The Fabulous 40s!: January 2012

Well, here we are. This blog post has been a long time coming with all of the changes going on in my life.

But, before I go on, with what is going to be one hell of a long blog entry, I’ve got a question. Why do I keep calling my blog entries posts? If, from the beginning, I always intended this blog to be more of an on-line book, then shouldn’t my on-line book entries (long blog posts) be called blong entries, like my friend Rod calls them? How about blong-ass entries? Better?

Another question: How the hell am I going to wrap this thing up? Don’t misunderstand me. I have no intention of abandoning my blog once the so-called on-line book portion has concluded. You can count on me to continue to post at a snail’s pace. I just imagine my blong entries will be shorter, more post like. (Who am I kidding? I’m definitely a blonger, not a blogger.) But this brings me to my point. Life—more specifically my non-fiction life—isn’t like a fiction book (on-line or otherwise). Ultimately, I don’t get to decide what happens. None of us do. That’s life.

Sure, our decisions and choices may alter the trajectory of our life. That’s cause and effect 101. But, we cannot manipulate happenstance. That’s entry-level learning to surrender. Or, in my case, that’s rinse and repeat until you get that resistance retard out. So, if I’m fresh out of creative control when it comes to concocting a tidy conclusion for the part of my life that has evolved during the course of what I’m considering the on-line-book portion of my blog, then, once again, how the hell am I going to wrap this thing up? I can no more align the circumstances that unfold in my life than you can decide on or against the doozies that come up in yours. Therefore, I’m at a loss when it comes to culminating a series of posts that would suffice as a conclusion to this on-line book.

Nevertheless, try as I might to control the uncontrollable, and continue to fail as I obviously will, if I can’t get my life to go exactly as I’m trying to create, I am hopeful that at the very least I will get some of my perspective back and that I will finally learn to surrender to the journey more and resist against the process less. Still, I can’t help but wonder if there will be a natural outcome, some sort of closure, befitting of how this blog started almost two years ago, with me inspired, unabashedly hopeful (for every possible outcome), and even wondering if love would find me.

About eight months have passed since the great meltdown of 2011. That’s what I’m calling my reaction to my dad’s quadruple bypass and to the stress of working for two back-to-back power-hungry, energy-sucking bosses for almost three years. If you’ve got another description for me, other than meltdown, one which more adequately describes my decision to quit my job the day after my father was taken off of his breathing tube, and then, consequently, decide to move to Colorado because I was afraid my own life/job stress would result in me having a heart attack, then let’s have it. Because, even though I’d had some of my friends tell me that I was brave for daring to re-arrange my entire life by moving to another state, in hindsight “brave” is not exactly the word I’d choose right now.

Can I get another vote for insane? You’d have to be a little bit batty or feeling a lot pushed into a corner by your life to leap so far and to not consider the consequential after math. What did my frisky life leap get me? Initially, more shit to meltdown over. But, most of the melting is over and I can now write it all down because I finally feel like I might be getting my sense of humor back.

I realize that I have so much less to grumble about in life than most. In the scheme of it all, I’m blessed. After all, I didn’t just quit my job. I walked off the job just before lunch and didn’t really tell them I wasn’t coming back. But, fortunately, because I do have the kind of friends who will open up their home to a girl gone crazy I was able to move in with one of my best friends, Jen. Then, when I realized I might have made a mistake, that I am not a Colorado girl after all, one of my other best friends, Samantha, and her husband, Gary, and their two kids, Bethany and Julian, and their two dogs, Cookie and Freo, and their cat, Twitch, and their turtle, Ed, opened up their home to me.

How lucky am I? I not only had one of my best friends offer me an exit plan when the only plan my crazy had was to stop crying all the time because I wasn’t happy with how my life was going. When my tears had started to dry, and when I was ready to get back to the business of being the real me again, Samantha and Gary provided me with a return plan and offered me their converted-garage guest room as a stepping stone to getting my finances and my shit back together.

Yeah, walking off the job can fuck you up financially. Crazy doesn’t pay. Well, it does and it doesn’t. It depends on if you’re asking the state of California or one of the state’s judges. (We’ll get to that.)

Did I mention that the guest room I stayed in at Samantha and Gary’s home, from early July to the first day in October, didn’t have a bathroom, just a small portable potty, like the kind you’d take camping? Shit. Now it sounds like I’m complaining again. I’m not. I am merely sharing that no matter how much one appreciates the blessings in their life, one should never take for granted just how much of a luxury a flushing toilet is. This I so get and will never forget every time I flush.

Because when you have to pee at 3:00 am, and you have a choice to make: (1) walk from the converted-garage guestroom to the main house, in a half-asleep state, across approximately 40 feet of backyard grass and pavement and attempt to avoid the gifts on the green which Samantha and Gary’s dogs, Cookie and Freo, have left behind right outside of your door, or (2) contribute to filling up your own pee and tissue into the available portable potty—which you’ll inevitably be emptying every other day, it’s easy to learn to be grateful for the little things in one’s every-day life like indoor plumbing.

What a beautiful thing it is to be able to stumble into your own bathroom where a porcelain thrown and a magic chrome-covered handle await you and will flush all of your business away. Ah, perspective.

Until I had my melt down, I never thought about how lucky I’ve been to have lived a single life where I’ve been able to afford rent on a place of my own, a place where it’s always been possible to leave the bathroom door wide-open while taking a crap in the early am. There have never been any little girls silently lurking around bathroom-door corners who suddenly appear and ask, “Aunt, Lev? Are you pooping?” Not having to empty out my own pee into another toilet every other day for about three months, that’s also not something I ever would have considered I’d appreciate not having to do.

Again, if it sounds like I am slamming the offering of Samantha and Gary’s guestroom, it’s quite the contrary. In fact, it was living with Samantha and Gary, and their beautifully raised and well-mannered children, and, before that, living with Jen and her precious little girls, which has made me realize, Now more than ever, that with everything that has been going on with my life, if it wasn’t for my friends, for the beautiful family I have, I might have already broken in half.

Nah. Fuck breaking in half. I might have broken into a million pieces that wouldn’t have gone back together.

However, because of my friends, and because of the shoulders, ears, and places to stay they’ve lent me, I’ve only occasionally broken off into smaller bite-sized awkward pieces. Too bad many of the disagreeable fragments that have chipped off have been inadvertently reserved for an unsuspecting public.

You know you’re crazy is showing when the expression on the post-office attendant’s face says, “Um, hun? Could I get you a Xanax? You’re starting to drip in front of me.”

Damn it! My brain fought against Ms. Post Office’s pointed and concerned attention. I’d thought I’d been swift enough to pull my sunglasses down over the puddles starting to pool in the corners of my eyes before this stranger could see the emotional hit I wanted to hide. Too late, m mess was up and out. Lookie, lookie we have a loony loose.

Poor Ms. Post, she had no way of knowing I’d reached a point of emotional exhaustion that day and that when she, a slight presence of a woman with dark, curly hair, and warm brown eyes, asked me, “Are you okay?” I wasn’t. (Nothing says life has stacked up on you like oozing out a mildly hysterical chunk in front of a complete stranger.)

Even though I was ecstatic to be back in California, the repercussion of my emotional melting was also up and out. Having just gotten back from visiting my father before he was to start his chemo, and being consumed with worry for his health, and likewise concerned about my mother’s wellbeing, the stress in my life was wearing me down. I’d also been worried about trying to find a new job and a new place to live before I outstayed my welcome at Samantha and Gary’s home.

It didn’t matter that they’d kept telling me, “We love having you. Our home is your home. Take as long as you need.” No matter how comfortable they’d made me feel, there was no way I could begin to explain to them how displaced, how homeless, I’ve felt for most of my life.

While Sam and Gary opened up their home to me, their home wasn’t my home. Jen’s home wasn’t my home. The bat-cave condo wasn’t my home. I never even felt at home while living in any of the houses I grew up in. Oddly, as a child, I always felt those houses were my parents’ home; not mine. I’d thought, I’ll get my home when I move out, when I get married, which may explain why I’ve had a sense of homelessness for a very long time.

I doubt that I’m ever getting married, which means that if I keep going at my current salary grade, it’s very likely that I won’t be able to afford a home that’s truly mine and I will probably have to keep renting an apartment which for me means I am at the mercy of others. Ava always tells me that you have to make wherever you are living your home. She’s right. Except, while I know how to do homey, and definitely know how to make my surroundings comfortable, I have never known how to do being at home.

Did I tell you this story already? When I was 19 years old and living in South Lake Tahoe, my roommate and I went out clubbing at the casinos one night. Later, we ended up at an after-hours party in a luxury hotel suite. As the party hopped inside, I was outside, standing on the roof-top balcony, smoking my cigarette, wanting to be social but also needing my space from the crowd (story of my life). Some guy joined me on the balcony and started playing twenty questions. “Are you having fun? What’s your name? What do you do? Where are you from; where’s home?”

“I don’t know where home is,” I said, and then turned away from him so that he couldn’t see my face. His question had hit me hard. I’d started to tear up. It was a defining moment. As young as I was, my inability to answer where home was triggered something in my deep knowing. In that moment I understood that the definition of home meant something different to me. Finding home would be more of a battle for me in life than it would be for most.

Balcony guy thought I was a military brat or something, that I’d moved around a lot and that’s why I didn’t know where home was, so he asked, “Well, where are you from, then? Where’s your home town?”

“Where I’m from is not my home,” I told him, then tamped out my cigarette and rejoined the party to get away from his probing questions.

When I went to sleep later than night, I asked myself, what does home mean to you? Why where you so unsettled by his question? The best I could answer myself is that home is a sense of safety. To most, that means being surrounded by four walls and having a roof over one’s head. To me, it means being protected and feeling comfortable.

Unfortunately, when you are as independent as I am, and have always been somewhat independent, even as a little girl, you don’t always know how to let others protect you or give you the comfort you need. You’re always trying to make sure you can do everything on your own, just in case you are the only one you can rely on. We’re all a little that way, regardless of whether it’s the result of some childhood trauma or we’ve simply learned to buy into the independence American society is built upon.

I don’t know when this independence of mine started. Once my mother told me a story about how I’d gotten sick in the middle of the night and had thrown up all over my bedding, but instead of waking anyone up for help, I put all of my sheets into the washing machine and then went back to sleep on my naked mattress. Since I have no recollection of this happening, I am assuming my independence started pretty young.

What’s not hard to assume is how much my need for independence has affected every aspect of my life. If I feel threatened by someone or by a situation, it threatens my independence. It’s a reminder that someone else has control, and, as you can see, by the way I react to bad bosses and to stress, I don’t do well when the controlling power is an abusive power.

My independence is the reason that my old home, the one that I lived in for almost 14 years, is the only home I have ever known. I moved into that place when I got my first lay off, back in 1997. I was able to make the rent on that place while living off of student loans and getting a college degree. That place, because it afforded me independence in the worst of times, eventually turned into a home. That place got me through three more layoffs. I had lived there longer than I have lived anywhere.

Then, I felt pushed out of my home by the butthead neighbors. (Detecting a little continued PTSD?) It’s now taken me the last year and a half of being so uprooted to realize that the only reason I felt so at home there was because I’d been there long enough to allow myself to focus on balancing the home in my heart, which is where home is supposed to start.

Man, it’s crazy, though, when you realize how fragile we are as humans. The lessons we need to learn are so simple, but we’re so attached to the tangible that it’s nearly impossible for us to absorb the real truth if it’s not something we can reach out and touch.

My surroundings at my old place had been such a constant for so long. I think that’s what afforded me a tangible anchor, a physical sense of safety, of home, which in turn allowed me to realign my focus inward, towards the intangible and towards working on finding that spiritual sense of home within.

Going without the protection of one of the only anchors I’ve ever known, I’ve been floundering ever since. Obviously. After all, since my first 9-5 job resulted in a layoff, without even knowing there would be three more layoffs to come, it’s not like I ever viewed any job as being safe or secure.

I get that all of this uprooting and change (both the change of my making and those changes dealt via life’s hand) are part of life’s tests. Tests designed to bring me to a higher level of inner home/consciousness, where my heart’s song redefines what home means. But, so far, I feel like I’ve gotten an ‘F’ on every pop quiz. I also feel like telling the teacher, “You can shove your mid-term up your—”

What I guess I’m trying to say is that I don’t care how evolved a person means to become. There is something to be said for recognizing, and admitting, that along the way that you are human. With being human comes the understanding that we all crave control of the perceived tangible. We are all caught in the illusion of our human dream. We want to soar and be free of our fears, yet we’re tethered by our needs for stability, in both our surroundings and in who surrounds us.

We need home. We need a safety that feels like it’s ours. We need a job we can count on. We need people in our lives who love us and who we can trust.

Hopefully, if we have these things, we began to realize and accept that the life we’ve planned is rarely the life we’re living and we can be more open to finding the courage it takes to surrender to the process of the unplanned journey. At the very least, it would be nice if we could find a way to be a little less hard on ourselves when we feel like we’ve failed another one of life’s pop quizzes. After all, our teacher, life, has never, and will never, grade us as harshly as we grade ourselves.

Sometimes, though, even when we have everyone and everything we need, we still find ourselves amazed at how much we’re adversely affected by the words and actions of others. That just goes to show you how powerful we all are, how much influence we have on each other, and how careful we need to be when it comes minding our own imbalances and insecurities. Our words and actions matter.

If we’re not paying attention, someone else may find that we’ve become quit adept at projecting the pain we’ve experienced onto them and have been unconsciously feeding off of their imbalance so that we can steel their power in order to replace the power we lost so long ago. Not that I’m talking about any bosses I’ve worked for or anything. And I’m definitely not admitting that you’d have to be in a state of imbalance in the first place in order for someone else to knock you further off your kilter because no one can take your power. You have to give it up, even if you’ve relinquished it unconsciously. Why and when we’ve begun to give up our power is a question we all need to ask ourselves.

While we’re looking for that answer, it might be useful to understand that life doesn’t have to look how one thinks it is supposed to look. The journey is the imperfect perfection.

Still trying to suck that one up? Me, too. I’m fucking struggling. I’m still tired.

I no longer want the choices I make or the circumstances life hands me to contribute to an imbalance that creates a sense of homelessness in my heart. I want to learn to embrace the intangible better. (I’m going to put that desire right up there with wanting to get better at meditating.) I no longer want the plans I’ve had in my heart for my life to be so different in comparison to the life that I’ve been living that the disparity between the two makes me feel disconnected enough from myself that I’m prone to leaking in front of strangers.

Okay, so it’s been months since my crazy has opened up a can of cry in front of someone I don’t know. Lie alert. I accidentally leaked, just a wee bit, the other day when I went to buy a green food supplement. There I was, just asking the Living Temple store owner if he could tell me which supplement was best, when he asked me if I needed— No, told me that I needed a hug. He said he could read my energy. In horror, I asked, “It’s not bad, is it, my energy?”

“NO. No,” he said, assuring me and smiling his totally balanced-being grin. “You’re energy is good. It’s just stressed. Very stressed. I can tell. You need more hugs in life. 10 hugs a day. That’s what I prescribe.”

That’s when, feeling found out, my damn eyeballs seeped. My independence wanted to run. Screw you, asshole. I don’t need this shit. Then my interdependence slowed me down. Well, okay there, Mr. Living Temple dude. Thanks for peering into my unprepared soul, but can I just get my green-food supplement and go now before you tell me what color my bra is? You see, I’d like to stay and curl up in your balance, but your amazing force of random, positive energy caring unto me is making me feel a little exposed. I don’t know how to handle it.

Plus, I’ve been single for about two years now and mostly single for a lot longer before that. Therefore, the majority of my human contact consists of the people I just started working with and I’m not about to start asking them for hugs. People will talk. So thanks for the Rx, dude, but if you could just find me a new lover than might make it easier.

How much did I hate the fact that Mr. Living Temple could see that the fragility of my humanity has been more raw than most for a quite a while? Not much. My independence would have preferred a hot poker to the gut.

It seems to me that we are all just one trick of fate away, in a series of circumstantial events, from losing it in front of Ms. Post or from tearing up in front of Mr. Living Temple. Then again, I got the feeling that Mr. Living Temple is tapped into the pulse of most people and could probably get a rock to emote. His caring energy was that strong.

But, Ms. Post? She wasn’t privy to the series of stacked events which had brought me to her post-office counter that day in order to mail off a plea which would decide the fate of my financial welfare. She didn’t know I was in a tiff with one of California’s unemployment judges who had sided with my previous employer after California had given me the go-ahead on unemployment benefits.

Now I want to know something, California. Was the preliminary phone interview you held for me, which resulted in me being awarded unemployment benefits, not ultimately enough to satisfy your appeals judge? I thought you and I were clear, that you understood and agreed that I had good reason to quit my job. Based on the benefits you awarded me, you seemed to concur that my work environment was hostile and that I was being assigned work that was outside of my position scope and my job duties per my union job description.

Side Note: We’ve covered this. Even if the state of California didn’t get it, in what universe am I the girl who is hired to understand the logistics of accounting principles as related to the underlying code behind an accounting software designed to reconfigure multiple accounting data scenarios? (Right?)

In the interest of current and continued anonymity, I know I have never exactly defined what I do for a living. Until I am actually getting paid to write about my crazy, it wouldn’t be personally or professionally prudent to disclose any details which may reveal my identity, but come on. If you had your pick between me being a software developer/accounting decoding data smarty pants kind of a gal or a creative communicator type chick, who do you honestly think I am? Is there a point in continuing?

What’s up, California? Were you mad at me for leaving for a spell? Should I have not waited until my previous employer appealed my unemployment benefits to tell you about the forced birthday luncheon where the VP called all of us subordinates piglets because we didn’t agree to share a birthday meal with the VP? Was I wrong to initially leave out that offence? What about when the VP, during the same birthday luncheon, bullied a table full of people into drinking alcoholic beverages during working hours so that the VP wouldn’t have to drink alone? Should I have also told you about that before? Did I screw up?

(What’s sad is that never before in my life have I ever been offered a drink and didn’t feel comfortable enough to accept.)

I have another question, California, and maybe I’m just whining, but was it right for me to be verbally berated, where an entire office could hear the VP yelling at me (at a top of the lungs/belittling speed), for what was clearly another higher-up’s mistake? California, I know your EED representative and I didn’t discuss that incident expressly during my benefits award phone interview, nor did we go into the acute and stressful details of each offence which created a hostile work environment, but I thought we had a general understanding, that I was only one, among many, who had grievances against the management/division I’d worked for—the only difference being that I was one of the few who hadn’t formally filed any grievances with the union.

So why did you let me down, California? I just want to let this all go and leave it behind me. Why do you think it took me so long to write this blong? I don’t want to live in my past. Yet, because you justifiably awarded me unemployment benefits, but then scheduled my benefits appeal hearing three days after I started my new job, and I didn’t want to jeopardize my standing with my new employer, so I chose to appear by written declaration rather than appear in person, one of your appointed judges decided that it was my previous employer’s word against my written declaration and you took those benefits away?

Well, you showed me Cali, didn’t you? I get it. I’ll tell everyone. If your unemployment insurance is ever appealed by your previous employer, and you receive a court date, even if the day you are supposed to appear in court is right after you’ve started a new job, work it out.

Create an emergency. Get creative. Just be there.

Because if you’re a fricken idiot, like I apparently am, and appear by written declaration, any representative from your previous employer who shows up can contradict anything you’ve written in your declaration (even if they’re full of utter shit). Then, the six stressful hours you spent, after spending three days of doing research into your own previously painful experience, putting that written declaration together, will have been wasted.

And, you’ll find yourself standing in front of Ms. Post. You’ll be wondering how you’re going to come up with the $4,500.00 worth of benefits that you’d lived off of for 4 months, which is the amount California expects you to pay back right the fuck away. Also, since you are really more worried about whether or not your dad’s chemo is going to work, and whether or not he’s going to die and leave your mother behind, and you are also mildly consumed with wondering if you’ll find a new job and a new place to live before the holidays hit (which is when job and/or apartment hunting becomes almost impossible), you’ll likely leek a bit as you hand Ms. Post your appeal to the judge’s decision which you’re asking Ms. Post to send off via certified mail.

Oh, one more thing, California. Between filing an appeal to the initial appeal, then appealing the appeal that was denied, and then filing for the financial hardship so as not to have to pay the benefit money back in one lump sum, and then appealing that appeal, which was denied, or was it the appeal for the—? Well, you get it, Cali. You’ve confused the crap out of me and I’ve been finding it pretty frustrating that when I get something from you I not only have no more than 20 days, and often only 10 days, to get back to you, should I have any questions for you I am forced to listen to 40 seconds of a pre-recorded message before an automated voice informs me that all of the lines are busy and I need to hang up and try my call again later.

Also, way to go on how you’ve trained many of your staff. I’m scrambling to get a hold of you during my lunch, and sneaking calls on my breaks, an/or before and after work, and it only takes me approximately 30 dialing attempts and at least 40 minutes to get through to an impressively impenetrable operator who displays very little concern for the fact that I am freaking out about money and deadlines and now, because I am at work, or on my lunch, I only have two minutes to talk. Thank you, California.

F’ GEEZE! It’s no wonder there is a history of heart disease in my family. My people are an anxiety people who honestly don’t know how to handle stress.

Unfortunately, no one is more aware of this fact than Samantha’s husband Gary. Wonderful, sweet, logical Gary, who wants to fix, and can fix, most everything. Except me. When I got back to Samantha and Gary’s home that day from the post office, I was F’n FRAZZLED!

As I walked through the door, I was not expecting to see anyone already home from work. But Gary had taken the early train. He was standing in the kitchen making a snack. With a broad grin across his face, cheerfully he said, “Hi. How was your day?”

First the leaking started, as I answered, “I just got back from the post office.” Then the short, choked breaths moved in as I pushed out, “I don’t have the money to pay them back in 10 days.” Stilted speech followed as I began to gasp for air. I couldn’t catch my breath as I told Gary, “I was thinking about my dad when I crossed traffic lanes without signaling.” Without pausing, I went on to say, “I cut someone off. I almost got in a car accident.” Then, I tried to exhale out a big sigh so that I could continue on more coherently. Instead, I only managed to suck in deeper and deeper breaths between each word. I couldn’t find a way to exhale. My airway felt constricted. I became more and more light headed.

Having Gary witness my convulsive efforts to breath mortified me. Gary didn’t ask me, “Are you okay?” He knew I wasn’t. “Just take a breath. Breath,” he said, hoping whatever was happening to me would stop. Even in the midst of what is now I’m considering the third full-blown panic attack that I’ve had in the last year and a half, I could read the expression that Gary was unaware had registered across his face.

Inherent in a man’s nature is the desire fix the situation. The look of horror on Gary’s face proved that beyond giving me instructions on how to do something that should have come naturally, breathing, he was at a loss. Wanting at least one of us to find relief in an uncomfortable moment where my sanity was tipping more than sideways, I did what I’m good at. I lied.

As the heat of my emotion and embarrassment flushed my face red, I said, “I’m fine. No, really. I’m fine.” Then, I scurried out of the kitchen and made my way across the green to find sanctuary in the converted-garage guest room. And I hoped, like hell, that I wouldn’t need to take a shit for the rest of the night. I had no desire to scuttle back across the green only to find the rest of the household in full swing awaiting the second coming of the embarrassment I felt for hyperventilating over the little and the BIG of my life.

As I lay there in the guest room on a borrowed bed surrounded by only a select few of my belongings, some of my bathroom toiletries stored in a couple of plastic tubs, and some of my clothes hung on Samantha’s treadmill and the rest of them folded not-so-neatly inside of two suitcases, I stared at the feather and pinecone bird that my dad had made and had given me during our last visit.

This funky-ass bird, with it’s googly eyes, looked ridiculous hanging next to a picture of Samantha and me wearing lobster hats at a lobster festival which had taken place over five years ago. Beginning to laugh through my chocked sobs I thought: Lookie, lookie we have a loony loose. Gary thinking that I’m a freak is the last of my worries.

My self-deprecating humor wasn’t enough to stop my tears from continuing to erupt, but it was enough to get me back on track with starting to breathe more normally. As I started to wonder whether or not minor and/or major panic attacks were now a part of my new emotional landscape, I reminded myself that everything is temporary, no matter what it is, and there is always something to be grateful for.

Again and again I told myself: I’ve got amazing friends and a great family. I’ll find a job. I’ll find a new place to live. My dad will be okay. Who cares if countless strangers, everyone from the EED staff, to various Kinko’s workers, many post-office attendants, and a host of bank employees have all had their peek at my private affairs? So what if they all know that I am in an unemployment case with the state of California and also have the low down on my financial not worth? My vital data (social security number, etc.) is safe with them, right? What’s a little information between friends?

A couple of days after I dropped my basket in front of Gary, I was back at Kinko’s again, my new home office, but this time it was not for EED business. My efforts to meet my quota of applying to three job postings a day had paid off. I was trying to secure a new position printing out an offer letter. But, unfortunately, due to some known glitch, my Kinko’s friend told me there was a problem in connecting to Yahoo email accounts, so I wouldn’t be able to retrieve the offer letter which the HR representative gave me 72 hours to respond to. No problem. All my new friends at Kinko’s already knew all of my business, so why shouldn’t they, along with Gary, also know what my new annual salary would be?

Grumbling aside, it was nice that Gary was willing to use my Yahoo password to access my email account in order for him to use his resources at his work to print out my offer letter and then fax it to me at my Kinko’s office. It was a character building experience hanging out with all of my new Kinko’s office friends while I was on and off the phone with Gary waiting to see when one of my friends would confirm receipt of Gary’s fax so I could then sign my offer letter, give it back to another friend, fax it off to the HR rep, and also do another round of phone confirmation with the HR rep while I waited to see if “they got it.”

Don’t you get it? Any time it’s necessary to involve at least three other parties and you must give up the privacy of your affairs in order to accomplish a task that would normally take twenties minutes, but, by way of Murphy’s law, gets extended to two and a half hours and threatens the precarious nature of your need for independence, you are now a better person for it.

(Convinced? Me neither.)

It’s also character building when you undergo three interviews totaling over five hours over the course of almost a month in order to get a job that will help you barely make the rent on your new apartment and also struggle to meet your other monthly expenses.

Don’t worry. I’ll do it for you. I’ll say it if you’re thinking it: SHUT THE FUCK UP! You have got a job when so many people don’t have one right now. Quit complaining.

Yes. I am fortunate. I have worked for more than 10 years in my industry which means I have enough experience to be impressive sometimes and other times be just as much of a hack as the rest of us getting by and therefore have been lucky enough to get more than one job to complain about. But, that’s the point.

Finding work during this economy is difficult. This I know. Does that mean that if we are among the lucky-to-be-working we should just be happy because we’ve got an income? Should we give up on our personal and professional passions? Are we supposed to yield to a bad boss/company who might be using the current economic climate as an excuse to take advantage of people? Is it wrong for us to want more?

My answer is NO.

Maybe it’s just the influence of the Eckhart Toll I’ve read, or maybe, even while I’ve been coming to terms with the fact that I’m less capable of handling stress than most, I still get the bigger picture. This may be my little blog, my own little experience, and my account of last year’s meltdown, but I am one among many sharing this universal challenge.

The Universe has a message. Are we listening yet? Are we getting that we’re being asked to rearrange our priorities on a mass level? Are we not being reminded that we’re in this together? Is this economy not our generation’s spiritual wakeup call?

What’s important to you? What are you afraid of? What’s holding you back? What do you really want?

Don’t hide. I’ve shown you my crazy. Show me yours. Ask yourself, What’s my cracked? Where do I break and then come out passion screaming?

Let’s try it again. What do you want but aren’t going after? What scares you enough that you won’t even admit it to your friends, to your family? What is it that you should you be confiding in them about just as much as they need to confide in you about something? What are the voices in your head that are screaming at you to leap towards your forward movement? Don’t lie to yourself. We’ve all got those voices.

We’re all fighting at least one demon—consciously or not. If we weren’t, shit wouldn’t bother us. We wouldn’t worry about money. Work wouldn’t be a problem for any of us; it would be our pleasure, our passion, and our play. We’d schedule more time for play.

Imbalanced people wouldn’t get the better of us. We’d be a better us for them so we could be their example by our living. We’d be living our moments, our words, and our actions with more integrity. That would be our way of life.

Food wouldn’t be an issue. We wouldn’t feel guilty about the comfort we’re eating in order to forget the discomfort we’re drowning out. Eating would be our social pleasure and our singular sustenance instead of an individual battle.

Alcohol would only be an occasion. Nicotine wouldn’t be an addiction. Recreational or prescription drugs wouldn’t be a problem.

We’d be in more constant touch with our spirituality/personal religion. We wouldn’t have a bone to pick with our past or a fret to pick with our future. Nothing about our family would test our strength. We wouldn’t question the mate we’ve chosen, or the mate we’ve not yet met.

We wouldn’t question our mortality, or anything that reminds of how frail we are. We’d all dream better and sleep like babies, instead of trying to pull the blankets over the day we’ve had and forget the bad dreams that are keeping us awake at night.

There wouldn’t be something that we’re hiding from most of the people we know. Mostly, if we weren’t fighting at least one demon, exposing ourselves would feel more like a relief than a fear-based hurdle.

Now, let me ask you this. Did you cringe, if only a bit, at one of the questions I just asked in the previous paragraphs? Was there something there, even if just a little, that fits your crazy?

Of course you found something to flinch at. I’m not a fricken genius. Far from it. I’m just getting more in touch with my human than I’ve been in a long time. That’s why I’m feeling a little freer with my crazy. The least I can do is help you get in touch with yours. You’re welcome.

(I know. What a Bitch.)

If you recall, when I started this blog, my biggest fear was that I’d be found out. That’s still my fear, but not in the way you might think.

I know I still have to play by the rules. I can’t take my crazy out to dinner with me, nor can I put my batty in a pair of jeans on casual Fridays at work. (My crazy never did look good in leggings.) But the great thing is; I now get that we’re all hiding from our humanity.

There is no one amongst us who doesn’t fear how difficult it is to face the day-to-day insanity that we all deal with. We all wonder whether or not our kook-to-the-loo looks more lopsided than someone else’s jacked-to-the-whack.

What else have I learned from the last twenty or so months? My need for independence, in the long run, is probably not serving me well. I’ve also learned that sometimes you have to put a bra on to take the garbage out. Sorry. I wasn’t trying to be profound. It’s just that in my new neighborhood the trashcans are in the alleyway and there are a couple of different neighbors of the dude persuasion who hang out in their garages along the alley. Maybe I’ve got it wrong, but usually no girl wants to give up a free view of her tits without reasonable cajoling.

Second garbage rule? Buy a shredder, babe. If, at least every two hours, you can hear people riffling through the alley dumpsters for recyclables, etc., than it might be a good idea if you learn to dispose of your sensitive trash more properly. God forbid a recycler gets a hold of your thyroid medication.

I’ve also learned that there are better alternatives to showing one’s gratitude than almost killing your friends’ cat, Twitch. Yes, nothing says, “Hey friends, Samantha, Gary, thanks for letting me stay with you while I figure out how to put my life back together. Incidentally, do you mind if I step on your cat’s tail and just keep that tail under my foot without budging because I am too tone deaf to hear your cat me-grrr-ow-ling at me to get the OUCH off?

You don’t think Sam and Gary minded, do you? Twitch is not only just as vertigo ridden as I am, he’s half blind. Plus, he’s what, almost 92 in cat years? Sam and Gary were totally aware of the fact that Twitch, with his slow-moving and warbling cat thing, and me, with my didn’t-fucking-see-Twitch-under-foot-half-the-friggen time thing, couldn’t seem to get out of each other’s way.

Me tripping over Twitch daily still fails in comparison to building a bomb in Sam and Gary’s kitchen. Look, I was just trying to do my part. When you’re the girl without a job living rent-free, doing your friends’ dishes and laundry, without them asking you to, is the least you can do.

Little did I know that when I tried to use my regular stain-removing mix, a ½ of a cup of rubbing alcohol and a ½ of a cup of white vinegar, in order to get the pink out of their previously off-white bed sheet, which got stained from a mystery item in the wash (I never did find the damn red culprit), it was a potentially lethal combination if I were to add bleach to that mix, which I did. Sonuva! The pink in the sheet wasn’t budgeting after two washes. That’s where the bleach came in.

Less did I know that adding bleach would cause a toxic gas to be emitted from the washing machine which would them permeate the entire house. When the always knowledgeable Gary informed me that the combination of fumes I’d constructed could be deadly when inhaled, and that I was only one lit match away from building a combustible gas, it really was news to me, but it did explain why my throat burned, why I felt lightheaded, and why I wasn’t the only one who’s eyes were tearing up from the fumes.

Honestly, it wasn’t my intention for us all to have to open up every door and window and put fans in every room so that we could circulate out the deadly fumes. I wasn’t trying to kill anyone. I was only trying to do a little laundry.

I think the almost making a bomb incident made me even hungrier to get back into a place of my own. I figured, if I’m going to blow something up, shouldn’t it be mine to obliterate? My need to get to my independence back is probably why it didn’t seem to matter that the property management company for my prospective new place was located in one of the worst downtown areas of my city. The place itself, that I wanted to rent, was located in a safe area close to my old neighborhood not so far from the beach.

After Samantha and I had walked through the front door of my prospective new place, I could see that sunlight filled every corner of the living room, the kitchen, and the bedroom. I could also see that the place was big enough for all of my belongings, which is rare for places near the beach which have decent rent.

I wanted the place. The property management told me that I had two hours before they would be closing and if I wanted to be considered first on the list, I would need to have all of my paperwork turned in that day. So, Sam and I drove a half of an hour back to her house for me to get a copy of the only pay stub from work that I’d received which the property management told me was required as proof of employment. Hearing that Sam and I intended to go to lunch at my favorite Lebanese crack chicken place after all the apartment application paperwork was signed, Bethany was eager to join us on our return trip to the rental office.

As we all stood at the rental-office counter, waiting for the slow moving older lady with the thick glasses and the bad attitude to give me the rest of the forms I was required to complete, Sam was preoccupied with the policeman who was also waiting at the counter. Mr. Law had informed the younger Rosie Perez look-alike working behind the counter that he needed one of the tenant’s apartment keys so he could do a dead check.

Okay, the policeman didn’t exactly say, “I gotta do a dead check.” But I’ve watched enough television to know that if a policeman says, “Neighbors are reporting they haven’t seen or heard from Mr. So-and-so for weeks. There’s no noise coming from his apartment but they insist he’s home,” and, if Mr. So-and-so lives in a neighborhood where hookers, drugs, and crime are the usual, then they’re probably doing a dead check. I’m just saying.

Trying to lighten the mood, the policeman turned to me and said, “It was you. Wasn’t it?” I asked the policemen, “How’d you know? I thought I looked so innocent.”

Once the policeman smiled, and flirtatiously replied, “No. I thought you looked pretty guilty,” the hooker outside, who was on her cellular phone and was cussing someone out at the top of her lungs as she paced frantically back and forth in front of the rental office’s front door, no longer held 13 year old Bethany’s attention. Bethany now wanted to know, “Why does that policeman want to get into someone’s apartment?” Sam and I exchanged a look. We’d decided it was best not to indulge Bethany’s intrigue on that one.

Minutes later, when we got back into my car to head to lunch, I worried about whether or not I’d get the place. I also worried about how much I wasn’t looking forward to going downtown once a month to pay my rent. Samantha, the eternal optimist, said, “You’ll get the place. You’ll be fine.”

Maybe I’d be better than fine. The reality is, when I am not at work, if I don’t have plans with friends, I spend most of my time alone, and so I could probably use some new friends to hang out with. I bet me and some of my Kinko’s friends and some of the downtown hookers would have a blast going to see a Disney movie together. We could get the cop to be our designated driver and not tell him we’re going to smuggle in our own libations? Cha-ching!

Samantha was right, two days later I received the call. I’d gotten the place. But, before they’d give me the keys, there was more paperwork which required my signature. Paperwork which included a bed-bug waiver. That didn’t creep me out at all.

I’m used to signing mold notification forms and asbestos warnings. Those are par for the Long Beach apartment renting course, but bed bugs? Do you mean to tell me that you’ve had enough outbreaks in your apartment buildings that you now have a form your tenants are required to sign which states that they will comply with your bed bug removal procedures? Excuse me? Am I supposed to feel better once you tell me the story of how your Bed Bug Addendum became a standardized form in your property management’s Residential Rental Agreement? What’s that you say? A disgruntled renter dragged a bed-bug-infested mattress back into the apartment they’d moved out of as a retaliatory measure?

Thanks for telling me that. I feel better already. I’ll sleep as snug as a bug in a rug in my new place.

Fuck it! Trudge forward, girl. You need your independence back.

The lesson I had no idea I would be learning is that just when you think you’ve had enough, when you are starting to question if you can handle any more, more might still be coming.

I took possession of the keys to my new apartment, my new home and my new hoped for sense of safety, on a Wednesday. The following Thursday after work I took some of my clothes over to my new place. The next Friday night after work, I took some more clothes over. That’s when, on that Friday evening, the night before I was going to move all of my stuff out of storage and into my new comfort zone, I saw that someone had broken into my apartment.

I’m sorry. Now I’m just being dramatic. If there is no sign of forced entry then it is not called breaking and entering, is it? What does it matter if the night before I’m supposed to move into my new place I found my front door wide open?

Maybe it was me. Maybe I left the door open when I’d dropped some of my stuff off. No. It wasn’t me.

I specifically remember making sure I’d locked the door. I’d even futzed with the deadbolt. After I locked it, I pushed on the door and pushed again, to make certain that the door was secure before I locked the bottom doorknob lock. I even remember being satisfied that the deadbolt was locked, and thinking, I’m going to have to get used to this deadbolt. It turns a different way than the doorknob lock does.

So, after having locked both of the locks and after having checked and rechecked that both of them were secure, and after having pushed on the front door once more, I was satisfied that I could walk away.

But I was bothered that I’d been so paranoid. What’s wrong with me? I wondered. You’ll be back tomorrow. What’s going to happen in one day?

In one day I’d come back to a front door which was wide open, yet the bottom doorknob was locked and the deadbolt was undone. No worries. I’m sure it was just the wind that blew my door open. The weird feeling my intuition had the night before when I was dropping off my cloths was probably nothing.

The uneasiness I felt while I was signing the rest of the Residential Rental Agreement forms couldn’t have been my intuition, could it have? But wouldn’t anyone feel on edge if they noticed all the motley minimum wage workers passing each other in the hallways? Wouldn’t they also wonder how many of those workers had access to all the rental record files and keys? Just because the greasy haired guy with the missing tooth reminded me of the time Jen’s apartment was broken into by someone from her apartment’s rental office, that didn’t mean it was going to happen to me. It was a stupid thought. You just have safety issues, I told myself.

Wanting a false sense of safety back after the mysteriously wide-open door incident, on the day of my move in, amidst everyone from Sam, Gary, their kids, my movers, and Fae helping move my boxes and furniture into my new upstairs residence, I asked Gary to change my locks so that I could sleep more peacefully that night.

Boy did it ever piss me off when three days later the property management hung a notice on my door that they would need to enter the premises in order to install a carbon monoxide detector. SHITzaF’n! FINE! I’ll just have Cella’s boyfriend change the door nob back out but I’ll keep the new deadbolt in place. Then, since I can’t take off from work, I’ll leave the deadbolt unlocked so those fuckers can get inside. But, I’ll booby trap the place. I’ll hang a jacket over the closed TV and stereo cabinet doors just so. I’ll drape a blanket over the computer cabinet this way. Then I’ll place small pieces of paper over each cabinet and doorway, like I saw that guy do in that one movie, and we’ll just see if they get into my shit. I’ll look for the ever-so-small fallen piece of paper.

Thankfully, there was no evidence that anyone had been into any of my stuff on the day of the detector installation so I estimated that I would have a false sense of security back in six, seven weeks max.

Then, when I was just trying to get back some of the peace and quiet I’d lost over the last six months since my crazy had fucked me over, and when all I wanted to do was to leave the television off, to let go of all the distractions I’m not used to having (which living in a household entails), and to just putter around in silence while I settled into my new place, I jammed my little toe into the corner of a box. F’theSONUVAgrhhh! THAT HURT! Are you kidding me?!

Not to worry. After my insurance carrier figured out that they were actually supposed to X-ray the little toe on my right foot, not my left, they assured me that they’d call me if the toe was in fact broken. They didn’t call. So how come 6 weeks later, even after all the black and swelling had gone away, my toe still hurt?

“Oh, that’s because you have what appears to be some sort of a bone fragment or a growth coming off of the inside of the bone and a sharp possible spur coming off of the other side,” the podiatrist said.

Ah, I see. “So that hooked, tree branch looking thing might be a growth?” I asked. “Yes. We should take a biopsy of that,” the podiatrist said.

Great, thanks. I know what my next steps are. “If I ever want to be able to wear shoes comfortably again, I need surgery to investigate the possible growth/fragment thingy and you’ll have to shave off the sharp protrusion before you re-set my toe to point in the right direction again. Have I got that right?”

Whatever. It’s just a toe. Truth is, aside from fearing the expense of surgery, I’m kinda chicken. I’m afraid something will go wrong and my toe will be worse. I read somewhere that injuries to your appendages mean your creative energy is being blocked. Point taken.

That’s why I should be asking myself when I am going to manage to finish the final chapter of my other book; the one that’s not on-line. It’d be nice to get to the place where I have sent my book out to multiple publishers in the hopes of hearing back something great, that is as opposed to just being stuck in the place where I’m hoping that I’ve done my book justice and, as such, can’t seem to finish the last chapter. (Yes, Lyta, you’ve been right to keep pushing me. I’ve been emotionally depleted and brain dead. But that’s no excuse not to keep at least trying to work towards my passion.)

It’s crazy to me when I think about how free I’ve allowed myself to be in my blong posts. There have been countless entries where I’ve not remembered if I’d wrote about this before, or referenced that already and even more entries (usually late night entries) where my spelling and grammar have shit the bed. Still, while I’ve let my written expressions free into the Ethernet for my blong, I continue to put a tremendous amount of pressure on myself to make the other book that I’ve been working on perfect.

What else should I be asking myself? When am I going to put myself back out there again? We got the word in late December, on the 23rd, the day of my dad’s last chemo treatment, that dad is officially in remission. This means I can breathe now.

I have also had a place of my own since the first of October. And, I am working again. I may not be making enough to continue working at this job for long, but financial problems aside, there is so much less stress in my current work environment. My boss is actually pretty awesome. So, why do I still feel closed down when it comes to opening myself up to love again?

Not having slept with anyone since Watt, it’s no secret that baby girl needs some action. Plus, before Watt, the box of just-in-case condoms which I’d kept by my bedside had expired. It’s sort of sad that I am now working my way towards having another box of condoms expire on me.

Watt and I have touched basis, you know? While I was still living in Colorado, I’d messaged Watt on Facebook. About eight months after we’d parted ways, I’d been periodically checking for Watt’s surrender to the social networking beast. I figured if I could catch him on Facebook, then, regardless of whether or not he responded to me, I could be fairly certain he’d receive the message I’d wanted to give to him for some time.

In typical Watt fashion, having more class than most men, he told me he was happy to hear from me and immediately let me off the hook when I expressed my regret for how I ended things with just a phone call and didn’t give him the courtesy of a face-to-face conversation. In fact, Watt didn’t even acknowledge my apology. He just blazed straight towards the catching up part. What a guy.

After we exchanged a few emails, bringing each other up to speed on the high-level details of our lives (he’d moved to Texas a bit before I’d moved to Colorado), Watt did a quiet drop off, which was fine and is what I expected and respected. Watt’s Facebook status indicated that he had a girlfriend. Therefore, it wouldn’t have been right of him to continue a correspondence with me.

I was glad when he responded to my initial contact, though. That meant we were friends. Sure, we were only friends on Facebook, friends who I wasn’t sure would ever catch up again, but we were friends. That’s all that mattered to me.

Then, in early November, out of the blue I got an email from him, “Hey. I was thinking about you the other day. Let’s get something to eat sometime. Easy breezy.” I wrote back, “Yeah. Good company and good eats, easy. Let me know.”

After that, I didn’t hear back from Watt. If I ever do, I don’t think it will be for a while. I’m okay with that. When he and I were together, while I was open to so much more than we shared, I felt that our time together was going to be brief, and it was, which was disappointing. I get the feeling now that if we’re meant for more, as friends or otherwise, it’s not going to be for a long time. If I’m wrong, about any of it, I welcome the correction. Regardless, I’m just happy that when I think about Watt now, I no longer have regret for how things were left. I can wish him well in whatever he does and wherever he goes.

I would, however, like to be more open than I have been lately when it comes to love. I’ve accepted that I’m pretty normal. For a lot of people, when the things you’re dealing with in your life are already requiring most of you attention, the idea of making yourself emotionally available to someone else is less than appealing. But I’ve learned that because of my independence, I’ve never been very good at making myself available for love. When I have been open, I didn’t have a choice. My inner knowing pushed me.

Haven’t I mentioned that distinct feeling I’ve only gotten about six times in my life? Did I already tell you about the first time I felt it, when I was 16 years old, a sophomore in high school? I was at the arcade hanging out with friends when this boy, playing video games in the corner of the arcade, laughed. I couldn’t see his face, and I wasn’t exactly sure who I’d find when I walked past Frogger and came around the Asteroids game, but I ended up having a crush on that boy for the rest of high school. 15 years later, when I ran into him in Newport Beach on the boardwalk, he still made me weak in the knees.

What about Now? I haven’t seen or heard of him in years, but I can admit that I think about him at least once every couple of months and have no doubt that he’s still someone I could fall in love with. Who cares if, years ago, his sister said he’s scary looking now and is totally tatted. I’d still roll around with that ink and take my chances.

I also know that, aside from the last man who truly had my heart (a man who I still hope has found a way to put back together his broken pieces), every man I’ve ever had this feeling for is someone I could fall back in love with or who I could willingly fall in love with for the first time. This includes the guy who seemed to enjoy my attention and kept me on a friend string for a couple of years while he dealt with his father’s sickness and then eventual death. I never faulted him then, and I fault him even less now.

Watt is one of the six guys I felt that distinct feeling for and this six is split into two groups: those I had a feeling I was going to meet before I met them, and those I met and then instantly had the feeling I could fall. Watt, Mr. Kept Me on a String, and Mr. Gold standard all fall in the group which I had a feeling I was going to meet before I did.

What's my point? Why am I bringing all of this up, this gut feeling stuff? It’s because I’ve realized that I’ve reached a point in my life where I’ve gotten too independent. I’m so used to not needing anyone in my life, thinking that I don’t need someone, even becoming almost afraid to count on someone else, that I am not sure I am still capable of opening my life up. That’s probably not healthy.

Lyta tells me, “Take baby steps. Date first. Then worry about learning to get over the fact that you don’t want to have to share your bed in place of getting a good night’s sleep.”

So, I’ve been thinking about going back on the internet again. But, every time I think about doing this it makes me sick to my stomach. It feels wrong for me. So I’ve been asking myself why the internet was good enough for me when I needed material for the main character in my other book, yet it doesn’t feel right for me?

I keep coming back to the same answer. In my knowing, I have never felt like I’d meet the person I was going to end up with on the internet. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think there is anything wrong with internet dating. I am all for it. I’m just having an incredible time fighting that feeling that in my gut that the internet is not how I'm going to meet the One.

I’m willing to be wrong on this, too, and I’ll likely sign back up to internet dating again just to give myself something to bitch about, because we all know I’m good at that. It’d also be nice to have plans on the weekend when my friends are busy. But if that’s my attitude, then what success can I hope to have?

Well, that’s pretty much it. You’re up to speed on the emotions and events of the last months.

Now, I’m just trying to focus forward, because if I’ve learned anything at all, in order to be free from the confines of the past, you have to stop thinking about how you’ve been affected by what’s happened to you. Freedom doesn’t come until you let go.

I’ve written it all down now, so I don’t want to think about much of anything for a while. I’m going to start living my charmed life now.

Ready. Set. GO!

The Fabulous 40s!

Saturday, January 21, 2012

I swore; I wasn’t going to do this.

Monday, January 16, 2012

Ready. Set. GO!

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