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There is a whole damn universe out there in internet land. I could look up the directions for making napalm. I could learn to speak Italian. I could look at really gross pictures of dead people or watch Homestar......I could do all of those things, and yet the energy to click isn't there. It just isn't there.

Today has been a rough one. It was my last day at my job and I felt really unwelcomed, unappreciated and I really felt like they were happy to get rid of me. That sucks. I worked there a year tomorrow, and I don't even get a 'goodbye' on the schedule. In fact, my two weeks was to end NEXT week....they just didn't put me on the schedule for next week. Not even a day. So much for self esteem today....

I know our minds hold on to anniversaries long after the conscious mind lets them go. There have been so many days I've felt like crap for no reason, crying, whatnot, and finally realized at the end of the day what day it was. It was always some anniversary. There are so many days that are almost off limits that it sucks living between them. And I don't even realize them until I figure out why the hell I'm running around crying or down in the dumps.

I talked to mom a bit today. She was kinda down too. Nothing major, just lacking energy to do much of anything. I just want to lie on the couch and watch an entire season of some show that will take my mind off my life at this moment. Life is good, for the most part. I still have a life. That's what I'm dealing with....those that don't have them anymore.

GOD! I thought this would be long gone. I thought I was WAY more over Mike than I am. I know it's been a little over seven months, and that isn't too long of a time, but then again, there is no universal timeline for grief. I used to think there was. That made the whole process even more painful, to think I was a burdeon on everyone else because I just should have been over it by then....blah blah blah. I know I have to give myself time. I know I need to let myself feel whatever I feel and accept it as the healing crap, but enough already! He was stupid. He did something stupid and selfish and we are all paying for it, all the 'good' ones. The bad ones get his money and pretend nothing happened. We are the ones who are crying about it, feeling the loss. Regardless of anything else, the thing that's the hardest is knowing how much it hurts Mamaw and mom and dad and Amy. Those are the ones that I'm thinking of during most of my down moments. There's the pain that I feel too, multiplied by the holidays last time around, but it's them. I hurt for them. That's what you do when you love someone so much. I hurt for them and myself as well.

Arg. Just a bunch of shit.
All of it.
Shit.

AH!

The closeness of school is sinking into my brain now. I just bought some school supplies and am taking a break from organizing all my stuff. I can't wait. Eight days, not counting today.

Life is so great.

I remember those moments of dread when thinking about school. Or the moments I DON'T remember while IN school. All of the mistakes I've made are now being rectified. I am doing what I should.

Today I had a moment of complete anger and sadness. I realized all the things Mike was going to miss. It's amazing.....if he were still alive, I might not even invite him to these events (the wedding, my graduation, etc). I would be so afraid of him showing his ass and embarrasing me. But I want the choice. I want to be able to NOT invite him because I'm mad at him, not because he's dead. All I wanted today was to hear Mike and Dad yell at the top of their lungs, "Soaker Leigh" as I get my diploma from Roosevelt. I wanted to have that feeling of falling through the floor, embarrased, because of him and something he did.

I was so pissed at him. His birthday is in two days. Maybe that's why I'm thinking of him. The anger was so real, so palapable. I could taste the rage in the back of my throat. I could feel my nails digging into my palms as I cried on Steve's side of the bed. I was a flame, cursing his name and what he did to our family. I was cursing him for putting Mamaw and Mom and Dad and Amy and everyone through this.

I just want the option to not have him there for something that's going on in my life, and that was taken from me. I want the knowledge that if he couldn't make it to something for some reason, it was because he was being a jerk, or working, or out of money, or out of state, not because he shot himself in the chest and bled to death in his bedroom. The anger is back and is very real.

The thought of school is what's keeping me happy right now. Of course, Steve is still wonderful and things with us are great. Money, eh. Money is nothing compared to the feeling of getting that phone call last January from mom. Mom, who woke me up from a dream where I was getting shot in the head. Mom, who's voice I didn't even have to hear to know something was horribly wrong. The thoughts of all the people ran through my head.....who was it? Who was dead or hurt or missing? Who was it this time? Who were we going to have to get used to not having in our lives? Then her voice. The crying. The almost screaming. I did scream a bit. A small one, but enough of one to wake up the cat. And misunderstanding mom and thinking his note was blaming us, the family. I drove for over four hours thinking we were to blame for his suicide and he was pissed enough at us to leave it in his note. It wasn't us. It was HER. SHE, the one with no soul. The one I would love to be in a room with for five minutes, alone.

But the blame can't stop there. Blame. I know, it's common for people who live while someone they loved killed themselves, all the 'what if's' and 'if only I...'. I'm not doing that anymore. But there is some geniune, certifiable blame to lay on some people, and I'm not afraid to do that. Is it keeping me from really dealing with his death? Maybe. Does it give some sort of cold comfort, knowing there is someone to place the blame on? Maybe. Do I give a shit right now? No. Not really. Not at all. Those who created Mike, who made him who he is/was, those are the ones that are going to burn for this. One already is. I only wish he was alive to see what he created, to feel the pain of losing a child, to see what destruction this bullet created. I would give anything to have him come back for one day, the day mom and dad found him, and have to KNOW that HE did this.

And now, I am done. I don't really feel much better, but I guess I will. Hell, school starts in eight days. Tomorrow is a murder mystery. That's always fun. It's a beautiful day out. That's good.

I keep going back to last semester.....it started less than a week after getting back from the funeral. And it was my first ever 4.0 semester. While I hope to god nothing like that happens again, I can always be proud of the fact that I got all A's during that horrible time, and can strive to do that again, minus the pain and grief.

We will heal from this. We need to get past the year of 'firsts'. The holidays, his birthday, all of our birthdays without a call or email or card. He always got me these horrible cards with women in bikinis on them, making some sort of sexual joke because he was so proud I was a lesbian. We had something in common, I guess. Thank god my tastes in women, while not always perfect, were so much better than his.

But I am going to miss him yelling at my graduation. And there's that part of me that will miss the gnawing in my gut, worrying if he's going to do something stupid at the wedding.

Damn him. Damn him for doing this to us. His rage at HER was more influencing than the love of his family. And while we didn't always like him or his decisions, we always loved him. That's part of being a family....you're not always liked, but you're always loved.

Damn him.....

Kerplah

So there's a bug in the kitchen. It's after one a.m. and I am writing in my blog about a damn bug.

Feeling the ever-exciting, well, excitement about school starting up again. Gonna get some school supplies tomorrow at Target with the old man's discount.

Life is good. Nothing is going wrong at this moment. Well, money, but after I get the loan check in September things will be all good. We'll have a much needed safety net.

This is one of the world's most boring blog entries.

And now a word from our sponsors....

It's been awhile.....

So I guess the last time I saw my friend Heather's chihuahua was about three years ago and she was overweight......the dog's name is actually 'Tequila' and he belongs to the family living downstairs from Pat. He scarfed up the food because, well, I guess that's what little dogs do. And the growling, well, I can't really explain that one.

There was that moment of kinda being sad because I wanted to keep him. Of course, KittenFatCat would have eaten him, but he is so damn cute.

I've been over there twice daily this week, and have seen him twice since then.

I'm so glad he has a home and isn't starving. I guess I'm just not used to seeing animals who have bones that are apparent.....god knows none of MY heifer animals have ever had a bone showing!

All's well that, kerplah. I'm glad he has a home. And I'm also glad I have the type of personality that makes me worry non stop about random animals and whether or not they are loved like mine is. I'm not claiming to be the perfect mother, but my cat is one of the most spoiled creatures to ever walk the damn planet.....

Seeley

So there is a really good possiblity that I am about to get my heart broken........damn this compassionate nature of mine.....

I am watching my friend Pat's dog while she is on vacation. He is a beautiful dog named Donnie, and I have loved him since the moment I met him six years ago. This is not the story...

I went over today to take Donnie on a walk (this was the first time I've been there....they left this morning) and as I climbed the back stairs, I heard a little growl and small bark. I look up and standing on the landing ahead of me is a chihuahua. He is skinny. Not typical chihuahua skinny....I mean, can see almost every bone in his little body. He is growling, teeth bared. Not looking too friendly. I said, (in my attempt to be damn Dr. Doolittle) "Hi there baby dog" and he instantly looked at me, came up to me and started licking my foot. Then he started the jumping up and down, crawling under my feet little happy scamper that little tiny dogs can do.

After I got inside the apartment, I gave Donnie some food and water and took a plate of food out to the little one (who, in an attempt to become hopelessly attached, I have named Seeley). He scarfed the food like he was, well, starving.

I took Donnie down the front stairs and thought about Seeley the entire walk.

The facts: The apartment Pat lives in is walled up....there is a large wooden wall between their two flat and the alley, the gangway and stops on the building. Now, a little dog like Seeley could potentially climb under such a fence, or slide between the small cracks in the gate, but I'm not sure he would stay there, confined, unless he felt safe (which, technically, he IS much safer there than in the streets).

Pat's downstairs neighbors weren't home when I was there, so I could ask them if they just rescued the dog and were keeping it in the walled-up area for awhile. It seems to me that one of the perks of having a dog the size of a human foot is to be able to keep it in places like apartments, but that's just me. A chihuahua doesn't seem like a dog that needs much room to run. A run from our bathroom to the dining room would wear one out. But I digress......It's possible that this family has just rescued this dog and he hasn't gotten used to having food. You know, the whole 'starving animal syndrome' (and the one I STILL have from my first semester of school, starving and living off of expired Luna Bars in Key Lime Pie atrosity *ahem* flavor). Of all the animals my family has rescued over the years, I understand that once an animal has been starving, they tend to always eat like it's their last meal. Again, I can understand that.

I'm waiting for Pat to call me back and tell me if she knows if the neighbors just acquired a dog. I think she would have said something to me, but maybe in the excitement of packing up a husband and two year old, she forgot.

I don't know what to do.

KittenFatCat would eat Seeley. And ask for more. There is no way we could bring Seeley into the apartment. Life would be hell. KFC would make it so.

But there's no way I can leave Seeley in a backyard if he really doesn't belong to anyone living there. My bleeding heart will just not allow it.

I've checked out the Anti-Cruelty website and might make a phone call there tomorrow if I hear from Pat and/or the neighbors. I would really rather ask if anyone I know wants him. That way, I would know he was getting a good home and I could visit him.

As I was leaving, I said goodbye to Donnie and locked up. Seeley was waiting for me outside the door, whining and tail all a-wag. I sat and petted him for a few minutes. He jumped in my lap, put his paws on either side of my head, and gave me kisses all over my face and neck. Then he laid down in my lap, his face resting on my arm, and gave me his belly to rub. Obviously, this was someone's baby at one point in time.

It's breaking my heart, knowing that there is a baby out there with no one to love it tonight. I know there are thousands of babies in the city alone with no one to love them, but I haven't held any of them. They are in my thoughts (almost always) but this one left his hair on my black tank top.

Steve and I have a magnet that we bought (the first thing we bought for the new place) and it says "Everything Happens for a Reason".

Pat never mentioned the dog.
I have never seen him before today.
Today was the first day I took care of Donnie.

Things are leading me to believe I was supposed to find Seeley. But now that I've found him, what do I DO about him?

In my ideal world, everyONE and everyTHING will have someone to love them every night.

I just wonder why I was supposed to find this little tan nippy dog.......damn my Pisces sensitivity.....

Just now

I just played in the HUGE thunderstorm that is going on. Playing in the rain at 2:30 in the morning on the night/morning of a full moon.

Life does not get any better than this.

I am dripping dry, sitting on the uncomfortable desk chair. Life is so damn good....

And somewhere, the child is sleeping. Or maybe he's awake, singing softly through his window to make the rain rain go away.....

To Dance with Nerds

Tonight is going to be a wonderful time to let the nerd flag fly. Ah, the musical scores of Star Wars.

I bought Crunch Berries to munch on. I could think of no better food for a night of snorting and pushing up my glasses.....

And discussing the socio-economical impact of teenagers singing songs from "Chicago".....

Ah Hah!

Frozen foods.

That's what we need.

We need a freezer full of pizzas, veggies, veggie meat, real meat for him, breads, etc.

We need a fridge full of very similiar things as well.

And a pantry full of, um, pantry type things.

My goal is to have enough food that we can look in a recipe book, find one we like, and make it without having to run to the store.

One more thing I took for granted when living with Mom and Dad.

The pasta was great, btw. And I feel so much better than just moments ago. Just experiencing the very natural variety of human emotion.

It's actually kind of comforting to me. I'm reminded that I'm human.

And that keeps me from tying a cape to my neck and attempting to fly off buildings. And some such things.....

Catching?

I'm in kind of a slump today, it seems. I think I know the reason, but nonetheless I plow on with cleaning.....

Of course, I'm taking a break from the cleaning of the bedroom to make some organic parmesan pasta. Super yummy......

Wow. This is really pointless.

But it's not.

I have this warm, fuzzy place in my belly that knows good things are just around the corner but is really impatient to get there. So many wonderful things have happened so far, and this is far from a cry of 'poor me', but I'm waiting for the dust to settle already so I can ENJOY the wonderful things that have been going on. I am so excited for Steve to come home from work and not have to step over piles of things we have no home for yet. I can't wait for my days off from work to NOT be spent in this apartment, cleaning and organizing, or else I feel like I'm not doing my part. I can't wait for a 'mess' to consist of a pile of dishes in the living room, not the disaster that is the dining room. God. In my quest to keep Steve from finding the right bell tower I've sort of neglected to take time for me.

Which is crazy, right?

I am working three days a week (thanks to sales being down in every freakin' store but ours). I am home almost all the time. While he works to pay for our rent, I keep the place in order, or try to get it in order to KEEP in order. I have all the free time in the world, right?

Arg.

I feel so bad when I take it, because he's working his ass off. Three jobs. Granted, he only has one shift left at the Zone, but it will still be two jobs he's working.

I know we agreed that as long as I was in school, he would pay the bills (with the hefty assistance we're going to be getting with my student loan check). Still, there is that feeling of guilt. Not much, just a small little rumbling in my lower back (or is that my herniated disc acting up again??) And again, I run the risk of sounding like a spoiled little bitch girl, you know, the one who finally found the person she was created for, has an amazing home, has a promising future with school and will be married in less than a year.......but damnit, I'm having a moment.

I haven't had one in a long time.

And writing about it really helped.

Gonna eat my pasta now. Then finish the bedroom. Then get happy again.......he gets home at eleven.....

Raining

I love the sound of rain. I am trying to get the dining room in some sort of order, but the drizzle keeps distracting me.

We are almost finished. Steve has started at Target now, and only has one or two shifts left at the Zone. I found a box of my school stuff and have a meeting for the Mansfield Institute next week. I can't believe classes start in less than a month! I can't wait. I love buying school supplies (but not the books....I hate shelling out hundreds of dollars for school books!) and I'm so excited about having a set schedule again. I never realized how much I need a schedule to feel like I'm productive. I feel like I'm in a limbo right now. I'm only working a few days a week, despite my five or more day availability, and rehearsals are on hold. And the thing that sucks is that when I DO work, it's ususally nights, so I can't even get with my friends during the day because they all work days.

I keep getting distracted from typing because of the rain. There are dishes to do and books to organize, but it's the damn rain. It keeps me looking up and out the windows. I wonder if the kid in my old apartment building is singing the 'Rain, Rain, Go Away' song at the top of his lungs, completely out of tune, making up the words as he goes along? I hope he is.

Closer and Closer....

It's only when I talk to Mom that I feel that the wedding is real. All of the planning we've done so far has seemed like it's for an event so far in the future for someone else. It's weird. I'm almost positive of the dress I'm going to wear, but I feel like I'm going to be wearing it for something other than my wedding. Mom is trying to figure out what she can do from Indiana and wants to help get things in order for us. THAT'S what makes it real to me. Once Steve settles in to his new job and leaves the Zone, and school starts and life has more of a set schedule, that's when we'll start the heavy duty plans. It just seems that we've had one big thing after another and there's been no time to plan anything for it.

I'm so proud of how far the apartment is coming along. I got a new haircut today. Wow. This is turning into a blah entry.......

Maybe I'll flip through some wedding books and see what sparks my interest......

Finally

Well, the apartment is starting to come together more and more. I just finished the guest bathroom and am working on the guest bedroom. Last night I tackled the office, and the only big thing left is the dining room. It's packed full of crap that we need to take to storage. One day, hopefully when it cools off a bit, we are going to have to make a day of it and just pack up both cars and head on over to the unit. Other than the dining room (and figuring out what the hell we're gonna do with all the clothes we have in our bedroom) it's almost done. We just need little things to make life a bit easier, like baskets to put appliances in we don't use often and putting them on the tops of our cabinets. For as huge as this place is, we have very little storage. Our closets are tiny and shoved beyond the point of full. We need to get a nightstand for me, a new bed frame (it broke the other night) and some random other things.

Yes. This home is feeling more and more like it every day. I'm excited. I can't wait to walk in and not see any damn cardboard. Anywhere. No more cardboard EVER!!!!! AAHH!!!!

Sorry. Moment of cardboard induced insanity. All better now......

Coupla things....

First of all, the audition came and went. I got a part, which I believe is small. A small part is awesome. I really wanted to do the show, but with school and working two jobs on top of that, I was afraid rehearsals would get to be too much. But considering it's a musical, and singing is not my strongest point, I think it would have been a small part, if any, regardless of what I wanted. And I'm okay with that. It's going to be my first on-stage experience with New Millennium. I'm so stoked.

On another note, Steve is really down. I understand why (the ex filled his head with bullshit, like he was worth nothing and everything was his fault, etc). He is now, in an attempt to deal with all the massive life changes we've been going through, turning on himself. His self confidence is completely gone, and I don't know what to do about it. I know I can't fix him, and he is quite aware of that as well. I don't know how to let him know that being there for him and helping him is what a relationship is about. He feels guilty for unloading how he feels on me, but he doesn't realize it's my job. It's what I signed up for when I said I would be with him forever. I'm not stupid enough to think we would be happy 24/7. We are human. Humans don't work that way. But I told him I would be with him through the good and the bad. This is some of the bad.

The thing I still don't get is this: we can pretty much pinpoint WHO these ideas came from......yet why is this person still a part of our lives? I understand his wanting to not be 'that guy' who refuses to forgive an ex. I understand wanting to have as few enemies or people you avoid as possible. Yet when her name is even MENTIONED, let alone when she sends him a text message or 'stops by' to see him at work, I get the creepy crawlies. She is toxic. She is an emotional vampire, taking what she can and sucking everyone dry. Once they've dried up, she leaves. As she did with him. She got what she wanted from him, let him go, and realized he wanted her back. She played him like a goddamn yo-yo, destroying all he thought about himself and his sense of worth. Now we are left to piece him back together (which I will gladly do) and she gets to say *sniffsniff* "I'm SO sorry" and here we are. We are trying to get the poison out of his body while the supplier of it stops by to have a drink with a friend while he's working. How can we get rid of her when she is right there?

As a side note, I want NONE of this to come off as jealousy. There is no part of me that is jealous of their relationship. I could turn into Godzilla and still be a better girlfriend than she was. And, there is no part of me that is afraid because she's still in the picture. I just want her out of the picture so we can work on fixing what she fucked up. The blame is mostly on her. And she hurt him. Badly. And for that I will never be interested in being around her. In fact, she makes me sick to my stomach. Feeling a little queezy right now.....

Arg. It's so frustrating to see the reason it happened and know that there's nothing I can do to make the reason go away so we can work on healing. Infuriating. Is it too much to ask to want her to move away and make someone ELSE'S life miserable for awhile? I mean, isn't her work here done? Damn.