Question

Alright, think about this. Are you who you are or who you want to be? Seriously, I mean, I am 30 years old, and this seemingly amateur question keeps rolling around in my head. Are we on a road to self discovery or are we on a quest to be some kind of super-self, forged from the baser fires of human desire? I really don't know!

I am pretty sure it is the knowledge of the difference and not some sort of cosmic, judgemental scale that places me here to ask this question. No one answer is any better than the other. Option A or Option B do not determine your or my place in the world. I guess I just want to know which journey am I on? Am I looking in to be out or am I looking out to be in?

Doubtful that I am the first to ask this question but sure that I am asking it of myself for the first time, I am going to go with I am who I want to be, but that person is dependent on who I have been shaped to be thus far.

That is not a fence type answer, I think it leans toward who I want to be more than who I am.

The coffee isn't ready yet, and my fingers feel clumsy this morning. Spending time with someone else's family later today, and I secretly pretend that they are mine. Not such a secret now.

No news on the car. Progress is being made. Listening to tapes in the old red car. Feels like high school. Probably the subconscious source of such nascent introspection.

Friday night lights (on tow trucks)

In Nashville this morning. Drove up Friday night to spend some QT with one of best buds and oldest friends. At the 65/40 split, my old faithful car coughed, sputtered, and gave up the ghost. That line from Braveheart, that was what I thought of first. "Death comes to us all." My little car, who is a who and not a what, passed away 12.6 miles from my destination, and now she sits in my friend's parking lot awaitng the inevitability of her junkyard demise.

Does anyone know anyone who wants a good deal on some extremely new and hardly used BF Goodrich's? I was so happy about the deal I got on them,and I will sell them for less than what I paid. They still have the little new tire marks on them... Driven on them less than 2 weeks... New rainX wipers, too... Oh, and the new headlights...

Mom and step-dad not being supportive. No news there. I can here the "I told you so" in the back of everything my mother has said to me since Friday night. They own 5 cars, they had time this weekend, and they have not offered to let me borrow one to get to work on Monday. I don't actually know how I am going to get to work on Monday or the days after that.

Did I mention that they own 5 cars, and that they only drive one of those cars on Friday night and once in the summer when they drive to Florida?

There is all kinds of good in this. Seriously. Towing my car from the interstate to Sarah's apt only cost me 4 dollars. The guy driving the truck was not creepy and he was kind. A guy from a repair shop drove to where my car is parked and told me not to waste my money fixing a car that wasn't worth the cost of repair. My friend's husband has friends in from out of town, and they have generously offered to take me home because it is on the way. My friends have made so many unbelievably kind offers, including the offer of letting me use one of their cars, and they have been so nice about everything. Sarah talked the her apt manager, and made sure my car would be ok sitting in their lot for a week. Seriously, a lot of good things have happened.

Oh, and Friday night we went to see the best movie of 2009. I wanted to run back in to the theater and watch it again. The Blind Side. Go see it. We got a ton of school work done yesterday. She studied for law school stuff, and I graded 24 essays in one sitting. Today we will do more of the same, and there is a real possibility that I will be able to finish everything before schools starts back on Monday. I told you, lots of good things happened this weekend. Did I even mention the fabulous Indian food?

I also got a chance to really talk to my friend about the events in my head. She just understands, and that makes me feel better than anythng else right now. It's just so good to have a friend who loves me, puts up with me, and understands what I am trying to understand.

Now, I wish she would wake up so that we can get this productive day moving. Hehehe. I will start the coffee. That may do the trick.

Tumble dry ideas

Everyday is like rising closer and closer to the surface. Yesterday was full of feeling like myself. Today, I have been very upbeat, but not unrealistically happy. I am looking at just how sporadic and erratic my feelings can be, and I am just sort of thinking about how a thermostat would try to regulate. No, this is not ideal, but I think it is still better than just wishing to be better and that being all I do.

Basketball was good last night, and even though it was a loss, I think our reputation is a lot more in line with where it was that where it was going. My student who was on ESPN until midnight last night was in class at 11:30 today. I staggered.

Friends are so important. I keep thinking about that these days. The ones I have had and the ones I will have and the ones I have right now, they are all such a part of me. I am missing one friend so much. I wanted to watch basketball with this friend, I wanted to laugh at this CD with this friend, and I wanted to just drink a cup of coffee with this friend. I won't be doing any of those things. That is how it seems. I am not even sure if I should hold out or keep walking away. I keep looking back, that is for sure. I keep looking for my friend to say that things will be ok, and that we can be friends again. It's the saddest thing I think these days, and I try so hard not to think about it too much.

Have you ever felt like you are so much better at being who you are, but that the who you are never really gets to be seen the way you want it to be? That is another thing I think about. I know, it seems incredibly self-absorbed and narcissistic, and I can be those things, but the drive causes my mind to wander, and sometimes I get stuck on self without any way away from it. Just thoughts that tend to drift in and out, but they are the thoughts that seem most celebrated in a blog where I share MY thoughts. That's all I'm sayin...

Lonely Island songs in my head today, too. It's difficult to teach without smirking as I go through the lyrics to the last track on the CD in my head. If you don't know, it is a song about three 13 year old boys who have sex with an alien (at the same time thanks to the generous, hospitable anatomy of the arguably male alien)in order to preserve the alien race. After the group climax, the alien grants the young boys a wish. They all agree that they want to be the "greatest fake MC's on earth." Try teaching comparison and contrast essay writing with that song in your head...

Repurposing office supplies

Got through the weekend and made it back to work today. It started to rain somewhere around mile marker 52, and I looked forward to testing out my new wiper blades. Looking for the little things. Read a lot this weekend, didn't grade that much, and cooked a few meals. Doing instead of not doing seems to be a good step to make.

Using office supplies to keep my hair off my shoulders today. With my door open, I am sure someone will wander by and wonder why that girl has a huge paper clip holding her hair up. The rain has made the air in the office humid, and I just can't stand that feeling. I improvise with office supplies.

Wrote poetry in my head today. Going to see if I can remember it...

Heavy velvet slumber stealing sleepy sighs
Wrap me up, hold me on
Around deeper thoughts and preventing inspired rise
Cocoon, a womb, red heartbeat
Breathe more or less against the morning writhe
Broken skin, torn will, pain
Unreal and unspoken in the primal vernal eternal sunrise
Here, near, above
From tiny shoulder to weak elbow and skinned knees to parted thighs
Day night and night day
The vicious velvet curtain takes all and leaves the lips and sighs

I guess I am trying to let the darkness out. I do kind of feel better.

Contents under pressure

The truth lives here. I mean, that was the premise of why I decided to join the nation of bloggers. Initially, this was where I was supposed to go when I just couldn't hold on to the thoughts about life-changing cells. Then it was where I came when I wanted to moan about the ridiculousness of the job search. Recently, this has been the forum for endless teachery rants. Today, it is, once again, a truth forum where I have come in order to release a little of the darkness that has been taking me over.

Anyone who knows me, has seen that I often have a revolving nature. Never one to be really violent or extremely angry, my moods go from unrealistic joy to a kind of sadness that consumes. Last year, in the middle of one of those consuming times, I backed away from the world and did my best to go from day to day with no real goal. It was only when I thought that I might be surviving the winter that I finally forced myself back into the world, even though I never have gotten back to where I had once been.

When the Memphis job happened, you know what happened. I was back on the land of sunshine and bubbles, and that is basically where I have been for a while. A sunny feeling has taken me over, and I haven't really known how to react to it. Happy is just something that I don't do very well in large doses. Sure, I laugh, I think I am funny, and people generally laugh more with me than at me, but I definitely feel more at home in a gloom than in the sun. It is depressing to admit these things, but I promised the truth here, and that is what I am delivering.

As this job has become more routine than life-fulfilling destiny, I have begun to suffer the harsh sting of emotional investments that just don't pay off. Putting everything I am into my classes has proven to be the straw. I am the camel with the broken back.

Much like last year when I went into a dark place alone, I feel myself looking for the hide-out again. Not sleeping, not talking to friends, not thinking about much more than my obligations to my students, and walking roads best left unexplored have put me here. I don't want another time like last year. I don't want to be sad, and I don't want to be so... so... alone and lost. I feel like a child, and I don't want to feel like a child.

A few nights ago, something in me snapped. I remember laughing at a song and then I remember being panicked at how late it was. I felt myself looking for something, but I wasn't home, and I am not sure what I was looking for, and I just wanted to lay my head down and think about where this thing was. I must have made an ass of myself because I left my friend's house and he hasn't talked to me since. I have no idea how I got home, and that is scary because home was so far away. The next morning I woke up, and for longer than is usual, I really thought it had all been a dream. Slowly, it came back to me. I had driven myself home from Memphis. I had held my head because I had been afraid of something. Walking down a sidewalk came back to me, walking to a door, needing my water bottle, I had the lid, why did I have the lid?

It's all here now. That night and the little I can bring back about it. Everything was fine, and then I panicked about the time, and that was when it happened. My little step away from reality is all I can think about. Why did it happen, and what am I supposed to do about it? Do I talk to my mother? Do I talk to a shrink? Do I close my eyes and wish it away? Do I recognize that I am a grown up and I have to take care of what I can take care of admit when it is out of my hands?

Yesterday, I called my insurance folks, and I am waiting on a call back from them. She said something about 7 to 10 days, but I am sure I will call back before that can happen. My friend won't talk to me, so I am leaving that one alone for now. I won't tell my mom, mostly because things like this tend to worry her at first and then just annoy her. I talked to my friend about it last night. It took me the whole ride from Memphis to Jackson to feel like I was coming back to the surface. The tears are at the corners of my eyes as I think about friendship and love and all the ways both are shown.

Limbo, I guess, until I can take another step. I don't want to go back to the dark place, even though it was so nice. I can't sink lower. I have good friends, a family, and a life that I have always wanted. There isn't any reason why I should feel so sad. But I do feel sad. I have to find out why that is. I am the only one who can ask that question.

I can still laugh, I can still smile, and I can still do what needs to be done. Right now, according to my friend, I need to just be careful and take care of my mental self. Ok. I guess I will, as soon as I figure out how to do that.

Twice today, I have felt myself push feelings back. I knew I was doing it, and then my head hurt, and then I felt the tears form. I have been doing a lot of throat clearing and head shaking, but I am almost to the weekend. I have a meeting in Memphis on Friday, and then I can finally rest some this weekend. I hate feeling so fragile, but that is how I feel. Fragile when I have never thought of myself as that. Fragile people need someone to take care of them. No one has ever taken care of me, and there is no one to take care of me now. I have the friends who will stick by me, and I have the friends who I hope will see me through this.

Signs of life from the trench

From amidst the fog of self-induced work, I am emerging to say that I am alive. I am doing as much as I can everyday to get myself out of this grading mess.

I feel like I am in grad school! I am actually planning on how little sleep I can manage in order to get the stack gone by Monday at 11:30.

Oh no! I still need to plan a lesson.... or three. How did this happen? Oh yeah... I spent last weekend acting like it was a weekend. Sorry, my bad. I will try to remember that weekends are only weekends if there isn't work to do.

There is fun to be had tonight, and tomorrow I am back at it again.

Promise.

Robbed

The weekend was a blast. As usual, I am the girl at the party without a camera or even a decent camera phone. Sorry. My costume was kinda awesome, though. Just so you know.

Today begins a week of uncertainties, and I am trying to remain optimistic. The unplanned is often the the gateway to fun and new things. The time change reminds me that if it were last week, I would be done by now. Whatever that means.

My identity was stolen on Friday by someone pretending to assist a hearing impaired me. I feel so... just... vulnerable and... robbed? When I told a few people about this, they started to talk about all the things I could have done to prevent it from happening. There is an analogy that works here, and it is in poor taste, but I will say this. I wasn't asking for it, I wasn't dressed like I wanted it, it happened, and now I am dealing with it, so will you please, just say "that sucks" and stop acting like I somehow brought this on myself. Gah, it just makes me want to cry and write it run-on sentences, and even I know that those tears and commas would be stupid. Grrrr, it just sucks. It wasn't my fault.