling of the place.  The way the ground felt under my feet.  The air, the light, the fragrance of the place.  The press of the bodies in a crowd.  The open sidewalk going up a hill, the tree in bloom before me.  The little drops of misting rain that landed on my face and in my eyes as I walked uncovered just feeling it.  I have often heard when someone passes you can't remember their face clearly in your mind, you can't remember the sound of their voice or laugh.  It is not true.

In my memory, Seattle is clearly recalled.  In just a few days it settled permanently into my skin.

What do you say, for yourself?  I have often wondered what someone like Saul Leiter would say in moments of artistic high, upon reflection, about his chosen subject, about himself. 

I like to think perhaps like the organism of a city it is ever changing but still one constant all together.  Like the photographs depiction of little things within a whole.  For myself, it is what I would say in a moment about a moment... and yet, there is essence in my response of who I am that would permeate it.  My personal perspective, my eye.

I have always felt, when I present something as I see it, to let the person seeing it have their own experience.  Sure, I present something I see, something I'd like to communicate.  I suppose I would like it to be clearly defined, some feeling, some idea.  Yet...I feel it is important for the viewer, the reader, the individual to feel their own ownership of it, their own idea, their own interpretation.  That they might become part of the tapestry as I have.  That they might place themselves in the moment I am capturing.

Interestingly, I just realized, maybe most of the time when they move away from it they are happier the further they away they are.  I would be nice though, if perhaps, it would become part of them.  Unforgettable, craved, experienced with simply a closing of their eyes and simply recalling.

I'd like that.

That Slippery Slope

I don't want to get old, he said
It was easy to watch the past
the best of who he'd been
The very thing he cherished
cascading over and over
just as the shadows passed over his face
as we drove under street lights
at 38 miles and hour in his car

Songs playing out
designed to push away the failure
the lack in his life
Because he is what was
The Night Watch on the South China Sea
Ocean smooth as glass
New wave music playing out
on his cd player in the freezing cold
To get him through the starry night

Each song playing then, plays now
His happier, identified past on his iPod
in his little mat-black economy car
On a silky spring night
a bit too warm, and too early for it's season
Windows down
Hoping for enough courage
to get him through the next hour
To get him through tomorrow

He asks me not one question, not one
He speaks over anything I offer
I am simply a sound board
A new pair of ears for old tunes
and what they represent 
A time that slithered away from him

He'd wanted to be married, hell yeah
and he figured he would have been by now
He'd wanted kids, sure he did
Thought he'd've always been a good father
He likes kids, of course he does

But he's 48 now
it's too late and he's past all that now too
He doesn't want to be a Dad in his 50's
He'd dated a few times and had his heart broken
It wasn't him
He likes to think
I can see it, say it enough times and it is true
lies he tells himself and hopes are truths

The Cult, The Cure, Depeche Mode, Psychedelic Furs, Joy Division
The list was endless
My god, he knows the albums, the tracks, facts about the bands
Each and every one, precious
highlighting how great times are gone
Now he does just enough
to keep the cobwebs from gathering in aging joints
$1 Coors Light bottle beer night Thursday's
With his Boys

Trolling Hotties and pretending
None of it makes him feel old and tired
Unless he's reminiscing how good it Was
His eyes a bit hollow, a little swollen from hang-over
The eyes that have given up
The smile that tries, and fails
To convince even him that this life isn't  proof
of his being incapable

He just turned 48 last week
He's that guy now
That old guy, not completely creepy, yet
But he's not...
He's still That guy
That guy that swaggers in his comfort zone
and insists
There's enough time to be all the things
He never actually became.

The Wicked, Wandering, and Wonderful

The path is smoothing out again
It is not rice paper, it is not broken glass
I started looking up again
Not down
Not feeling every dip, every curve
Not seeing every bad thing ahead
laying in wait with it's tail snapping in the shadows

The sun has been shining here
soft and warm and new
I've hidden from it some
Gently now I let it cover me
craving the warmth and sweetness of
the muted sounds of things alive around me

Even in the light, or in the cooler cover of night
I carry both my suspicious mind
my optimistic hope
They are fragile things to build upon

I owe Nothing
I have paid and paid the price
of things I did not purchase
and things I did

The Wicked, Wandering, and Wonderful
The small things
The greater things
all shaping and forming
all draped on My shoulders
The past
The present
The future
In my hands
long delicate fingers
attempt to draw them down
To cradle them there

Knotched Arrow ----> Fly

This morning I receive a phone call. 

Yesterday I spoke to the school psychologist after she was referred to me after my meeting with one of my sons teachers.  She overloaded me with information and resources, particularly regarding counseling and proper diagnosis for my son.  She indicated his medication might be the problem as it is common with the wrong med, wrong dosage, wrong diagnosis, that these things can lead to unfortunate side effects like my son is exhibiting.  Unfortunately since their father moved away last year he changed medical coverage and this change resulted in no mental health coverage. 
Now, if any of you out there have a child that is ADHD you know there is really no help unless you have mental health coverage (something this new insurance lacks and my sons doctor found shocking) because doctors refer out for this sort of thing.

If you don't have to refer out, I am jealous.

Now, the uncomfortable part...the phone call.  The phone call was a return call from one of the reference numbers.  Back story: I went to Covered California and filled out the information.  I do not qualify for discounted insurance.  Oh, it is not because I am rolling in the deep pockets of financial bliss.  No.  It is because I am the hard working and no money making single Mom of the self employed.

I qualify for MediCal. 

I suddenly feel nauseous. All I know is I am now a pariah to a large majority of conservative-politically bent people I know, and worse... my own ego.

Even in the early stages of my separation and divorce and child support order, when I was putting myself through school (stupid choice of cosmetology. I should have done anything medical), had the boys 24/7 to support my ex in his training for corrections, I had no money, no help, and I still refused assistance.  Luckily I was bar tending then and managed to get by.  The same now, only I do hair and I have been years in the building my clientele. Honestly, without child support I don't think I could survive on my own.  I love what I do, but I am realizing now that John is gone and the distractions are gone, my Job is not a job but a Hobby.

MediCal.  It seems wrong.  It rubs uncomfortably against my pride.  I should have made better choices.  How can I move forward now?

Now I have to have proof of insurance.  I can't hide anymore.  I tried private pay, and thankfully my sons are covered under their fathers benefits, so my dropping the insurance when they raised my premiums impossibly high didn't effect them.  By the way, I looked up Effect and Affect.  I think I got it right.  These two have always caused me problems.  If I am wrong I tried.  If you, reader-voyeur, are dissatisfied with me, fuck off and I hope you eat many spiders while you sleep and feel all creepy inside.

My shame, now I get to roll out the MediCal for services I'd rather avoid but honestly, can't...shouldn't.  I have to reveal my 'shame' to my future doctor and their staff who will judge me for my iPhone 4 and non-walmart kitty decal clothin.  My accountant who lit the fire under my reluctant ass will know.  Well, he already knows I suppose he saw my AGI.

The few people I have confided in have told me I am being ridiculous and they wish they'd qualified for MediCal.

Even typing it out here makes me uncomfortable.  I feel like a failure.

Yet, I don't judge negatively anyone I know that does use assistance.  I don't think less of them at all.  I see them as who they are, the person.  This is a ME thing.  As well, I never did lack in understanding of John not wanting to go to the doctor regarding his health, his blood pressure.  Of course I continually mentioned it wanting him to go.  Knowing deep down no matter how healthy he looked, how remarkably young, his internal health was suffering.  And tragically his not taking care of his health lead to his passing at far too young an age.  I understood it though.

Something else, and maybe all of these confessions will lead to making me a better person or something, but...I envy my friends that can take care of themselves where I can't.  I envy my friends that are married and don't live under the pressure I do.  They made better choices.  That's the plain truth.

If most people knew what was in my checking and savings combined they'd probably die from horror.  I am trying to save.  My debt is manageable but keeps me from saving as much as I'd like.  I never pay anything late, my sons eat and often have things they like. I take care of my paid off car.  My credit is good, though I should personally check it again it's been long enough since the last time.  Probably too long.  But I'm clean.  I'm just broke.

But the constant sense of instability in the background is frightening.

And yet, I'd rather be alone than ever settle again.  I haven't always made this choice in my past but my choices were always genuine.  John highlighted something in me no one else ever did.  I won't ever settle again.  There's this barrier I'm not sure will ever let anyone in, and yes that is different than settling.  I wish you, reader, could be a little observer on my shoulder.  You'd agree, I'm right to feel the way I do.  I'm not looking, but what I am seeing is... settling in the extreme material.  It falls under, Do Not Touch Me Again Ever material.  There's a lot of creeps out there.  A lot of lazy boys.  No intelligent great gentlemanly men.  Everyone wants an easy mark, a hook up.  Even my dating girlfriends.  It's just not my thing.  I'm not frigid...in fact I am highly aware of my needs, I just can't make myself willing to waste my time.

Sometimes I wish I were more calculating.  If I were I'd have focused a lot more on my education I think. 

There is a song I find running through my mind often...

Nick Drake, One of These Things First


http://youtu.be/QSlh8u8Nrig
*look I figured it out, minus the image. pity*

I know it doesn't really sum up what I am saying here, but I could have been...

I could still be.  However, right now I have my son to focus on and my other son to see taking flight into his adult life soon.

Life is a transition.  Sometimes I wonder why I am the way I am.  Why I have such strange standards for different areas of my life.  Why I am one thing and not another.  Or why I am conflicted, Why am I (as my mother-in-law states) surrounded by crazy. 

No more crazy.  I am trying to get my shit together.  I am slowly waking up from the last year and a half.  I hope I am moving forward.

I Think Fury Is Knock, Knock, Knocking

Knock, knock.

Who's there?

Fury...

Many years ago I blogged a little short I titled, There's a Bitch in my Head and Her Name is Fury.

It was a funny little description of something my then husband did that pissed me off.

The alter ego's name fit though and the poor self protective bitch has been on lock down in solitary confinement since third grade at Turtle Rock Elementary School.  She kind of took over when I saw red during a show and tell presentation in class.  I became aware and found my hand fisted in a boys hair and my left hand in a fist raised and ready to knock him out.  He was heckling me from his seat, poor stupid kid.  My teacher, Mr. Comb-over, had kept my left fist from flying to it's mark where it intended to break the nose of boy who's hair I was ripping out with the pressure of my fingers alone.

Fury made me nervous.  So I put her away.  I've written about her before.

Well, she's started to get past weakening bonds and locks and cell walls.  I'm okay with that.  However, she and I are getting to know each other and she can be a real bitch and sadly, at the wrong times.  She and I have a lot to learn.

For example, we are wise enough to not engage with someone worthless.  However, dropping responsibility in someones lap and not caring how they react would be a nice place for us to step up to.
Exhibit one: Diana, my ultra co-dependent co-worker.  I like this girl, but I don't.  She's full of venom, but only she is allowed to talk smack on others, or be frustrated by them.  I guess because she has a better reason than I do.  She's fat.
She put me on blast online, she thought it was a closed group.  I saw the whole thing.  I knew it was about me even if she didn't name me specifically.  She sees my youngest son, and the rest of the world as needing to be protected from the pretty, slender-curvy mean girl.  She made opinions fact not knowing shit about my life.  When I gently (and I could have let Fury out but didn't) informed her of her lack of knowledge, which I gave her a rundown on the last year and a half of my life, and how narrow perspective was she apologized profusely and offered to let me hit her hard with the anger I so greatly deserved because she was a said, 'Piece of Shit'.  Another incident, she told me things, personal things I do not need to know, about the owner of our workplace and her boyfriend.  When I then stated that he'd made a poor social impression to me by treating us like peon's when he didn't outright ignore our existence, she then defended him as though she hadn't been gossiping maliciously about him a second before.  I let her know she didn't need to do that.  Her response, so so so co-dependent was this, 'I just won't say Anything then' and in an injured tone.  Oh snap.  She is my grandmother.

Well, exhibit one, almost at the finish line: March 2nd she came over, me having forgiven her for her online blast of me and my mothering and kindly moving on... she went out on the patio to have a cigaret before leaving and my thirteen year old followed her out because she treats him like he's amazing even when her countenance reads, he's annoying. All because she sees an awkward kindred spirit.  She comes in and informs me my son was making sex sounds at her and then told her that is how he met his best friend Stephanie, they made sex sounds at each other.

Great.

I asked her if she told him he was making her uncomfortable and if she told him that sort of behavior is inappropriate.  She poo-poo'd me!  Not literally, but she waved it off and said, 'Ohhhhhh, it's okahhhhhy. ha-ha-ha.'

I said to her, "No it's not.  I need the village to help raise my son.  You had a great opportunity to help him know his behavior is making you uncomfortable and inappropriate."

No, she's like everyone else in my life, with exception of my mother-in-law, They prefer to dump that crap on my lap instead.

Fury decided that Bitch isn't coming to my home ever again.  Fury pretty much put me on blast in my head pointing out that Diana is proven to not be worth my effort in confrontation.  She'll just act injured instead.  Unless of course I just write it out and let her digest it first.  Screw that.  I won't waste my time.  She's struck out three times.  I'll be friendly at work and only because we work together.  Otherwise I would have let Fury have at her. 


Next up, the Social Life and Fury being inappropriate.

I went out last Friday night.  The two times before that weren't so great before that either.  One because Mr. Been There Done That (10 years ago guy) showed up with his friends.  These guys have not changed in 10 years.  I will quote them from our table, 'Look, Hotties.'  To which they went outside and began to hit on a few obvious trashy blonds.  When Mr. 10 years ago sat down my girlfriend put her arm around me while her husband talked to his buddy (that recognized me but couldn't place me and we realized it was from when I was bar tending and had met Mr. 10 years ago), he said, 'Oh Honey I had her first' to which they then went back and forth over me making that statement.  Awesome.  No Mr. 10, she did.  I've known her since I was 19.  He then shut up, a great feat of self control for him.  I think it was because he was texting and struggling to spell a word.

His friend that recognized me proceeded to bring up my brief relationship and a sexual encounter and how good '04 was.  Fury let him know the facts, bluntly.  It was nice to see him shut up about it.  Later he got my number from his friend to ask for a picture I'd taken of him, Mr. 10 years ago, and their buddy.  He also then messaged me leading up to asking me out.  Poor sad emotionally delayed sack of stupid.  Do you really think I'm that woman from 10 years ago and isn't there some kind of bro code?  Because if you think you can hit me up and get a piece of me, well, I'll hurt your ego and fast.

Then I had a girls night.  Another band.  Some creepy guy kept trying to dance with me when I was dancing with my friends.  He kept letting me know he was interested when I let him know I wasn't.
We left early as our band played first and best.  I was relieved.

And last Friday.  My friend and her husband, another friend and her husband, and another two couples the same.  I was the single girl, dancing with her girlfriends, while hubbies did their thing.  When we walked in the night was shadowed by that married guys wife my 'friend' tried to set me up with.  I knew her when I saw her because feeling things were shady I'd checked his profile on Facebook scrolling down until I finally found a mention of her.  Checked her Facebook, ironically the same night she called me because he left his phone on the counter when he went to shower.  I can only think she did a little Facebook stalking too.  I'm easy to find if you know my name.  It's very uncommon.  She looked at me a few times, a few of her friends did too.  Nothing malicious, but uncomfortable.  She was there with her friends as I was.  It's too bad things played out the way they did because I am certain we'd like each other if we'd met under other circumstances.  I'm still convinced John is laughing at me and saying, 'I told you so' from wherever he is now.  Dancing with my friends this guy tried to dance with my close friend (her husband talking to the other guys while we danced), she pawned him off on me knowing if she didn't fast her nice night would end with her 5'6" husband trying to kick a 6'4" guys ass.  Yes, I was pissed.  I a not interested in being anyone's second choice, part time, some times, maybe girl.  I extracted myself and went back to our table and went back after he left the floor soon after so I could dance with my girlfriends again.  But Fury had leaked out that night.  The drummer for the band is friendly with my friends.  I put him 'on blast'.  His words, for giving me false info, regarding his email to send him something I'd found on youtube he was interesting in.  When I tried to send it later the email came back as invalid.  I figured he gave out a fake one to seem polite to our mutual friends but didn't want to bother with me or perhaps have issue with his girl or something.  So Fury confronted him on that bluntly.  Had it been me I would have mentioned it more tactfully.

So the last several times I have escaped for me time it has been shadowed by petty bs.  A good time slimmed by the past or creepy guys trying to dance with me. Or by Fury blowing off steam and making me look like an ass.

As a result of all these little things, my son, my social life, work being slow... I'm tired and feeling kind of pathetic.

Fury has retreated so I don't even have her gumption to keep on keeping on.

Today I am helping my elderly friend by taking her to a doctor appointment.  She is trying to minimize her expenses so she can stay at this senior living community she loves.  He doctor can sign off that she is in need of assisted living and she can, instead of having her own apartment at over $2000 per month, have a roommate in assisted living (as opposed to independent living where she is now) and pay half.

Being around her I can tell her these tales of woe and she is utterly entertained by my 'man friends' as she calls them.  She remembers only enough to ask if any of my Man Friends have called when she sees me about once a week. 

She puts things into perspective for me and she kind of lightens my load by making what seems seedy and disappointing a funny night out instead.  Her situation makes me appreciate mine a little more and we like each other.


Tonight I agreed to visit with a friend I've known for a very long time.  He, like the one I am no longer friends with, challenges my willingness to be his friend.  He's good for a few a few coffee/catching up visits, then he goes to that, let's be more than friends thing.  I don't mean to seem ungrateful, but I don't feel special when he does this.  I feel like I'm a thread he pulls when he's lonely and feeling like a failure.  I get it, wanting to break that cycle and make a good life.  But he's not the guy for me, he screwed that up many years ago.  Hell, he frustrates our friendship.  We've never had sex and I think he'd like to see if his idea of having sex with me lives up to reality.  I assured him it wouldn't.

Now...

Just me.

I cut my fringe.  My bangs.  Short.  As typical, I liked them at first, now I am over it and now I get to wait for them to grow out.  They'd gotten to a point I liked and in a hormonal misguided burst of hyper-focus and shears in hand I cut them.
Last night I colored my hair.  An old formula I used to use a few levels lighter.  While my color was pretty before, I felt a little washed out. So I colored it, covering the highlight a girlfriend did that I wasn't in love with.

Essentially, I am taking my stress out on my hair.  I don't look terrible but I'm not loving it, probably due to my bangs.

I feel worn out...and as follows, I'd just love to get a break from it all.  I crave to have some sense of the life I've always wanted while fighting off  becoming jaded and convinced it'll never even come close, that I am somehow destined to be surrounded by crazy.

And yet, Life is Beautiful.

Fury says, Yeah keep telling yourself that sap.

She was right too.  I just got off the phone with the school psychologist.  She's great, but she also just inundated me with resources after having me run-down the last year and a half an some of my concerns regarding my son.

Calgon, take me away.  Oh wait, I have to hustle, I need to get ready to pick up my friend for her doctor appointment.  

Roy Orbison - Only The Lonely (A Black & White Night)

I would have loved to have added this to the post below.  Haven't worked that out yet.

Dis Pretty Woman

I am having a Roy Orbison kind of day.  Damn it, truth be told, I have a Roy Orbison kind of life.  And none of the happy shit he wrote songs about either.  I am Tragedy.  I am well suppressed Fury.  I am tired. 

I came here today to delete this account.  To delete it an create a new one.  To slip even further into anonymity.  To disassociate myself from what I'd wanted this blog to be...a place to chart to growth after death visited my life so personally.  A place where I could watch myself bloom with new life and purpose.  Well, I missed the mark on that.

I will always be the first to admit I am damn naive.  This 42 year old woman, mother of two teenaged sons...well, I'm done.  I may still be naive, but I am sad to admit I think I have become angry, distrustful, disenfranchised, my heart is becoming disabled.  I am become Jaded.  Sadly I can't even write herewith  that 'Cool Cat Jaded' like Winnona Rider in all her cheesy intellectual type-cast roles in the eighties and nineties.  Non of that feverish, spanked fresh writing for me.  No.  No I don't gracefully step fort on the page, I stumble drunkenly miserabl.  Here I vomit up my frustrations.  I'm not even cool enough to get faded, Bukowski-like, and blow others away with raw visceral truths.

Instead I am whiner.  A feeble-minded moaner on the page.  A sad and stumbling victim of my own pathetic life.

Last night I had the great displeasure of crying myself to sleep.  Triggered by my thirteen year old son.  He loves his penis more than his education or my sanity.  He's a terrible person.  No really.  It's not just being thirteen years old, though my seventeen year old was just awful then too.  My youngest son excels at being awful.  He lies, he sneaks, he steals, he neglects.  He is brilliant.  He is that guy that flies under the wire.  He has super powers.  I swear he does.  He seems to be in training for super villainy.  And he does all this with big blue 'deer in headlights' eyes and smile.

I want to smack him.

I suppose he'll just get to repeat eighth grade at another junior high (the one he attends now was due to our previous address and I did an intra-district transfer for him to stay at the one he is failing miserably at now), our address feeds into this other junior high and high school campus,  It is an elitist high school where doctors, layers, and other very upper class $800,000+ home owners demand results for their privileged and spoiled children growing up in the pressure cooker of success.  I don't care now if he's thrown to the wolves of the upper social class.  Please don't think I am being 'judgy' now... I have friends and their children matriculate there and it's awful, mean, and clicky.  Fact, one of the counselors informed my friend that the school could be brutal socially.  That in no way should a gay young adult be open about their orientation at that school.  Now Ian says he isn't gay (her children aren't either, the counselor was just making a very disturbing point) but my sons behavior often sets him apart in negative ways.   My kid and his awkward refusal to conform would likely make him a target there and make his life a little miserable as well.  You see, he likes to wear that big target on his back these days.  Now instead of wanting to protect him I kind of feel this instead, Screw him.

I've been nearly sweating over his transition to high school.  The one our address requires him to go to is the one I mentioned above.  There is another I could use my work address for, but I am not so sure it isn't about the same.  I could use my mother-in-laws address and send him where my oldest son goes but I'd really rather avoid that as my son established himself in negative ways with other students he went went to elementary school with and frankly they were just as bad as the elitist kids I am worrying about.  There seems to be no middle road for me to choose.  At this point I am so frustrated with him I want what's easy for me.  He can bus to and from the school our address feeds into and if  he pulls his head out of his ass long enough to take advantage of what this campus has to offer and stops acting like a dick he might make something of it.  High school sucks for most people except those that peak there.  I realize that.  However, I am not wishing any Pretty in Pink scenario on my son.  The district lines were redrawn about two years ago.  The school he's in now, and its feeder high school where where he wants to be, and I wanted him to be (minus a few friends I'm am so over).

While I spend my time concerned and trying to make a good choice for his next phase in his education I also constantly battle his Défiant le vent.  I now feel if he doesn't care, let the world smack his skinny butt down.

I have had this mentality since my oldest son put me through this.  Sadly it is continually shocking to me how schools operate.  Syllabuses I have to sign, my son has to sign.  Expectations and consequences.  The convenience of the expectation is there, to make life easy for everyone if he complies.  Yet, no follow through on consequences.  Everyone in his life is teaching him his actions are acceptable.  No One Anywhere holds him to any standard.  Not even their own.

Except me.  Sadly most of the time I am clueless, by choice, as I have been naive enough to expect that a teacher will actually follow their own syllabus.  No, no they do not.  They are simply failing my son and lazily relying on Parent Connect, a good way to stalk your child online, to do their job of informing a parent of their child's doing well or slipping intoa  hellish scholastic purgatory.

Now, they aren't entirely failing at their job, even if they don't follow their own rules, even if the school doesn't follow it's own policies. You see, if my son shows no interest in his own welfare, even if he is proven to be highly intelligent and capable, I agree...why should they put effort into him? 

My cluelessness by choice isn't because I don't care but because this is the safest time in my sons life for him to learn the consequences of his actions and not end up with him on the street.  My frustration is this, I'd like his teachers to follow their own rules.  Yet, silly me...they already are teaching him the ways of the world.

He is being given enough rope to hang himself.

Hang he will.

I care you see.  I care a great deal.  I care so much I had taken my hands off.  Unfortunately I waited until the burner of my son was red hot to touch it again.  I regret it.  Our home life has been hellish for the last week and a half because I decided to 'parent connect' and realized he is doing horribly and I have receive no communication at all.  Then I concluded, well, you read that already.

If I were as intelligent as my son I would have simply informed his teachers to go ahead and fail him and let him repeat eighth grade on our home address campus instead of his intra-district transfer. They can simply do what they are already doing, hands off, let him hang.  He can do it over next year on another campus.  Not our problem.

This school district doesn't like that much though.  They are elitist in general.  Excellence!  My son tests well, but his everyday performance?  It sucks.  Well, his penis knows he gets an A+++.

He was wanting me to send him to the feeder school for the junior high he is now because of one particular (he said) friend. As I mentioned above.  However I think he wants his little group of misfits, his bestie Stephanie.  I saw her for the first time.  Scary.  That he identifies with her freaks me right out.  My first impression of her was So Cal (DogTown) surfer, skater boy.  I thought she was a boy.  Then I realized who she was when I was in a meeting with him and his English/US History teacher they all came up to the window and made faces and acted like chimpanzees let out for recess.

I realize he's thirteen, and probably mostly typical. But for the ADHD and behavioral issues and lack of filter and love of things inappropriate and preferably sexual in nature.

I'm just tired of all the shit I've been through with him the last several years.  I'm worn out.  Every time I think think we hit a place that is going to smooth out a bit I get kicked in the gut and there is no Village willing to help me, and I have been reaching out damn it.

I didn't put down most of what I am dealing with...I am still slogging through.  And I am slogging through it alone.

I'll admit this, alone is daunting.  Alone is weighty.  Alone is terrifying.  I have learned very acutely, alone is better.

Occam's Razor.  There is no village for me.  I finally realized it Sunday the second of March.   Wicked March and it's cruel curses and truths.

My mother-in-law put it clearly.  I am surrounded by crazy.  I come from crazy.  Somehow it skipped me personally, but it is to me like iron to the magnet.

I am slowly working on demagnetizing myself.