"Yes Daddy"

I just got lectured for an hour for seemingly "giving up" on my passion (photography). This coming from someone who's not a part of my everyday life and does not know that I have boxes of film in the fridge, a camera that's constantly loaded, probably a few rolls of film at the 1-Hour place and am constantly seeking out new places to go to for inspiration. Places my friends wouldn't be caught dead at for fear of it not being considered "cool."

Did I also mention he knows nothing of photography?

Heh. It was the weirdest thing. Funny even. And he seems to think that while I have a job that doesn't suit me I plan on being there forever.

Pfftt . . . not going to happen. What he doesn't know is that my life will drastically change in the course of the next year or so. I'm simply trying to enjoy what little time I have left in the city I call home and not trying to make long-term commitments to this place.

I absolutely love it here, but I'm itching to get up and move again.

It's going to break his heart when he finds out why I seem to not be moving forward with my calling at the moment.

But hey . . . shit happens.




Random thought of the day: You say one thing one day and another thing the next. How do I know you'll stand true to your word? More importantly . . . which one is truly your word?

Cleanliness Is Next To ADHD

My house is going to be in immaculate shape when I get older.

I have a tendency to direct my energy into cleaning when I have a lot of things on my mind. And this is one of those times. After working an eight hour shift at work and getting home close to 2 a.m. I let my eyes roam around my apartment and decided then and there that it looked like a dump (compared to my usual mess of piles of clean clothes in the corner on the floor and photo supplies in another corner).

So I changed out of my work clothes, threw on some sweats, piled my hair into a ponytail and went at it.

I must say, I feel better. There's something about a clean habitat that makes you feel loads better.

I even gave my Ali and Sonny a bath. Course they hate me now because I already disturbed their sleeping habits by staying away all night. Usually when I'm home at night they sleep with me and because I was constantly moving around and threatening to envelope them with the vacuum cleaner they were pissed. I could practically hear Sonny cursing me under his breath as I bathed him.

*Mutters* "Dammit. Yo, why you do this every week? You know it's not doin' any good. Me and the broad just get dirty all over again."

That's right, my kittens have East Coast mobster accents.

Ugh. I'm going to get off this high soon and it's going to suck! I have about an hour before the lids fall and I'm out for a while. It's been days since I've actually slept and I can feel a short hibernation coming on. Luckily I have tomorrow (today?) off.

I need to go load up on food for the winter. I wonder if the cashier at the store will think it strange if I buy liquor this early in the morning.




Random thought of the day: I miss my family.

Road Not Taken

I pictured more champagne and laughter when telling my friends I was getting married.

However that's not what happened last night.

How do you tell your best friend you're getting married when you love him just as much as you love your fiance?

The question had been on my mind for weeks on end. How do I tell him? I'd whisper it every time I spoke with him. Every time I picked up the phone to call him I'd tell myself, "Okay, I'm going to tell him tonight." But then halfway through the conversation I'd catch myself mouthing the words, "I'm getting married," yet he could never hear me.

I was more scared than anything of the fact that I might lose him. He may very well have decided I had hurt him more than enough and he no longer wanted to stick around. After all, I knew in the back of his mind he had kind of hoped maybe we had a chance. I put that thought in his mind because at some point in our friendship I wanted the same thing.

I know it's not a very fashionable thing, to genuinely love two people at the same time, but you can't tell your heart that. You can try and tell your brain, but you'll only be fooling yourself. Not to mention you'd only be setting yourself up for what might as well be a tsunami when the waves of emotions (pain) hit you at the time of the confession.

Of course I didn't let myself be fooled and acknowledged the love I had for my best friend. We've only known one another three years and maybe I haven't seen his sweet face inches away from mine. Maybe I haven't been able to hug or kiss him or cry on his shoulder when I'm having a bad day. Maybe we've never gone to IHOP in the middle of the night after some lame movie and sat there, talking for hours on end about absolutely nothing, yet feeling like we were having the greatest conversation in the world.

But you know what? I don't need any of that to know I love him and that I care more about him than he'll ever know.

I don't know what would have happened had you "acted" sooner. Would I be with you instead of him? Would we have managed some sort of relationship? Would we last?

Part of me wants to speculate, but another part doesn't because I think we both know we could have very well maintained a courtship for years and have it turn to something wonderful.

I've been incredibly selfish when it comes to you. I know that. Having someone you love 1,700 miles away and not being able to speak with them as often as you want is a hard fact to face. And with you, simply a hop, skip and a jump away . . . it's so easy to just show up and say, "Well, I'm here." I can't tell you how many times I had to suppress the urge to do that.

People have accused me of using them before. Maybe you're thinking the same thing. Maybe not. I'm not scared of what you think of me right now because in all honesty I don't blame you one bit. I have a boyfriend over a thousand miles away and I can't talk/see him as much as I want as I can with you.

Some people would question my love for him because they can't fathom the thought of loving two people at the same time in their lives. However my love for my fiance is genuine and incredibly powerful. It's changed the way I think and act. For the first time in my life I actually look forward to my future and not because I'm getting married but because I want to do so many things. I'm living like I'm dying right now. I've gotten more accomplished in the short amount of time I've known my fiance than I had done in all the previous years. In one way or another he was part of some of the biggest decisions I've had to make.

As was my best friend. You know who you are. At the time I was learning to open up and trust someone you were standing right there, willing and able to hear anything I had to say. And boy did I say a lot! Yet with all my demons and all my quirks you still loved me and never judged or assumed I was something I wasn't. I'm eternally grateful for that. And I love you so, so very much.

But that's impossible right? You can't truthfully love two different people at the exact same time. Can you?

Heh. Trust me folks, it's possible. It's one of the hardest things you can do and what may be one of the toughest decision you may have to make, but it's very possible.

Life is full of forks in the road and paths not taken. When you get to them you sort of linger around, taking a peek down each path before having to venture down one of them. They look exactly the same, they just lead to different places. Or perhaps they lead to the same place and only the journey is different. Who knows? All you know is one day you have to walk down one of those paths and hope for the best. It may not be an easy journey and sometimes you may wonder, "What would have happened had I taken that other path?" You don't necessarily regret your decision and the path you took, but you wish with all your heart you could have experienced them both.




Thought of the day: You.

3:12 A.M.

I've spent many nights watching bad made-for-television movies and infomercials with overly eager hosts because I can't fall asleep at night.

This is one of those nights.

And I just realized how selfish I am.

I won the lottery? Here's half my winnings.

You need me to drop everything I'm doing for the next two days so I can babysit your diabetic cat and give him a shot in his ass once a day and water your geraniums while you're on a cruise with some chick you met just last week? Sure.

It's 3 a.m. I'm wide awake and it's raining so I can't even take a walk and I am absolutely wired. Hey . . . where is everyone? Oh, that's right. They're sleeping.

*Mutters*

Two people crashed on me tonight. They didn't know it, but it made me a little upset when they said they were tired and wanted to sleep (Bunch of whiners). Course, being the person I am I didn't let on that I wanted them to keep me company. I simply said goodnight and hung up.

It bothers me that I'm like that. It also bothers me that I have periods where I turn into an insomniac. I'm left alone with my thoughts at night, when they are particularly most verbal and I have nothing to do but go over them in my head, constantly. I can tear myself to pieces for hours on end this way and make myself feel lower than dirt, although I try not to. But in the back of my mind I know I'm playing with so many people's feelings and yet I hesitate to say anything. I guess I'm realizing that whole 'Out of sight, out of mind" concept isn't working.

And I was going somewhere with this but I looked over at the TV and they're advertising some weird gadget that I'm interested in. Hmm . . .



Random thought of the day: Never, ever mention again that I have extra film in the fridge.

Spared

You ever walk through life thinking you've been spared sometimes?

I mean, don't get me wrong. My use of the word 'spared' doesn't include emotional pain or anything, but perhaps you've had more than your share of close encounters?

I fell Sunday evening. And I don't mean I tripped over a dog or fell off a two story house "fell."

NO, my dumbass slipped on a puddle of water in a grocery store while I was walking up to the self check out lines. These kinds of things never happen to me. I may be a total klutz sometimes, but for the most part I'm pretty observant and would normally notice things like puddles of water, glass or other things on the floor. Having two rambunctious kittens does that to you. You wake up on mornings and thing, "Gee, what did the little monsters leave on the floor last night that will stab me in my bare foot today?"

Anyway, it wasn't even a pretty fall. I was walking and before I knew it I could hear myself exclaiming, "Yeeeeeoooow!" and then opening my eyes and finding myself lying on my right side with my limbs spread out everywhere. I immediately felt the pain in my right hip. As I sat up I felt more in my elbow and saw my skin turning red. I have a fair complexion so I'm prone to redness and bruises. I've got them everywhere. I can't even account for them all.

Afterwards, as I slowly stood up and examined the area I noticed about 15 people staring at me. Four of whom worked there. Not a single one of them asked me if I was okay, which pissed me off more than anything. In fact only one person helped me at all, a guy about my age put my groceries back in my hand basket as I was getting up. Regardless, they were probably a bit nervous that I was going to ask to speak to someone and file an accident report. I mean c'mon, this was no little puddle as if someone spilled ice. Try more like someone took to using the U-Scan as a hydrant!

I wasn't up to talking to anyone so I just checked my things out and left, still very upset.

It wasn't until this morning that I started feeling all the pain, mainly in my head. I examined it with my fingertips and found a lump.

Fuck!

Probably wasn't a smart thing to go to sleep that night, but I didn't know I hit my head. It must've bounced or something when I hit the floor. The parental figure always told me I was hard headed!

At least I didn't hit the bottle like I wanted to. Last time I did that I woke up in a hotel room wondering where the hell I was (See # 77 here)!

Regardless, I got lucky. I know most people would shrug incidents like this off, but it's so unlike me to fall. And while I know I probably won't die if I fell like that again it just got me to thinking about all the other times I could have.

There's been a lot. Every time I get in the passenger seat with my mom I'm risking my life. Seriously, she is your typical 'woman' driver. She will talk on her cell phone (Did I mention her car is a STANDARD?), race trains, speed through school zones, change lanes like she's playing a game of tag and is just an all around bad driver.

But she does make good use of her turning signals. When a cop stopped her one day for speeding he did say, "At least you were using your turn signals as you changed lanes." He had been tailing her for a couple miles.

But as I was saying . . . I've been in my share of questionable situations. My friend and I nearly got raped when we were 13 from an older classmate and his brother. We were at the middle school one night with our parents and were goofing off outside waiting for them when these boys approached us. Luckily though people started coming out a few minutes after they came up to us. We managed to get awake with only bruises around our necks.

I nearly drowned at the beach.

I've gotten food poisoning.

I get scared every time I have bronchitis because I go days without eating and lose obscene amounts of weight (and I'm not big to begin with). However the hacking and coughing does wonders for the abs!

As a pre-teen I was at the stage in life where I was seriously contemplating if I should end it. Got to the point where I had a handful of pills in my left hand and the empty bottle in my right. Never could do it though.

I've been hit on the head, had sprained ankles, knees, have the back of an old man and I'm just an all around very uncareful person.

Yet . . . I'm alive!

Makes me wonder what it is I'm supposed to do with my life. And before you go thinking I'm being egotistical let me start by saying odds are no one will no my name until I'm dead anyway. Andy Warhol, Babe, does the 15 minutes of fame thing apply to the afterlife?

You ever just feel it in your bones? I'm supposed to do something. I don't know what it is yet, but I need to better the world somehow. It may be a baby step, but it will hopefully be a catalyst for greater things to come.

I don't think I'll find the cure for cancer, but maybe I'll save the person who will.

You never know.

Little things people. It's the little things that add up in life.

Random thought of the day: Oh the things I do with potatoes when I'm bored!

Million Dollar Film

I saw Million Dollar Baby today.

Don't worry I won't spoil the movie for you.

In fact, I won't talk much about it rather than to use it to catapult my thoughts. I never had much intention to see this particular movie. I'm not a huge movie goer and rarely do previews of movies catch my attention so much that my first thought is, "I have to see this." However after so much buzz about the film and one of my bosses telling me he saw it twice and then Hilary Swank calling Clint Eastwood 'Mo Cuisle' at the Academy Awards last weekend I was more than curious about the film.

Early on in the film you can tell the whole boxing thing is a metaphor for something bigger. Eastwood's character, Frankie, has only one rule: Always protect yourself.

Problem is he applies that rule to life and in doing so doesn't really allow himself to get close to anyone, be it his friend 'Scraps' (Morgan Freeman's character), the boxers at his gym and at first Maggie (Hilary Swank's character).

As people we are so scared of getting hurt. We're constantly 'protecting' ourselves. We make mistakes in the past which cause us a great deal of pain and we drag those wounds around with us later in life like luggage. And it's that 'luggage' that stops us from taking chances on anything: friends, career path, love.

It's only human to get hurt. Show me a man who has never felt pain and I'll show you a man who's never really lived a day in his life.


Frankie was so concerned with protecting his boxers that they never could truly succeed until they left him.

Enter Maggie.

Not only has she not been taught to box properly, but she's too old and she's a girl. Frankie doesn't train girls. However after showing such dedication and simply having nothing else left to live for Frankie takes her on and puts his heart on the line.


It only takes one person to really turn your life around. They're the ones that strip down those walls you used to 'protect' yourself, take your hand and gradually get you to take baby steps out of your comfort zone.

For me that 'one person' was my uncle.

He is my father's older brother and before the summer of 2002 I had never met or spoken to him.

It was my second day in Wyoming and my father, his wife and I went and had breakfast with my grandmother and uncle. By the end of the meal I was captivated by the man. The relationship was instantaneous. However, be it as it may I still didn't allow myself to open up right away. He was after all, my father's brother. My father was the one who was responsible for three of my four pieces of luggage! So I wasn't about to just throw my arms open and say, "Come on in."

My first five months in Wyoming I spent at my father's house. I saw my uncle and grandmother on the weekends when we all went out to breakfast or lunch together. On Sundays during the summer and a few times during the fall I went and played bingo with them at the senior citizen center. I never really spent much time alone with either one of them. It wasn't that I didn't want to, but I had classes throughout the week and when my father wasn't dragging me across Wyoming and Utah I had design/photography projects to work on during the weekends.

That all changed my spring semester. I moved into a dorm in the town where the main campus was located (20 miles from where the family lived) and on weekends I went back because I had a religion class at the college there. My father's {new, 3rd} wife wanted nothing to do with me so I crashed at my uncle's.

In those five short months so many events took place that could have easily caused me to shut doors to everyone I knew. In fact I was so close to doing that. I wanted to. More than anything I wanted to just sit and wallow in my own misery and enjoy it. Some days it took everything I had to simply get out of bed and get to my morning classes. The only one I truly enjoyed for a while was my Self Defense class, because at least then I was able to take some of my frustration and anger out physically.

However that didn't last long. It was still killing me not to talk to someone. And even though I met some great people while in school I was still scared of what they thought of me.

Soon though the weekends were the only thing I looked forward to. They meant a decent home cooked meal, TV and conversation with my uncle. I didn't know it at the time but he was responsible for my relationship with the few friends I met and kept. I gradually opened up to him and began to trust another person. And it's funny because even though we're family, blood, we had to start with a clean slate. Sure, we were probably both told things about one another from other members of our family and who we were in the past, but we had to find out for ourselves what the other person was all about. We had demons we were dealing with. Things we weren't exactly proud of or didn't want to put on display, but we got past that and accepted the other for who they were in that moment of time.

I'll never forget him opening up his home and life to me. I felt more at home in his tiny apartment than at my father's place. And it was there, in his living room that we would sit and talk for hours before going to sleep for the night. I'd tell him about my mom, brothers and school and my silly friends. In fact before long I started telling him about a guy I was seeing at the time and other personal thoughts I had. And when my life started taking a downfall he was the one holding me up.

Early that May my mom called to tell me her brother had died from a heart attack. The shock was too much. I sat on my bed and couldn't even cry right away. I simply got dressed in my sweats, T-shirt and sneakers, went to the computer lab to finish a journal entry for my religion course and then went to my Step Aerobics class. I told the teacher what had happened and she sympathized with me and told me that if I felt like leaving any time during the class I could. I managed to stick it out though.

A few hours later my uncle picked me up at my dorm and took me to his place. I knew he knew something was wrong but he didn't ask. When we got to his place I did what I always did and sorted my laundry (was cheaper to do it in the laundry area of his apartment complex than at my dorm's) and went to wash.

Five minutes later I'm on the floor, crying my eyes out. My uncle walks in on me like this, sits down next to me, gives me a hug and allows me to cry.

He didn't even ask me what was wrong at first. For all he knew I could have slammed my finger in the door of the washer. He didn't care. I was crying so he comforted me.

That's the kind of man he is.

And that's the man who stripped down my walls and made me take a chance on a person. I opened up once again and risked the chance of getting hurt, and not just with him. I met new friends, new loves and with each and every one of them I gave my all.

By that time I was so sick of being an introvert and 'protecting' myself that I was more than willing to risk getting hurt than not living a day in my life. What I didn't realize at the time was throughout the year I spent in Wyoming and in the presence of my uncle I was already slowly revealing myself.

And in Million Dollar Baby that's what Frankie did. He gradually started taking chances he normally wouldn't. He unknowingly broke his own rule, but I don't think he regretted it. In the end, he was probably able to say, "I did okay."

And isn't that what everyone wants? Not just professional boxers, but every other person. To have their last thought be I did okay.

I know that's what I want. To be able to openly love another person, faults, quirkiness and all. To be able to risk everything for love and life and doing what I want to do despite what others may think.

I left my luggage in Wyoming. It's my intentions to never claim it again.

Oh To Be A Girl

I am the first person to scream: I LOVE being a girl!

Except at "that time."

Yeah, you girls know what I'm talking about. It sneaks up on you when you least want it to. And then you go through a hundred billion emotions all at the same time and it always feels like no one understands and you're all alone in the world. And we have Eve to thank for this.

Thanks Eve.

*Mutters* "Apple eating bitch."

Anyway, so yeah . . . it's "that time." And while I've managed to cut mine down to four days maximum (exercise and tons of water) it still sucks. Besides nature taking its course there's also what I like to call 'the bitch factor.'

You can be the sweetest person on God's green earth, but even YOU are susceptible to mood swings, arguments and having the capability of biting someone's head off if they even look at you crooked during this monthly occasion.

Take me for example. I'm not a very serious person. The world is my stage and I take it upon myself to entertain people and make them laugh as much as possible. I go to extreme lengths to get a laugh, everything from bending myself into a shopping cart and having the parental figure push me at top speed down grocery aisles to speaking in my Abe Simpson voice and talking about the benefits of having adult diapers.

I'm 24.

I look 18.

And I act all of about the age of 12.

Moving on . . . so when it's "that time" I'm a different person. I want the world suffering with me and happy people make me want to scream. I have to give up Coke for a few days because drinking it pains me which means I start having withdrawal symptoms. I don't care what anyone says. It IS possible to have withdrawal symptoms from soda!

During "this time" you also start craving weird shit you normally don't eat. For most girls it's chocolate. But for me it's salt. I eat the hell out of Paydays and Lay's potato chips during this time. And chocolate milk. I normally don't do chocolate or milk because it makes me gag, but during this time I'm chugging down four or five bottles a day. You can imagine how often I'm running to the bathroom.

Add the uncomfortableness of your clothes not feeling quite right and having to wear (sorry guys) the "granny panties" which bunch all up in the rear area and make your ass look like you had a mishap. So you can't wear your tight jeans and have to settle for your sweats or any other baggy garment (pajamas, housedress, muumuu).

AND you're constantly grazing your backside with your hand to make sure you didn't have an 'accident.' Girls will understand what I'm talking about when I say you can't sit still for very long and then suddenly stand up without having that weird sensation (eww).

Not to mention you think you constantly smell fish.

Then there's the feeling of being incredibly horny during that time. Although at first it's usually not wanting to be touched. This happens before the actual event. This is the PMS part ('P' standing for 'Pre'). However during those few days you're as hot as ever and you're willing to jump anything that has the right body part and moves.

Hell, who am I kidding; it doesn't even have to move!

And I don't care what anyone says this shit IS contagious because I HAVE started early when I'm around friends who are going through this. I ask for a few dollars and instead they give me a few days of Hell. You see why I don't have many girl friends.


On the other hand . . . to bring up something Connie's mom said in the cartoon King Of The Hill, watching a movie like Titanic is ten times better when it's "that time."

And on behalf of all girls who go through this torture every month and take it out on our best friends, brothers, husbands, friends, or any other important guy in our life: stay the fuck away from us!




Random thought of the day: Everyone should be forced to have a job where they have to deal with the public. Maybe then they'll understand the importance of having common sense.