It's the hard knock Life for Us!

I wrote this days ago and never posted it. I'll post it now, don't have time to re-read so God knows what I've written. Oh well, I'm sure it will be entertaining for now. Leaving civilization today. heading up north with Mike for a bit. Not getting "back together" per say, but I need time away from this area and helping out up there will fit the bill. Peace out to everyone who has been there for me through weird shit and "good" times too. love to you all from the lifelong "junkie loser" - strange how that doesn't really upset me. Is it such a bad thing to be. Maybe nobody says I want to be a junkie when I grow up because nobody knows it's an option.

Remember the shit? That movie, Annie, about the red-headed orphan? That sit's funny, it came on tv while I was sleeping, sort of, and I've ended up watching it. Who plays Miss Hannigan? She does a great job playing a drunk, heartless bitch.

Sometimes I prefer old movies to the new movies out nowadays. All the people aren't super perfect, perfect skin, perfect bodies, perfect everything.....they look more real, just like the rest of us. I think that the way people are portrayed in magazines and film these days is super detrimental to the collective soul of our world. It's not realistic, everyone knows that, yet we all still strive to attain such perfection. Perfection that will never come to us, ever, no matter how hard we try, how many products we use, or how many surgeries we have.

Ah, shit, Miss Hannigan just fixes the picture by tilting it when it was straight to begin with. After she wakes up with a bottle in her hand next to her bathtub gin........funny shit. She tries to seduce Daddy Warbucks.....I need my own Daddy Morebucks.......

I have to stop doing this white shit. I'm going to kill myself with a heart attack. Some kid I sort of chilled with in high school just died from an OD, heroin, but it's easier, I think to OD on coke. Because with dope you generally nod out or fall asleep before you die. Coke just makes you want more and more until your heart pops or something. I wish it were gone.

Why do so many women have a thing for a bad boy image? Do we like the torture? Is life too boring without it for us? I wish I were average, ordinary, blind like it seems so many are. It seems like life would be so much easier if I were one of those people who worked the same job for twenty five years without missing more than. like, five days ever. How do they do that? I can't imagine being at any of the jobs I've had in my life for that long. But some people not only accomplish it, but they seem actually okay, maybe even content if not exactly happy. They have happy, or really truly stimulating moments every so often....a child is born or someone dies, a holiday comes around and it's just so fuckin pleasant for them to focus on that and make it worth living for. For me, it's just so difficult to maintain one personality, or situation for very long. I need there to be unknowns, surprises, something to trip me up, make my blood pump hard. Without that I get too antsy and create situations in which I need to function at a higher, faster level than everyday life.

yesterday I could have stayed here, safely, with no problems at all and gone Christmas shopping and errands and shit for my Mom. But the very thought makes me want to puke. Instead I deliberately put myself in danger by driving an hour or more to a city to meet a man who does not ever have my best interests at heart, only trouble is in his heart. But I wanted the trouble, the closeness to the edge is stimulating. Will we get caught? Will we die? Will we go to jail? Is he lying? I kind of enjoy the not knowing, it scares me as much as it intrigues me. Am I warped? Other people must feel that desire to be close to death or destruction just to see if they can make it through. Anyone who does an extreme sport is certainly flirting with death? What I do is similar to that of an athlete addicted to the adrenaline the sport creates for them. Mine is just a less healthy, overall, addiction.

Mikey just had to hide the rest of the yayo from me so I don't sit here all ganked out all day writing stupid shit on the internet. My arms are busted, but I like scars. What's his face has a scar down his left side below his eye. It's pretty big but it blends in well and I personally think it's sexy as hell. I wish my scar that I got when I fell was more like a real scar, well part of it is a real scar, over my eye. I definitely needed stitches and had a concussion but I didn't want to go to the hospital but ended up having to anyhow in the long run because the clinic wouldn't dose me with my eye all busted until the hospital cleared me for a head trauma. So I should have just gone to begin with and maybe my scar would have come out better. Above the place where there was a deep cut there was another patch that wasn't quite so deep. But as it's healing it looks retarded because it just looks like rug burn now. Of course I have to get a doofy scar and not a cool one. I guess facial scars are better on men anyhow. I've dated a couple guys with substantial facial scars. Not, like, all over their faces but a big one down the side. Both what's his face and my boy Anthony from back in the day have scars like that. Mad sexy.

What's his face just called. He said he would but I try never to wait for anything he promises with great anticipation because I know he will disappoint if I wait for it. But if I pretend I don't care he has to call to make sure he's still got me by at least a little thread. The more I seem to give the less interested he seems. I think he may be jealous because he finally listened to me just now and realized I was going far away from him for a while, with my ex no less, so he said he would call me right back but now I haven't heard back from him in a few hours. But I won't call him back, no he'll call me when he can't take it anymore, I hope. If not, at least I know the name of the program he's going to so I can find him if I want to later.

Today was, well, I don't really know what to say about today. It should be over but it's not....it's still going, I'm still going....strong. I was taking suboxone for a few days, in fact I took it today as well and didn't use any H, but I'm pretty amped up on some damn good coke at the moment. Not my usual drug of choice but not, certainly, something I'm going to turn down given the opportunity. My crush of all crushes did call me over the week that my phone was broken and I was hiding away, sick as hell, up in the North country. He had his court date and wanted to see me before he went away. Although I'm not so sure that he would care to see me so much if I didn't show up with a car to haul his ass around all day and night. Plus I bring him shit to sell or simply share my money so we can both get high. What addict wouldn't want to hang out with some pretty girl who was so in love with them that they would risk their own safety in order to please them. I know it's pathetic, but I almost don't care because I really do love him, all his faults of which there are many, and his monstrous beauty. He scares me and confuses me and I know he doesn't feel exactly the same about me. I honestly can't tell how he feels about me at all. One moment he's telling me we'll live in the shelter together and get an apartment through the state and live there together, and the next he's giving me the most pitiful hug goodbye that I was actually horrified and insulted and called him out on it. I swear he tries to start a fight with me every time we part because it's easier for him to leave when he's angry. I hate that, I want to have a heartfelt goodbye. If he's going to a program, or jail if he doesn't set the program shit up, for six months to what could be fifteen years than I want a real hug and kiss goodbye. I mean seriously....is he fucking fucked or what? It drives me crazy. He drives me crazy, but I love it. I love the challenge. (why and how can I taste the coke in my mouth when I put it in a vein? It's crazy but I can't see how some folks can do this every day. It's way too much, I prefer to be brought down rather than forced up. I'm pretty amped all on my own without much help.......eeeeek, hot damn! this shit is Sta..rong!)

I've been awake now for far too long. Mikey passed out hours ago - not really into the yay even though he's the one who hooked it up. He should know better than to leave me alone at night with a gram of coke. I haven't done it all but it's only because it's so good I couldn't have without making myself sick. A gram of dope would be a different story. That wouldn't be around for very long at all. But then again dope doesn't make my heart feel like it's about to explode.

Anyhow, Mike and I are staying at my mom's house through Christmas because she seems to want us to be here for the holiday. But then we're going to head back up north. I'm going to stay up there and help him with his house for a while, and hopefully it will help me stay out of trouble. With what's his face in a rehab program for an indefinite period and me far too far away to get to him, maybe, just maybe I'll get over it/him. But I also don't feel like it's right to make Mikey think that everything is fine and I'm gonna just go right back to him. After feeling such intense attraction to someone else I realize that he is more my best friend than anything. But he realized, after I wasn't there anymore, that he was in love with me and he wants me to simply move there with him and have kids and live in this weird border town. I just don't think I can do that. Mikey knows all about what's his face, everyone does. I really suck at lying or even just keeping things to myself. Everyone in my fam knows where I've been these past weeks. They all know I relapsed and fell in love with a crackhead, dopehead, felon asshole who happens to be unbearably magnetic as far as I'm concerned. I doubt there are very many women in this world who wouldn't find him alluring. Without knowing all the details of his life, just meeting him is something to throw anyone for a loop. And he just happens to be all the things I find must be a trait in any man of mine. I really don't think he feels the same, and that sucks. But maybe it's a blessing. Maybe I can find someone else I'm as drawn to who isn't so emotionally unavailable and complicated.

Life.....Still F'd

Wow-eeeee, oh so, SO much has happened since last I posted. I spiraled away into a black hole of using for about the last three weeks (well, no it's been exactly a month, now that I consult a calendar since the show, Nov. 19th) - but this was a binger way crazier than anything or anywhere I have ever gone before. The catalyst for my recent breakdown was trying to live with my family and trying so hard to fit into a town that is just too stuffy and straight-laced, I had so much steam to blow off I just couldn't control myself. I can't even say it's over but I'm not using today. I made it from here to there a hard way - by making myself get stuck in the north country with no shit, nobody to get shit from except Mikey with his suboxone. So I had to wait until I was sick enough and then I gave in and took some suboxone and now here I am fake "clean", barely maintained on synthetic heroin that the govt. can regulate and feel good about. fuck that. But it's better than being sick and better than compromising my soul to get high everyday. But I don't know how long I will be able to stay at this pace, this level, I am an addict at heart and never really stop thinking about my first and strongest love which is heroin. Suboxone keeps me from being physically ill but it's never worked well for me for very long. As an addict it's too hard for me to regulate myself. I can play with that shit too easily - take it when I want to and not when I don't. Use, get sick, maintain, fumble and cycle back around all over again.

But for the last week I've been staying up in the far North with Mikey, the ex, I know......but it's the only safe place I have right now. He's gutting a house up there which he bought outright over the summer. It might just be crazy and intense enough of a situation to keep me pumped enough not to use for a while. Sleeping in a tent inside a gutted building in eight degree temps, scaling roofs covered in snow to install our wood stove and meeting some crazy people who work the border - pretty interesting. And for now it's keeping me off the streets which is where I have been since that night I met my latest downfall. I have to finish up this post because I am currently at my mother's house gathering some things to bring back north and she needs me to go to the grocery store for her - ah, how things just never change, right back in the old groove of icky. But you have to give to get, right? I just feel like I give a lot and then get weird things I don't really want in return. Although I do know I owe my mother right now - at least payback for the craziness she's witnessed from me and the worry I've caused. It's the least I can do I suppose - I just hate it though.

Anyway, I'll try to post again later because I know everyone really wants to know what happened on the streets of Worcester with my crazy man over the past month. And of course that is the juicy story. Oh boy-o am I hung up on the baddest boy I could possibly find. But isn't he just the most alluring motherfucker on the planet to me. He's like a magnet for me - I can feel him pulling me from here as I sit writing this. We've spent many a night tramping the streets since that first - and I should be running from him in the opposite direction. But that just isn't what I want to do. I want to burrow into him, be part of his being, and never be broken apart. And I know there is a part of him that feels the same way........but we're like that doofy eminem song..."When a volcano meets a tornado"........that's us. It's been a wild ride........

......to be continued. Soon, I hope.

Until then, keep on keeping on the best we can.

Life is F'd

I haven't posted at all lately because my computer (laptop) was stolen out of my car. Why was is there that night? I don'y know, it shouldn't have been. It should have been at home, I should have been at home.
I have sooooo much I want to say, I feel like my head is exploding. I'm so used to blogging as an outlet and I just don't have that right now. I need to figure out a way to get a new comp, or use the town library in the meantime.
life sucks right now. I totally relapsed. I've gone off the deep end, I've been doing crazy shit that I didn't even do ever before when I was at my very worst using drugs back in the day. I've been "clean" for so long. I used qouatation marks because I've only been really clean from opiates and hard drugs. I still smoke weed and take my meds, which are certainly drugs. I just don't believe how fast and crazy shit like this can happen.
It all started because I went to Worcester, Mass to try to meet up with my sister to get some xanax or klonopins or something cuz I was all out. But pretty much everything that could possibly go wrong did just that. My phone died, and I had no charger so I couldn't call my sister and the show seemed like it had already started by the time I got there, and shakedown (the area where people sell anything from crystals to stickers to heroin, usually). But this shakedown sucked. And by the time I was there, it was all over. My mind was working all on it's own. My feet took themselves to the exact place I knew I needed to be even though I'd never copped in Worcester before, it was as if I knew my way around already. Within minutes of showing up at the spot, I found myself being carried along by a huge man. I wasn't really paying attention to him, I just wanted to score. He smelled clean and I wasn't getting a bad vibe about him. So He found me what I wanted and a clean needle and he brought me to a quiet hallway where I could boot up.
I don't look at people very closely when meeting them. I go more on feeling. Can I feel like this is a good person. And I just felt safe with him. WE did our shit and then we were just sitting there talking. And he must be very insecure beuase he asked me if he was handsome. And I honestly hadn't really looked at him until he said that directly, so I had to look at him closely now. I wanted to know now, was he handsome. A lot of the kids I've always copped from have been good looking but there are always nso young and hardly speak english, I've just never hit it off with a street dealer before. But here I am lookinh at him, finally, and he is not just handsome, he's magneticaaly beautiful. He draws you in with a look. I never should have looked. I wish I'd never met this torturous male siren, with the fullest lips and humungous brown eyes. And because we both were high I don't rememenber the specifics of how I ended up straddling him (clothes on, thank you very much) But he must have said something to get me there because I'm very shy and insecure and I never would have approaced such beauty without an invitation.
I have to go, this is my brother's computer and I need to get going. More later, because the story nis not even close to over. My heart is breaking, and I know he wants me too but I don't know if he knows what to make of me, we are so different.

Well Mumsie Dearest is away. How sad. How sad it is that she has to eventually come home. Sorry, I guess I shouldn't say that. It's not that I don't love her, I just can't stand her. I don't even know how much I can even get into right now. There's just not enough time in the day, the night, this life altogether needs to slow down and give me more time.

For starters I'm here alone with my twenty year old, passive aggressive, hallucinogen obsessed, asshole brother. If he's not here begging for money, showering, or sleeping with his seventeen year old GF, he's off doing who knows what ans shuts down communication. He has no regard for the wa others may feel, I worry he's hurt.

I can't even get into the details. my mom bought this stupid car I didn't want her to buy. I said it was a scam. But she never listens to me. So she buys this jalopy b/c this fat greasy schemer tells her she's beautiful. The car I picked, the guy didn't flirt with her. OMG he was professional. So out with him and now I'm driving this fricken death trap. Literally. Anti-freeze is blowing right at my face every time I turn the heat on.

Only positive: hot new mechanic, will keep posted,

Hello Hello to all My Dears

Hello and Good Happy Halloween Mornin' to Ya! It sure has been a while. I'm going to try to address some of the comments I've been neglecting and give a general update here while I have a rare moment of peace and quiet. I miss my blogging world despite have a new real world which is taking up all of my time. I feel often that my blogger friends understand me better than some of the friends and/or family who actually see me in person daily. And I don't want to lose the connection I have to you guys - those in particular, who I would miss the most, probably know who you are. And then there are some new folks been stopping by and I feel so psyched about that because they seem cool. I'm glad to be hearing from you Verity Vaudeville cuz I think we have a lot in common and it's good to bounce thoughts off other interesting folks cuz they understand the origin of the pain or happiness better than someone who does not think in the same intense way as you or I or those who are in the realm of the functioning crazies. And I say that with as much love as possible. I really appreciate you all. And I love when Boston Joe stops by on his way about his own super busy life. Much Love to you all!!!!

So what's new? Oh, there's just so much I don't know where to begin. I'll have to check in with Jeannie and see how her illness has played out cuz mine's still hanging on with a lot of might. I feel a bit better for a day or two and then here it comes, rolling back at me with full force. I'd probably have more luck beating this thing if I had a few days off to recuperate. I hadn't been working at all (well, not a real job anyhow. And work for my Mom is more forgiving than the real thing) and now I'm working non-stop. I think, since I started my first day at the choco store at the very end of September, until now at the very end of October I've had only three days off. And we all know I spent those days doing my laundry, cleaning my space, cooking so I'd have lunches for the week, and generally preparing to continue the daily grind with as few snafus as possible. One afternoon I did just take to bed and refused to acknowledge anyone or anything so I could sleep a bit. And that helped a lot. If I could do that for just, like, two days I think I could beat this faster. But I've been taking plenty of the traditional Day/NightQuil, the Theraflu icky hot medicine drinks, and the Mucinex which just seems to make gooey shit come dripping out of every orifice - shouldn't I be dried up already? For crying out loud!? It's begun to dry my skin out to the point it's itching and I have to slather myself in moisturizer - but my lungs and sinus areas are still slogging in mucus. So I've added some alternative remedies and have been drinking much Gypsy Cold Tea and echinacea with garlic and ginger. And although I am not well yet, there should be something to be said for not collapsing entirely. I don't feel a hundred percent but I'm still getting high praise at both my new jobs so imagine how much they'll love me when they see how hard I work when I'm not sick. Whoo hoo, they better watch out, can they handle my greatness as an employee?

No, really, in all seriousness I am enjoying both jobs for the most part. I love, love, love the chocolate shop because I'm learning so much I really feel as if I'm an apprentice to this amazing trade. I feel very blessed to have found something which makes me happy and advances my culinary knowledge. Because any regular reader must know how much I love food, and cooking and baking and now I'll be adding confections to my repertoire - and that is awesome. More details on that later because I do have to work today for only four hours but it takes time to get ready too. And I still need to walk dogs and do some yoga for my own salvation in this life.

And this is mostly in response to SB because she brought up that working at Starbucks must be cool cuz free drinks and stuff. I actually am beginning to like it more and more as I'm learning all the crazy variations and coffee police guidelines - but there is one thing that puts a damper on it. Well, more than one but let's just focus for now on the fact the Starbucks I work at is not a "real" Starbucks. It appears so to the eye of every customer walking in the door, you are greeted with the traditional green and black color pattern, and all the typical products appear to be present but it is owned by Stop and Shop. And this is apparently an extremely rare arrangement, but of course I managed to find it. So although we serve the same drinks and follow ninety-nine percent of the same rules, certain little things don't apply. For one, us employees don't get free drinks like at a real Starbucks. We don't get a bag of coffee every month to take home and we don't get trained as well. Our paychecks are actually signed by Stop and Shop. How weird is that? We also have slightly different prices and we don't offer all of the same promotions to the customers. It can make things a little confusing, for sure.

Okay, dammit, I have to end this now so I have enough time to get ready and do some yoga, just a little, enough to keep my as pain free as possible. If people know how much yoga could help them they would just have to do it. I wish I had started years ago, I wish I had learned as a child. If I do it regularly, and I admit I have been slacking because I've been feeling sick and tired (the very reasons I should force myself TO DO it even more), it really help me in so many ways but mostly it helps keep the pain out of my shoulder. Without yoga, I can't even lay on my left side to sleep at night because it's too uncomfortable.

Well, for the third time, I think, I am off. I'm working downstairs in the shop part of the chocolate factory today. I prefer the kitchen, obviously, but the shop is wonderful too. Being decorated for the holidays makes it so magical feeling. I feel like an elf working at Santa's chocolate shop. Have a good day everyone.

Love,
Nellie

Sorry, sorry, so sorry I've been neglecting comments, friends, and many other things while starting these new jobs. Got two jobs, one at the chocolate place and part time at Starbucks too. Things are good for the most part...looking up. Promise to fulfill my duties to friends very soon.

Super duper busy. Got a bad cold - stupid cold. I hate being sick. It's like you're still alive and you look normal, mostly, but no one can tell how shitty you feel cuz it's not like having a broken leg. A cold is like mental illness, only a cold actually has more discernible side effects as far as the outside world could see.
The worst thing is that i just made this dinner I've been craving all day, all the while I was selling chocolates at the chocolate shop, and I can't even taste it properly. i'm gonna try the best I can though because I can imagine how fricken delicious it should be.
I love my job at the chocolate shop - I really do. I've been getting along with everyone. Except for this one lady who I will tell all about later. Right now I'm gonna eat this here steak and taste it the best I can.
Goodnight, dear readers. I promise, promise, promise I will check comments tomorrow.

Love to All,
Nellie

Good day. Long day. Interview at Stop&Shop grocery store. Hired to work part-time at the in-store Starbucks. So with both jobs combined I'll be working at least full time, maybe more. Nice. I'll be making some money. AND, I got some anxiety meds today. Nothing crazy but I think it will help. I don't talk about it too much, I don't know why. I have super bad anxiety. Maybe because I lived with it for so long that most of the time I figured I was just going to have to go through life anxious and unhappy because of it forever. But I really like me new counselor and my new Doc, so who knows. Maybe with my 'team' I'll actually be able to get off this fricken methadone shit for good. And maybe I'll eventually be able to go into a store without sweating profusely, heart pounding, loss of breath, tingling fingers. That would be cool.

Well, things are good and things are bad. I have my new job which is really cool. It's pretty laid back so far. I like working with chocolate. It's an art for sure. The melting and coating, the setting of the creams and checking for inconsistencies. I feel like I'm in Charlie's chocolate factory. Everyone seems to like me and I feel like I fit in. And I have an interview tomorrow for another job at the local Stop & Shop grocery store. So with both jobs, because it seems like once you get the interview the job is yours - at least in the service/low paying industries - I should be able to save up for a car. I want to get a small 4x4 pick-up or suv, used of course. Something I paid for and will be ALL MINE. That's the motto for the future. Get what I need to live all by myself. It's been my dream and my goal since I began writing it down, so since I can remember. I look back at old journals and I keep reading the same thing. I just need to get the basics so I can go off and do what I want. But the same issues just keep repeating themselves and I get nowhere. But it does seem like I have a chance for things to be different this time. Why? Well, it's me, I'm different. Before I would have been so out of here with nothing to keep me going. I would be sleeping in a tent or car or a cabin with no electric or water - just to get away from my crazy family. My family is still crazy, and I still have no respect for any of them - but I've learned to fake it so so. I haven't lived in my parent's house since I was seventeen. I got no help then and I don't get much now. I get a roof and the basics but it's always been emotional support I've craved. I've wanted a role model, someone to copy who did things the way I wish I could. I know there are people out there who are like what I wish I could be, I've just never actually personally met any. But I will. Because I'm going to stop hanging around close enough to my Mom so I can save the day for her or my siblings when she has an emotional/mental breakdown. I'm always worries she'll kill herself and I'll need to be nearby to pick up the pieces of her mess. That's no way to live, it has never been a way to live, it sucks, it sucks me dry, I have nothing left for myself after blotting her wounds all the time. I'm done, I'm living for myself. And part of that entails dealing with her crazy for once in my life, not running away from it because it stresses me out. I have to find ways to deal until I have my own basics and then I'm doing what I've always wanted even if it means I'm not near by to clean up her mess.

It's not that late but I'm tired. I get up by six most days, earlier now because I GOT A JOB!!! Whoo-hooo! It's not a really crappy job either, it's a cool job. I'm working at a place called The Chocolatier and it's a small chocolate shop within walking distance of my house. But the best part is that they have a kitchen above the shop where they make all their chocolates by hand and I get to work in the kitchen and the shop. So it's not as if I'll be spending my days feeling like I'm just a wart on the face of society, doing nothing beautiful. Because every day I will be doing something beautiful, something that makes people feel happy. Okay, well maybe not every day, because it's only part time for now - but at least three days a week but maybe more as the holidays come. And if people call out I'll take their shifts. Anyhow, things are looking up. There is light at the end of the tunnel on my way out of my mother's house.

I can't write anymore because I drank too much wine and now I want to have some of the pie I made. And I have to put away the overly dry mac and cheese I made from scratch. All of which my mother ate even though the last several days she's been deliberately leaving me out of meals. I finally cooked myself something cuz I was starving - I thought she was out so I could eat in peace. But of course she came home mid-prep - awful. But I just kept doing my thing, and I'm glad I did. Pooh pooh to them all.

I finally got a job. So it's only at Dunkin' Donuts, but so what. It's better than nothing and they're the only place that's called me back at all (well, the chocolate shop, but they only need part-time. And I need full-time so I can get out of here) so I'm taking it. And the guy who interviewed me was the son of the family who owns, like, all the DD's in the area and he was very nice. So that's a really good sign. I've learned that it's important to like your boss, and I think as far as bosses go he's alright. He seemed easy going but on top of things. And it's a brand new store so it's wicked clean. And it's not really a very busy location. I live in kind of the middle of nowhere so it probably won't be the worse job I've ever had. The owner said he would try to work around me taking classes, within reason. That's important.
I'm a little worried about coming off the methadone while I'm working. But I'm going to do what I can to get on some sort of anxiety medication which should help me get through work. And maybe I'll even get some sleep. The thing about a job like this is that I can't smoke on the job. Once I'm making some money I'll be paying for me own methadone and maybe I'll have enough eventually to go to the doctor who gives my mom and my sister their meds. I just want some ativan or something.
Anyhow, for some reason I don't really feel well. I think I'm dizzy from the release of stress from knowing I have a job finally. I'm gonna chill while I still can. I already went to the clinic this morning, than the beach for almost two hours. I go swimming almost every day even though it's super cold. I wish I had known how close the beach was all summer.

Things are lookin' up. I've got two job interviews lined up, one tomorrow and another on Friday. So that is, like, a humongo load off my shoulders. I'm pretty confident that I'll be offered a place at at least one of them. So since I've been so stressed lately I think I'm going to be a little indulgent today and go to the beach by myself. No dogs, no nothing but me, my reading, and the sun and waves.

Later.

How lame is it to have a blog called The Daily Dosing and then rarely give a daily dose of anything? Super lame, that's how lame. Well, you're still not gettin' anything good right now even though I have a million things to comment on, from a dead, crusty raccoon on the beach to more crazy mum stories. Oh, and I have a good one...oh, nevermind it's almost six thirty a.m. and I'm dragging my ass. The dogs are like, 'what the hell?"

So, until later then my peeps.

Sunday. I've always liked Sunday. It's a slow, lazy day. I think the world needs to slow down, the people in the United States in particular need to slow down and appreciate life more. Why are we rushing? What is the hurry?

I cleaned the house up a bit this morning, sat around, ate breakfast, watched a couple episodes of Nurse Jackie (what a crazy fricken show, huh?) and now I think I'm gonna head to the beach and watch the surfers while I do some yoga. Then I'm going to come home later on, early evening, and make dinner for my little brother and myself. I can't decide if we're going to have blueberry pancakes with chicken sausage or pasta with chicken, broccoli, and creamy garlic sauce. I'll ask him what he wants. Then I think I'm going to bake banana bread because we have a bunch of overripe bananas. What a life. I feel really lucky at times like these.

Of course there are things I want that I don't have. But I have time to get those things. I've also done a lot of things that other people haven't had a chance to do because they did the other stuff first. But I think that getting that out of my system will make me appreciate everything that is to come.

Have a happy Sunday people. Even all you grumpy meany people out there. I hope you find happiness too.

Have You Heard of Ibogaine Therapy?

This morning I learned something new in the realm of opiate addiction treatment. It's actually quite interesting and I think anyone who has an issue with opiate dependence may find it intriguing as well. And I must give credit to my younger brother, Sam, who made me aware of this controversial and fascinating therapy. Some of you may have heard of it before, or like myself, know you should have but didn't pay enough attention. If you've read any Hunter S. Thompson you have read about it and just let it slip through your mind like so many other things. Anyone who reads my blog somewhat regularly may know that I've been struggling with, first a heroin addiction, and now a methadone addiction for many years. I have been on methadone for seven years and was a successful H addict for about five years prior to that. I desperately wish to be free of the burden of dependence. I don't want to medicate myself everyday with something that has so much power over me.
But despite my many efforts at complete detox I have never yet been able to entirely overcome my addiction. I have come pretty far though. I am now on only 33mg of methadone a day and I come down 1mg a week. I am more or less only on it now because it helps to treat my extreme anxiety. But I would much rather find other methods of lowering my anxiety which do not require me to be tied to a clinic, unable to live a normal life. I will continue to smoke marijuana daily because that does not affect my life negatively in the way that my methadone dependency does. And it also does a great deal to limit my level of anxiety in day to day activities. Something as simple as going grocery shopping can produce nausea, sweating, my cheeks will burn and my throat flutters. I race through the store, often forgetting items I need and I limit my interaction with people as much as possible. I'm not like that when I'm high. But there has to be another way to make life less anxiety inducing.
Since I am always interested to find a promising possibility when it comes to recovery, I was thrilled when my brother mentioned this newish therapy. It is called Ibogaine Treatment and it's a little freaky but I think it could be right for someone like myself who has been trying for so long to be clean. It's basically intense therapy but the talk therapy is assisted by the use of a "naturally occurring psychoactive substance found", actually, "in a number of plants" but especially those in the Tabernathe iboga species. Apparently, ingestion of the active chemicals in this plant produce minor hallucinations and deep introspection causing patients to understand the root causes of their addiction. But it's not only that, it gets even crazier. It is claimed by doctors and patients alike that after a short period of time ingesting this drug, patients notice that the withdrawal symptoms of their opiate dependency are no longer discernible to them. Something about the chemical structure of this plant is able to heal the broken pathways of our brains and reset the way we create dopamine and other "feel-good" type chemicals that we need to lead healthy, happy lives. People who have experienced this treatment say they feel the way they did before they became addicted, they don't get cravings and their depression has been alleviated. It seems almost too good to be true.
But there are clinics being operated in many countries around the world. Of course, the United States is not one of them because we like to keep beneficial medical treatments out of the hands of the public if we think it may, in any way, interfere with the ability to make mucho money off the black market drug trade and the subsequent influx of cash into law enforcement and politics. The US is also notorious for fearing anything which opens the mind to internal exploration and introspection. Because then, of course, people begin to question what the hell is going on in the world and that's just a fricken nuisance for those trying to make a living off of the raping of our natural resources and the destruction of our souls.
So I guess my point is that I think this therapy is worth researching further. I am guessing, especially because I have not been able to find any info on cost, that it is somewhat prohibitive. I have wanted for years to go away to a recovery retreat and not come home until I have healed myself. But that's damned expensive. Once a person takes their very last mg. of methadone it can still take up to several more months before they can sleep through the night, eat without feeling sick; before the constant aching in their bones begins to subside, before the body temp regulates itself and there is not a constant feeling of dread hanging over them. But traditional detox programs don't keep patients more than two weeks because insurance doesn't cover it. So the way it stands now is that rich people get way more of a chance to get clean than poor people. But I've been thinking of taking advantage of living with my mother and trying to save up enough to send myself to a really nice private clinic so I can really focus on fully detoxing from the methadone and then doing some really intense therapy so I can get on with my life. I think it could be really amazing for me. So I can get down really low as I'm saving up and then go when I would really need the most help.
So I've included some links to information about this Ibogaine treatment. I have read a lot of it but not all of it. I plan to do quite a lot more research on this method of recovery. I think it could help to allow me to do what I really want in my life. I want to heal myself so that I can help others who suffer from the same afflictions heal themselves. And I think people are more effective as healers if they are accepting of themselves.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibogaine

http://www.ibogaine.desk.nl/

I tried something different with my dogs this morning. Instead of taking all of them on the morning walk, I only took two. I figured that way, if we ran into anyone on the trail, I could focus my attention more and hopefully they would get more out of the interaction. And even though we didn't end up running into anyone I feel like they benefited from the more individualized attention. We were able to walk farther because I wasn't as worried about them flipping out so they got more exercise. And I'm going to take the other two out with me for a walk this evening after dinner. My plan is to rotate which two I take every morning. And it's not like the others are abused and sitting in the basement all day. We have a backyard that's big enough for them to run around in the grass and then they get to spend the rest of the day chilling on the screened-in porch. Of course I also let them out throughout the day to go to the bathroom.
It will be harder if I ever get a job because I'll have less time. But that's partially why I want to work a second or third shift. That way I have plenty of time to get to the clinic, take the dogs out for a walk, take a shower, eat, smoke, and then still get to work with time to spare. I'm a much better employee if I can do my morning routine everyday. Because even in the winter I can take the dogs to the beach to walk because there is no snow right next to the water because of all the salt. So it's the only place they can walk because they are too short to walk in snow, they would be buried over their heads after most storms.
So anyhow, I'm going to try to make the afternoon/evening walk take us past some people. I think it's the only way I'm ever going to be able to have them pass by people without flipping. I just have to get them to see that it's okay. So if I take just two I can control them so they know it's not okay. When I have all four, the worst of them, the leader I guess, she gets them all going and then it's as if I'm not even there. They don't register me, they can see or hear me until they calm down. I think if I only have two I can keep it from getting to that point. And I'll probably have to work with the "leader" on her own so she stops starting it.
Oh my, I've had too much coffee and no food yet today and it's after noon. I have to eat and get my resumes printed so I can drop them off TODAY! Come on Nellie, get my shit together. I have to make myself do this because I get so depressed even though I despise depression in people. I try to hide it but it's there. If I push through it, which I can do more now than ever before, it does go away before coming back. Today is better than yesterday because I got a chance to do some yoga this morning which always helps get me moving and excited about things. Then I like a chance to write here, to all the random people out there. It's very healing to be able just vent. So today I have list I need to do and that's good.
And my sister is coming to dinner and maybe she'll and up spending the night. So I have to get going. I always try to fit too much in and then we don't eat until nine at night.

I'm feeling kind of down. I can't seem to catch a break on this job thing. I called Friendly's and the manager said he had just done some hiring the beginning of last week - right before I handed in my application. I don't know how those people knew about the job, the sign hadn't even gone up yet. They had to be friends of employees. Anyhow, he said he was going to do some more hiring in a week or so, so it's not all hopeless. But why does it have to be so hard to get a lame job? I'm printing out resumes today to take to three new places I found online today. They could be promising - A cafe, banquet set-up, and another hotel. And one is sort of close. Of course, I'm not going to give up on Friendly's because it's within walking distance which would be the best for me. I'm still waiting to hear from the hotel in Maine. I'll give them until tomorrow because I just filled out the online addition to my application. I brought them a resume which told them about five times more about me than their stupid online app. But still they needed me to fill it out. Only I didn't do it as fast as I should have. So I probably look like a big jerk. Oh well. I'm tired of worrying so much so it is what it is. People who don't worry as much about little stuff seem happier. So that's my goal - to learn to just chill. But still I haven't really learned yet so I feel lost and depressed at the moment.

cupcakes and cool people

I was looking for a recipe for chocolate cupcakes and I found this blog. It seems to me that there are a lot of different ways to blog and they don't all link to one another. Or maybe they do if you know how, but it's not easy. I think I need to take a class all about blogging so I know how to make my blog as awesome as possible. Why? I don't know. But for me, blogging is like journaling - only you get to share it with other people. Only it's people you don't already know personally so they don't judge you right off so really they get to know you better than most other people because why hold back, really? Anyhow. this woman has a blog but it's not through blogger. I'm going to try to link to her site because it seems pretty cool. I like anything that is about living the best life possible. This lady grew up off the grid with her parents - no electricity, no running water and she became very thrifty and handy at using what she had. She now runs a store and has her own family. But she has stayed loyal to the simple life it seems. She's all about baking, cooking, sewing and raising wholesome kids. The same life I want to live if I could get my shit together and meet a real man.

http://thefarmchicks.typepad.com/

Check her out. She's my new temporary role model.

What is Friendship?

How do I always manage to find these people? It just occurred to me that part of it is that they all, most recently anyhow, have been connected to the methadone clinic. I thought maybe this time I had done better because this girl didn't ever do heroin. She became addicted to her pain meds after a surgery she had after having her kids. So I though that since she didn't smoke weed and never really was part of a drug scene that maybe she would be different than the people who had. I thought maybe she would have her shit together more. But the more time that goes by I'm finding her to be very needy. I hate that in a friend. When a friendship becomes off balance and there is always one who needs something and then always the other one giving, it isn't really a friendship anymore. It's now a relationship of a whole different color. I feel like when I'm always the one who is giving it starts to suck me dry and I begin to resent the relationship. For some reason it seems like all the people I ever connect with are like this.
And I have to believe that in some way it is a reflection of myself. I have a difficult time being comfortable around people who aren't like that because I never really spent any time with people who were stable. Ever. Like never in my whole life, aside from in passing, have I ever really gotten to know anyone who kept a full time job, didn't get a bitter divorce, wasn't on loads of psychiatric drugs, dealing with legal issues, or a massive drug problem; or possibly a combination of those. I don't know anyone really happy and successful. No one who loves what they do. I wish I had someone near me who I really respected so I could see what they do and then copy them. Because isn't that really how humans learn everything? Isn't that why Rosetta stone is so effective? Because not only do you see the words, you see the action, you do the action yourself and then call it what it is. I wish I had someone who could show me the day to day activities of a happy, successful person. It's like learning anything. If you try to teach yourself something by reading books about it and then trial and error, you may eventually become competent. But it would be much more effective and probably faster if you could study along with someone who is already proficient in the thing you want to do. Hence, schools and teachers. Why don't we just let our children go out there and figure it out? It probably wouldn't be that effective.
Well, anyway. I'm trying to set my life up so that I spend more time around people who I want to emulate. In five years I don't want to be reading old posts and thinking, "My, nothing has changed. I'm still floundering and unsatisfied with life". I want to be able to look at my life and not feel like a failure. I want to have friends who I love and respect. I want to be around people I admire, not people I pity and resent. And I think for that to happen I have to have more respect for myself.
I think I took a positive step in that direction by finally breaking up with Mikey. And I'm really happy that we have been able to remain friends. We see each other every couple of weeks - because he's been living at a friend's house about an hour from me since, probably, May or June. And I miss him sometimes, but overall my stress level has decreased significantly. I sleep better, I get more exercise. Overall I just take better care of myself because I'm not playing mommy to him. But I'm so totally not ready to begin dating anyone else right now. Eventually I do want to meet someone, and I really want kids someday and I'm worried I'm getting too old. I'm terrified I'm going to be one of the women in the world who hits early menopause and can't have kids because I waited too long.
And then other times I think that it's selfish to want kids so badly when the world is so overpopulated. And I would definitely adopt but I wouldn't be allowed probably because of my history with drugs, right? And I couldn't afford it. Doesn't it cost a ton to adopt children? You would think with all the kids dying and starving all over the world they would give one to me. I might be wacky but I'd be a great mom. I know I'd at least be better than some. This girl I was talking about earlier (I would never write this if I ever, ever, ever thought she would read it, but there's no way in frozen hell. So it's okay...right?) swears and screams at her kids every time I'm on the phone with her. I want to say something, but how? What? It will not go over well. No one likes to be told what to do with their kids. Especially by someone who doesn't have kids of their own. It's just too easy to dismiss what they're saying because it comes from someone who has no clue what it's like to be them. But I do know how much I still remember the fucked up things my mom said to me and this lady is worse. I'm trying to talk to her and I can barely make out what she's saying because her kids are being so loud in the background. And it's every single time I talk to her. So then she's like, "Hold on, will ya?.......Shut THE FUCK UP!!!!!!!". I don't even know how to react.
Okay, I know this sounds so awful. How did I become friends with this person to begin with? Using the word friend is, well, not quite accurate I guess. Because we don't know each other very well. I guess it's a relationship which was going from acquaintance towards a fledgling friendship when it hit a rut at way too needy and I'm getting nervous and want to abandon the whole thing but feel like I'm in too deep. Yikes!
Okay. Instead of panicking and doing something I'll regret, I'm going to take it slow. I'll try to assert myself in the meantime so that I don't end up spending too much time on the phone giving advice or listening to her scream at her kids. School starts soon and I'm thinking once she has had some time to herself I could begin to let her know that it bothers me that she talks to her kids like that. Maybe. What do you guys think? Do you say anything in this situation? Okay, I'm not going to ramble anymore about this until I get some advice of my own.

Another Day, Another Application, Another Rejection

The rain has stopped. I must admit I enjoy a good, heavy, dark rain every now and again. It seems like everyone slows down a bit when it rains. You don't have to feel quite so guilty just sitting around cuddled under blankets with a book when it's raining.

But the sun is out and the business of life must go on. Procrastinating here, putting off yet another application drop off. This time it's the Union Bluff Hotel in York, Maine which isn't as far away as it sounds. Southern coastal Maine dips down almost hitting Massachusetts, leaving New Hampshire with a teenie tiny coastline. So it's really only a twenty minute drive to York, I've been told anyhow. I try not to drive around too much since I STILL don't have a valid driver's license. Hence another reason I need a job. I've paid off all the fines I owed but in order to be reinstated I need a special kind of insurance called an SR-22. Anyone ever heard of it? It's bullshit. Basically everyone I talk to about it, including the court system and the insurance companies themselves, don't seem to be able to give me a reasonable explanation of what it is. The best I can tell from the mumble jumble I've been served is that it's personal insurance basically. Insurance on myself because, apparently, I suck and am not to be trusted. But no one can seem to tell me for how long I need to have this. And it's super expensive. So if I lost my license because I couldn't afford the fines does it seem probable that I will be able to afford this crappy, unnecessary, over-priced insurance? So until I can save up the initial fee to get started I have to find a job and drive there unlicensed, praying to God I don't get pulled over just a little bit longer. It's an awful feeling. The constant anxiety couldn't be healthy. But what choice do have? I'm lucky I have what I have.
Part of the reason I was stuck with Mike for so long was because I needed the car. My Mom wants to go away all the time and it's her car so what do I have to stand on there? Other than the fact that she harped at me to ditch Mike, promising all the while that if I did she would back me up until I got on me feet. But apparently I am not getting there fast enough. Shit, it's like the worst time to be looking for a job. People with Master's Degrees are applying for the same fricken Friendly's Restaurant as me. I'm not even calling ahead today so they don't have a chance to blow me off. Maybe if I dress exceedingly well and have a big smile they will give me an interview. It's for a front desk/hostess position. It would be perfect for me since I hate manual labor. Just writing stuff/typing reservations, answering phones, being polite to people - I can DO that! For sure. Perfect. I really hope they hire me. I'd much rather work there than at Friendly's. Everyone pray for me!!!!

I'm so close to getting my little basement space livable. I've sent out a few job applications and I have a few more and then some places to which I'm simply sending my resume. I should have a job soon. I have an appt. at the community college in Portsmouth, NH to talk to a counselor to help me figure out what I need to do to get my A.S. in science, which should only take a year. Then I can be a medical assistant or a vet tech so I can get paid a decent wage while I finish my B.A.
I just want to save enough money to buy my own car and get my own apartment and get away from my crazy mother. She's just so miserable it makes me feel physically sick to be around her. I do love her, somehow, some way, I do. I just don't know how to take her, what to say to her, how to tune out the whining, the depression, the misery. She's never happy. I don't think I've seen her actually happy since I was a very young child. And even then who knows if it was genuine or just the poorly remembered fantasy of a child?
Anyway, I'm going to stick it out. For once, I left so many times when I was young, and then haven't been back for over ten years. So I don't care how miserable she tries to make me, I'm not leaving until I have the things I need to make it on my own without having to ask for anyone's help. I'm not going to have to rely on anyone else.

Wow, how sad is it that while putting stuff away from boxes which have been long packed I came across an old journal in which the first entry was almost identical to what I have written above. I have made no strides in the past eight years. I am still stuck, unable to take care of myself, jobless and under-educated. Oh my, how sad am I? The one difference is that I'm no longer hung up on some loser asshole with no care for anyone in the world but himself. That has to be something, right?

(Ah, what was that? A blood-curling scream from above? My mother, the only one it could be. She's alone, making dinner for I don't know who since she just saw my brother eat twenty minutes ago, but she'll still be angry when he doesn't eat anything, and I am certainly not eating anywhere near her. I'll eat what she makes cuz she'll cause a scene if I don't but I'm not sitting there so she can scowl at me and make rude comments the whole time I'm eating. There's nothing like trying to enjoy a meal in front of someone who insinuates how fat you are all the time. Anyway, only she could find a reason to scream that loud while alone in a room. I'm not even buying into it and running up there - and that is partially why she hates me. Because I don't buy into her insane dramatics.)

Even if I don't stay here very long, it feels good to take my books out and set them up on shelves. It feels like soon I will have my own retreat, my own safe, happy place away from all their shit. And they wonder why I don't want to live in a tiny room upstairs with the rest of them. I'd rather sleep on a mattress on the floor in the basement. Oh yeah, my crazy junkie brother decided he wanted the bed I was sleeping on because it was "his". And my mother told me I had to give it to him right away. That's why we're fighting today. I dared to be so bold as to suggest he needed to wait until I got my futon out of storage since I just offered to make a point to get it the other day if he needed the bed and my mother told me he said "No, It doesn't even fit in his room at his new place". So I told Mikey not to worry about getting it until he got back from his trip next week. Then on Sunday morning he decided he needed me to get it right then. I said he could continue to sleep on his futon, which he's been doing so I could have someplace decent to sleep too. No, no go. So I'm on the floor. But get this, after I put my breakfast on a back burner to sit while I dismantled the bed and put it out the top of the bulkhead door for him, he left it there! In the rain! All afternoon and night. Then my mother told my sister I left it in the rain. I handed it right to her out the bulkhead, so how did I leave it there. Does anyone think it was my responsibility to move it for him. He was supposed to be taking it right to his new place. I really can't stand my family.
Please God, let someone hire me so I can spend much of my time at work. Even work would seem like a retreat right now.
Oh, did I also mention I went upstairs to pee the other night at about two a.m. and my mom was sitting there with some random guy out on the porch. I thought she had gone out w/her friend Cynthia. Not to mention she's had this long term boyfriend, Larry who's been calling and calling and whose Volvo she drives. But she's ignoring Larry because she thinks he answered her in an insensitive tone the other day and doesn't care enough about her problems. But then the guy was still there sleeping right next to her the next morning. I think that's really vulgar behavior for a sixty year old woman. At least fuck some stranger in your own room so your kids don't have to see your two hung-over, half naked bodies draped over the furniture first thing in the morning. In fact, I think that's really irresponsible behavior for anyone of any age. That's how you get raped and murdered. I wouldn't have heard if he decided to kill her. Thank God I lock myself in the basement from the inside every night. With my mother bringing strange men into the house. Maybe it helps that my younger brother, Sam, not the junkie, just crazy, threatens every man my mother brings home with his butterfly knife. I'm not kidding, he walks around the house just flipping the f'n thing around and around. I hate it. I can't go anywhere without hearing that clink of metal on metal and not think of him flipping those damn knives.

I love it when the threat of oncoming rain at dusk makes the air itself take on color. Sometimes green, blue, purple. It's sad and beautiful.

I just want to remind everyone out there that it is really important to use your directional signals when you are driving. It can help you to avoid a lot of accidents. It's a simple movement of the hand which can save you your life. And while we're on the subject of driving, people, you are not supposed to pass in the right hand lanes. You should ALWAYS pass on the left. There is a huge blind spot on the right side of a car, whereas on the left the driver can see what is coming. It seems like people these days just do not follow simple driving rules.
In fact, in this post I can discuss two peeves I have in one. Some of the worst drivers I see up here in New Hampshire are the folks who come up from Massachusetts and New York. It's like they forget or don't care to begin with that this is where some people live all the time, this is our home. They are on vacation and they feel like the full time residents are there just to serve or revolve around them. When they are not speeding excessively down our highways, they are clogging up our back roads by driving fifteen miles under the speed limit because they can't be bothered to pull over on the shoulder to take a picture of the changing leaf colors. Just remember that your vacation spot is someone else's home. And they are just trying to get to work or live their life day to day.
Okay, well, that got out a little bit of the annoyance I feel towards the world today.....

If You're not Willing to Change - You should shut up and not complain

It seems to me that as a person gets older they should begin to realize that they are but a speck on the surface of earth, and earth is but a speck in the vastness of the universe. Therefore, all their personal, crappy little problems are so meaningless in the greater scheme of things that they may as well not worry about things they can't change. How does a person go through life day after day, year after year and not eventually learn what they need to do to make themselves happy? Or at least learn to be happy with what they've got? Do some people just feel more comfortable in a state of unhappiness? Are they so used to being unhappy that they don't know how to be happy?

I feel like my mother is one of these people. And her unhappiness is affecting all of us, it always has. It's why I left at such a young age to begin with and why I desperately wish I could leave now. But I have to admit I've made some brash choices in the past in my scurrying, anxious, dash to escape this place and now I have to suck it up in order to get my shit together so I can eventually live a peaceful, fulfilling life. But I have to say, it's hard, day to day to not simply explode on her, to say "Just Shut UP! Stop complaining, you have such a great life! So many people would be so happy to have what you have, you could do anything!". And I pretty much did just that this morning. I feel bad, sort of. I didn't swear, I didn't actually tell her to shut up, though she did say that to me. But I did say I couldn't take her being so angry all the time, and then taking that anger out on me. It's exhausting. Listening to her and my sister complain lately is taking up hours and hours of my day. Time I need to be job searching and finishing up my room so I can move on in this life. I need a car but I need a job to get a car and I need a car to get a job........so my mom is going to have to honor her promise to let me use the car until I save up for my own. She promised that if I broke up with Mike (therefore losing the only car we both had, bc he gets it bc he bought it) that she would help by replacing what he did for me until I could get it myself. Her family certainly did that for her plenty of times. She wouldn't...essentially she wouldn't even BE if it weren't for her mother and then subsequently the family business not entirely supporting her lifestyle. I stayed with him as long as I did because we shared too many things. I would be lost without his help for a while. And she promised to help me, something she hasn't done effectively since I was very young. She was always good with little kids. But anyone over twelve, she's lost, she has no clue what to say or do. Maybe it's just that she is such a child herself. I feel like I've been her parent for so long. To this day I have to sit there and listen to her for hours, literally, hours going on and on about my father and his lack of paying on time. They've been divorced for so long I don't even know exactly - over ten years for sure, probably closer to fifteen. Get over it already!! All your kids are grown, he has another family, he's old and doesn't really have any money anymore, does he really still owe her anything? Who agrees with her? Go on, tell me if you do, I hear her side all the time, I know the argument but I just think she should be living on her own by now, she would be able to just fine if she weren't so bad with money.
Get this, probably two years ago she buys this bedroom set. A bed, two dressers, a side table, a bunch of mirrors to go above the tables, there was a tall dresser too. It was beautiful, really, it was made from this rich, dark wood - but the problem was that it was HUGE! I mean really huge. And it must have cost a fortune, probably between five and seven thousand for the set. Like, did she measure anything before buying it? Apparently not because it totally didn't fit in her room at all. I can't believe they even got it upstairs. Anyway, she had to give the tall dresser to my brother for his room, the other two ended up covering over one of her windows once the mirror was attached and you could just barely walk around the bed, it took up the whole room! It was awful. But we all, for a full two years, had to go along with admiring how nice it was. (because if anyone criticizes her she has a fit - might even threaten suicide actually) But finally she realizes it's hideous. She doesn't realize, of course, that that means we've all been lying to her for all this time. That would require some self-reflection and thinking through an uncomfortable situation, and that just wouldn't do. So two years after spending that kind of money she decides it's awful and she can't live like that. So she takes everything out - and most of it is still sitting in our garage, getting ruined so we can't even sell it. And now she has bought a new bed (and a new daybed for the spare room while she was at it, "It was on sale Nellie" so she saved money, duh!) a bunch of new dressers, side tables, a little desk, new curtains, and God knows what else that I may or may not have seen. She even goes so far as to hide things because sometimes even she knows it's too far. And then she wants me to sit there and listen to her complain about money. But I'm not allowed to say anything about the spending, and I can't offer suggestions on how to be frugal and save - because she doesn't really want to know these things. She just wants to bitch. And I just can't take it anymore.
This week has been particularly bad. Between her and my sister who does the same thing only it's about sort of different subjects. She bitches about her lack of ability to get her own classroom her first year out of school and her boyfriend who she won't leave but who she really hates.

I'm just so sick of all these Negative Nancy's. I just want to be around people who are trying to better themselves. I'm tired of the whining. So I've gotten my whining out for the day. I have too much to do to sit around complaining. Sorry to have subjected the cyberworld to my negativity. It has to go somewhere.

Inherent Good?

I was reading 'Yoga Journal' the other day which is a monthly yoga magazine my mom gets delivered to our house. She doesn't do yoga, at all, but she got some deal where she had to order a bunch of magazines, so she gets it for me pretty much. I really like it because it has a lot of good articles every month which are good at making it clear how much yoga can affect you in so many aspects of life. And it always has a section where a full sequence of postures is laid out with clear pictures and descriptions of how to carry out each pose. I feel like I learn many new things each month. Of course, I am a beginner so I have a lot to learn.
Another feature is the monthly interview. It's just a short interview on the back page, usually with someone who teaches yoga somewhere in the United States. This month it was with some guy named John Friend. Apparently he developed this type of yoga called Anusara Yoga. According to his website, Anusara Yoga is "a life affirming Tantric philosophy of inherent goodness" combined with Universal Principles of Alignment. Basically, there is good in everything and everyone and all differences are accepted. I tried to add the link to his website at the bottom of this post in case anyone wants to learn more about this type of yoga practice (sorry if it's not right, I'm not so great at that type of thing, yet). It seems like a good place for beginners because it's non-judgmental and he works mostly with alignment and it seems more practical rather than super spiritual. Not to say that the spiritual aspects of yoga aren't as important, they are. I just think that some people are turned off by the religious/spiritual aspects of yoga. They think they have to change their religion to practice; this of course is not true, but I can understand where the misconception comes from.
Anyhow, clearly this guy, John Friend, believes in the inherent goodness of all things on earth and beyond. So in this interview they ask him about his views regarding all the evil shit that happens on this planet. If everything is inherently good, what gives?

YJ: With your positivity, how do you reconcile the problems of suffering and evil in the world?

John Friend: "Everything in it's essence is benevolent, good, and auspicious. But we do actions that aren't skillful. Everyone wants to be happy, but we misbehave or misspeak and cause pain for ourselves and for others. There's karma and interconnectedness, cause and effect, reasons for everything. Sometimes things seem random and unfair. The interweavings of the tapestry of destiny and karma are beyond my view. Some mysteries we don't have to figure out. We just flow with them and respond in the best ways to connect with our spiritual essence."


So, even though he's a little whoopdy di doopty or whatever, he does have a point. I think everyone, even those who seem like they don't, have the intention of doing something good. Whether it's good for just themselves, or good for the whole, is another matter completely. But everyone DOES want to be happy. And I believe we all are connected. Because everything is just energy in different forms. So we are everything because everything is energy, right? And us as individuals are too small to see the greater picture. We can't see the whole web of human and earth energy from above. If we could, if we could see the bigger picture, I think it wouldn't seem so random and mean. I think there would be some patterns and understanding. And there is a lot to be said for the actions of humans. We often DO misspeak, or misbehave, even with the best of intentions. And that does cause pain. So to eradicate pain, as much as possible, we just need to become more aware of our actions. Right?

Sorry if this whole post is a little whoopdy di doopty. But I think it is a question we all ask ourselves all the time: Why do bad, evil things happen if there is a God? And I think people like this John Friend begin to answer that question for us. Of course, it will never definitively be answered in our lifetime. Maybe not even once we die. But we can try to understand as much as possible.

http://www.anusara.com/index.php?option=content&view=frontpage&Itemid=73

I know this is going to make me sound retarded, but I don't care. I've always had help when it came to using power tools. But recently there is no one around to help me. I never had an attitude of 'I can't do something', it was more like 'why should I?'. But now I feel like I just should be able to do everything. I should be able to change a tire, whether I need to or not. Everyone should be able to drive stick (that I've been able to do for a while), be able to pop start a standard vehicle, use a chainsaw, a screwdriver, a lawnmower, things like that. Most of those I can do. But I've never really used a power screwdriver before. But I just put up a piece of sheet rock in my room to cover up a section that wasn't done. And I put up two sets of hooks!!! Whoo-hoo!! I'm awesome.

National Healthcare - Common Sense

It recently occurred to me that if I were to come down with some terrible injury or illness, I would be totally screwed. I don't have health insurance. And you can't get health insurance once you've been diagnosed. And there is no way I could pay for my health care, especially for a long drawn out illness like cancer or something. This situation must happen to millions of people regularly. How many poor people are there out there who don't have health insurance? And it's easy to break a bone. Who knows when an accident can happen.
As I get older and seem to get sick more often, this has really begun to worry me. What if it turns out I have a really bad disease? It seems like only people with money get help. Or if you happen to be a cute child with e freaky new illness and you can be used to raise money. This is a terrible system. One I know that is trying to be changed as I type this. And I have to admit that I am extremely ignorant when it comes to the ins and outs of the argument over national health care. But from that ignorant standpoint, based solely on common sense, doesn't it make sense that everyone should have access to adequate health care? At least the basic emergency and preventative care? When I lived in Vermont we had a state health insurance system. If you made under a certain amount, insurance was free, after that you paid a deductible based on income. I thought it was great. It was better than private insurance. I got rehab bills taken care of, they paid for my methadone medication across state lines, and it was affordable. If it meant my taxes were a little higher, they weren't high enough to be noticeable. But the benefits were noticeable. How can people not want to pitch in to help everyone around them be healthier? Don't they realize we are all connected?

Is That What Death is Like?

Over the past few days that I've been sick I've had this really weird feeling of being disconnected to my body. I was shaky and tingling as if the seam of my insides were no longer tightly stitched to my outsides. Like I was about to jump out of my skin and float away. And as I've begun to feel better I've started to feel like I'm being sewn back together. I'm more grounded and connected to the earth. And I started to wonder, this morning as I was driving back from the first walk I've had in days, is that what death is like? Is it a slow moving away from your body? Until you are completely separate. Your mind and soul are relatively intact, but they leave your body? Of course I was far from death, but I wonder if it can happen so fast that we hardly notice when we die. It's an interesting thought anyhow.

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with me responses and stopping by to support the folks who always support me. I have no good excuse except that I've been really sick. Until this afternoon I've pretty much been stuck in bed. It was such a weird sickness too. It felt like I was going through withdrawals, except how could I be since I've been on the same dose at the clinic for over a year. They did say that added stress can sometimes make your body freak out, and I have been under extra stress lately, but really? Could stress make me feel that sick? I guess it could. But I just want to send my love and support out to everyone who is always there for me.

THANK YOU!!!

blah, blah, blah

I don't even know what to write. It's been so long since I've posted anything. I feel so out of sorts, so disconnected to anything, so lost. I have nothing lately that is my own, nothing to make me feel like it even matters if I am here or not. I don't have a job, school, a purpose for waking up. And despite knowing what I want my purpose to be, despite always knowing what I wanted to do with my life, I just can't seem to figure out how to go about getting there. I feel so STUCK. It's such an awfully familiar feeling. Why can't I ever seem to get unstuck? I want a job but I have no skills worth anything to anyone. There is so much competition for the crappiest jobs. I just called a woman about a job I saw in the paper and the phone call went to badly I cried when I hung up. This was the conversation:

I call because the ad says to call the number and then the given extension. I figured I could just drop off my resume but it's kind of far and I don't technically have a driver's license (a fact everyone in my family loves to overlook. And they seem to not think it necessary to live up to the deal we made that they would help me when I needed it to get my license back. Suddenly they never have the time, money, whatever it may be when I need it. My brother the junkie or my sister the junkie, they need something, no problem. I need it and it's just so easy to say NO to me, I guess. At least that's what they actually say to me.) Anyway, this place is located just across the border in Maine, so I thought I may as well confirm that the position is still open. Before I drive all the way to Maine for no reason.

Woman: (In a gravelly, bored, and put-out tone) "This is Mary."

Me: "Hi, Mary. My name is Helen Hager and I'm calling to inquire about the ad I saw in the Exeter News about the front desk position. I'm just wondering if it's still available?" (This, obviously, is the one line I had rehearsed previous to making the call.)

Mary: "Well, have you already filled out an application?"

Me: "Uh, No, I just saw the ad in the paper today and it said to call this extension. So I just thought I would call ahead to find out first if the position was still available and if it was, is there anything particular I should know before coming in to fill out an application."

Mary: "Well, I think we're pretty much finished with looking. If anything comes up we'll call you. What's the name and number?'

Me: My name is Helen Hager, H-A-G-E-R. And my phone number is (blah, blah, blah...obviously can't put my phone number up here, right?) But maybe I could just drop by and leave my resume with you just in case something comes up and then you would have some more information about me?" (I said this because, maybe you noticed, she did NOT say the position had been filled. I got the distinct impression from her tone and frequent pauses that it had not been filled. I think she must have received a ton of applications, or maybe she just didn't want to be the contact person, I don't know. Writing the conversation so far, it seems like I'm just being crazy, because the actual words weren't mean, just her tone was so nasty.)

Mary: (first I hear a very audible "Tsk", like when you put the tip of your tongue to your top front teeth and make that tsk, tsk short sucking sound when you're exasperated or disgusted. well, that's what she did. Tsk. Sigh.) "No, I said we would call you if anything comes up."

Me: (Attempting, probably unsuccessfully to mask my shock. I mean, why can't I drop off my resume, even if the position had been filled? Maybe whoever they hire won't work out, maybe I'd be super qualified, what's the harm?) "Uh, Okay. Well, Thank You."

Then I hung up. And my mother had been watching the entire exchange so she was like, "What was that? What happened?" And I was just like, "I don't really know. She just didn't seem interested. I swear, mom, it was as if she knew who I was and she hated me." Now, logically, I know that's totally crazy. There is no way she could know me. But her voice, her emotion was so mean and abrupt. I felt like my phone call had ruined her day, put her out so totally. I should have just made the drive and dropped off my resume. Why did I have to call first? I thought for a minute, maybe I should still just go and fill out an application. They put the name of the motel in the ad. I mean, it's a fricken front desk position. It specifically said 'no experience necessary', they only pay $9/hour. WTF? Why can't I get a job at a fricken lame ass motel or gas station? What is wrong with me? Does something weird come across in my voice? The way I speak? My vocabulary? Do I look scary? WHAT is IT????

So here I am, in my half finished basement, furniture stacked here and there, no desk available to fill out applications properly (because shit is stacked on top of it) trying to fill out another application for another stupid gas station. Maybe this one will hire me to ring up cigarettes for rude people. I need to finish painting and putting my furniture back in place so I can feel more organized and easily print out resumes. I'm probably the only person in NH who brings a resume to a gas station job. Maybe that's part of the problem. Maybe I come off as pretentious. So this time I'm only filling out their form application that they printed out from some program. Whatever. Maybe it'll help. I just need a job. One that I can do while I continue school so that one day I can actually have a job I don't loathe.

So, later, i guess. I need to go shower and put on make-up, do my hair, and find a nice outfit so that I can be rejected again by another place I'm totally qualified to work at.

There was a study done on sheep. If you take a herd of one hundred sheep and corral them to a point where they all must jump over a stick to continue, all the sheep will jump the stick. Do the same thing again, only remove the stick for them to jump after the third or fourth sheep has passed. Even with no stick there, the remaining ninety-seven sheep continue to jump as if the stick were still there. They simply do the same as the sheep before them. True story. Sound familiar?

Humanity is just so disappointing. I'm shocked, daily, by how stupid and thoughtless people are. I question regularly how people justify regulating the world the death. Why do some people think they need to protect adults from themselves? I am able to make my own choices. I am able to decide what is right for me. I do not need a parental official telling me to wear my seat belt, don't smoke, raise your children like this, act this way or we'll punish you. Why do so many people want everyone to be the same? I just don't get it. Why are so many people so scared to be different? Scared to stand up for self-expression? Scared to question the status quo? It's sad. It's pathetic. It's scary.

So lately I've been doing a lot of yoga. Well, a lot for me. Certainly that is not as much as many yogis out there are doing. But it's a start. I can understand now how yoga can be responsible for weight loss and muscle strengthening. It's definitely more than just sitting around doing stretches. A lot more. Sometimes, depending on how the routine or the circumstance, I break out into a pretty heavy sweat. And although I'm not breathing heavily in the same exact way as I would doing some sort of cardio exercise, I'm definitely exerting my breath and strengthening my lungs. I'm actually surprised and amazed. I mean, I always conceptually understood that yoga had benefits. How could something endure with such high praise for so long if there were not benefits galore? But I've always had a hard time in the past finding time to fit a yoga practice into my life. I thought I had to take a class and that would be expensive, and I was working so much and making so little, it just some impossible. But finally having the peace in my life to find myself and what I really need and love has done wonders for me already. My Mom has cable so I can follow the yoga practices on the On Demand feature. And eventually, because of the help of my mother, I will have my license and a car and a job, and school, and hopefully then I can take a real class and get certified to teach. Hopefully doing it as much as I can now will give me a foundation for when I want to take it to the next level.

What I really wanted to write about though is how much yoga has helped my shoulder. it still hurts, but not nearly as much as it did before. I think the pain has been causing me to readjust the rest of my body to try to avoid moving my arm at all. So I was getting twisted and off balance. After a couple weeks of doing stuff to open my chest, shoulders, back and hips, I feel like a different body. It's like I want to do yoga right now because I feel so good afterward. It's really helping me build muscle to because you have to hold these fricken poses in, like, a lunge position. So you're lunging one way, holding your arms out and circling them about your head, all the while breathing deeply and controlled. It's damn hard. Harder than a good curves workout for sure. I'm looking forward to taking this activity further.

So I was watching a movie the other day and there was a concept I found very interesting. Have you ever thought about what your last meal will be? What's the last song you will hear? Will I know ahead of time? Will I get to pick my last outfit? I know that my last outfit might sound silly, but doesn't it make you want that outfit to be a good one? The thought that what I'm eating right now might be the last thing I ever eat makes me want to make this meal awesome. And it is in a way. Fresh basil, fresh tomato and spinach, toasted on just made bread with perfect cheddar melted on top. It makes me want to make every song I listen a really great one. It just makes me want to make everything I do worth it, because if it is my last, I want it to be a good one.

An Apology Post

Oh my, I have to counteract the massive purging of negativity on my part this morning. I don't take back the truth in anything I wrote. And since no one in question reads my blog, there's no feelings to be hurt. I guess that's, in part, one of the biggest reasons I use Blogger. If I get it out here, I'm less likely to take it out elsewhere. But I went to the clinic and for my morning walk, and I learned a few things.

1. It really helps for me to get out of the house and just walk.
2. It's even better if I can get myself to stop and do some stretching and breathing exercises.
3. I am not as angry after I calm myself down and relax.
4. I do have the ability to let things go.
5. I will not be here forever, this is only a moment, and moments pass.
6. I can get to where I want to. I have seen a lot of change so far.
7. I'm going to have to separate my dogs, and one by one, make the like people. I have a plan.
8. Yoga does actually change your body chemistry. It's amazing.

I know I sound cheesy. But I'm really trying hard to make this time I have here a transitional period. I'm done making excuses for myself. I have to take control and make happen the things I want. I know I've already taken strides in the right direction. I do feel empowered by the change I see in myself over time. It makes me feel like there is hope.

I apologize to anyone who may have stumbled across my angry post. I needed to get it out but I hope it didn't stick to any of you.

I am now sending out very positive, happy vibes to everyone! Thank You!

I need a little reassurance. And sometimes just writing something down makes it makes a bit more sense to me. I often feel as if I am my Mom's employee, not a member of this household. She thinks we're getting on great, well except for the past few days she's been horribly mean to me because I say something about the way her boyfriend treats people. I didn't scream it, swear it, or otherwise deliver the information in an obnoxious way. I was a bit upset because he's a bully. All around, to everyone. And she knows it. She lets everyone, but me, I'm her punching bag and always have been. That's why I moved to begin with. I can't stand being the person she takes out everything on. If she's mad at my sister, takes it out on me because I won't be as mean as Lily, ever, or as loud as Lily, ever. I won't hit her like she's afraid my brothers will. But she is the one who cultivated the relationship to be the way it is with everyone around her. And then she doesn't want to fix anything, she just wants to complain. I'm sick and tired of her crap. I've been sick and tired of it since the days she manipulated me into sitting around listening to her bad mouth my father and bitterly complain about a divorce that she asked for! I'm SO MAD right now. I just, simply find my mother to be a sad, simple, pathetic woman who is angry at the world. She thinks the world owes her something for her crappy life. If you ask me, she's blessed. She has a home, money without having to work, four healthy (physically) children, and honestly, the world at her fingertips. She could do whatever she wants. But all she wants is to complain.

And when I'm around it's suddenly as if her own arms and legs don't work. Nellie do this, Nellie do that. Now I really don't mind helping around the house, but this is way beyond that. She mad as hell right now because I spent yesterday painting part of the floor of the basement I have to live in. I just want to make it livable before winter. I also need to set up a desk so I can go to school and be able to do homework. I also need to take some time to myself so I can find a job. I spent pretty much all my money on my methadone payments. So I need a job because I'd rather spit up blood daily than ask her for money. See my siblings have always ignored her bullshit, let it slip over them, so they ask, ask, ask. I've always wanted to ask her for nothing. She's the typical sour Italian woman who will give you something and then hold it over your head for eternity! I can't take the guilt, the stress, the lies. Because I think behavior like that is one big lie to yourself. You can't tell yourself what is really the most important to yourself, so you are unable to stand up for what you want. How do you get to be on this planet for 60 years and be so scared to look inside yourself?

Example: She's been wanting this oldish, 1920's type crystal chandelier. It helps to know that buying things is one of the only ways she feels whole. So she finally bought it the other day when she dragged me to the antique shop on the pretense that we were trying to find the feed and grain store. So she bought it. She got a hundred bucks off because she sort of knows the man. So she was wicked excited to hang it. And she had asked her horrible "boyfriend" to come up to help her do some stuff around the house. She probably would have gladly had me do it since he complained the whole time and took, like, five hundred breaks, but I'm not strong enough or tall enough for certain things. So anyway, he fancies himself some sort of expert, because he's got to be the cheapest man alive, on obtaining things for a deal. And unless he's the one to find the deal, he puts it down. So he's ripping on this thing that my mom bought, making her feel shitty. Saying it was worth only fifty bucks. And she's just doing nothing. Sheepishly giving him some sort of satisfaction by getting red-faced and upset while scrubbing the dirty crystal furiously to clean it to hang. And he's just sitting there, in a lawn chair, watching her work, criticizing. I think he's a poor excuse for a man. And I know she just wants help and companionship, but only when it's convenient for her. That's always sort of been her thing. Something is cool, only if it's cool with her at the moment. And you never know which moment is which. He does passive aggressive stuff like that everyday, all day long. He's snide, sneaky, and cheating. And I know, and this is telling, that my Mom though he was rich when she met him and that colored her opinion of him. She would have seen him more realistically if he hadn't posed himself as something other than what he actually is. He was RENTING a house in Westport, CT from his friends for really cheap. My Mom thought the house was fancy. Now he's living in his daughters vacant apartment while she's away since the other people came home and didn't want to share their house with Larry anymore. But at least he had my mom go down there and break her back cleaning it for him so he could get his deposit back. And she thought he had this great business until she realized it was going under and he needed money, lots of it, to stop that from happening. He's mid divorce, was fired from his last job and leaves the Volvo he bought with money he stole from his dying father at my mom's house so he doesn't have to share it with his wife in the divorce. Cool guy. I think I'll find someone just like him. And then I will stick hot needles in my eyes for fun. Sweet role models I've always had, I wonder why it's been so hard to find up from down. Anyway, I swear my Mom treats me badly when she knows something I said was right but she doesn't want to admit it. She was annoyed with him too. He's sitting under the umbrella outside while she's lugging stuff around. Of course she is crazy and doesn't know when to stop and wants everyone else right there with her. Except when she overdoes it, every couple days, and has to lie in bed puking to recover. Then she doesn't think you get to rest too, because you were her minion the whole time. Now you must serve her. Get me eggs, go pick up my medication, vacuum the house, do, do do. I'm sick of it. The family therapist says to write down everything I do, and once it equals what I would pay for rent, tell her and then anything I do over that, she has tom pay me. She didn't like that idea. I did.

Do You Like Jackson Pollock?

I Know that there are very many people out there who really don't like this type of art. Although I wouldn't call it my favorite, I think there is some merit to it. Part of what makes art, well, art I guess, is that whatever it is makes people feel something, some strong emotion. And if the so-called art does this for enough people that it becomes well-known, I think that's enough for it to count as "real" art. Of course being well-known or not doesn't really matter for something to be art, it only matters if the artist desires recognition, right?
Well, anyway, I like these paintings because they are visual representations of the way I sometimes feel inside, emotionally, psychologically, just the way I feel as a piece of matter walking around. All frazzled and crazy. Not necessarily bad or not beautiful, but definitely hectic and hard to follow. A little misunderstood.

Even though this is, actually and truly, just a bunch a splatters of paint, there's something to it. I think. I like the black spots. They are like concentrations of anger for me, or anxiety, which are still all compacted while the rest of the soul of the painting is trying to break free. Maybe calm people hate these paintings because they don't ever feel this way and don't understand. And maybe anxious people hate them because it reminds them too much of themselves. Who knows? But I like them. We owe this random post to the inspirational paintings by Jackson Pollock.