Whoa. I just got through writing an email to my mom. It probably went on for about three pages of ancient hostility and ranting that I have badly needed to say directly to her for... far, far too long. I rather doubt it's the road to peace, but it may be a fog that needs to be cleared before I can travel that road. Despite the weight I've thrown her, I have high hopes, and it is a relief to finally voice some of my resentment after so long. Who knows? It may not be too late.
I'll try to brace myself for an equally hostile response and be forgiving toward it, even if it's shrouded in words of sweetness and steeped in the role of the victim. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Dare the conflict. Ride it out.
Maybe this is the start of something vital and important. We'll see.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Friday, March 8, 2013
One Man's Trash
I stayed up all night again. This time it isn't Puppy's fault, though he contributed, for the last few hours of it. I wanted to make sure to be up for an event that was happening today right on my block: the Impact Junk Solutions Open House. The company is a garbage removal service, but it seems that when they pick up trash that isn't as trashy as usual and may be of interest to someone, they stash it in their warehouse and occasionally let anyone who is in need of furniture or other household goods come with their cars, trailers, or on foot, and take away anything they would like from the collection of thrown-away items. I've been needing furniture since moving in, so naturally, I went. I was not disappointed with what I found. The staff helped me load some furniture I could not have carried into a shopping cart to trundle home and back.
Not everything made it inside in one piece, sadly. A nice chest of drawers I'd found took too much shock to the joints while I was awkwardly maneuvering the heavy thing down the stairs by myself, and the frame came apart, nails and screws having been jarred loose. One of the nubby plastic legs also broke. The drawers themselves and the rollers, though, are completely sound. I think with a hammer and some new nails, and perhaps a pair of pliers, I can salvage it and return it to stability and usefulness, though it won't be as pretty as it was, due to places in the sides where the nails ripping away tore chunks off the edge of the particle board.
More successful was the transport of a rather tall and skinny little wooden desk, with four drawers in it. It lost a strip of surface false wood texture on one side of the top, and got slightly scuffed, but is still very pretty and perfectly stable and solid, as a desk should be. I brought home a short, shabby office chair and a thick pillow to raise the effective level of the seat, too, and now I actually have a functional chair and desk for my ridiculous excuse for a laptop... and for a better one, once I am able to get one.
One more piece of furniture was amongst my loot, a squat, slightly bulky end table with a single hollow storage space inside, accessed by decoratively carved double doors, made to look like dark red wood and also good and stable.
Other items I brought home (that made it without breaking):
2 candle holders
1 large red candle
1 plastic basket
1 woven basket
1 dollar store travel mug that seems new
2 large stacking paper trays
1 square cookie tin
1 nearly new board game of uncertain entertainment value called "HearMeOut!"
5 garish pink striped bedsheets
2 garish pink patterned pillowcases
1 long peach curtain
2 other bedsheets
1 other pillowcase
1 small pink throw blanket
11 saucers
9 large plates
4 small plates
2 teacups
2 shot glasses
6 bowls of varying sizes
1 segmented snack dish
1 juice pitcher
1 small ice cube tray
1 matching set of salt & pepper shakers
11 drinking glasses, assorted plastic and glass
2 small kitchen storage containers
1 wine glass
1 lid that doesn't seem to go with anything
1 lightbulb that happened to be in a box of kitchenware
All in all, I feel rather accomplished, and am quite happy with this haul of stuff. Most of it clearly worn, all of it free, almost all of it definitely useful to me. I think I will probably use the garish pink striped sheets to make triangular bandages for first aid, and then if there's ever a need, I can tie people up with garish pink striped arm slings.
P.S: Apparently there was so much stuff I inevitably had to forget to list some! I also got a box of assorted coathangers, probably around 30 count, and a bar of Irish Spring soap, still in its box.
Not everything made it inside in one piece, sadly. A nice chest of drawers I'd found took too much shock to the joints while I was awkwardly maneuvering the heavy thing down the stairs by myself, and the frame came apart, nails and screws having been jarred loose. One of the nubby plastic legs also broke. The drawers themselves and the rollers, though, are completely sound. I think with a hammer and some new nails, and perhaps a pair of pliers, I can salvage it and return it to stability and usefulness, though it won't be as pretty as it was, due to places in the sides where the nails ripping away tore chunks off the edge of the particle board.
More successful was the transport of a rather tall and skinny little wooden desk, with four drawers in it. It lost a strip of surface false wood texture on one side of the top, and got slightly scuffed, but is still very pretty and perfectly stable and solid, as a desk should be. I brought home a short, shabby office chair and a thick pillow to raise the effective level of the seat, too, and now I actually have a functional chair and desk for my ridiculous excuse for a laptop... and for a better one, once I am able to get one.
One more piece of furniture was amongst my loot, a squat, slightly bulky end table with a single hollow storage space inside, accessed by decoratively carved double doors, made to look like dark red wood and also good and stable.
Other items I brought home (that made it without breaking):
2 candle holders
1 large red candle
1 plastic basket
1 woven basket
1 dollar store travel mug that seems new
2 large stacking paper trays
1 square cookie tin
1 nearly new board game of uncertain entertainment value called "HearMeOut!"
5 garish pink striped bedsheets
2 garish pink patterned pillowcases
1 long peach curtain
2 other bedsheets
1 other pillowcase
1 small pink throw blanket
11 saucers
9 large plates
4 small plates
2 teacups
2 shot glasses
6 bowls of varying sizes
1 segmented snack dish
1 juice pitcher
1 small ice cube tray
1 matching set of salt & pepper shakers
11 drinking glasses, assorted plastic and glass
2 small kitchen storage containers
1 wine glass
1 lid that doesn't seem to go with anything
1 lightbulb that happened to be in a box of kitchenware
All in all, I feel rather accomplished, and am quite happy with this haul of stuff. Most of it clearly worn, all of it free, almost all of it definitely useful to me. I think I will probably use the garish pink striped sheets to make triangular bandages for first aid, and then if there's ever a need, I can tie people up with garish pink striped arm slings.
P.S: Apparently there was so much stuff I inevitably had to forget to list some! I also got a box of assorted coathangers, probably around 30 count, and a bar of Irish Spring soap, still in its box.
Thursday, March 7, 2013
Status Update
Yeah, there's been some stuff to talk about, but I just haven't been wanting to sit down and write to you guys. Almost a month ago, I broke up with Pup on Valentine's Day. I didn't even realize the timing. We talked a lot, I decided on the terms of One Last Chance, and consented to stay. But he still annoys me almost every day. Over the past two weeks, he's been breaking down after listening in on a conversation between me and a friend of his apparently taught him that despite his pretenses to morality, to logic, to rationality, he doesn't know a goddamn thing. Now for the last two days, something seems to have broken, and his answer to everything is saying "I don't know"; blaming everything on his Aspergers, on overexposure to mercury, on the stimuli he's responding to... including me... and lashing out.
For about a week, I've picked up Fitocracy again; I've been planking, but not really anything else. It's too early to say whether I'll stay with it. I do manage to do it for a while even when I'm really not very into it, though... I just tend to collapse after a minute if my spirit isn't in it or I'm otherwise worn out.
I returned to Writing.com and wrote a few contest entries, the first of which won an on-site prize. The contests I'm entering have a 300 or 100 max word count, and make great practice for cutting stories down to the vital core, making them succinct. I did fall into a jealous habit of comparing my work to the other entries, though, when I didn't win. Or worse, calling into question the taste and legitimacy of the judges. I might post my work here, some of it. I might not.
I've also been doing a little bit of sketching and artwork. For a while, while things were going well with Pup, I sketched him in anime style, something I've never really managed to work in before, and it seemed to go really well. I think of, or say, something funny, and I do a quick sketch of it, sometimes.
This week, I finally got my First Aid/CPR certification, Level C. I felt noble learning the material, and it was a bit of work, mostly because Pup kept me up very late so I was doing the 8-hour courses on four and three hour nights of sleep. The course itself was fun and seems very useful. If I'm ever in an emergency situation, I think I will feel much more confident dealing with it now. There was some confusion with my certificate card, though. The course instructor accidentally filled out the expiry date and the issue date as the same, so that I would be certified for 24 hours, rather than three years. I brought up the mistake to Goodwill, and my card was redone properly. I was told the other staff members laughed at her for the mistake, though that bit didn't make me feel any better.
Yesterday I had a mild, prolonged anxiety attack, apparently prompted by a bunch of people trying to help me with my questions at Goodwill, and someone answering other questions a bit shortly, since he had a lot of different things to do. The attack lasted over two hours and I felt hostile and feeble throughout it. Then came home to Pup and fought for a long time about him failing to aplogize to me or take my feelings into account even when I make them clear, and me being irrational and unstable to a point that he feels he has to be afraid of my leaving him any time he does anything at all.
Today, from the time I woke up, despite doing my planking and having a shower, and despite close to twelve hours of sleep, it felt like the world was slowed down. When I listened to my music, it all sounded slightly but uncannily flat, and I didn't care about it, even though it was music that was usually very powerful to me. I went to Goodwill to retrieve a flash drive I'd forgotten there, and came home immediately. It was obvious to me that I needed to just rest, today, and recover from my stresses... my body and despondent mind were telling me something was wrong and I needed to tend to that before anything else.
It seems much of this, my own participation in all sorts of other activities, including some active job search work, practicing various forms of my artistry... was largely prompted by Pup's computer being fixed, meaning he now has something to spend time with without me having to be there to engage him constantly. The fact that it's now, after this, that his responses to me have seemed to step up again in aggression and disrespect has some very disappointing implications that now that he doesn't need me as much, there's a lot more dissatisfaction and hostility he may have been holding back, that's now out. Perhaps having what he wanted has actually made his mental and emotional condition worse, because he can junkie out on video games and avoid real world responsibilities as much as he wants. I don't really know. Whatever's going on, I don't think this will last long.
P.S: I... just discovered something weird on my Writing.com account. Apparently someone spent $20 on me to get me three months of upgraded account. It was an anonymous gift, with the message: "Keep reviewing!". I... feel kind of stunned. It's weird that some random person on the internet would spent money on me to get me to keep doing reviews of writing... I wonder, is this how Grimith feels?
For about a week, I've picked up Fitocracy again; I've been planking, but not really anything else. It's too early to say whether I'll stay with it. I do manage to do it for a while even when I'm really not very into it, though... I just tend to collapse after a minute if my spirit isn't in it or I'm otherwise worn out.
I returned to Writing.com and wrote a few contest entries, the first of which won an on-site prize. The contests I'm entering have a 300 or 100 max word count, and make great practice for cutting stories down to the vital core, making them succinct. I did fall into a jealous habit of comparing my work to the other entries, though, when I didn't win. Or worse, calling into question the taste and legitimacy of the judges. I might post my work here, some of it. I might not.
I've also been doing a little bit of sketching and artwork. For a while, while things were going well with Pup, I sketched him in anime style, something I've never really managed to work in before, and it seemed to go really well. I think of, or say, something funny, and I do a quick sketch of it, sometimes.
This week, I finally got my First Aid/CPR certification, Level C. I felt noble learning the material, and it was a bit of work, mostly because Pup kept me up very late so I was doing the 8-hour courses on four and three hour nights of sleep. The course itself was fun and seems very useful. If I'm ever in an emergency situation, I think I will feel much more confident dealing with it now. There was some confusion with my certificate card, though. The course instructor accidentally filled out the expiry date and the issue date as the same, so that I would be certified for 24 hours, rather than three years. I brought up the mistake to Goodwill, and my card was redone properly. I was told the other staff members laughed at her for the mistake, though that bit didn't make me feel any better.
Yesterday I had a mild, prolonged anxiety attack, apparently prompted by a bunch of people trying to help me with my questions at Goodwill, and someone answering other questions a bit shortly, since he had a lot of different things to do. The attack lasted over two hours and I felt hostile and feeble throughout it. Then came home to Pup and fought for a long time about him failing to aplogize to me or take my feelings into account even when I make them clear, and me being irrational and unstable to a point that he feels he has to be afraid of my leaving him any time he does anything at all.
Today, from the time I woke up, despite doing my planking and having a shower, and despite close to twelve hours of sleep, it felt like the world was slowed down. When I listened to my music, it all sounded slightly but uncannily flat, and I didn't care about it, even though it was music that was usually very powerful to me. I went to Goodwill to retrieve a flash drive I'd forgotten there, and came home immediately. It was obvious to me that I needed to just rest, today, and recover from my stresses... my body and despondent mind were telling me something was wrong and I needed to tend to that before anything else.
It seems much of this, my own participation in all sorts of other activities, including some active job search work, practicing various forms of my artistry... was largely prompted by Pup's computer being fixed, meaning he now has something to spend time with without me having to be there to engage him constantly. The fact that it's now, after this, that his responses to me have seemed to step up again in aggression and disrespect has some very disappointing implications that now that he doesn't need me as much, there's a lot more dissatisfaction and hostility he may have been holding back, that's now out. Perhaps having what he wanted has actually made his mental and emotional condition worse, because he can junkie out on video games and avoid real world responsibilities as much as he wants. I don't really know. Whatever's going on, I don't think this will last long.
P.S: I... just discovered something weird on my Writing.com account. Apparently someone spent $20 on me to get me three months of upgraded account. It was an anonymous gift, with the message: "Keep reviewing!". I... feel kind of stunned. It's weird that some random person on the internet would spent money on me to get me to keep doing reviews of writing... I wonder, is this how Grimith feels?
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