moving on

Right now I almost feel like I can't move on or move forward. I feel stuck. My life doesn't feel like my own.

thankful

I saw this on a friend's comment space:

Be Thankful

Be thankful that you don't already have everything you desire,
If you did, what would there be to look forward to?

Be thankful when you don't know something
For it gives you the opportunity to learn.

Be thankful for the difficult times.
During those times you grow.

Be thankful for your limitations
Because they give you opportunities for improvement.

Be thankful for each new challenge
Because it will build your strength and character.

Be thankful for your mistakes
They will teach you valuable lessons.

Be thankful when you're tired and weary
Because it means you've made a difference.

It is easy to be thankful for the good things.
A life of rich fulfillment comes to those who are
also thankful for the setbacks.

GRATITUDE can turn a negative into a positive.
Find a way to be thankful for your troubles
and they can become your blessings.
~ Author Unknown ~

hard

Another of my favorite movie quotes is from A League of Their Own (another sports movie I know). It goes a little something like this:

"It just got too hard."

"It's supposed to be hard, the hard is what makes it good."

I know they don't mean difficult, things shouldn't always be difficult. I know that they mean hard in that it's about how hard you try, striving for betterment, recognizing that something worth having is worth the challenge. The harder you try, the greater the reward. I know that I tried, was willing to continue trying, maybe even tried my hardest, and THAT is what makes me good. Because ultimately it comes down to that, I am good.

little buddha

Keanu Reeves may not be the best actor, but despite his wooden delivery some of his movies have some good quotes. This one, from The Replacements (a super cheese-fest sports movie that I seem to really like for some strange reason) is one that I find fits my general mood of late:

Pain heals,
Chicks dig scars,
Glory lasts forever...

I'm working on step one right now...I'm looking forward to step three.

insults & injuries

It's true, shitty things do come in threes. First it was the relationship ending, that was a huge one. Then it became the stress of needing to move in January (although that stress has been lingering for a while because I am a planner and start worrying about things way too soon). Then finally it became my car. On the way to my mom's house on Wednesday for an early family dinner, my fucking car broke down while I sat in holiday stop and go traffic. Luckily I was able to pull over into a mall parking lot and have my car towed to my mom's house. Having to have your car towed at night right before the holiday is a major pain in the ass. But I guess if I have to look for the silver lining, at least I got my three out of the way quickly, a swift and painful bandage removal.

fighting

I can still hear the words in travelling into my ear and straight to my heart, as if they had been spoken yesterday, "If you leave, I would fight like hell to get you back." That was less than a year ago. Now the story is different. The will to fight became inversely proportional to the frustration of fights begat from conflict. I don't think that early promise was a mistruth or an exaggeration, I believe that when he said it he meant it fully and deeply. I just wish that that conviction was still there, the desire to fight like hell was still there, the knowledge that it was worth the sacrifice and the commitment was still there. I believe it still and part of me doesn't want to stop believing it. But I can't make somebody else believe what I believe and even if I could I don't think I would, despite the personal cost.

stripped

It feels like most of the things I have relied on in the last few years have been stripped away recently. From big things to little things, important things to simple things, taken for granted things and things I have been profoundly grateful for. It's hard to maintain my sense of being a whole person when I am starting to feel like huge chunks of my life are being gouged away. I almost feel like I couldn't take much more without crumbling like a house of cards.

breaking up is hard to do

And so it goes. I am single again and again and again. In the end, the boy didn't want to commit to the work or the relationship. He wanted to work on himself which frankly I am going to interpret as be selfish and not ready to handle the mature responsibilities of commitment and sacrifice. I have been struggling, A LOT. I'm looking for answers that will never be found. I'm asking questions that have no meaning. I can't find the motivation in myself to move anywhere much less move on. I'm grieving, grieving the love I don't have in the way I once did, the love I will no longer be able to give, and the empty space inside of me that feels like it could take me over.

grieving

So after almost two years, the man I am still very much in love with and I have broken up. It wasn't one of those "easy" splits where wrongs can be pinpointed and accusations hurled (though that seems to be happening a little anyway). It's just one of those really fucking unfortunate things that can happen despite two people loving one another. When communication isn't working and the constant cycle of doubt and wonder creeps in and then somebody's investment wanes...sometimes even the most profoundly wonderful love can turn into something else, something painful for both people. We all carry our own baggage, our own personal struggles and doubts and insecurities and neurosis, our own questions of worth and how we identify ourselves, our own level of commitment and sacrifice, our own expectations of others, and our own needs. Sometimes these two things can mesh and when they don't, sometimes compromises can be made. But not this time.

worth

Sometimes, despite what you tell yourself, it's hard not to fall into old patterns. Unfortunately, when things aren't going well...I start to question myself and my worth. Lately the question has become, aren't I worth the effort and the sacrifice? Part of me knows that I am and another part of me is waiting for somebody else to prove it so that I can believe it more fully. The part of me who knows I am is right now, a distant whisper, white noise intermingling in the cacophony of self-doubt and questioning.

disaster

The boy and I are "on a break." We are taking a time out so that we can decide whether or not we are willing and able to do the work necessary to work things out. I think I have decided that I am, I don't know that he will decide that he is. But for my sake and his sake and our sake, I have to give him the time and space to make that decision. And that feels like one of the most painful things for me to do right now, letting go of my desire to control situations in order to make myself more secure and comfortable. I have to let go of my control right now and let him decide what he wants. I have to give him his space and time. I have to let him choose so that I can be secure in the knowledge that if we do decide to try and work things out, both of us are in it together. It's hard to not be hard on myself right now. It's hard not to find ways to point the finger at myself and think that there is something wrong with me, something that is pushing away the person I am still very much in love with. Not that anybody said that this was going to be easy. It's also hard for me to hear that everything is going to be okay because right now, okay seems like a million miles away. I'm a pulsing exposed wound right now and at this point, healing feels impossible.

pop-ups

Never one to give up the chance to analyze absolutely nothing...

Before I took my computer into the fix-it shop, I was getting a lot of pop-ups. And they were all dirty pop-ups. Hornysingles.com was a big one. Stranger hook-ups was another. Penis enhancers. Etc. Lots of sexual innuedo in those pop-ups. I think my computer must have thought I was hard up or something.

Then I took my computer into the shop where they removed a bunch of malware and spyware and stuff. Now I get only two popups:
HorrorFest and Wristcutters.

I'm a little afraid of my harddrive now. First it goes from propositioning me for strangers, essentially pimping either me or other people out for dirty anonymous sex. Then I say no and it starts suggested suicide and horror. It's like high school dating all over again.

PS-Happy Halloween!

craps!

My luck/fate/whatever has been feeling a little tarnished lately.
The last two job interviews I went on, the employers decided to "go with another candidate" or that I "wouldn't be moving forward in the selection process." Seriously, I can only think of one other time in my life when I didn't get a job after an interview, I was eighteen and blew the interview on purpose because I didn't want my job to interfere with my aerobics schedule (oh the folly of youth). I fear that I will be stuck doing my current line of work forever because branching out isn't working out so well. And frankly, at this point in my life, I am not really willing to take a pay cut or work horrendously long hours so that I can prove myself in another occupation.
My housing situation is making me so fucking stressed out. My roommate bought a house with her boyfriend. My relationship situation is still a little rocky, or at least not doing well enough for us to be uber-confident. So, any previous mention of moving in together has dissipated except for him to suggest that I move into his place with his other two roommates, no closet space, and one bathroom. I'm pretty sure that I should have just stayed in my old apartment, actually I started feeling that way after about a month of living here. I'm honestly trying to figure out what I gained from the last year of living here and I guess it's that sometimes a person should just stay where they are, particularly when they're generally happy and satisfied with it. Sometimes bigger and nicer does not necessarily mean better. Sometimes moving up really is just an illusion.
I am developing a general state of loathing for one of my coworkers. On the days she is there, I can barely stand to be there myself. The sound of her voice is like some obscene speaker torture like when they played Van Halen over and over again in Panama. The other night, one of my coworkers asked why I felt so comfortable talking to other people about their not doing their work or generally being annoying but I don't talk to her about it. And it isn't because I'm intimidated by her, she's kind of a twit and wouldn't know a good comeback if it ate her face. But I guess it's because no good would come of it. It would just make things worse and then I would hate going in to work even more and I would probably get into trouble. It's funny how one person can have such an effect on your mood. I'm sure I am that person to somebody, probably her.
I need to win the lottery. They say that money doesn't buy happiness, but I'm sure you can get an awesome rent-to-own deal.

the spy who loved me

People who create spyware can seriously rot in a dirty and dank cell full of mold, spiders, rats, and rotting food. My computer is at the shop...AGAIN. I let my anti-virus subscription expire and like a day later my computer was just infested with spyware. It's just so lame to think that the people (techie guys, not necessarily the store I took my computer to) I take my computer to are probably the same guys writing code for viruses and such. It's like pharmacy companies developing disease so that they can sell the remedy...oh wait that kind of happens doesn't it?

birthday wishes

A friend of mine had this saying, or at least somebody he knew had the saying, and I'm sure that that somebody heard it from somebody else, and so on...

It went a little something like this,
"If wishes and buts were fishes and nuts, we'd all have a merry Christmas."
I'm not exactly sure what it means. But I do like me some wishes and I likes me some fishes and I got lots of buts and nuts going on...
so on with the birthday list!

Things I want for my birthday:

World Peace
A cheap and lovely apartment (with a parking space) on the hill, preferably the west side of Broadway...ie my old apartment
Fixing or replacing/upgrading my iPod
Fixing or replacing/upgrading my computer
A virus scanner, firewall, pop-up blocker provider with lifelong subscription for said fixed/replaced/upgraded computer
Heroes Season 1 on DVD (too bad season 2 sucks so bad, damn you sophmore slump)
A bad bad case of laryngitis that miraculously makes you work harder (for one of my coworkers, not me...I don't want to work hard)
A winning lottery ticket (and not necessarily just powerball...I'd take just a few million, I'm not greedy)
All expenses paid trip to India or Brazil for four-six weeks
Sewing lessons
Cello lessons
A cello
Summer weather
A visit to the hair salon
Hugs
World Peace

See, I don't ask for much.

em.em.em

This is a sort-of secret because several people already know about it, but I've got another blog out there in cyberspaceland. It's my more "serious" blog. I used to be pretty serious about blogging a while back. Then I up and deleted the blog, named The Temple of Divine Disenchantments (No Vacancies at the blog's conception). But after not having a blog for a minute, I realized I couldn't stay away, so the new blog Rising was reborn (insert bad reference to a Phoenix rising from its ashes here).

At any rate, one of my posts has a spammer comment that is INSANE. It's like a fucking diatribe of nonsense. I couldn't read the majority of it because it is also very LONG!!!! However, while scanning I found this little tidbiddily piece of information that I wanted to share with all of you. And just to remind you before you start reading...Masil quite literally means magic!

"People want "magic"." Magic is the sign of evil, for the gods are employing their powers to hurt the disfavored.
"Magic" would have only been used to enhanced their tactics had this gone corporate.
When they employ magic the gods get something out of it. That's how it works. The total absence of magic about this educational process says something very, very positive about me and the Final Prophet event.
It was magic that led people into homosexuality, promiscuity, addiction, degeneracy. IF YOU FEEL MAGIC REPEL FROM IT, as hard as that may be. It's their way of making things increasingly more difficult, a chronic behavior people from the 20th century should be VERY familiar with.

Oh well...at least he didn't say magic was chunky............

party girl

I went to a really fun, albeit emotionally intense, wedding this weekend. It may be one of the most fun weddings I've been to. There was free wine and beer, the chicken dance and the electric slide, noodles in chinese food take-out boxes, and an eclectic mix of fun people. I wore this cute little party dress that belongs to my sister. It was adorable and it gave me the hourglass shape that I don't normally have due to being built like a plow pulling ox. I got quite a few compliments...and there was THIS conversation (not totally verbatim because it's been a few days and I've forgotten...but it's pretty fucking accurate):

(Me walking past a large and full table. Pause as older woman grabs me by the arm to talk to me)
Her: You know, we already wore those dresses back in the 1950s.
Me: Oh, I love this style of dress. But geez, were you able to breathe in these dresses because I can barely breathe right now.
Her: Oh, well we weren't nearly as chunky back then.
Me: Oh...
Her: It was after the war, I guess we just didn't have as much food back then.
Me: Oh...

Seriously, this is the second time in the last six months that some older person has called me chunky. Well, I guess that's better than when my mom squeezes my muffin top and asks me what I've been eating lately.

worm catching

Now that the boy is back in school, he has "normal" hours. Every once in a while I too will wake up during the hours when egg mcmuffins are still purchasable in solidarity with my early-rising brothers and sisters. It's pretty alright I guess. Coffee really DOES seem to taste a little better at 8am. People seem much more "on the move" during the sort-of wee hours of the morning. The televisions at the gym are NOT playing soap operas. But now I have a little TOO much time on my hands. It's not even noon and I've done most of the things that I would normally do right up until the very second I rush out of the door to work. It's a little strange not feeling constrained for time...

reading rainbows

Rediscoving the library has been pretty great. You don't even really have to go to the library anymore other than for the quick self-service grocery store-like check out thing. I've read quite a few books lately, some good & some not-so-good. That is UNTIL I started reading the funniest thing I have read in a very very long time. It is seriously laugh-out-loud funny. I'm sure I made quite the spectacle at the gym this morning when I kept laughing openly during my attempts at mastering the stairmaster (thusly, I am no master of said machinery). If you need a good read, check out Colors Insulting to Nature. The book is outrageous, funny, campy and over-the-top in its gloriousness. Or even if you don't want to read this book, you should still get a library card. Reading is FUNdamental.

strawberry fields and marmalade skies

I saw Across the Universe this weekend. I don't know what it is about movie musicals primarily composed of Beatles songs...but I am enamored. It was cheesy, predictable, over-the-top and I LOVED IT! I could watch it again and again. And seriously, in a perfect world of all my wishes being granted, a mod-ish Brit guy who can serenade you, definitely for me.