Perpetual Smile

I am officially all set for school. My first class is Tuesday, September 1st. I could outline all of the crap I had to do to get everything squared away, but it’s exhausting even to me so I’ll just stick with “all set.” Heh.

I’m a little nervous, but I’m also really excited about this new path in front of me. I’m mainly nervous because it’s a bigger campus — a lot bigger — and I think I will go crazy if I get lost there ever again. (I’d like to say I won’t ever get lost again, but I will. Believe me. I will. I’ve already decided that both the university and the town of New Haven have it in for me.) I’m also a little nervous about double-majoring, but I’ve decided I’m not going to let it get to me. I am, after all, the kind of person who has to have more than one thing to focus on. I get bored way too quickly. So I have to give myself a lot of different things to stimulate myself with. This, of course, contributes to [my workaholic problem], but I’ll think about that tomorrow. (You get a cookie if you can comment and tell me where that reference is from!)

I’m excited, though, because it’s a new beginning. I have a million things that I want to do and experience, and maybe I’m jumping the gun on some of them but who cares. It’s my life, and I get to enjoy it however I want. I always wanted to be a teacher and to be a writer, and then I found and fell in love with web design. I also, of course, am married to my Letters of Love project. Who says I can’t do it all? (Maybe my mental health, but I’ll think about that tomorrow.)

Next on my agenda is finishing up my car (she still needs new struts and mounts, some stuff to install my stereo, and something is wrong with my back right brake), and then once that’s all set I want to start saving for an apartment. I keep bouncing back and forth between continuing to live with my parents in my current very crowded living situation, getting my own place, and getting a place with Mike. Some days I feel like getting a place with Mike is the best choice, and other days I feel like I should stay with my parents until I finish my Bachelor degrees. Some days I just want a place all to myself. It all depends on my mood (which has always been the case, making decision-making very difficult on my end). I still need to figure out what I want to do, but I know I can’t continue to live with as many people as I’m living with. I love my family dearly but I have no space of my own, which makes it very hard to live. I know that I should be grateful — and I am, believe me — but it’s still rough. It’s hard when I want to work or sleep, or even when I just want to be by myself. It just doesn’t work that way in my house. I try not to complain, because I know the alternative would have been a shelter or the street, but some days it’s harder to deal with than others.

At any rate, I want to get my priorities in order and start really taking care of myself. I haven’t been the happiest lately, and I want to change that. I just have to figure out how.

It’s a huge relief that school is all set, even though it kind of sucks to have loans hanging over my head. The good news is, I don’t have to pay them until after I graduate. The bad news? I have a lot of very heavy books, so I’m sure you’ll soon hear me bitching that my neck and back hurt from carrying them around!

What about you? What would you like to do to improve your life and yourself? Tell me in the comments!

I’m still trying to figure out this whole keeping work and play separate on the internet thing. In real life, I don’t have to tell my coworkers anything. But online? They can Google me and every. little. thing. ever. pops up. Suddenly I’m self-conscious about every swear used on my blog and wondering if they think I’m crazy since I run a pen pal project for people with depression. I put myself on display, but when am I going to get bit in the ass about it?

Because it’s gonna happen. And I don’t know what I’ll do when it does.

So I’ve been ignoring the possibility that I could lose a client because of Twitter sarcasm about having a bad day, or that someone could stumble upon my blogs about depression and suicide and cutting and fire me dead because that’s shit that people just aren’t comfortable with. I know who I am. I’m a person who’s got a lot to say and doesn’t want to censor anything. I want to tell the truth about the things I experience, see, think, and feel because if I don’t, who the hell else is going to? I want to talk straight up about my past and muse about my future. I know I have a hell of a lot of potential, and I know what I want to do with my life. But the what ifs of being this OUT THERE and HONEST are terrifying.

The people who know me love me because they know me. The people who don’t already know me and may want to hire me aren’t going to love me. They’re going to be looking for any reason not to hire me, because that’s what people do. Especially now that I’m getting my teaching certificate. What if my hypothetical principal finds out I used to cut myself or that I used to starve myself, and decides I’m just not mentally stable enough to teach a bunch of kids? What if I lose a big website client with the company I’m partnered with because of something I’ve written about? I can’t blog and not be real. I’m not funny, so I can’t write up a riot about how to make corn. I’m not a mother, so I can’t write about little girls shoving handfuls of sugar into their mouths. There are a lot of things I’m not.

But I know that I can’t not blog. I know that I can’t blog only about work. I know that I can’t blog only about mundane, blah things that no one cares about. (Unless my blog is already mundane and blah. Then you should just let me know, so I can quit while I’m ahead.) I have a compulsive urge to write about everything that I know I shouldn’t write about. And I can’t figure out how to keep my professional life from colliding with my writing. I mean, let’s face it: I don’t hold much back, especially over at Scars Can Speak.

So tell me, all of you bloggers who do it anyway without worrying: what’s the secret? What’s the trick? What do I do and how do I do it?

I spent the last half of yesterday cleaning, organizing, and going through my books, memories (journals, yearbook, etc), and files. This wouldn’t be such a big deal for most people, but since I live with four to six other people in a one bedroom apartment, it is huge for me. Let me back up.

A little over four years ago I was living with my parents in a three bedroom apartment down the street from my grandparents’ house. To make a really, really long story short, we got evicted even though we had done nothing wrong. You can say we had bad luck with landlords for a while there. Anyway, we literally had no time to find a new place so we packed up our stuff, put most of it into storage, and moved in with my grandparents. My grandparents’ house is a three-family house, with my great-grandmother on the first floor, my great-aunt on the second floor, and my grandparents on the third floor. My parents moved their stuff into my great-grandmother’s living room, and my little sister and I moved our stuff into my grandparents’ dining and living rooms. We were only supposed to stay for a couple of weeks, but four years and some financial issues later, we’re still here. It’s crowded and not what the writers of Full House made it all out to be, but there’s a roof over our heads.

A few days ago my grandparents’ forty-something-year-old refrigerator burnt out — literally. If my grandfather hadn’t touched the electrical socket the fridge was plugged into and noticed it was burning hot (the plastic was melting!), I probably wouldn’t be blogging right now. My grandparents had just come home and my sister, Mom, and I were watching Wall-E, so we hadn’t noticed the burnt motor smell.

So last night we moved the old fridge out and brought the fridge Mike’s mom gave to us home and upstairs. While all that was going on, I decided it was probably a good time to do what I’d been wanting to do: organize all of my books into one storage bin and clean some of the dust off of everything in the dining and living rooms. I’d already hurt my neck carrying my laptop in a backpack on Sunday, so by the time I got finished last night my back and neck were in agony. I took the last 70mg of my amitriptyline to get some sleep and hopefully some pain relief, and passed out.

When I woke up this morning, I felt a little dizzy and groggy but I thought that was normal for amitriptyline. I felt better after getting moving and eating, but I still felt pretty out of it. I took some Zyrtec, since it’s the only thing that’s been helping with my allergies, and left for work. Not long after I got to work I started feeling really woozy, dizzy, and just completely out of this world. I’m super stubborn when it comes to work; if I don’t feel good, I usually try to stick it out as long as I can. I was also determined to finish the website I was working on before I left, so I tried to ignore the dizzy attacks.

It wasn’t working very well. I couldn’t stand, and no matter what I did it just didn’t get any better. I put everything into finishing the website, and then called it quits. I had Mike come get me and my Sunfire is still downtown in the parking lot. I hope she isn’t too mad at me.

I spent the early afternoon in the recliner, and the catnap I took helped a little. I’m still getting dizzy now and then but the worst of it has passed, I think.

I did learn an important lesson, though: Next time, ask Mom first.

I rarely use my MySpace account any more. I logged in tonight because I checked my email like a good working girl and saw that I had a tagged photo and a tagged photo comment, blah blah blah. I also had a message:

I give up

I didn’t reply to it, because it was an awfully immature message. Rather than trying to address the problem head on, you chose to send a message in an attempt to make it look like it was all my fault.

Yes, “Jude,” I stopped talking to you. Not because I am a bad person. Not because I am spiteful or immature. I stopped talking to you because, time and time again, you lied to me. You may think you treasure the friendship we had, but your actions showed otherwise. So, instead of wasting my time, energy, and peace of mind, I stopped talking to you.

We’ve been through this all before. It’s always the same: You get yourself into trouble; I try to be a good friend and help you out; you lash out at me; I withdraw and regroup; you lie to me; I walk way; you send me text messages, social media comments, and leave me voicemails pretending as if everything is okay; I start to miss you and call you back; rinse and repeat.

Not this time. I just can’t anymore. I cannot continue to exhaust myself on you. I cannot continue to give you everything and get absolutely nothing back. Under normal circumstances, I don’t mind. I think I’m a pretty damn good friend. Maybe I’m too loyal. I’ve realized that in trying to help you, I’ve only been hurting myself. And I’m not doing it anymore.

I hope to god you find a way to keep from down (Blue October, “Been Down”)

When someone lies to you once and you believe them, they’re an asshole.

When this person tells you that their new train wreckboyfriend has been clean for a year and tells your mutual friend that this new train wreckboyfriend has been clean for two weeks, they’re the asshole. Not you.

When this person lies to you about this new train wreck’sboyfriend’s job and tells you that he works as a carpenter and makes a lot of money, when in reality the new train wreckboyfriend lost his job because he is a train wreck and only does odd jobs for his grandma and is living off of this person (who happens to be a single mother), this person is still an asshole, but the new train wreckboyfriend is the bigger asshole.

When this person lies left and right about all things related to their new train wreckboyfriend, and things in their own life that this new train wreckboyfriend now controls, you get worried. You want to help this so-called friend, but they won’t stop lying to you.

When this person has lied to you for the hundredth time about their relationship status with the new train wreckboyfriend, and you believe them every time, you’re the asshole.

There are only so many times that you can lie to yourself about someone who obviously doesn’t care about you — or themselves — very much. And there are only so many times before you decide that you’re just not going to waste your time anymore.

Good luck, “Jude.”

Every time I go to write a new post, I end up writing about something I don’t want to write about, because I don’t want to write about what I actually want to write about. With me? Great.

I spent the last two weeks sort of reevaluating my life. I thought about my relationships with other people, my career, my goals, and blahblahblah (all one word, ’cause that’s how I actually say it). The only thing that I actually figured out was my current job situation. I didn’t make any decisions on the other things that are bothering me. I obviously can’t do anything about the things I can’t control, but it still sucks because waiting is not on my list of skills.

I did decide to stop letting everyone use me, and even though I do mean to stick to that, it’s hard. It was especially hard yesterday when someone who basically ditched me for the last couple of weeks suddenly called and wanted my sympathy (and possibly my help; I didn’t answer the phone).

I just can’t keep giving everything and getting nothing in return. I can’t live in a cesspool of drama and constant emergencies that I always feel obligated to help out with. The truth is, I don’t owe any of these people anything, because they never gave me anything to begin with. Sure, we had some good times (Rock Band marathons, trips to the mall for no reason, spontaneous trips to the bar, movie nights, and all that good stuff), but when it actually counted, none of these people — and by none I mean neither, ha ha ha — could give me any of their time.

So, although a part of me wants to return that phone call, I refuse to get suckered in again. I hope that both of these people end up getting their shit together, but I’m not going to stick around to find out.

I have to be a hardass about this because otherwise I’m only going to keep getting hurt.

Anyway. Now that that’s over with, we can get to the good stuff:

I’ve been thinking a lot lately, and a couple of other posts this week really got me going.

I’m tired of being everyone’s shoulder to cry on. I’m tired of being taken for granted. I’m tired of giving my all and getting nothing in return.

I have tried, several times during the last few weeks, to reach out to more than one friend because I needed someone to talk to or an escape. None of these people could give me the time of day, when I’ve been there for them on more than several occasions. They couldn’t be bothered when I’ve dropped everything time and again to give them a hand.

I kept holding on to the hope that these people would wake up and start treating me like a person again. I’ve been that teddy bear that a preteen drags out only when they need it and no one is looking.

No more.

I’m taking my soft, fuzzy self to the nearest Build-A-Bear shop and I’m getting my bleeding heart replaced with some balls of steel. And while I’m at it, I’m going to pick up some Watchmen action figures.

I’ve been hustling like crazy trying to get a certain website’s redesign finished. I’ve also been doing some soul searching and trying to figure out what I want in life.

To cut right to the chase: I miss school. I thought I wouldn’t and that I didn’t need it. I thought I was just using it as a safety net. The truth is, I was really enjoying college. Yes, it was a total pain in the ass trying to get everything together for Southern. Yes, I got completely shafted for financial aid, and $1100 seemed like a high price for just one class. But I could have done it. I gave up way too easily.

Every time I talked to one of my friends in school, all I could think of was, “I should be there.” Every time I thought of how easily I had given up, I wanted to kick myself. The more I thought about it, the more I realized how much I want this. I realized that in order to further my career, I need that BA. I don’t want to be another kid with an AA trying to make it out there. It’s not to say that it isn’t possible, but it would definitely be a lot harder. Further more, I realized that with the way the economy is right now, finding a full-time job is going to be nearly impossible. I found lots of freelance job listings but I don’t want to rely on freelance jobs to pay my bills.

In short, I am a total jackass and I admit it.

I love college and I love learning. My education is very, very important to me, and I want to at least get this BA. I will be going back either this summer or in the fall, and I will be majoring in English and minoring in Marketing; I’m starting to see that I have some marketing inclinations that can definitely be honed into killer skills.

Now if only I could figure everything else out this easily.

I decided to drop out of SCSU.

I’ve been agonizing over it these last couple of days (mainly last night and early into this morning), but I finally made a decision this afternoon. I know it sounds crazy, but hear me out.

I already know what I want to do with my life. I want to run my own web design business, and I want to write fiction. I also want to continue running my non-profit, and I want to start up something I’ve been sitting on for a while. (HA, I bet you thought I was gonna give it away! ) I have an AA in Digital Arts Technology: Multimedia/Web Authoring, and am currently working in my field, so I already have a foot in the door. I also have a high school diploma for Culinary Arts, so I can always fall back on that. While studying literature and writing in a school setting may be beneficial, I don’t think it’s really going to launch my career. Bottom line is, I need to pursue my dreams. I need to put all of my time into the things I love and the things I want to do. Taking classes is not going to help me finish my novel or get my business really going. I know that a BA in English couldn’t hurt, but I feel that this is not the path for me. I feel that I need to “get in the trenches” (as Gary V. would say) and get going.

I already talked to my mom about this, and she supports me. I also talked to Mike about it all — before I even made a decision — and I know that he supports me no matter what I choose. I know that some are going to look down on me and think I am making a mistake, but guess what: it’s my mistake to make. I want to get out there and experience life. I am tired of living in the box. I want to do things for myself and see how far I can go. I’m not knocking education in any way; I think that education is very important. However, there is only so much education you can get before you have to get out and live. I think I’ve been clinging to school as a safety net, and it’s time to let go of the safety nets and fall (or fly).

Anyway.

Mike and I went to see Taken last night. It was an excellent film. I was on the edge of my seat and cheered Liam Neeson’s character on the entire time. I thought it did a great job exposing human trafficking and entertaining at the same time. Some people in the theater — mainly one girl — didn’t get it at all. I thought the ending fit, but I won’t spoil it for anyone. Go see it if you haven’t already!

I enjoy taking risks. I love new things. Yeah, I’m usually a little anxious about it and sometimes a little nervous, but I love the thrill and excitement, the feeling of complete and total unknown that makes my belly do little flip flops.

I’ve been trying to be more independent, to do things for myself that my parents used to take care of. I’ve been working on big projects and spending more time than is probably healthy on the computer putting those dreams to reality.

I’ve been sitting on an idea for a while now, and I’m almost ready to get started. It’s a big risk. Just starting it is going to cost me a lot more money than I’d like to spend right now, especially with a particular Sunfire that needs a new blower motor and has something wrong with the shifter. It’s going to take a while for me to launch it. It’s going to take a lot of work, and it’s going to add a lot to my current daily workload. Still, it’s something that I’m passionate about and something that I think could be beneficial to others. I live for this sort of thing. I love working on more than one thing at once. It’s how I thrive.

I’m excited and anxious to get started, but also a little nervous. It’s the feeling that makes my life so vibrant and full of wonder.

So I ask you, what moves you? What makes you truly happy?