Kiosk People

I don't know when the middle part of the mall became a foreign market place. When I walk through the mall I"m forced to pretend that kiosk people don't exist. I dodge in and out of huts like I'm navigating a maze. I look down, to the side, up, but never directly at them. Eye contact with kiosk people means a 20 minutes demonstration about their silly eye brow thread or  lotion  made of sea lion blubber or smokeless tobacco. There is an area in the local mall here that is like the skid row of kiosks. Between Sears and JCPenneys is the worst stretch of mall I've seen. Kiosks spaced 2 or 3 feet apart. It's a constant barrage of people waving you over or trying to put lotion on your hand.

These people are making money, doing their jobs, but they are so annoying that I have to mentally prepare myself to weave in and out of their Tijuanaesque set ups to get to Victoria's Secret for my free underwear. I do not want my shoes shined, I don't want a plastic hello kitty case for my phone, I don't want feather clips for my hair and I really really don't want to talk to you. These people and their products are the plague of the mall. They are predators waiting for that one person to make eye contact and then they pounce.

Today I was just meeting my husband at the mall to pick up our kids. I saw Mr. Kiosk Man standing with his tiny sample of sea salt magic hand cream and I purposefully changed my path to avoid him. He must have seen my maneuver and popped up right in front of me and said in his thick exotic accent, "Come one, I'm harmless." I just looked down and said, no thanks, no thanks but my heart was racing and before I knew it the eye brow threading lady was asking me to sit in her chair, again, I rejected her, no thanks no thanks, then it was smokeless tobacco man, no thanks no thanks. Once I pass them I feel a sense of relief and accomplishment but also a sweeping layer of guilt.

What the shit is up with these people? Do they go through training on how to hassle people with their wares? The rejection they must face on a daily basis would wear me down. I'd go home and cry every night if I was rejected so many times by total strangers. When people run by you with their heads down and risk running into posts, you know your job sucks. You are the least liked people in the mall.

Many years ago though I was being polite, which I decided never to be again, and was sucked into a kiosk area where a beautiful, Brazilian islander vixen with a rolling accent asked me if I wanted some lotion. Like a moth to a flame I scooted up to her booth. She put a dollop of creamy white lotion on my hand and started to talk and moisturize my hand at the same time. I would have given all the money I had for her. She was mesmerizing and my hand felt the best a hand can ever feel. I never wanted her to stop talking to me and I didn't even care it was about lotion, I was hooked by her wiles. I bought 2 of whatever living dead salt of the life of the ocean lotion she was selling with all the money I had in my pocket, which was 20 bucks.

This is it. That is the lady who sold me lotion. 

But from then on the kiosk people have multiplied. I can only conjecture they have small wooden huts in the middle of the mall so they don't have to pay rent in an actual store. Who are their kiosk pimps? There has to be a ring leader kiosk mall master mind who thought of putting pseudo stores in the middle of the mall to guilt people into stopping. Our parents and teachers and ministers have taught us all to be nice so my initial thought of telling them to fuck off goes against my upbringing. I can't be that mean to strangers unless they cut me off in traffic first.

Kiosk people are preying upon people's societal politeness. They are taking advantage of people by guilting them into looking at useless products in the middle of the mall when all we are trying to do is avoid eye contact with other humans and dodge people in our way. The kiosk people are getting more aggressive. If you Google Kiosk People you will others who are equally as baffled. This is a real social issue.  It's our basic human right to walk through the mall unaccosted.  Soon there will be a movement against them, an uprising, a revolution against the kioskers. Leave us alone, we'll shout! Americans can only be nice for so long and in Arizona in the summer the mall is supposed to be a refuge. If we all wanted to feel guilty we would go to church. We want you, kioskers, to stay on your stool. When I see you get up, I walk faster, my heart beats quicker and my eye contact shoots from side to side but not in your direction. So stop it. Fuck. Just Stop.

Links to the beginnings of a revolution: All over the country, people are getting ready to overthrow you. I tried to google, "people running into a pole to avoid kiosk people" but nothing came up. I'm going to have to create this image myself.

How are any of these images remotely related to pole running into? Geez Google. 

Out of Control! http://blog.timesunion.com/kristi/those-mall-kiosk-sales-people-are-out-of-control/33279/

https://www.facebook.com/pages/KIOSK-PEOPLE-WE-DO-NOT-WANT-TO-BUY-YOUR-STUFF-IF-WE-DO-WE-WILL-/214974461697

http://www.yelp.com/topic/chicago-annoying-mall-kiosk-people

A VIDEO! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLpzQLkgBwk

Happy 20th Birthday

Today is my son's 20th birthday. I can't tell him on Facebook though because he has once again deleted me. Even though he deleted me, I want him to know, that I am right. 

If you want to be right, you can move out and be right in your own apartment. So for the time being, I get to be right and for all the following reasons: 

1.) I said so

2.) I had you when I was 18 which makes me wise as I am the epitome of the phrase, initiation by fire. 

3.) When you were born there was no Internet, therefore, you are lucky to be alive. 

4.) I watch everything you do in wonderment and awe. It used to be because it was cute, now it's because I can't fuckin believe it. 

5.) When you were born I made 6$ an hour sorting office paper for a finance company that loaned money to people who sucked so bad at driving they had to finance their auto insurance. 

6.) I never gave up on myself and you shouldn't give up on yourself either. I showed you that.  

7.) I took you to college with me to show you how to persevere. 

8.) I took you to my college graduations to show you success, drive, motivation, and progress.

9.) I fought with you and for you all the through high school until graduation. 

10.) I showed you how to fight for yourself. 

11.) I keep on fixing the stupid shit you do. 

12.) without complaining. 

13.) Through my own mistakes, I paved the way for your success. 

14.) You now have the examples, the fire, the fight, and the finesse to navigate your own life. 

15.) I will always be plan B. 

Happy Birthday.

One day you might be right, but probably not soon

June 14th

My son will be 20 on Friday. When I was his age, I had a 2 -year -old child, no internet, no outlet plug covers, and I've been letting him sit in the front seat, well, since he was 2. He's lucky to be alive. I've written a lot about my struggles with him, sometimes much to his dismay. Our relationship has been rocky and tumultuous at times. 

When he was born, I adored him as any mother would adore a newborn child. When I heard him cry in the night I rushed to pick him up and rock him for hours. He was a sweet baby. I took a million pictures of him and had stacks of scrapbooks and baby books documenting his every move. My husband at the time said I loved him too much and that probably God would take him away from me. Yeah, he was an asshole. But I loved that little boy and I still do. 

However, somewhere along the way his little personality grew. He grew intense and sometimes hostile. We moved to Florida when he was four, leaving behind his drug addicted father. I sold everything I owned, bought a booster seat and drove across the country to start my life over and save myself and my son. 

Sometimes though the best intentions often have negative consequences and immediately upon moving he started having trouble in day care. He was afraid to have me leave my side and was constantly defying anyone in authority, even at age 4. Kindergarten was our worst year. The first day of school I went to pick him up, all the kids were sitting in a circle listening to the teacher read a book. My son was crawling on his hands and knees in the middle of the circle. By the third grade I had picked him up for fighting, for kicking, for failing, for refusing to sit, stand, or do anything any adult wanted him to do. In the 5th grade he got in trouble for breaking another student's calculator and when questioned why, why he did that, he told the teacher, the school psychologist and the principal that I was beating him up at home; making him mow the lawn with his hands, and making him run behind the car as punishment. I was in my first year teaching. I got called out of my classroom into a meeting with 6 people including the state psychologist to answer to the allegations that I was beating and abusing my son. I was mortified and instantly broke into uncontrollable sobs that either made me look guilty or extremely unstable. Child protective services were called. My friends and boyfriend were interviewed and an investigation was launched. I thought my career was over before it has really begun. 

By then his father was sober. Within a week my son was on a plane moving to Arizona. I was free. 

However, when he got to Arizona he realized that I, perhaps, was not so bad after all and that he had over glamorized the idea of a father. Whatever his motive was for 'turning me in' for abuse had backfired on him. He had been duped by his own treachery. At some point he was put on anti-osmotic medication as he'd killed his step-brother's tiny rat pet as retaliation for not being allowed to play outside. He was held back a grade and had to repeat the 5th grade. 

I moved back from Florida to Arizona, alone, to do whatever I could to help him. Seven months later his father was back on meth and my son was living with me again full time. In the 6th grade he was expelled for telling a group of teasing girls that he was going home that night, getting his dad's gun, and coming back to kill them. He was placed in special education services for ED or emotionally disabled students. 

Of course I blamed absolutely everything that was wrong with him on me. I thought I didn't rock him enough, hug him enough, I just thought I wasn't enough. It was breaking me down and by the time he was 16 and I was 35, I was a full blown alcoholic. His junior year at the high school I teach at, he attempted suicide. By 19 he has attempted 4 more times. What we know now is that somewhere along the way he developed or was born with a personality or mood disorder. Much of the way I deal with him and deal with my own guilt or responsibility is by writing about it, talking about it, and understanding certain truths about me and him. 

1.) I didn't create his mood disorder. However it is that he internalizes problems or copes with life is something he developed on his own. I never beat him or punched him or neglected him. He was everything to me and he wanted to remain everything to me. Part of my ex-husband's stupid ass statement was right. I loved him into co-dependence and some of his negative behavior was to keep me near to him, even in a negative capacity. This is what he told me after I kicked him out of the house at age 18. 

2.) I have to save myself and my current family. I have remarried and had 2 more children. I have a responsibility to protect them and that means setting boundaries that often make my son angry or hostile and accusatory towards me. 

3.) I must not take his personal verbal attacks personally. This one was really difficult because when someone comes at you with a vitriol of insults a natural defense is to well, defend yourself. At one point, in the most recent verbal explosion, I told him straight forward, "I will never, ever agree with you and I do not care what you say about me or to me." It took me 20 years to really stand my ground. 

4.) I love him. He loves me. 

He is my boy. He is my child. And although he makes terrible decisions, seems ungrateful, and makes me question my sanity, I will be, and sometimes I'm the only one, standing by his side. Even when his anger, disappointment, and sadness all lash out in my direction, I know it isn't about me. It's about him. I have to watch my boy child grow into a man. This task is often difficult for someone who does not have a personality disorder. And sometimes watching him fall, letting him fall, breaks my heart. He needs to learn to live without my constant assistance. I've had to learn to let go of him with the full knowledge that he may not be able to make it on his own and that part of him may self-sabotage himself in order to keep me in immediate stand by. 

The Demons of Addiction

June 8th marks four years of sobriety for me. Four years really isn't a long time in the scheme of life, but what transpired in these last four years changed who I am. I didn't quit drinking because I hit rock bottom or got a DUI or had an intervention; I wanted to quit. I was tired of fighting the battle in my head every day and losing. I was worn down; it had control of me, mentally. I needed to start my life and start living. I was in a perpetual hell, waiting for the strength to get out. I knew myself well enough to know that I was better and stronger than the alcohol. But, I was so mentally addicted to it; it took me 12 years to finally quit. I was done being beaten.

People are faced with many types and degrees of demons that control their lives. We all have an obstacle that causes harm to our soul. And if you have this, this obsession, whether it's with food, alcohol, gambling, weed, sex, bad relationships or just fear, you know that it can seize your life in ways that will hold you back from being the person you know you can be. Getting trapped in an addiction is hard work. It takes effort to feed the demon that you know is destroying your happiness and that can potentially end your life. It's a struggle with your mind and body to either partake or abstain from the activity that we are so forcefully drawn to it's as if we have no choice but to do it. For me it became a fun, fascinating game, a challenge, I played with my life. I walked a balance so thin that one step, one error in judgment could have ended in personal tragedy. I lived a normal life within the parameters of what people expected. I held my life together well on the outside but inside I was fighting a battle with myself. I wasn't being me; I was just going through the motions. I looked successful, but I was deeply unhappy with myself. I thought I was unacceptable and irreversibly flawed. I basked in my own self-loathing, yet I found a comfort in it so reassuring I couldn't let it go. I wasn't authentic. I was constantly hiding from hurt and pain of the past which I let define my life.

I was existing but not really living. I tried to fly under the radar so I could be who I really was when I got home. An alcoholic.  The only time I could feel normal was when I was with my best friend, alcohol. And if you happened to be with me while I was drinking, fine, but I would have just as well been alone. And if you walked away for long enough, I would drink yours too. When that tiny click of liquid relief hit my blood stream, all I needed was ...more, and I felt at peace. Being drunk was something I did for myself. I was rewarding my mind and body for putting up with life. I deserved it and I basked in it.  There is a deep dysfunctional comfort in giving into the addiction.

“If you live in the dark a long time and the sun comes out, you do not cross into it whistling. There's an initial uprush of relief at first, then-for me, anyway- a profound dislocation. My old assumptions about how the world works are buried, yet my new ones aren't yet operational. There's been a death of sorts, but without a few days in hell, no resurrection is possible.” 

― Mary Karr, Lit: A Memoir

When I stopped drinking I grieved like I had lost a loved one. The sense of loss was so profound, so unexpected and often so unbearable I'd go right back to drinking a few days or a month later. I felt I lost something important to me and I was gravely sad for myself. My brain and my body missed it; they told me in unison I needed it to survive. My mind told me it wasn't worth it to stop. My body wouldn't let me sleep. I longed for a drink like I was missing an old friend or lover. I spent so much time thinking about drinking, finding more to drink, hiding it, and recovering from it, that I wasn't sure how I would spend my days without it in my life. The fear of living without that companion was worth the hatred I felt for myself in the morning. Alcohol for me was an abusive boyfriend who punches you in the face but holds you close at night telling you that you're beautiful. My emotional attachment to alcohol was far more intense than I had ever imagined and letting go of it was feeling a part of myself die.

Every one's journey through addiction is different but there is a commonality that connects us all. When I went to meetings I was no better than anyone else regardless of success, degrees, career, or socio economic status. We are intertwined. We are the same. I heard myself in their stories, I understood people I had never met before. 

The desire to change my life well mostly my thinking about life eventually led me to begin the journey towards sobriety. That meant humbling myself in front of my family, my friends, myself, and even strangers and admitting I am powerless and I need help. There is no way to fight that battle alone. I found the fighter in me. I found the pain from my past was a fire that could destroy me or build me back up. So, I fought. I fought with and against my weak mind, I fought with my body, I fought the overwhelming desire to drink, a desire so strong I thought I might crawl out of my skin.

“The real struggle is about you: you, a person who has to learn to live in the real world, to inhabit her own skin, to know her own heart, to stop waiting for life to begin.” 

― Caroline Knapp, Appetites: Why Women Want

I had to learn who I was without alcohol because addiction hides you. So if you've seen me in the last four years, I've been busy learning who I am. I had to set boundaries in relationships, I had to find out who my friends really were, I had to learn to cope with problems without running to the liquor store, I had to learn what I stand for, learn what I was good at, learn my limits and learn to set  limits with others. Here are some things that changed when I changed.

1.) Relationships: I lost some. I became honest with myself and others. I said honest things out loud and in emails. People don't like that. So I lost people, important people. However, my other relationships, some old and some new, have become so fulfilling I can't believe I spent so much time alone drinking when there were all these amazing people to hang out with. I didn't set out to improve my friendships; it was a side effect of sobriety. The love and admiration I have for the people in my life fills me up, it makes it okay if I don't always get what I want or if I fail at something. They inspire me, encourage me, and appreciate who I am because now I finally know who I am. I was so locked inside my addiction the only person I could ever see was me.

2.) Setting boundaries with people: I have people in my life who can or used to engage me in excessive emotional arguments where I would ramble on and on about shit while crying and then barely remember the next day anything that I said, I just knew I was drained. These types of people are exhausting to know, but I had also taught them, through my participation, that it was okay to treat me this way. I used to let people reel me into drama that was fueled by alcohol and my own emotional immaturity. When I stopped talking back, texting back or getting upset, those people got really pissed off and accused me of being mean, narcissistic, and selfish. There was some ugly backlash when I took a step back and stopped participating in emotional manipulation.

3.) Sleeping: I couldn't sleep anymore. For twelve years falling asleep was drinking enough until I passed out. At first, I would panic at night in fear that I wouldn't be able to ever sleep again. Alcohol was the only way to shut off my brain. Until I found over the counter sleep aids. Sometimes though I dream about drinking. The disease plays in my subconscious because it's still a part of me... It's a kind of haunting that reminds me I am a product of all my experiences, my past is always nearby, and being an alcoholic isn't something I was...it's something I am. 

4.) Loving myself: People don't like this either as it can seem arrogant to others who have previously known me as a drunken, crying, self-loathing, bloated person who has the potential to fall down. Loving oneself is not arrogance, it's confidence. With sobriety I found a bold sense of peace.  I found a pride I didn't know I had. I found a sense of belonging in and to my own life. I broke through the perception of what I thought I was supposed to be. I started to become unashamed of well, everything I thought I lacked. I've learned who I am, what I can handle, and what I'll allow.

5.) Fear: Breaking through something that holds you captive is like conquering your greatest fear. It's jumping out of an airplane or winning an award over and over again. It's exhilarating every day. When you take a leap that changes your life, there is a euphoria that follows the hell you went through to get there. I tried to describe being sober to someone as a person who is saved by finding Jesus. These newly saved people are highly annoying and ridiculously happy. That's what I'm like but without the Bible or Jesus. I am so happy that I'm annoying and there will always be people who try to undermine my progress or remind me of who I used to be or what I used to do. I ignore those people. 

6.) Running into things and falling down: I can say that I have not fallen down in 4 years. I haven’t run into the bathroom door with my face. The mystery bruises I had all over my body are gone as is the puffiness I carried in my face. I'm brighter. 

7.) Talking on the phone: Drunk people like to talk on the phone. I had the best ideas and epiphanies when I was intoxicated. I don’t really talk on the phone much anymore, it’s lost its appeal. The vitriol of brilliant ideas is gone so really, what’s the point.

8.) Eating a lot of nachos late at night until I am wearing it: I don’t do this anymore.

9.) Smoking.  I also smoked when I drank. I craved cigarettes so badly I would have eaten them whole if it helped get the nicotine into my body faster.

10.) Crying and throwing up: I put these 2 in the same number because crying was usually followed by throwing up.  

11.) Remembering what I watched on TV: I can’t remember anything I saw on TV for 12 years. I had to watch all the episodes of Friends as if I’d never seen them. That was fun.

Now, I look forward to, well, everything, being alive and being the person I was always afraid to be. Sometimes I have bad days; sometimes I struggle with life and relationships. I'm still learning to navigate this sober life I have with sober feelings and sober reactions. 

With sobriety, everything, absolutely everything got better in my life. I lost the people I needed to lose. I gained a sense of self that seeps into every area of my life. I had to wade through the shit in my head for my life to be different. I'm not a victim of my fears and insecurities and I don't handle them by self-medicating. I might seem arrogant. I might seem narcissistic or selfish, but I'm not. I'm happy with who I am and I'm happy for what I had to go through to get here. The fight isn't over; I'm always going to carry this weight of addiction. But, I'm confident and self-reflective and I know I can fight the demons of my past now with clarity and grace.

“Trying to describe the process of becoming an alcoholic is like trying to describe air. It's too big and mysterious and pervasive to be defined. Alcohol is everywhere in your life, omnipresent, and you're both aware and unaware of it almost all the time, all you know is you'd die without it, and there is no simple reason why this happens, no single moment, no physiological event that pushes a heavy drinker across a concrete line into alcoholism. It's a slow, gradual, insidious, elusive becoming.” 

― Caroline Knapp

This is me 3 months before, so march 09' all
bloated and stupid

This is 2013, I'm on the right 

I'm Ignoring You

My son has BPD which is borderline personality disorder. However, he doesn't believe he has this and gets terribly upset when I say he does, which is a sign of having BPD. I suppose if anyone accuses you of having a personality disorder though, anger and denial may be your first reaction. For almost 20 years I've been dealing with a person who has a myriad of emotions or non emotions which leave me a teensy bit insane. I wrote a blog a few years ago about raising teenagers and how it can equate to having or developing PTSD. Some angry person, possibly with a mood disorder themselves, responded that I was minimizing the war veterans real problems with PTSD. I deleted that comment because it's my blog and I do what I want. But, it made me think. I decided I thought they were wrong and I was right and moved forward.

Recently though I bought a book about living with someone with  BPD. Guess what it said? Those people, I'll call us victims, develop PTSD. Holy fuck. I'm right again. I love that.

Now that I have a book that validates how confused, bewildered, angry, and sad I've been on and off for almost 20 years, I can finally  start to understand my own reactions to his reactions.

Much of my reaction has been ignoring his reactions because reacting to every dumb ass thing he does would ruin my quality of life. I ignore people who bother me, harass me, are mean to me, or are making a lot of undue noise. Until I snap. Then I freak out and tell you exactly what it is I have been meaning to say all along and it's quite ugly. I can be not so nice about it. Here is an example of things that make me want to freak out. I've think I've said before that I have been known to throw things at people with the intention of hitting them. I have toned that impulse down to a quiet, seething hostility. I decided long ago that if I freaked out about everything he did that made me want to freak out, I would be freaking out all day long, every day.

Scenario A:

1.) When you hit my car backing out of the garage and don't tell me.
This makes me angry.
2.) When I ask you about it you say, "It just looked like some paint."
This makes me angry
3.) When you never apologize for any of it.
This makes me angry

I'll call this scenario "I hit two of your cars and never told you, geez, get over it"

Scott and I have spent the last several years going over this situation in our heads. Both of our cars have dents. Dents. Not paint marks but noticeable dents in our cars. The person who did it thinks we are both bat shit crazy and need to stop being so negative. That's what he says. I choose to ignore the obvious flaws in his logic and move on. I made my peace with the dents, but I've added it to my quiet seething.

Quit being such a materialistic cry baby about the dent in your car. It's just paint. 

Scenario B:

1.) When you let a 15 -year- old with no driver's license 'get gas' for you in a car that is not yours but one we've given to you to drive to and from work and school.
2.) When that 15- year- old does a beer run at Safeway and uses the car that says ROMO on the license plate as his getaway car and the whole thing is caught on surveillance video.
3.) When you go pick up your son's friend (before you know about the beer run) from the Walgreen's where the 15 -year- old has been arrested for trespassing and find out your car has been used in a crime.
4.) When you're told to 'quit living in the past' when you confront the son who gave the car to the kid to drive and 'get gas' and tell him he cannot use the car anymore. Good lord you crazy old bat, that was a week ago!

I'll call this scenario: "I thought he was just getting gas, get over it, you're so negative, stop living in the past."

These 2 scenarios are just a taste of what I've been dealing with for about 20 years so the art of ignoring shit that makes no sense and leaves me utterly bereft, forlorn, and chain smoking, has become the norm. And when crazy is your norm, well, you start to doubt your own reality.

Since I've been on the mood disorder train for a while now, I've become a wonderful ignorer. I know that's not a word but I do what I want. I've ignored the whirlwind of anger that has punched holes in my walls, wrecked my cars, left doors open and unlocked to let in serial killers, yelled at strangers in parking lots, come home drunk, and then blamed all the fallout, consequences, and reasons he did those things...on me.

Living with someone with BPD has toughened me up. I can take a lot of shit, but then suddenly I can't and no one really knows when I'll snap.

I deal with people, mostly, in a very special way. I call it, Ignoring your stupid bullshit  in hopes you'll go away and take your problems with you method. Sometimes it works and people go away pretty quickly and other times I get vindictive and I don't like when my mind races with revenge.

I can ignore many of the dumb shit other people do around me, but one day I'm going to start plotting against you or tell you off. It's just my natural defense now. It's how I work. I have PTSD in response to someone elses BPD. I'm trying to recognize that my pattern is to ignore, then freak out, then ignore, then freak out. I have to remember that not everyone has BPD and that perhaps I should talk to people who bother me immediately to clear the air, but I need to relearn how to talk to people who don't have mood disorders. However, when you've lived for many years with someone telling you that you overreact, are crazy, mean, wrong, and living in the past even though the past happens 2 days ago it tends to make you leery of your own emotions and afraid to react to them. I'm left second guessing what I feel or do when the person I'm dealing with deflects everything back on to me and makes it all my fault.

Since I'm used to being manipulated and lied to, I've developed a keen perception  when people are full of shit. I've been surrounded by a game player for half my life. I've learned to nod and agree while the dialogue in my head sings the song of bullshit.

A friend of mine always reminds me that I continually give people the benefit of the doubt hoping that maybe that person has a mental disorder and they need more care and compassion.  But I can see your bullshit. And when I see it, I ignore it until I can't ignore it anymore. I haven't learned to tolerate corruption as well I'd like.  I can tell when you're trying to appear more important than you are. I can tell when you're trying to make others seem or feel less important. I can tell when you're trying to convince me of something that I know is false or stupid. And, just because you can screw someone over doesn't mean you should. When you are given the opportunity to do good, you shouldn't take most of the good for yourself and give only the good that's convenient for you to others and then act like you are altruistic. Cuz, you're not. I can ignore this for a long time. Mostly because I don't care that much as I've got a master game playing manipulator living at my house, 3 jobs, 3 kids, and a cat. I just don't have time to get worked up about all the shit that annoys me.

I very often get hung up on stupid shit  though even when I don't want to. I teach people writing and in writing I teach people ideas. I tell them they cannot merely have an opinion, they must express that opinion through action via communication be it verbal or written. With knowledge comes great responsibility. When something feels wrong, fight for what is right. Even if you lose, it's worth the fight. Silence is often the permission for corruption to continue.

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." (Edmund Burke)

Your life won't change until and unless you change it. You have to freak out and fight for yourself  because a lot of people don't have the strength or knowledge or passion to fight for you. Sometimes you're the voice of people who are afraid to make waves. Like dealing with someone with BPD, you need to carefully plan your responses so when you do freak out, it's over something that's worth it. Believe me, you are always worth it.

You can be stronger than how weak you feel

Can I be Excused... From This Family?

My brother died last year around this time, May something or other. I wasn't even sure he was really dead.. I got a muffled cell phone call from my mom around 5 am saying that Tim may have died. So, I didn't really know. I got up,  took a shower, came to work and met up with Annie in the parking lot. She said, "What's up?" And I said, "My brother may have died."

 By the next day we confirmed he was dead. I wasn't that sad. I had stopped talking to my brother about four years earlier because he was an addict, a terrible father, and a selfish, self destructive person. I cried though, but not because I missed him. I cried for the concept of a brother. I cried for the idea of family. I cried for the destruction of something I saw crumble around me when I was 11.  I cried for the child who had a big brother. I cried for the family dinners when I had to ask, "May I be excused?" before I left the dinner table and the family who prayed together before bed. I cried for ever wanting someone to call me his little sister and then protect me like I thought a brother might do.

I often get trapped in the concept of things rather than the reality of them. The reality is that he wasn't a good person and I was kind of expecting him to die at an early age.

I wanted to look up to him and I tried. People with brothers seemed to like them so much. I wanted to think he was great or powerful or successful.  I wanted him to be cool. But he wasn't any of those things. He was an addict. I can only ever remember him as an addict too. I have no memory of him being a brother. When I was 9 he asked me, while I was watching cartoons, what I would do if I were ever raped. He asked me if I knew what being raped meant.  I said I didn't know what I would do and yes, I knew what it meant. I sat so stiffly in my pleather bean bag chair my eyes burned as I stared intently at the T.V. I heard him and his friend giggling and whispering in the kitchen. I started to get really scared that he might let his friend rape me just to see what I would do.  When he  finally left the room I called a family friend, explained quietly what he had said to me and she came over and picked me up. I never felt safe with him again.

He was perpetually on drugs.When I was 10, I unknowingly and repeatedly slammed his head against the bathroom door because he had passed out on the toilet and fallen face first onto the floor, pants down. He spent a year in a boys home in Texas when he was 13. My dad knocked over his dinner chair with him in it when he came home at age 15 with an earring. When I was 13 and he, 17,  he cut up lines of cocaine and offered it to me in an attic space in Idaho that he had painted in satanic ritual markings. I didn't like him much, didn't respect him, and was gravely disappointed in everything he did. I declined his kind cocaine offer that night too.

He called me once around the time I graduated from college. I was drinking beer from a keg I kept on my back porch and watching reruns of Friends. When I answered, he said he was sitting in a truck and contemplating suicide.I was sick of all his shit and I was like, "What? Why? And why are you calling ME? I don't even live in the same state as you. Stop fucking with my head man!" He ignored me and asked me to play a certain song at his funeral by the band Live called Lightening Crashes. A woman's placenta falls to the ground in the first stanza. It's fuckin stupid and he's such an asshole for calling to tell me this. I should have called the police but I didn't. I went to bed because I know he's a selfish asshole and by threatening to kill yourself over the phone to someone in another state who has no idea where you live or what your address is, is a shitty, dick move. Fucker. About 5 years ago he ran away from a mental health facility and went missing. I was worried for about 10 minutes until I called my dad and he said, "Don't worry about it. He's an adult He'll figure it out." My parents are very supportive and concerned. He never killed himself that night but a few weeks later called and asked if him and his wife (wife? When did he get a wife?) could come to Florida and sleep on my floor otherwise they would be homeless. I said no. My family sucks.

 He was family though and from what I gather about society and families it's that no matter what happens, they will be there for you and you should in turn be there for them. They will always have your back. You can always go home. Family is forever. Even when families break down and divorce, mothers and fathers still love their kids. Parents don't leave you.  They won't move out of state and tell you one day before so you have no time to plan a goodbye to everyone you've ever known. They don't get married to people you've never met and not tell you until you see the wedding pictures that you're not in, at their condo. They won't take off to another town and leave you living in an apartment with your strung out brother. They won't forget your birthday or to call you on holidays. They won't treat you like you're worthless or insignificant.

But they do. Families forget you.

If I had friends like I have family, I would stop being their friend.

If my friend responded, "Graduate school is really difficult and expensive and you probably can't do it" when I told him/her I was thinking of getting a master's degree, then I wouldn't be friends with that person because that person is an asshole. So when you tell me, "I'm going to get a rainbow tattoo that spans both sides of my butt cheeks" I'm going to be all like, "Hooray for you."  I'm going to be happy for you because damn it, you deserve that rainbow ass tattoo.

I don't need your negative bullshit when I tell you good news. If you're going to talk to me, you better have something fucking positive to say even if you have to fake it. I might not get into that program, or win that award but I don't need your stupid ass attitude reminding me that I'm mediocre and regular and that nothing about me is particularly outstanding. Also, if I don't know you very well, Do Not call me and tell me you are going to kill yourself. I hate that.

The whole point here is that family didn't work out for me. I'm sad and bitter about this and I talk about it all the time. Check out the name of this blog. This month I had some very cool news about things that are happening in my life. I didn't call anyone in my family. It's been a few weeks and I've contemplated putting the news in an email, but they have a way of diminishing me so I haven't said anything.  Now that I'm older I know I'm responsible for maintaining relationships and things I do and say can intentionally and unintentionally affect people. So, I'm going to talk to the people who build me up instead of bring me down. I guess I do have family, technically, but I have better friends.

I don't know what's going on here, but he looks smug. I'm wondering where my real family is in this picture. just kidding. 

My parents took us out for McDonald's before Tim left for some other state to do more drugs.  You can tell by the mullet  and mesh shirt that he's headed for no good. 

Madness

I've been teaching the play, Hamlet, for about 8 years. I like the play, but I hate hearing 12th graders read it out loud. So, we watch the movie most of the time. Hamlet provides society with many words of wisdom and contemplation about life, living, family, and interpersonal relationships including blended families. The most obvious and well known quote is Hamlet's famous To Be or Not To Be soliloquy. I'm gonna say that some people may not realize or remember that it's about suicide. To be alive or not to be alive. That is the question. Should I kill myself today or not? The audience knows that Hamlet is kind of a melancholy fellow all dressed in black and moping around and pissing everyone off all day long. Hes' the quintessential young adult: mad, passionate, sarcastic, manipulative. These are all wonderful characteristics of being young. Part of the play, however, dates Hamlet as being 30 years old, which, if he is, he is a giant loser. You shouldn't be a whiny cry baby asshole when you're 30.

Anyway, the most famous line, though, is about suicide. Hamlet  must decide whether or not to endure fortune's  'slings and arrows' or just kill himself and be free from all the bullshit. However, he doesn't really feel like burning in eternal hell so he lives to see another day and decides to pester and kill other people instead. 

I've never thought about killing myself but when I talk to teenagers about suicide and go over the meaning of that soliloquy, I bet there are many a kid in the audience who has. For myself, I'm more afraid of dying accidentally than anything and to purposefully seek it out isn't something I've considered. For some reason I'm sure I'll die from the sneak attack under the bed murderer or death in the shower when I'm home alone and swear I hear a window break and armed men talking in muffled voices. I've also been worried that people who turn more than 2 times the same way I do are following me home to kill me and stuff me in my own trunk. I realize too much sometimes the fragility of life. It is most evident when I'm on an airplane. If that flimsy looking wing taps the ground or one of those tiny wheels falls off, I'm dead. Every time I walk off a plane I'm happy to be alive. I do not want to die. 

I must be very comforting or wise or some shit because I've been faced with other people's desire to end their lives and it stresses me out. I've had a total 4 people tell me they wanted to die and one person asked me to play a certain song at his funeral. Now whenever I hear that song I think of death. Thanks for that. 

Each time I'm left with the question about whether or not it's my responsibility to keep somebody alive. When you tell someone you want to die you put the onus on that person to take some action. I know now that some people don't really want to die, they want help. But some people really want to die. People who really really want to die, die.

But, when I'm the person they choose to call and talk to about ending their life, is it because they've given me the task of proving to them that life is worth living? Why me? I think strangers are going to crawl through my doggy door and stab me. I'm not that wise.

Sometimes I have my own doubts about the absurdity of life. I'm not religious, anymore, so I can't follow what the Bible says and lean not on my own understanding. I'm usually okay with not understanding. It doesn't cause me too much undo stress since I can navigate bullshit pretty well. It's a skill  I've learned over time. If you want to be happy, you have to learn how to deal with bullshit.  Here are some instances of how I stay alive:

1.) Doing less: I actively try to do less. I clean less. I cook less. I care less. If you are fastidious about everything then everything will bother you. Dishes in the sink? Who cares! Clothes in the hamper? Get a life.
Car dirty? It will rain soon enough. Once in Florida though I knew I had to take all the old food wrappers out of my car when I saw a cockroach on my floor board. That's a little excessive so now I throw the garbage from the car onto the garage floor.

2.) Avoiding people who are high, drunk, or excessively stupid. Avoiding these types of people have made me a calmer person. People who get so drunk they fall down, cry, or get arrested need to be avoided. High people are also a problem. They may seem all nonchalant and shit but they are sneaky little fucks plus it's just not fun to hang out with someone who is high. As for the excessively stupid, those are usually your high and drunk folks.

3.) Sleep. Sleep. or you'll go nuts, everything will bother you and you will be a giant walking talking freak show.


I really don't know how to keep people alive.

I don't know if I know how to love someone enough to make living worth the pain for them.

 I don't know how to make people happy or make them inspired or concerned or generous or funny.

 I can only hope that however it is that I learned to be genuine, generous, funny, and inspirational, will somehow float through the air and hit the people that I love and be enough to keep them alive.

A Fragile Balance

Someone once described to me that a fragile state of mind  is like a  cup that is full to the top. If you put one more drop in it, it will overflow and get your shit all wet.

The last few months or so I've often felt like that full cup. If I get one more drop of bullshit,  I'll over flow and freak out. In the Bible it's nice when your cup overflows, like you have a lot of blessings to be grateful for. Well, my cup runneth over with insanity and one more drop of awful is going to turn me into a lunatic. You don't want a cup full of crazy.

Be careful. Your crazy is dripping. 

Last week my 4- year- old had asthma trouble. We have been in and out of the doctors about 8 times since August so this time we took her back to the asthma specialist as it seems that every time she catches a common virus, she gets asthma that we can't control. This situation caused me a great deal of stress, it just about ran my cup over but then I realize when these things happen that there are some things in life that just don't matter. What matters? Breathing. It's important to breathe. And that's it. Sometimes that's all you've got so your only choice is, breathe.

Here are some things I chose not to give a *fecund about while 'Breathing' was at the top of my worry list.

1.) Which dog is peeing on my kitchen rug? This question makes me a tiny bit insane because I can't catch any dogs peeing on it which makes me think my dogs are trying to slowly drive me mad. They know my cup is brimming with insanity and their pee is going be the few drops that send me over the edge. Sometimes I lift up the kitchen rug in front of all three of them and use my Frankenstein's Monster voice while grumbling, "Whooooo did thisssss? Whooo is it???? You are all so ruuudddeee!" Well, any time you use a Frankenstein   voice with dogs, they all look guilty and wag their tales like, "What are doing you crazy freak? You'll never catch us." It's probably all three of them. They probably have a calendar or schedule for who gets to pee on the kitchen rug next. Assholes.

The next item I do care a lot of about, most of the time. But when my children can't breathe, this item goes shooting towards the bottom of my list.

2.) Dumb shit at work. Dumb shit at work can really get on ones nerves. The dumb shit  at work can take the form of many things that I'll leave purposefully vague in case I work with you. I don't want all the people at work to wonder if I think they are pieces of dumb shit. Which I don't. I love you all. Unless my kid can't breathe, then I don't care about you at all.

3.) Arguing with my kids about bedtime. If you've ever met me, you'll know that it's pretty much an impossibility of any child of mine to take direction when asked the first time. When one of them does something the first time I'm a little thrown off. Why are you being so compliant? Don't you want to finish that show you've seen 800 times? If they are too obedient I think they are probably lying in bed thinking of ways to overthrow me. I know consistency is a good way to raise kids but when one of them can't breathe and the medicine she's on is making her act like a rabid dog, some things just don't matter. Some nights, as long as you're lying in the bed, I don't give a *fecund if you've brushed your teeth, read a story, or are holding the dog hostage in your room with a scarf tied to the leg of the bed. It's probably the dog that's been peeing on my kitchen rug anyway and it would do her some good to be tied up for a bit.

*Fecund is a word I use instead of the actual F word. It's pronounced Feeecund, but if you emphasize the FA cund, it's sounds like fuckin. Which is a great misuse of a word.

4.) Money: When things get rough and people can't breathe, I don't care about money. Even if I don't really have any real money, say like in my bank account, I always have a credit card somewhere and that's good enough for me. I have the same mentality about money when I go on vacation too. Breathing, being on vacation. Same thing.

5.) Rules. I love rules. Okay, no I don't really. And when people are struggling to breathe, I don't care about them. I try to follow the big rules, like not punching people, but it's the little rules I just can't seem to care about when one of my children can't breathe. If my garbage can is supposed to be inside right after the garbage man comes. Who cares. It's been known to sit for days even when everyone in the house could breathe. Drinking an energy drink while I shop and then throwing it away while I shop. I know that's probably shop lifting, so yeah, I don't ever do that. I do eat when I shop though, I walk through the aisles with a bag of chips or cookie dough and mill around. I don't know if that's a rule of not, but I do it sometimes. It's not like I have a knife and fork out, I just snack a little while I browse. There are quite a few people in life who get all hung up on the rules of everything and those people I avoid. You better watch out because when you're a freak about all the little shit in life, something happens to straighten your ass back out, like when you can't breathe or you think the pimple on your neck is skin cancer.

When life stabilizes again and all people are breathing as they should, I can worry about little rules or niceties or garbage cans or pee, but when it comes right down to what is important in life it's the people in your house. It's the people. And the dogs too since even if you pee on my rug, I'll still let you sleep right above my head even though I'm allergic to dogs.

 My brain prioritizes problems like a computer quickly readjusting a calculation so that my cup doesn't run over. I can very quickly not give a shit.


I also didn't proofread this yet because I hate doing that. It makes me rethink everything about my life. I'll edit it later when I'm in the mood.

When it Rains

When I was seven or eight or some naive age, I gave my dad a picture I colored of a rainbow, some rain, and a few clouds. In my childish writing, over the rainbow I wrote, "When it rains, look for the rainbow." It said that because it was a song I was singing in the school choir so it was plastered to my psyche even though I had no idea what it meant. My dad knew what it meant and he started crying. I was pretty freaked out by seeing a man cry, especially my dad.  He saw how startled I was, called me over to him, said thank you as he hugged me and explained he was crying because he just needed to see that today. He needed to look for the rainbow. Since I couldn't Google what that meant I just shrugged and hugged him back. Whatever.

Then he left. It was a few years later but one day he was fuckin gone and I never drew him another picture or really ever hugged him in the same way ever again.

Yeah that's sad. But sad shit happens to people all the time and in many different ways. That wasn't even the saddest thing that's gone on in my life. I have a lot more of sad in my stack and I keep adding to my pile but so does everyone else.

There might be a rainbow after it rains but your dad is not coming back and your dog is still dead.

This week  I needed to help someone up from their own pile of sadness and in the process I tasted, once again, what it feels like to be devastated and hopeless. It tumbled me back in time when taking a shower was only a place to rest my head and cry so no one could hear me gasping for breath.  It's the kind of sad that pulls you downward, towards the ground, where you're sure you belong. It's the pain inside your chest that feels as if your heart is breaking.  It isn't your heart though, it's your soul, and when your soul is challenged with despair it tells your brain a lot of fucked up things like, this is the end, you're done, there isn't anything else you can do, you've lost, give up.

When your dad leaves or your brother lets your dog out on purpose to get eaten by coyotes or you get cancer you can rest your head against the shower wall and let the water wash away your pain, or you can do what I told my mom to do when we found out she had stage 4 breast cancer:

Start smoking.  Fuck that cancer. I told her to pick up a pack of smokes or some crack and just see how it feels. Why not? She spent her entire life doing what she thought she should do, what other people expected her to do. She didn't drink or smoke or cuss and she still got fuckin breast cancer. Doing what other people want you to do gives you cancer.

When life gets really shitty you can also go to a lot of bars and sleep with people you don't know well. That also washes off in the shower.

Some people do try to self-destruct when they're sad which is fine for a while, but in the long term it really only makes you sick inside and out and then it's time to try something else.

The advice I gave someone this week was based on the level of hopelessness I've felt when I thought I'd lost a piece of myself while living this life. It's the feeling when something happens and you know you'll never be the same and you can physically feel yourself getting smaller. The advice I gave came from a place within that is only available when you've been crushed inside and can literally only crawl up the stairs into bed and hope that the world isn't sitting on your chest when you wake up.

This is what I said:

I said, 'Fight.' You have to fight. You have to get fired up, you have to get mad. Anger and rage will lift you up to conquer the voice inside your head that tells you you're not good enough, smart enough, thin enough, pretty enough or sane enough. You have to fight to save yourself because you're the only one who can.

Then I said, 'Get Up,' even if it's only to look at yourself in the mirror and see if your shame, guilt, and sadness look as bad as they feel. Study the tears racing down your face and try to tell if they're making you older or wiser or both. But just, get up.

And I said, 'Talk.' Talk to people, tell the truth even if it makes you vulnerable, even if it scares you. Even if you cry. Tell your story and listen to the story of others. I know this because, I know. I know from my own stack of sadness, I know, I know, that there is someone who needs to hear how vulnerable you are so they can begin their own fight.

And if all else fails, try listening to Jimmy Eat World's song, "The Middle." Sing along. In the car. Flail. Works every time.

It will be

The Value of Strangers

When I was 24 I was a hot mess and probably a little evil too. I wasn't as angry then because I was too busy being sad and drunk. Being sad and drunk was something I could do right when it seemed I had done everything wrong.  It was something I had to go through like a right of passage. Some people decide to have a leg warmer or big purse phase; I decided to be sad and drunk. I really rocked sad and drunk for a very long time. It's just another thing I'm good at.

Even through my self-loathing and falling down, I managed to earn a master's degree and keep a small child alive. However, I developed panic attacks and exaggerated fears. I would sometimes cry the entire way to work or school and tell people I had allergies when they asked if I was okay. I was excessively stressed out and always on the verge of a meltdown. I had generalized anxiety disorder too. I was a good time.

 I struggled for many years making it 'on my own', but this week I was reminded that I really didn't make it all on my own. What I guess I really mean is that I made it this far without any help from immediate family whom I expected to help me, which they didn't, and now I'm a tad bitter about it. No one can tell though.

Anyway, a few people have floated into my life over the years that remind me of who I am and who I owe my gratitude towards. I've become indebted to these 'strangers' for seeing in me characteristics I didn't or couldn't see in myself. These are all the people who are better than me, nicer than me, and people who saved my life.

1.) Scott: He gets me. He lets me be who I am and reels me back in when I start to panic or cry. He is my anxiety medication.  He calms me down with just a phone call. He won't make me fat or bloated either. He also thinks I'm amazing and spends his time making sure I know he loves me. He fixes things in my life, not broken things, more like problems I have that frustrate me, like getting my oil changed and dealing with tedious bullshit which I like to call talking to people I don't want to talk to. I love that about him. He is my lobster.

2.) Jodie. I've known Jodie since I was 11. She gets me too. She doesn't fix anything for me, but she laughs so hard at my problems that they all become kind of funny. Like that one year I thought my kid might be a serial killer:  While on vacation he found a tiny sharp metal object to poke people with and then enjoyed their discomfort and smiled at their pain. It's been ten years, but we still talk about it and luckily Tyler turned out okay. He would, however, still love to stab some people with sharp objects, but I'm confident he won't. I hope.

Also, Jodie laughs with me, at me, and near me with the kind of hearty laugh that  makes people wonder what the joke is and want to be a part of it. She knows me so well I can look in her direction and she'll know what I'm thinking. She is friendship gold. Her and I are like twins sometimes with our own language because we have 25 years of inside jokes. We are very annoying to other people because nobody knows what we are actually laughing at.

We made up a joke when we were 11 which purposefully wasn't funny. It made no sense. We carefully constructed this joke and then told it to adults and children in hopes to make them look dumb for our own amusement. It was about a frog in a bathtub and a door knob. When we came across people we'd ask as a team, "hey, do you want to hear a joke?" And usually people said yes because you say yes to jokes from children. Immediately Jodie would start to laugh, not because the joke was funny, but because it wasn't. I was the calm teller of the joke. By the time the joke was through, her and I were laughing so hard we were doubled over. The other person either 1.) Pretended they got the joke and laughed or 2.) Didn't get the joke and just looked at us in bewilderment. Either way, it was funny. For us.

The next group of people were strangers who met me during the worst days of my life, saw what a crazy dumb ass I was, but helped me anyway. For the kindness of the following people I will always give someone the benefit of the doubt. It will take the rest of my life to repay the kindness they showed me when I was at my lowest point.

1.) Sherry. Sherry is a bad ass and will tell you what's up. One day at soccer practice for my 5- year- old son I was talking to Sherry about being new in town. Our sons went to the same school and I lived in the same general area she did. She offered, the first day I met her, to pick Tyler up from school with her kids and take him to soccer practice. She picked him up from school for 4 years give or take. He wasn't an easy kid either, but she took him into her family as if he'd always been a part of it. These 4 years weren't without conflict. My kid was troubled and had behavior issues in school. Many times I was called to the office to discuss his behavior and she would go with me. We went  everywhere her family went; we ate dinner at her house almost every night.

When my car broke down, I called her. If I had stomach pain in the middle of the night and I thought I was going to die because I didn't have health insurance, I called her. I slept at her house for a week when I had a panic attack so severe I was afraid to be alone. When I needed to get away from an asshole boyfriend but didn't have good enough credit to get my own place, she pretended to be getting a divorce and rented me an apartment in her name with her credit. I lived there for a year and pretended I was her when I paid the rent.  Eventually we both moved and just grew apart after I moved out of state. I was a panicky drunken, hungover mess during those years and trying to cope with my son. Whatever it was she saw in me, to help a stranger out in that way, I will forever appreciate. I don't know if I met a single parent from another state if I'd offer to care for her child every day and take her in as part of my family for 4 years. I don't know if that type of extension of myself would come naturally, but if it ever comes up, I will first remember Sherry. I will try to pay forward the kindness she showed me and Tyler for the rest of my life.

2.) Wendy. I was sitting at my desk one day and got a call that my child care was canceled for the evening. I had class at USF after work and was panicked that I'd miss class, get behind, and fail. I only had one child care option, see above, and would have to miss school to pick him up. He was about 10 at the time and at the height of his dysfunction. Wendy saw me sitting with my head down at my dumb office job desk and said, "What's wrong. Nothing can be that bad we can't fix," or something to that effect. I told her my problem through teary blurry eyes and she, without hesitation, said she would pick him up for me so I could go to class. It wasn't a big deal and it was no problem.

She picked him up for me for 2 more years. She picked him up, fed him, and talked to him until my classes were finished and I had earned a master's degree.

She didn't have to. I didn't give her anything.

She never made me feel bad or seemed put out by it. She just helped me to help me. I don't know if I'll ever be able to help someone the way she helped me. I don't know if I'll ever be able to see the good in someone who is struggling. I don't know if I'll ever be able to see the strength and determination and potential in someone the way she did me. I don't know. What I do know is that I'll never stop trying to pay back the kindness she extended to me and my son. I just don't know how yet.

To both of these women I probably wasn't even a good friend. I was about 10 years younger than Sherry and probably 15 or 20 years younger than Wendy. When I look back on myself at the ages of 23-29, I don't know how anyone saw anything in me except a total wreck.  I was trying to survive in my life during that time and, as a result, the only person I could see was me.

This is me all skinny and panicky before I started taking medication for anxiety that made me fat and bloated looking. I'm sure the beer didn't help either.....

Me, fatter, but with a college degree

There are also people in my life who treated me like shit for being young, inexperienced, selfish and a bad decision maker. I already knew these things about myself so to have others point them out didn't do me any good, motivate me to be better, or teach me any kind of valuable lesson. Here is a big fuck you to those people:

1.) The lady at church who I over heard saying she was not glad I was back. Fuck You.
2.) The person who said that I could never make it without him. Fuck You.
3.) The lady who told me I needed therapy but in such a way to suggest I was crazy, not that she cared I needed help. Fuck You.
4.) The other moms in the elementary school who wouldn't talk to me or include me when I was 18 because I was very young and had an eye brow piercing. Fuck You.
5.) My department chairs my first year teaching who were condescending, rude and unhelpful. Fuck You.
6.) To that principal who told me my kid would never catch up. Fuck You.
7.) To every person who tried to 'teach me a lesson' by being rude, unforgiving, relentless, mean, or distant. Fuck You.
8.) To any one who thought I was too much trouble, quit calling me, helping me, or remembering my birthday. Fuck You.
9.) To that guy in Idaho who thought it would be a good idea to drive me out in the middle of nowhere while he was drunk. Fuck You.
10.) To the committee who suggested my son be sent to Aces. Fuck You too.
11.) To the girls in my class junior year who were mean bitches. Fuck You. And, I hope you're fat and still live in Michigan.

What is comes down to is the good people will see through your low self-esteem, your bad decisions, and your drug and alcohol problem. They will be kind to you when you can't be kind to yourself. They will be nice to you when you don't deserve it. They will help you when you never asked them for help. They will see you when you've lost who you are.

For many the good people are your family. For me the good people were strangers. I might be that stranger to someone. I might not even know it. You might be that stranger to someone too. I figure there's enough people in life who are going to be mean and try to teach everyone a god damn lesson about tough love, but that's not going to be me.

I'm Still Angry

I thought for a moment that I was becoming less angry. I'm not. I've had a good month or so where I've felt very calm about things. I'm taking life in stride. I'm chilling out. I thought maybe my maturity level had finally caught up to me and I could approach issues that irritated me with grace and dignity.

Well,  I can't.

I still see bullshit all around me and it makes me angry. Then I spew out all my unwanted opinions about it to everyone in close enough range to hear and then I feel better.

Luckily for me, I'm angry and smart, so I can have intelligent arguments ready to go if someone should challenge me on my beliefs. I feel sorta bad for angry, stupid people. They probably have good reasons to be mad but don't have a large enough vocabulary or education to articulate their dilemma or offer up any valid or useful solutions.

Here are a few things that made me angry this week:

1.) Students who hate everyone and complain about shit all the time but don't want to educate themselves about the topics, vote, or be a part of the solution. They just want to bitch about everything being unfair, unjust and fucked up. Why don't you learn more about the world you live in, how problems and issues have developed over time, and then be a part of an organization or movement to create change in whatever part of the world or society you find a flaw. Sitting around with your hoodie on pouting about religion and government isn't going to make your life any better. If you don't like what you see, hear, or experience, change it. If you can't talk to me about perceived solutions, don't complain to me about the way the world is and how you hate everyone and everything. Keep your uneducated bullshit opinions to yourself.

Uh, Omg. The government is so corrupt and everyone is super stupid. Waaa. Where's my hoodie and  head phones?

2.) People who imply that a woman should cook Thanksgiving dinner and ask me everywhere I go if I'm cooking. I also don't like when people are surprised that my husband is going to cook.  I'm going to provide moral support in the form of loving his food and asking if I can help then hoping he says NO. It's 2012 and people still assume or expect women to cook the big dinner while the men watch football in the other room? This is the archaic model in the 70s and 80s or at least as far back as I can remember when the women cook and the men enjoy the couch. I remember my mother, aunts and grandmother would all gather in the kitchen talking about cooking and chatting about inane things like recipes and dish sizes. I don't want to talk about dish sizes or flour sifters or baking times. I don't like to cook and somehow I feel some sort of a twinge of guilt about that as if my XX chromosome is flawed or I'm flawed and I'm not as good as other women who like to cook. I hate cooking! And I'm angry that I perceive that people expect me to cook or that I should cook anyway because people cook on Thanksgiving. I don't want to cook. I don't want to stand around in a kitchen and mix stuff together and wait for it to bake. I'm not sorry. But I am kind of jealous of people who find it comforting to cook. Only kind of jealous though like the way I'm jealous of people of who like bananas. They look really good but I don't fuckin want one.

3.) Men who are rude to women. First of all. I'm not a big fan of men in general. I don't like their macho attitudes. I don't like their superior aura. I don't dislike all men, just men who think they are better than me or anyone else. I don't like men who are overly competitive or have something to continually prove to someone.There I said it. I once put up with a lot of bullshit from a few men in my life. Years of experience with dating, divorcing, and breaking up have taught me to notice red flags in men. So I'm angry when I hear stories of women who are treated poorly by a man in their lives. It really pisses me off and it's not even my relationship. Why do I even care? I develop a sense of rage when I hear that so and so's husband or boyfriend did this or that fucked up thing to her and on at least 2 occasions my response is this: " Why didn't you throw something at his head?" I find that throwing blunt objects at the heads of men who are intentionally being verbally abusive to you helps end the relationship and set the expectation for future arguments. If you ever call me a cunt and I'm close enough to a heavy object, you should run and then consider our relationship forever over. It infuriates more than I ever let on that men do this to women. I suppose women do it to men too and it goes both ways. I just have more sympathies for my own gender. I'm not sorry.

The Truth DOES piss me off. If you don't get pissed off, how do you know when you should fight and stand up for yourself or others? Do people who are mildly upset radically change the world? It is the anger that moves through people in the form passion, injustice, and indignation.  

4.) CYA bullshit at work. I hate when groups of people think of stupid shit for other groups of people to do just so it looks good on paper or in reports. This kind of bullshit comes in all forms and I'm right in the middle of my own bullshit fest at work. I'm going to do it. I'm going to pretend I like it. But it makes me angry and it might as well be called, "bullshit we made up so it looks like we are improving. Oh, and it cost a lot of money." If you want me to do MORE work and buy into your dumbness, you'll have to pay me more, lower my class size, and otherwise do something other than give me more work to do and expect better results. There are solutions in education that are overlooked because they cost money (more teachers salaries, physical classroom space, and resources) like lowering class size by 1/3, paying teachers to work an entire work day, like 7-2 teaching and 2-5 planning, grading and consulting, or requiring all parents to take an active role in the education of the child. Right now parental involvement is strongly encouraged. Blech.

That's about it for right now. I'm eating small candy bars and life is okay.

I can be angry if I want to be. Sometimes I like how it makes me think....