two days ago, it was september 1st. i was married on september 1st, 1996. two days ago would have been my 17th wedding anniversary.
i wouldn't go back. my ex is happier where he is, and so am i, but still... there's that wistful part of me that can't help thinking about hearth and home and family, things that are scarce for me at this point in my life. that life i had was as close as i've gotten so far.
cuz i totally look like this
the concept of home is still problematic. i've been turning over options. i don't make enough at present to afford rent. sad but true. i don't. i'm looking for better work, but nothing so far.
that means that i have to find a way to make work the shit i got. thousand trails has a campground near here. it's actually occurred to me that it might be kinda fun to fix up my trailer and live out of a campground for a while. $450 something buys you a year-long camping pass in one of their "zones". you can stay at any one place for 14 days before you have to move for a week, and then you can go back again. there's one campground on the outskirts of morgan hill and another one about an hour away in paicines. anyway, that's just the working theory so far.
of course, my whatever and i are still doing well, and we've talked about what's going to happen. we don't have plans for anything to change, but of course that's no guarantee of anything.
this shit is EXACTLY why people have nightmares about these guys
completely pointless non-sequitr clown ad for, of course, whiskey.
because utter and absolute inebriation is perhaps the only environment in which a grown man can approach the mindset necessary to be capable of dressing like a clown...
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tired today. feeling like i'm fighting something AGAIN. could not get my energy going yesterday, and it feels like today is worse.
we were supposed to go fishing today, but everybody in the house is as tired as i am. my whatever has his son over, and his grandson, and everybody is tense. i think it's because my whatever can't stand to have people in his house for very long. it's weird how he's comfortable around me, frankly.
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my whatever's son, jesse, just said:
"a twinkie is one ingredient away from being plastic, and yet they're sinfully delicious when fried".
i'm not going to ask how he knows this. i'm just going to bow to his superior twinkie knowledge.
sometimes i think, this is such a great relationship. sometimes i think, my whatever and i have something worth fighting for.
other times, i can't imagine how shit is going to work out. the landlord won't let me move in with him, and after i'm kicked out as of 01/01/2013, i won't be able to stay here anymore if he's not here.
and yet, he's lived here for the last 16 years. he's not going to move. just yesterday he opened up his kitchen window, looked out and said, "i'm so glad i can see fields when i open my window, and not another apartment".
i can't ask him to move. i can't see any way forward for us after the new year.
does anyone know who this is, really? does anyone care enough to go find out?
i do. Of course i do. it's my modus operandi, my raison d'etre... i research everything. i climb the mountain because it's there. i ask the nasty question: "who the hell is this guy and why the fuck does he dress like that?"
turns out this is buckethead, aka brian patrick carroll. "he has been voted number 8 on a list in GuitarOne magazine of the "top 20 greatest guitar shredders of all time"... proof positive that you can't judge a guitarist by his/her featureless white mask and kentucky fried chicken bucket hat. sometimes people do crazy shit because they're JUST THAT GOOD.
Of course, i can't use that excuse, but hey, it does work for some people.
things are weird, as always. i sure hope there's a meaning to what i'm going through, because if all i'm doing is just spinning my wheels and wasting my time on earth, then damn, am i ever going to have words with mama goddess when i get up to the great big sustainable-permaculture-family-farm-hippy-commune in the sky.
my whatever's son is visiting - right now he, his girlfriend and his girlfriend's daughter are all out in the pool messing around.
my daughter is out with my niece calla, grandma and grandpa. they're at gilroy gardens for the day. i didn't even bother to ask to go with them, nevermind the fact that i don't get to see my daughter for more than a few hours every two weeks...
i decided that today would be a writing day. i have indeed done some writing, though mostly just of the "reading over old stuff and rewriting" kind of writing.
i desperately need to get crackin' on the rhav story, because that's the closest to being done and it's book-length, which is the next hurdle i need to get over. sell a book, dammit ericka, sell a book!
i've been given an eviction notice. it's not the end of the world, though it felt like it at the time.
oh woe is me... *looking around for tiny violin*
of course, it ain't snowing here. it just doesn't snow here. i don't have to be out until dec 31st of this year, and really, that's a good long time to have to figure shit out, but still...
right now it just doesn't seem real. i'm sure as soon as the weather starts getting cooler, it'll start to become a whole lot more real.
in the last week and some i've been living in a bad place, emotionally and spiritually. i've struggled with jealousy, rage, loneliness, and grief. i've cried. i've struggled to feel close to anyone, and pretty much failed.
i have no idea why.
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i sat alone in the living room of my whatever's house one night. he was asleep in the bedroom, and i'd closed the door so i wouldn't wake him up.
remember how i've said i'm looking for a home i've never felt i had?
i was just absolutely despondent. i was crying hard, silently, which always strikes me as kind of pathetic, and i kept saying, to myself maybe, or maybe to mama goddess, i don't know: "please, i don't want to do this anymore, please..."
a thought came to me, clear as anything, almost like a voice in my head. i saw a picture of dorothy's ruby slippers in my mind. i've always loved how they looked in the movie, all sparkling and red. i saw them sparkling in my mind, and i could hear glinda's voice saying, "but you've ALWAYS had the power to go home..."
sparklesparklesparkle...
then dorothy asked, as she always does, "but why didn't you tell me?"
glinda answered, "you never would have believed me. you had to learn it for yourself."
it hit me, i've always had the power. even at this moment, trying to write this out, i realize i don't really understand that thought yet, but i know in my gut, i've always had the power, to make a home maybe, or to stop being involved in something that makes me feel bad?
i went onto ebay and ordered a cheap necklace with a ruby slipper pendent. i'm wearing it right now, and thinking about what it is i need to do.
clearly something big is going on, but i don't understand what. gotta go get ready for work now, and think some more about this...
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another quick thought: my whatever is just a guy, you know? he's not the devil, he's not saint anybody, he's just a guy.
a lot of what i'm feeling centers around him, and it occurs to me that he hasn't changed at all. i'm the one swirling around him like a hurricane.
i can imagine, oddly, that when the chaos, smoke and horror finally die away, he's just going to be standing there same as always. he may not be my whatever anymore, but whatever's happening now, it's not about him.
it's about me.
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can't remember when i stared this entry, but it was a few weeks back, i think. i don't know why i didn't post it at the time. i haven't worn the ruby slippers necklace again, but the thought still lingers.
just for the record, i'm feeling a lot better today. not great, but at least i'm moving forward again.
cuz everybody looks this good after suffering a huge existential crisis, right?
i'm currently on the phone with the foodstamp guys, trying to get my account straightened out. yes, i know how that sounds. i do indeed suck in that i can't get a better job that pays me enough money to survive and gives me benefits, but i've been looking and applying for years, and walmart has been the best i've been able to do so far. you have a better job you want to give me, go ahead and judge me after i've turned it down. i won't, promise. try me.
my current time on hold is 22 minutes, waiting to speak to a "phone agent". you would not believe how hard it is to find anything like a real human being to talk to.
how to put my thoughts into words?
the point of this blog right now, for me, is to open my life to the fresh air. what that means, i think, is that i want to yank off the bandaid and expose all the rotten crap i've been holding on to so that it all heals up.
maybe what i'm trying to say is, if there are parts of my life i don't want to expose to the open air and to public view, i don't want those things to be part of my life? not sure. this is going to take some thinking.
i don't mean, by the way, that i'm going to bare all aspects of my personal life. i'm not going to tell the world about my sex life, except in that i have one, and it's open and honest and hopefully as abundant as possible.
i couldn't even begin to tell you whether or not this is a valid method of doing anything. at 48, i feel like i'm allowed some room to experiment. i am certainly allowed the right to make mistakes without being judged for them.
baby steps, y'all. baby steps...
ok, finally off the phone. after all that, i was 35 minutes on hold, only to be told by the lady on the phone that my case had been closed and i need to reapply.
*sigh*
went to the website, reapplied, and now i wait for them to contact me. that will probably be in about a month.
yesterday i went to santa clara valley med center to try and get my health care coverage issues worked out. it takes me $20 in gas every time i go there, round trip, because i'm driving my huge old diesel pickup. i got there, waited in line and then was told i didn't have the right paperwork. i almost started crying right there at the front desk, but then i turned around and marched myself right out again and just drove home. no point at all in raging against that particular machine. it would be like schmacking a t-rex with a rolled-up newspaper. you're not going to get anything done any faster, and the t-rex, if it noticed you at all, would just eat you alive.
accomplishing anything productive with a government agency is like trying to build the hoover dam with handfuls of damp sand out of a beach bucket. every step forward takes forever, two steps forward, one step back, two steps forward, one step back, and just when you think you've gotten something accomplished, the water surges up and washes away about half your work.
this is one of those blog entries that's taking me a few days to write...
(caveat: i'm having a really bad couple of days. take this all with a grain of salt, ok?)
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you read those cutesy sayings on facebook: you're strong, you're wonderful, you deserve to be loved...
that may be so, you may deserve to be loved but that doesn't mean you ever will be.
likewise, you might be able to convince yourself that you're strong and beautiful and wonderful, but then someone comes along and gives you the stink eye for whatever weird reason, and your doubts and insecurities rise up like the anti-christ to devour you whole.
the problem is, the whole world has an opinion on who and what you are, probably formulated on a moment's impression, and they share this opinion with you in every single interaction, every instance of body language, every time they respond to your emails or your postings on facebook or even when they're driving past you in their car and they stare too long.
the standard ego and sense of self worth is generally sufficient to the task of standing up to shallow interactions that are perceived as negative/judgmental. it's when they get closer to home, and more persistent, that the ego begins to take a beating it can't easily recover from.
should mention, my daughter lives with my ex right now. we have joint
physical and legal custody, but he has a more stable living situation, a girlfriend who lives with him who helps with the kids,
and access to better schools, as well as a better paycheck, to be
perfectly blunt. i made a really nasty decision that i frequently
regret, but she's where she should be right now and so am i, and i need
to keep reminding myself of that.
my ex lets me see my daughter only two weekends out of the month. he makes decisions about how much time he's going to let her come see me and he never questions whether or not he has the right to do this. there's nothing i can do unless i'm willing to go back to court and drag us all through the mud in front of a judge.
he didn't work for the entirety of our daughter's first 9 years. i had to carry his dead weight throughout our almost 15 years of marriage. he used me up in all possible ways, and now he tells me i'm a deadbeat, i'm lazy, i'm insane (really. he said that), and a handful of other things, all along the lines of "things are shitty for you and it's all your fault", and he's not the only one saying things like that.
sometimes it scares me, the things i can't let go of. sometimes i feel like i can't move forward because of all the crap that cements me into my past...
my daughter has said all along that she wants to live with me, and it's been really hard trying to explain to her why she needs to stay with papa. when we first separated, she was still in that little kid stage of needing to be with me, and she cried every time she had to leave.
that used to piss my ex off so much - my daughter told me he'd yell at her every time she cried. i tried explaining it to him a number of times. never took.
recently, she's been getting more independent, as she should, and she's showing that she doesn't need to be near me all the time anymore. one weekend not too long ago, she spent most of her time across the street playing and with the neighbor girl. i spent a lot of that weekend crying, missing her and yet wanting her to play with her friends.
i feel like the world is systematically stripping from me everything i love and/or care about. in my daughter's case, it's right and good that she learns how to live without me, and i'll do everything i can to encourage her to do it, and yet...
sometimes i wonder if i really belong anywhere. not talking about suicide. i'd never do that. just wondering why it feels like there's no one place in the world that will ever be mine. click on the picture for a link to a poem...
someone i know made a comment about how i'm doing things, coming right out and telling me i'm a horrible mother, and that she's seen cats that are better mothers. this person made these comments for a number of reasons, but oddly, not for the reasons you'd think. i was getting yelled at because, even though i hadn't seen my daughter for two weeks, i was expected to continue to NOT see her because i had a cold.
i don't care who you are or how secure you are, it hurts when someone says something like that. i asked her why she felt the need to be so rude, when i hadn't been rude to her. i didn't get a particularly comprehensive answer, but i didn't expect one.
it's really hard to keep your head up and keep believing you can accomplish anything significant, when most of what you hear is someone telling you how much you suck.
when i get alone and quiet, though, and i have a bit of time to let this stuff pass, i usually manage to regain my equilibrium.
thought: maybe the reason why i just can't seem to pick myself up lately is that even if mr bluebird of happiness DID desire to alight on my shoulder, he would soon be devoured by mr happy snake, who has taken up residence and is QUITE content where he is, thank you very much.
zippity doo dah, zippity yay, my oh my what a wonderful... SQUAWK!!!! ACCKKK gargle erggghhhh....
mr happy makes me peaceful. he stops and stares up at me and i swear he's giving me lovie eyes. all the snakes make feel that way. there's mr happy the ball python, stimpy the orange corn snake, and roscoe, my baby cornsnake, the one that actually belongs to me. even fatty the argentinian tegu gives me the lovie eye, and he's a cranky old dinosaur.
but honestly, it feels like that's about all the peaceful i can find in my life these days. there are good moments, of course, but they're lived in an environment of emptiness that scares me and that i'm afraid is going to eventually consume me.
yes, i am trying to get back on my antidepressants. i promise i won't do anything foolish. really.
