A Word About These Here Blogs

I realize that I've been harping about the same bullshit here for the past few weeks. So I just wanted to throw a word or two out there about all this.

This is for me. It's not really for any of you. I am not one that often openly shares my thoughts or feelings, particularly in person. I feel it's my business and I shouldn't bother anyone with my personal shit. I'm not a big 'talk-things-out' person for the most part. However, I do need to get a lot of this recent crap out of my head and off my chest, and writing all this junk is the easiest and best way for me to do so. I could use a paper journal, but I find them cumbersome and besides, we all know this is the digital age; someday we'll be telling kids about long ago when books came IN THEIR OWN CONTAINERS! And they were made of this thing called paper. When you wanted to read something else, you had to get a separate container. And sometimes this thing you used called a bookmark would fall out and you'd curse and bitch until you found where you were again... so I write here.

As for why I chose to make all this public; once again it's a glimpse into the real me and the real shit in my head. And I've been called a lot of things, but I've never been accused of not being real or genuine, of being a fake or a poseur or coated with a facade. Also, I make them public because I myself do enjoy reading the notes/blogs/spewings of others. It was always a let down when you'd click on a new blog post here and get 'this blog is private. only the user can see it'. Damn it. I wanna see. It's voyeuristic, yes, but every single one of you is a voyeur too. Don't lie. Because if you weren't, you wouldn't be here, keeping up your own pages. For what is all this Social Networking if not a perfect study in Vanity And Voyeurism?

So, once again, this is for me. And in turn, you get to spy into my being. If I bring you down, sorry. Don't read it. If you are tired of me bitching, too bad. Don't read it. If you're going to judge me and my cynical and sarcastic views, fuck you. Don't read it.

I don't expect comments, but if you want to, go for it. But I don't really want your advice- particularly in regards to my latest diatribes because...
A) Any advice you give me has been heard before. It is not original. It's probably in a song lyric somewhere.
B) No one except me can really truly know how I feel. Yes, this sucks. I know, you know. But this sucks more for me than anything else ever has. This one hurts tremendously. I did really think I had found my one true love; that I had finally found the place I was meant to be and the person I was meant to be with for the rest of my life. Coming from someone like me- someone who keeps most people at a safe distance; this is not a belief or statement to be taken lightly. The few of you who know me get this. The rest of you, not so much.
C) Because we all know that all that advice is contrived and rather pointless; feel-good words for a feel-bad situation. "Forget him" "You're better off" "Just get over it"... we all know that it just doesn't work that way. At least not if there was honest and real emotion involved.

So, in conclusion. Yes, I am going to keep writing what I want. It will probably be shit you don't care about. Yes, it will probably be more of the same for now- mopey, me-and-my-heartbreak, sentimental mash. Or maybe not. Regardless... My blog, my brain, my bullshitting.

Isn't the internet great?

Hypothermia

Hypothermia is scientifically known to impair the immune system; thus it is believed that hypothermia can delay healing and lead to a higher incidence of post-operative infection.

Perhaps this is why these cold nights only make my heart ache even more.

I want nothing more than to be back where I should be. Where I was happy. Where I had finally found my place. Where I belonged (to someone).



Instead I'm cold, inside and out. I alternate between sadness and anger, and have found I prefer to be angry. Because then I can stave off the sadness; unfortunately it does inevitably follow.

All I can do now is wish to never see him again, to forget he ever existed. This will be made easier once I have planned a proper escape from this town.


"I hope we can be friends"... No. Fuck you. Go to hell. Never speak to me again. (I love you more than you could have ever imagined).

Dreams Vs. Reality

In my Dreams, he is waiting for me in my room when I get home. He tells me how badly he has missed me, and that in this time apart he has realized exactly how much he does love me. He says he's changed his mind and wants to try and work this through. He hugs me and apologizes for the pain this has caused, and promises to make it better. For those few moments before waking, I am in pure bliss. What power our Dreams can have! But only while we're sleeping...

Then I open my eyes and mentally fall into Reality.

Upon entering Reality, I know that he is probably already over me. That he is happy to no longer be required to devote time to someone he didn't ever really want to be with, and probably misses me about as much as most people miss dysentery. To him, I have become nothing more than a blip on the screen of his past as he regains his freedom to find something better.

In this Reality, I then spend the rest of my waking hours struggling to keep the sickening hollow sensation within me from bursting forth from my eyes as hot sticky tears. I fight to keep thoughts of him from invading each and every activity of the day, diverting my attention from matters I need to be addressing. I resist with everything I have to not reach out to him in a futile, and ultimately pathetic, effort to make him understand me, to make him come back to me.

By the end of the day, this Reality has worn me thin and that hollow feeling finally overtakes the floodgates. The levees break, and the tears flow freely as I slowly drift back into the fairy tale ending of my Dreams, which come again to give me a brief reprieve until the next morning arrives.

In my Dreams, Love always wins. In Reality, it's nothing more than a four letter word.

My Own Personal 9/11

Currently I'm trying not to vomit.

Today ranks pretty high on the list of worst days ever. Funny- well, no, not really- how the phrase "nine-eleven" is no longer two numbers off from a popular convenience store or a general date or time of day. No, now it is a noun with its own particular meaning; a day or event of total destruction and despair, where one feels that the only choice to make is to leap from a window 105 stories above the pavement below. That is right now.

I've watched the hours get shaved from my work schedule for the last couple weeks. I'm drowning in debt. School is about to start kicking my ass. I have four weeks tops to find somewhere to live that I can both tolerate and afford. Financial stress has been eating me alive for months now. But I had one thing. One thing that made me happy. One thing I loved and looked forward to and saw a future in. One thing I thought I could believe in. I was wrong. And that one thing has slipped away.

He told me he loved me. He's been telling me that regularly for the past month, the past 8 months. But what he wasn't telling me was that he was spending his time with another. He didn't cheat, not yet at least. And he said he couldn't guarantee that he wouldn't. So to the trash pile I go. She's prettier, younger, thinner, and less work since she has a much more carefree lifestyle. She also just broke up with her boyfriend and oh-so-conveniently lives upstairs. He said he still loves me, that he's not in love with her. But he wants easy. So I am discarded.

My own 9/11.

So I sit here and watch the flames grow closer and feel the heat singe my eyebrows. I have nothing left, but the decision to either let the fire take me or have one more moment of control and hurl myself from the window and get to experience freedom one more time.

I can't do this again.

Back For More

Today I did something I haven't done in a long time. I went to Espresso Royale, got a drink, and sat at a table in the corner and read. It was nice; an activity I've missed since I've stopped being a constant downtown fixture. However, I did notice something.
If you sort of go away for a year, and then reappear in your old habitat, it looks very similar, but is different. As for Espresso Royale, there were a couple new baristas (one was familiar). There was still coffee and art from local folks hanging on the walls. The soundtrack was indie-friendly artists like Bjork and Jeff Buckley. Most of the tables still had to have stacks of napkins and Flagpoles stuck under a foot or two to keep them from wobbling. And most of the people hanging out there were of the hipster/artistic/cool-student/townie-in-the-making (if they don't leave for Portland or NYC after they graduate) ilk.
But these were different hipster students than were there the last time I was there. Hipster students that I had never ever seen, in my multiple years of frequenting that coffee shop, sitting around and loudly blabbering on about all the shit that hipster-students talk about like they own the damn place and like everyone else in the room cares what they're saying. A strange feeling came over me, one like maybe I'm getting old...
And suddenly, I wanted to stand up and yell, "GET OFF MY LAWN, YOU FUCKING KIDS! KEEP YOUR GODDAMN FAKE-TOWNIE HANDS OFF MY AZALEA BUSHES!!"
This moment was spurred on by a hipster-student-chick in her early 20's wearing a lip-ring and mismatched prints who felt it necessary to sing along quietly, but not quietly enough that I could not hear her from 4 tables away, to three Jeff Buckley songs in a row. Congrats, kid. You know the words to some songs off the most popular album of an indie-loved artist that died when you were 10 or 11. You are so cool.
But what happened that almost make me puke was this: she went to the counter to get a drink. While waiting and chatting with the barista, the song "Dream Brother" came on. She enthusiasticly announced, "I love this song!". The barista said something along the lines of agreement back to her (so I assume; he was using his inside voice so I didn't hear him). Then I heard her proclaim, "I have this album on vinyl!!"

VOMIT.

Jesus. I'm so glad she left before "Hallelujah" played. She might have piddled on the floor from excitement.


Other observations of today:

Office Depot < Office Max.

I was behind an ACC sheriff deputy all the way down Hancock from downtown in front of the station by the federal building to N. Billups St. He went 20 mph the whole time. I think he was trying to figure out if I was sketchy or not since I drive a car that I rarely see white people driving. Either way, he completely ran the new 4-way stop at Chase St. Didn't even slow down. I started laughing, and I think he saw, because he turned at the next street.

Is It Curtains For This Here Blog? Or A Moving Box?

I'm thinking it might be time to move this rant of mine elsewhere. Or perhaps just call it a day. With the rising popularity of That Other Social Networking Site (use of that word may be a ban-worthy offense here... don't want to piss off Tom. Or get my knees broken by a Murdoch goonie.), and a decrease in the amount of time I spend per day online, I just don't check in with the old MySpace account nearly as often as I used to. One downfall of starting a new blog somewhere else is that the past 4 or whatever years of absolute bullshit I've written will no longer be there. Unless I move all that too, which I don't know that it's possible to do. Also, the 3-5 people who do read this do so because of the nifty little 'New Blog Posts!' notification... without that, I have no audience. Not that I need one to continue my bitching...

I finally get to use the car insurance I've been paying since I got a car. Yesterday I had a sucky day, which included having a sucky misperception of size and distance, and I ever so suckily clipped a coworker's pickup truck in the parking lot while turning into a parking space after my lunch break. Just a little cosmetic damage since I thankfully don't speed in parking lots. Perhaps I need an eye exam. Perhaps I just suck.

The other day I got a postcard in the mail announcing the date and place of my 10 year class reunion. I will probably go, even though I really have no reason to. I had a small group of friends in high school, and the number of those I still have some sort of contact with is even smaller. I was not popular, nor was I disliked really; I was just there. Anyway, from what I can gather from these folks' MySpace/Facebook pages, most of these people have somewhat real jobs and somewhat real families consisting of spouses and children. I don't have any of that, and by the time of the reunion I still won't have any of that (barring any unfortunate mishaps involving the use of prophylactics). And I'm OK with that, but it leads to conversations that are over in about 90 seconds what with the lack of wallet photos and shiny rings and business chatter. I suspect this could end up being a very boring event since people do pretty much end up all the same, though I tend to be pretty good at being nothing like them and therefore just don't fit in. However, I believe there will be a cash bar- not as good as an open bar, but a bar nonetheless. And events like this plus alcohol also have the potential to become awesome.

Speaking of spouses and children... babies freak me out. I don't like them much and I never have. Babies stare at me a lot. Pretty much every time I see one, it just stares me down. I don't get it. When I was little and someone in the family had a baby, it was assumed since I was a little girl I'd want to hold said baby. And ever since I can remember I never did want to hold the baby. "Erin, look at the cute baby! Do you want to hold him?" "No, thanks." "Why not? Why don't you want to hold the baby?"
Translation: What the hell is wrong with you? You're a six-year-old girl and you are supposed to want to hold babies and play dress-up and house and make believe you're a mommy to your dolls so you can be primed for the real thing in about 20 years! What is the problem? Is she gonna turn out to be gay? She is sort of a tomboy... is this her dad's fault? WHY AREN'T YOU A NORMAL LITTLE GIRL???
So, I didn't want to hold babies. And I still don't. You know why? Because when I do, they generally respond in one of three completely undesirable and highly irritating ways: They cry, puke, or shit themselves. Sometimes they'll do all three almost simultaneously. None of those are something I want happening in my arms. No thanks. I also don't think newborns are cute or adorable or any of those other kinds of descriptors. Newborns are not cute. They look like little aliens. They're red and wrinkly and a lot of times their heads are all misshapen. They don't get cute for a least a few weeks, if they ever do at all. No offense people... I don't HATE your babies, I just don't want to fawn over them. Or hold them.

Until next time...

Must I limit myself to one? Here are three.

I've been in the new house in Bishop for almost two weeks. So far it's awesome, except I'm still not used to being more than five minutes from downtown Athens. One of the first visitors we had to the house was a 3.5 ft long copperhead snake. He decided to chill in the basement until we shooed him out the sliding glass door with a pole. I'm quickly falling in love with the 5 rabbits, 4 chickens, 3 dogs, and one cat (I'm not including my own) that are on the property so far. Goats are yet to make the move, though they should be there soon. I now want my own goat or two, and a horse. Though I have very little horse experience, I did really like working with them in labs for school even if they freaked me out a bit with their size, and I'd like to do it more.

I still need a job. The market right now is complete crap. The only thing saving me is that my new house is pretty much half what I was paying in living expenses before (even though I loved my house), and that I was actually laid off, which means I am entitled to unemployment insurance for a bit. Though that pays less than 50% what my average pay was before I was laid off... still, it's better than zero.

One thing that irritates the hell out of me, and I meant to write this in a previous blog that included all sorts of shit that annoys me, is cars that have headlights that automatically turn off. Well, the fact that the headlights turn off all by themselves is not what makes me want to throw things or stab things with forks, but the fact that people who own these cars are the laziest motherfuckers on earth. They always get out of their cars, leave the lights on, and walk away. For real?? Just turn the goddamn lights off. It's a flick of a switch. "Oh, they turn off on their own", they say. "And??" is what I say. Are you so frickin' in a hurry that you can't be bothered to take the 0.034 seconds it takes to rotate that handle 38 degrees counterclockwise? Douchebag. That feature is there to save your ass for those times you forget. Man, I can't wait for when they all come out one night and they can't get anything to work because they relied on their (brainless) car to turn their shit off for them. They forgot that automatic things will fail, and they relied on it to save the day. But no, their battery's dead because that crap finally malfunctioned like all automated things eventually do and then the lights stayed on and then the battery died and now they aren't going anywhere. And then they gotta call their buddy to come pick them up from Happy Spa ('cause they're not gonna ask a stranger for a jump in front of Happy Spa, of all places...), and then face years of flak for getting a 'body shampoo' that one time. Hell, that incident will probably be mentioned in the Best Man's toast at his wedding, for god's sake, and there will be all sorts of jokes about happy endings. See, it's not worth it. Just turn off your lights and save your reputation.