Miscellania

I don’t like how I get/feel when my life feels like everything is uncertain. Something is gonna have to give and soon. So everyone bear with me…specially you Dan…you are the one I have gone into a million pieces with the most. I am sorry. I know I have been an emotional pain in the ass with all my mood swings.

I am so thankful for Diva and Dan and everyone else who has given me advice. And Peter…let me know if you and your family are ok. I am worried since you said yall have been having bad storms and I haven’t seen you in a week.

About the only thing I would change is the 23 to 33

Pardon me while I burst…

A decade ago,
I never thought I would be,
at twenty-three, on the verge of
spontaneous combustion. -Woe-is-me.-
But I guess that it comes
with the territory,
An ominous landscape of
never-ending calamity.
I need you to hear,
I need you to see
that I have had all I can take and
exploding seems like a DEFINITE possibility
to me.

So pardon me while I burst
into flames.
I’ve had enough of the world
and its people’s mindless games.
So pardon me while I burn
and rise above the flame.
Pardon me, pardon me…
I’ll never be the same!

Not two days ago,
I was having a look
in a book
and I saw a picture of a guy
fried up above his knee.
I said, “I can relate,”
cause lately I’ve been thinking of combustication
as a welcome vacation from
the burdens of
the planet Earth.
like gravity, hypocrisy,
and the perils of being in 3-D…
but thinking so much differently.

Pardon me while I burst
into flames.
I’ve had enough of the world
and its people’s mindless games.
So pardon me while I burn
and rise above the flame.
Pardon me, pardon me…
I’ll never be the same!

Never be the same, yeah…
Pardon me, while I burst into flames…
Pardon me, pardon me, pardon me.

So pardon me while I burst
into flames.
I’ve had enough of the world
and its people’s mindless games.
So pardon me while I burn
and rise above the flame.
Pardon me, pardon me…
I’ll never be the same!

Never be the same, yeahh!!

I dual boot…Windows XP on 1 partition, Ubuntu Linux on the other. Well I started using Windows so I could use XFire…muuuuch easier to talk to people while in a game. My WIndows side is basically a slug. Last night all I had running was XFire and AIM and it was soooo laggy. So I backed everything, formatted the Windows partition and reinstalled XP. All of that went so smoothly, I shoulda known something would happen.

Boy did it…

Got wifi working and then started installing drivers…motherboard, graphics, etc. Installed the Nvidia drivers and it threw me into 4 bit color. I have tried everything…it won’t recognize my AGP slot or the card in the AGP slot. It says my sounds are working in device manager, but i have no volume controls and when I try to open them it says I have no sound device. I was still fighting it at 5 am.

At one point I got so frustrated I slammed my fists down on the keyboard. Instant major pain to the point I thought I broke, cracked or chipped a bone. A knot came up on the side of my hand so I put ice on it for about 6 hrs. It still hurts…but doesn’t look as swollen, so maybe I just bruised the heck out of it.

Started out with me wanting to go to the beach for solitude and peace…that was a bust and add insult to injury the water stunk. So I tried to go to sleep. I slept less than an hour and woke up, couldn’t fall back asleep and saw a message from a friend where something was wrong, but I don’t know what…and have no way of knowing till they come back on.

Unrelated…here’s a pic I took the other day

This is something I wrote 7 years ago. I found it in my writings folder. It’s about abuse.

It’s Not Your Fault!!!!!
by  stormyeyez,  15th February 2001.

Society and the tendency to make abuse/rape survivors feel they are to blame.

I recently read the story of a woman who was blaming herself for the death of her daughter. This was a death that was sadly unnecessary, as was her self-blame, but I think the worst part of it was her family and friends blamed her as well. Did she kill her daughter? No, her husband did. They were in the garage and the woman was trying to stop her husband, who was in a rage, from going out on the road and possibly killing someone. He grabbed her by the hair (he was in the car) and started rolling up the window. As he did this he slammed her face into the window and continued rolling her hair up in the window. About this time their daughter came to the garage door and told her Daddy not to take off he had her Mommy by the hair and she started running for the car. He slammed his foot down on the gas and it was just as the little girl was at the back of the car. She died as a result of the head injuries she incurred from the back tire pulling her under.

How is this the mother’s fault? It is so easy for someone who has never been in an abusive situation to say “I would have left the first time he hit me” or “No man would ever hit me” or “If you hadn’t stayed then this wouldn’t have happened” or even “If she stayed she wanted it”. Fear is a very strong means of control and one of the hardest to break free from. You cannot know what it is truly like until you have “walked a mile in their shoes” so to speak.

Guilt from other people is the last thing any person needs in times like these. Abuse survivors heap more than enough on ourselves. The “if only’s” scream through our minds and taunt us with what might have been and what we should have done. What someone needs in times like these is support, hugs, being told, “I care” and “It isn’t your fault”. I read her story and wept, not only for the loss of a precious little girl, but because this woman was apologizing and terrified those who read her story would think less of her and not want to talk to her anymore.

I was 15 and in what started out a terrific relationship. I grew close to his family and was treated like and referred to as their daughter. I had the relationship with his mother that I had never been able to have with my own. The change came slowly and sinisterly. It tends to sneak up on you. Usually by the time the abuser actually hits you, they have you right where they want you emotionally. How so? Emotional abuse is the main way. He started out putting me down in little ways, making me feel as though he was doing me a favor staying with me because no one else would want me. By the time he pushed me for the first time I was beaten down emotionally. Of course I got told the typical “I’m so sorry, it won’t happen again” lines. Sometimes though, he shifted the blame to me. “If you were good then I wouldn’t have had to do this” was a frequent statement.

Why didn’t I leave? As I have said before, fear is a very powerful means of control. He beat, stabbed, and burned me when he was mad at someone else. There was no doubt in my mind that if _I_ made him mad he would kill me. No one knew what I was going through. I had become very clever at using makeup to hide any visible marks, though usually he marked me in places that most clothes would cover. I gave up skating, which I loved, because the skating dress showed the marks on my thighs. It took me 8 months to finally get the courage to leave. The last straw was when he raped me and had a female friend of his write a letter that was supposedly from me to him talking about how much that night had meant to me. This letter conveniently was passed around at school. Even so it took me almost 3 months to work up the courage to leave, but that was when I knew _I had to_. When I did it, I arranged for it to be in a public park with his mom, my grandmother, his sister, and a bunch of my guy friends scattered throughout the park. All I said in explanation was “I don’t know how he will react and I am afraid”.

He didn’t take it well. He stalked me, he called my family crying that he loved me and couldn’t understand why I had left him, he got our mutual friends to try to convince me to take him back, and countless other ways of trying to convince and/or intimidate me into coming back. When I finally began telling people what had happened they blamed me. I was told it was my fault, I asked for it and I deserved it by my mother. Others said if he really had done these things then I should have said something, that any intelligent person would have left when it first started, that I must have enjoyed being abused if I stayed for so long, etc. _These_ are the types of attitudes that need to be stopped.

Today’s society has a disturbing way of making the victims and survivors feel like _they_ are the criminals. A rape victim and their past is put on trial just as much or more as the rapist, a battered woman is often shunned and whispered about like _she_ is the one doing wrong, an abused child is often lost in the cracks because so many try to say “He is just looking for attention”. Each abuse case needs to be treated like there never was someone who tried to cheat the system, like it is the abuser’s and not the victim’s fault, and like it isn’t something to be ashamed of to have ended up in this situation. If you know someone who has been abused, tell them (as much as it takes for them to believe it) that it is not their fault. If you are a survivor, then I am telling you now “It is NOT your fault!!!”

I think it’s time I found me again. Somewhere along the way I have lost myself and let myself only be thought of in terms of other people. It is getting to where I don’t even know who *I* am anymore. I can’t write anymore, I rarely sing anymore, things I used to love are no longer interesting to me. I am tired of it. Part of the song I posted previously just keeps looping through my head:

I am walking on the bridge
I am over the water
And I am scared as hell
But I know there’s something better
Yes I know there’s something better

Just….meh

Sometimes it is best to keep one’s mouth shut…

It’s my birthday today and I am sick

I always get introspective on my birthday. Years keep marching by and I feel like I am not accomplishing a damn thing. I want so bad out of this rut, but for now I am stuck. Every year I say the next birthday will be different. One day….

Update lazy style cuz I dont feel like writing cohesive paragraphs

• Russ’s mom got out of the hospital May 29th
• She got readmitted May 31st dehydrated and with pneumonia
• we later found out it was MRSA pneumonia
• they put her on Vancomycin, it was working
• It stopped working
• They put her on Zyvox
• Her veins would no longer take an IV
• choice: pills or a PICC line — she chose pills
• Got to come home June 11th
• major drama - we wouldnt let her go home alone
• We start june $400 in hole because of gas and frequent hospital trips
• I work out a living right on the razor thin wire way to get us out of said hole
• today bad news from IRS - owe over $6000 on money I never got
• Filed my taxes the end of January but because of above I still dont have my return or our $600 stimulus payment
• all of above = me at end of my fucking rope

Nothing like a full day focusing on the thing that most makes you feel like a failure as a woman. The only difference this year is I didn’t get guilt tripped in an attempt to make me go to church. Only because Nanny felt too bad to go today.

I refuse to go to church on Mother’s Day. It is so painful to sit there watching all the mothers go forward and get recognized and get their flowers. What about those of us who have tried and just endured loss after loss? Not there would be any winning with me. If I went to church and they acknowledged those of us who are trying to become moms and not succeeding I would be too upset to stand up be acknowledged. Either way it’s like standing up and saying “Hey look at me I fail at the one thing I want most out of life.”

Not a single person said Happy Mother’s Day to me, I guess it’s because to most Angel babies don’t count.

For once I think I am thinking “Is it Monday yet?”

I am so tired. I would give anything for a full night’s sleep where I didn’t wake up every hour. And maybe that is clouding everything else, but I think it’s pretty bad when the idea of coming to work makes you wanna burst into tears. I am hurting. I don’t know how to explain it other than it feels like someone is trying to over-inflate a weighted ball in my bladder. It hurts to sit or stand. I don’t feel like cooking dinner. I am fed up with my  brother-in-law and my grandmother’s sister-in-law and my boss and I guess life right now.

I am sooo glad for the weekend to be here. I always say I am going to catch up on my sleep but I never do lol. I have no clue what we are going to do this weekend. I know we want to take Russ’s mom to the Diner we discovered in Pensacola. They had good food. It tasted like everything down to the ranch dressing was homemade.

Russ just told me that he just read “In the United States, Chevron pocketed an average of $87 per barrel for crude oil and natural gas liquids sold in the first quarter, more than doubling from $37 per barrel last year.” OK I understand oil is something we have a finite supply of and as demand continues to increase the price is going to go up. However, that just sounds obscene! Oil is currently $112 per barrel. That $87 is 77.7% of the cost per barrel.

Something HAS to give. We have got to really work at finding and using alternative sources of energy. Of course for those sources to be widely adapted, they will have to be affordable. That is one the major kickers. I’d love to set up solar panels to offset some of the electricity we use, but they are expensive. It was 3 months ago we went car shopping. I would have loved to get some kind of hybrid that got wonderful gas mileage, but they cost so much more.

The US, especially rural areas, needs a much better public transportation system. The fewer cars on the road, the less fuel used. I know our area is not very pedestrian/bike friendly. There are a few sidewalks and they even put in a walking/bike path in down Fort Morgan Road. The brain dead thing is that path is off the road, behind trees in a lot of cases, and it is not lit. So at night there are still bikers/walkers that are riding/walking right on the side of the road. We have come close to hitting some of them.

Just 2 more days till the weekend is here. I can’t wait. The tedium of rebuilding site after site in Dreamweaver instead of FrontPage is getting to me I think. Every time I finish a site I have about 5 seconds to feel like I accomplished something — then the realization hits that I still have multiple sites to go. I also find I miss working with people. Sometimes it sucks being alone in a little white walled, white floored, white ceilinged room. I guess burnout is hitting. It isn’t my boss’s fault really…I guess I just feel overwhelmed. Even before the whole FrontPage to DreamWeaver thing I felt overwhelmed.

Still haven’t decided on what to fix for dinner. Right now my appetite is a bit off because Russ and I tackled the fridge. I am officially traumatized. I wish it were easier to clean out the fridge. Not the process itself, but doing it without Nanny getting out of sorts because food is being tossed. The process itself isn’t that bad…unless you are dealing with stuff that goes beyond the realm of turning into a science experiment. We had quite a few containers that were like that. A few times I was thankful my stomach was empty. Yes, it was that bad… *shudders*

Along those lines I just do not get saving 1 spoonful of peas or mac-n-cheese or, and I kid you not, 2-3 small bites of pasta with meat and veggies and a small piece of garlic bread with a bite taken out. Yes I know she grew up during the depression era but she herself has said they never did without. It’s not just her I know, it’s her generation. The world is not going to come crashing to an end just because 3 bites of food gets thrown away. If it matters that much that it not go to waste then start a compost heap or something. Once food is over 3 days old I generally will not eat it. I rather be safe that end up sick as a dog.

ok enough rants.
here’s a cute puppy picture:

Trying the blog thing again >.< I sorta suck at it because I hate having to log in and all that (yeah yeah I am lazy..). We found some promising blogging packages in Linux so I am gonna give them a go.

More than anything today I am puzzled by my friends. At least I thought they were my friends. It seems like lately I keep getting shoved into the role of "I’ll talk to you when and if I need you…otherwise forget it" This isn’t counting my forum friends…it’s mostly real life friends and online friends from a few years back.

Part of the fault may be mine, I dropped off the planet when Russ’s mom got diagnosed with cancer. BUT I don’t consider it fair that the only way I hear from them is if I initiate contact. I am reaching the point where I am going to assume if I don’t hear from someone on their own prerogative at least some of the time that they have no interest in being friends anymore. I am just tired of this.

The only exception is Abigail. She and I may go months w/o touching base but when we do it is like nothing has changed. I know she is busy and she is like me and thinks about contacting someone at times where it isn’t an option. Plus we do have plans to go see Prince Caspian next month.