Perpetual Smile

None of this is ever going to be resolved if no one is going to be honest with each other or themselves. I am tired of all of this whispery, kindergarten stuff. I am tired of no one being willing to just say what is on their minds or to admit that they’ve been wrong. It doesn’t even really frustrate me anymore. It just sucks all of my energy.

“Jude” doesn’t seem to realize that she’s done anything wrong even though I have told her time after time what my problem is with her, but none of it seems to be sinking in. She blows me off left and right for “Tommy.” She doesn’t ever listen to my problems. She has started hanging out with a bad crowd. I’ve discussed these things with her over and over. Most recently, “Zeppelin” and I picked her up and were halfway out of town to go to Big Y and Blockbuster when she made us turn around and bring her home so she could attend to “Tommy,” who didn’t want to sit around by himself with her father while she went out with her friends. But this is nothing new.

Every time I try to point these things out to her, she acts as if I’m also partially at fault. She acts as if she has only blown me off once, and acts as if I’m always too busy for her. I’ve tried to be patient. I’ve tried to tell her how she was treating me like shit. She didn’t listen. I decided to distance myself and when she finally got the hint she pulled guilt trips. She still failed to see what she had done wrong.

Worse, “Zeppelin” is letting “Jude” think that she’s not hanging out with her until “Jude” and I make up, when in reality “Zeppelin” is just as exhausted as I am. “Zep” is just as overwhelmed as I am with school, work and other stuff, so I can almost understand. She would just rather be dishonest with “Jude” and clear up everything later, while I’d rather be honest and maybe clear things up later.

I wrote pages and pages of a letter to “Jude” the other night, spelling everything out for her. I told her exactly why I can’t be friends with her anymore and how frustrating it is that she seems to not know why I’ve stopped talking to her. The truth is, there is only so much shit one person can take. There are only so many times I can just sit back and let someone stomp all over me, not showing up for plans made ahead of time or ditching me just when things are getting good. There is only so much advice I can give when someone I care about is doing something wrong and doesn’t want to hear what I have to say. I think, in all honesty, she knows everything that she is doing and has done. I think she just doesn’t want to admit it, because she would rather put the blame on someone else than see herself for what she truly is.

I am not saying that she’s entirely bad, because there have been many times when we had fun or she was there for me. It’s just not enough, when you compare how much I have given her. It’s not enough when she sends me text messages that say “I miss you” or promises to take me to a movie I don’t want to see to make up for her blowing me off. It’s especially not enough when she doesn’t even apologize for what she does.

So I am not sure what I am going to do. I don’t want to lose KTC or KRB (she’s also decided to use them against me and doesn’t want me at KRB’s birthday party next weekend). She left me a voicemail Saturday afternoon wanting to talk, but I don’t really know if I want to talk to her. I’ve got so many other things on my plate and am just so overwhelmed that I just don’t want to deal with any of this right now.

You’ve gotta love the people who have never experienced life. You know, the ones who are squeamish and don’t want to hear the “bad” stuff. Like the lady at Barnes and Noble.

Last week Nikki and I went to Barnes and Noble, because we are broke and proud. We like the free water, the scent of Starbucks coffee abrewin’ and new books waiting to be read, and we like the plentiful tables that allow us to sit and talk for hours without being asked to leave.

This was the second time we’d done this. We sat and talked about everything from college to grandparents, from boyfriends and to jobs, from the economy to problems and everything in between. The conversation was flowing nicely. We weren’t being loud or obnoxious.

I can’t remember exactly what we were talking about (it may have been something along the lines of elderly bed-wetting), when I heard an irritated voice not two feet from my ear.

“Oh, let’s talk about old people shitting the bed and–”

I didn’t hear what else she said. I turned my head and looked straight at the woman sitting right behind me, who was suddenly preoccupied with the book in front of her. “It’s life, lady. Pick another table if you don’t want to hear about it.”

“Mom,” her teenage daughter, so obviously the victim here, said. She didn’t look up from her own book.

The woman didn’t say anything else. I turned back to Nikki, satisfied.

“Oh! I have to tell you the cat story!” Nikki told me about a cat she’d found in a car. “Was she talking about us?” She whispered.

I nodded. “Like I said,” I rose my voice a little higher, “there are plenty of other tables if she doesn’t want to hear it.”

I like this new, brazen version of me.

Nine Inch Nails makes me feel better. “I don’t feel anything at all,” Trent Reznor sings in “1,000,000.” The truth is, I do feel — everything. When Sarcastica wrote about a certain defamatory group on Facebook, I immediately felt like I had to have my say.

Sarcastica wrote that

Some of the stuff that was said was completely out of line, one guy commented on some girl’s photo saying “two words, down syndrome” and one girl was compaired to looking like a dead baby.

I immediately logged into the account I never use, because I wanted to report this group of people who think they have the right to be derogatory to people with physical and mental disabilities. I reported that group, and when I noticed that there was a mirror of that group, because the group owners had a feeling they were going to be deleted soon — gee, I wonder why? — I went there and reported that one, too. I joined the group long enough to write on their pathetic wall and tell them that they were low and should be ashamed of themselves, even though I knew well enough that I shouldn’t waste my time.

Still, when I get passionate about something, when something pisses me off this badly, I get so self-righteous. I feel the need to let the wrongdoer know that they’re being wrong, and even though I know it’s pointless and apt to start a flame war, I can’t help myself. As Trent Reznor sings in “Discipline” from The Slip, “once I start, I cannot stop myself.”

Perhaps this passionate aspect of me is a good thing, but it can also be a bad thing. If I do something to Mike, like hang up on him, it’s nothing to me. I tell him to get over it. But if he or someone else does it to me, I get mad. I tell them how rude it is and it irks the hell out of me.

So I guess I need to learn how to focus this energy on Facebook trolls with low self-esteem, or maybe just keep my damn mouth shut.

Anyway, if you are a member of Facebook and disagree with the use of the C word and discriminatory, defaming and derogatory remarks towards others, please report this group and its “backup.” Please note that they also don’t exactly discourage racist remarks. People like this should not be allowed to treat others the way they do. I hate to bring any kind of attention to them, but I really feel that they should be booted. At the least, their little group should. Please remember that you should always treat others the way that you yourself would want to be treated and — as my mom loves to say — if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all. Period.

On Wednesday, when I went to see my chiropractor, I asked him if I should be feeling better by now.

“Well, don’t you?” He stood leaning against the stand-up desk built into the wall of the small room. He flipped through my file. “You had back pain, neck pain, and pain in your arms, but now your back and neck are better, right?”

“My back and my neck, yeah, but it’s my arms. I don’t really care about my neck and back.”

He looked at me for a long moment. “I don’t want to be the one to throw in the towel, but if you’re not feeling any difference there’s really no point in you coming.”

I felt my world crashing down. “Are there any medications I can take?”

“Well, since your symptoms are so sporadic and you don’t have just one target area, it’s kind of hard to prescribe something.”

I nodded. “But you definitely think it’s thoracic outlet syndrome, right?”

He shook his head. “That’s the closest diagnosis I can come to, but here again, your symptoms are so sporadic. Thoracic outlet patients don’t usually have bilateral symptoms, either. Thoracic outlet syndrome patients usually respond really well to this, too.” He paused and looked at me thoughtfully. “I don’t even know where to send you, because you’ve already been through the mill.”

“Yeah,” I squeaked.

“I can suggest acupuncture. Let me go get you a card. You put yourself back together.” He closed the door and I stood there, in sweats and a gown.

“Fuck,” I said, and tore off the gown. I yanked my shirt and coat on and went into the hall.

“Here’s the card,” Dr. Rosa said. “Dr. Zhong does acupuncture.”

“Really?” My voice felt flat. Dr. Zhong stood there and smiled at me sympathetically. I wondered if she could do the acupuncture, but the name on the card was someone else’s, in another town. “Well, thanks,” I said.

“Keep doing the exercises, see if you notice a pattern, and give me a call in two weeks and let me know how you’re doing.” He smiled at me, and I tried to smile back.

I paid my co-pay and the girl behind the counter asked if I would be coming back next week. “No,” I said. We exchanged Happy Thanksgiving’s and I left.

I have to give him credit, for not stringing me along and continuing to take my money even though it wasn’t working. And he does seem to genuinely care. I’m still fucked, though.

I’m still back to square one.

Today my godson, Konner Ryan Birkenberger, turns 1. In the last year — and since before birth — he has beat every odd thrown at him.

When Sandy found out she was pregnant with him, it was almost disaster after disaster. The doctors in Connecticut thought he had Down’s Syndrome, because of the way his nose and the back of his neck were shaped in the ultrasounds. They took amniotic fluid and the results came back negative. Still, they were concerned about his health.

She spent most of her pregnancy in Florida, where the doctors determined that he had some kind of kidney problem. His left kidney, it seemed, was not working properly.

When Konner was born, he gave the world a huge booya! by being a healthy and normal baby boy, aside from the kidney problem. His nose was fine, just the way a baby’s nose is supposed to be. There was extra skin at the back of his neck, yes, but he was a big baby as it was. Shortly after birth he was diagnosed with hydronephrosis. His doctor wanted to remove the left kidney as soon as possible; it was affecting the right kidney. The doctor estimated that he would have to undergo surgery before he was a year old.

Luckily, they are now looking at surgery when he is about 3. The left kidney is doing okay and the right kidney is functioning fine enough for him to get along until it is safer to perform surgery. Konner will never be able to play football or basketball, but we think he’ll be a rockstar.

This Thanksgiving I am thankful that my godson is a healthy and happy baby boy. He is chunky and drooly and says “mamamama” and “a-duh.” He can escape from his car seat better than Houdini ever could. He plays drums with the pots and a spoon, and his smile can light up a room.

Happy birthday, handsome man. May this next year be bright and full of fun for you. I love you.

I figured I’d increase my chances at snagging the complete Buffy collection on DVD — and sidestep having to put chocolate syrup all over my chest — by writing about Avitable’s holiday giveaway. Plus, it’s an excellent opportunity for me to show off how much of a nerd I really am.

Last xmas Mike got me season three — you know, the one with Faith — because I wouldn’t stop gushing about how much I love Faith and how much I missed the show in general. Okay, so gushing isn’t the right word. I never stopped talking about it. Somehow, I never picked up on the fact that he was actually going to get it for me. I guess I’m just too slow.

For the next few weeks Lauren and I watched marathons on Friday and Saturday nights, trying to drag it out as long as possible so that we wouldn’t go into withdrawal. Well, just like everything else, season three came to an end. The withdrawal symptoms ensued.

Throughout the last year, I kept promising myself I’d go out and buy seasons one and two so we could have an even longer marathon. Naturally for one reason or another it never happened. Everything else just seemed to become priority, like food and doctor appointments.

Then came Avitable, blogging shiny promises of becoming the one in fifty-plus commenters to have the ultimate high — every Buffy episode, everrr. (Is the nerdiness coming off in waves or what?)

If you love Buffy just as much as I do and feel satanically competitive, up those odds! Post a comment in Avitable’s holiday giveaway and write your own blog post about his contest. (You can also email him pictures of his name on your chest, if you feel like being a good Samaritan.)

And maybe, just maybe, if you win and feel generous enough you’ll invite me over for a Buffy marathon night.

…used to cut and burn myself. I try to be really open about it, because hardly anyone talks about it. People are so uninformed; they think it’s for attention, and I can tell you straight up that it is not. Still, it scares the hell out of me to actually admit it to the world.

…am not religious — at all. I don’t believe in any kind of god, although sometimes I think there just might be a higher power. I do believe that your loved ones sometimes stick around to help you out or visit you one last time. I guess that’s similar to the angels some people believe in. I’m just not sure where they go after they’re done with you. Sometimes, it’s a little depressing.

…have a secret fear of people leaving me. This doesn’t just include my boyfriend suddenly breaking up with me or someone dying; when out shopping or even at home, I’m terrified that I’m going to get ditched. I don’t let anyone out of my sight.

…sometimes repeat things people say or copy things people do out of a compulsive urge to experience it for myself. One time while grocery shopping, Mike made a fingerprint in the dust on the shelf and I immediately did the same. He called me a copycat while I stood there trying to figure out why the hell I’d just done that.

…am really, really fucking weird. I don’t deny it. Everyone tells me I’m weird. Whatever. I guess it’s just one of my quirks.

…have thoracic outlet syndrome, with double crush syndrome. I probably don’t write about it enough. have chronic pain in my arms, which after four doctors is still undiagnosed.

…hate winter. Hate it, hate it, hate it. I want to move to Florida, but I’d probably have to go without Mike to make that dream come true.

…run a not-for-profit pen pal project for people with depression, called Letters of Love. It’s almost a year old and still running strong.

…am a total nerd. I love designing websites and coding everything by hand. I love to read and write. I miss playing video games all day. I collect comic books, dragons and other action figures. I am a huge fan of The Crow.

…am way too hard on myself. I tend to give myself a million projects at once with no hopes in ever completing them. Paradoxically, I can’t hold grudges against other people, even when they’ve screwed me over repeatedly. I’m just learning to get rid of the poison in my life.

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Everyone else is doing it, so I figured why the hell not.

If you haven’t seen the Twilight movie yet and don’t want it to be spoiled, skip this. Read the rest of this entry »

All I’ve wanted to do for the last few days was update, but my arms have been boycotting the keyboard position. Luckily my college is closed this coming Thursday, so I have a little extra time to get homework done. Otherwise I’d be in trouble right now. I’ve pretty much avoided the computer since Thursday, and work on Friday was agonizing.

I made a new friend this weekend. His name is Tommy. He is currently staying on my chin, and although toothpaste and rubbing alcohol have helped decrease his large size, I’m afraid he’s not leaving any time soon. I’m sure this is a byproduct of stress but I abhor zits. Oh, well. He can’t stay forever, right?

Anyway, tonight I’m going to see the Twilight movie with Mom and Kate. Lauren went to see it last night and might be coming with us again tonight. Nikki saw it Thursday night at midnight. I can’t promise that I totally won’t spoil it later on, but I’ll definitely put it under a cut.

I almost edited my previous post for this, but that post is a damn mess as it is.

In the past few weeks, I’ve been losing sense of control in my life. I’ve been feeling as if I couldn’t do anything I wanted to do, because everything seems to be getting in my way. Miss Britt wrote a post today about being alive, and I realized that I have been in my way.

To me, the song “Handlebars” (partially, because I’m aware of the political references as well) means being able to do anything you set your mind to. If I really want to continue my education and get my BA, I will. If I really want to get a novel published, I will. If I want to have my own web design business, as well, I will. If I want to move into my own place, I will. I can.

I look at Obama and I see a man who has come from virtually nothing — just like me. He has worked his way up through life, and all because he had the determination to do so. He is proof that anyone can achieve their dreams, no matter what the obstacles.

“The only way is up.”