Only-Child Syndrome

I don't do well with change ....

  am not one for change. Well let me take that back, I don't do well with change that doesn't benefit me in some way shape or form. This has nothing to do with wanting my own way as it does with being obsessed with routine and habit. I am a creature that thrives in it, lives for and now that the past months have been nothing but change and with more on the way I have to admit I am more than a little freaked out.

When I lost my job I didn't lose all my hope only my trainer and it took me at least two months before I had gained weight, started smoking AGAIN, and decided that booze could solve all. That is how easily I can fall back to an old comfortable and even 23 yr old pattern because really when unemployed what is there to do? I started this slip and just hung out in the gutter if you will for a while. Of course I wanted a job, needed a job, but there was something comforting about the fact that I had no responsibility; or none that I could afford anyway. Which is why I should have been EXCITED when my new job came along and it was so easy to pick back my routine.

At least that is what I thought.

Instead I am miserable; trainer back and all. I have quit smoking which I miss dearly if for no other reason than it gave me something to do. I guess when I quit a couple of years ago I was so busy with school, men/man and other rand tidbits that I didn't have time to be a smoke but now that I have been reduced to a job that any 18 yr old could do that I crave vices like red wine, Parliament lights and Three Musketeer bars. 

However, don't let me fool you to be working is an ends to a mean and if you listen to Smitten whose half glass full nonsense drives me nuts, all I have to do is SUCK IT UP for six months and the company is mine. BIG plans for me and all, and he might be right. I have heard as much from upper management but it doesn't make me want to slit my wrists any less these days. 

Speaking of change and a big one at that Smitten and I or maybe I have decided we should live together. When I say "I" It's not that have forced the issue. No we've had very grown up and mature conversations on the subject it's just that when they were only conversations we had over and over again that I had to draw a line in the sand somewhere. So in exactly 3 weeks we are supposed to start cohabiting. Honestly it's time to put the relationship to the test but at the same time I am expecting him to call me in 2 weeks and say he just can't do it. WHY? Probably because as I have said all along he wasn't ready to date when we started this, and that is ok or at least it was until we began inching between the two year mark and 
I see him even less than I did when we started dating. If it wasn't for all the traveling he did for work and me knowing it was legit, or knowing that he really does love me I would have already bailed. 

So yes there is more change to come in my life, more routines that need to be created. NO NO NO, not the Parliament lights but instead school and a new desire to SUCK IT UP and make it through this entry level position that I arrive at before the crack of dawn so that I can leave as the sun is setting. (yes another habit and work ethic problem I have) 

Yes this only child is drowning in change, when all I really want is a Sunday on a couch with some bad tv and maybe 4 or 5 hours of sleep. 

Wish me luck, and keep ya posted ....

Still breathing ....

I wanted to start writing about a normal summer life. Beer, sand, and plenty of trips but life decided against. I talked about my semester of writing and it looks like life is about to write my last chapter of my portfolio of illness, religion, and god. Death is going to be added to the mix and because my head is so wrapped around the events paining me such as my aunt preparing to pass I am having a hard time thinking of anything creative.

My mother turned 51 and I swore a text was all she was going to get, but instead I learned of hospice and went and sat and just watched my sit and watch.

Smitten has been gone for so long that it makes my heart ache, and I am counting the  minutes until his plane lands. I need a strong shoulder right now and I know that his can carry the weight.

I am still looking forward to dinner with Lust and getting an update on the adventures of Wondergrl. There is also my dad’s birthday and father’s day to look forward to where I will break out some culinary skill for the masses.

Numerouno will be celebrating his birthday this week and I have yet to decide if I am ready for dinner just yet. We spoke a few times this weekend but with everything going on with my aunt I have to be careful to not let him carry me. He knows my family, my aunt, and it would be so easy to get caught up in that familiarity and forget that we are where we are because of his past actions. Our friendship has to be rebuilt in a slow fashion and his birthday might be a little too soon.

In other news I am still a rockstar at work and thank goodness for that. It’s enough to keep me busy without going completely insane right now. It kept me grounded today and I only found myself in tears once.

So yeah, I apologize no happy stories to report just yet.

Nope, Not Dead ....

It’s been over a month since I have written anything that didn’t deal with drugs, death, or religion. I actually have a whole portfolio from this semester filled with three very different views of my life and my memories both current and old. It’s hard to sit here and not take myself so serious but that is exactly what I need.

Everything these days feels so serious and it’s really starting to change my outlook on many things. Things are getting serious at work, and even though I’m the new company ROCKSTAR it almost feels like a grown up job and I am just not ready for that. I still have so much school left and the balancing act has to be one of perfection.

My relationship with Smitten has been serious, and lately it has been serious rocks. We are strained with his travel schedule, my impending family stress and the things that so easily made us laugh have lost their luster. I know this is the growing pains part and I am ok with that. I just really wish they would have waited until everything else in my life had settled.

I am happy to report that if there is one person I can count on to not give me the serious it’s Lust. His birthday is coming up and I am so excited I can barely stand it. We haven’t seen each other since October and even though we have our txt messages, and very irregular catch up phone calls I know that I can count on him to make me laugh until I cry.  I need some of that laughter and I know his birthday will provide just that. I was also smart enough to make him agree to dinner a month in advance because Wanderlust might soon have a Wondergrl and well you know how couples and birthdays are. That is all I’m going to say about that because I don’t want to jinx any goodness that might be on the horizon for him.

I’d like to give more of an insight of the serious but it just wears me out thinking about it. My mother turns 51 in 3 days and we aren’t even speaking.

Numerouno (who is making his first appearance here/ i.e. first love) has come back into my life amongst a whirl wind of his own drama. I swear just every now and then if the men in my life would listen to me they’d save themselves some drama, heartache, and cash. Why he’s back, what he wants, and the things I’ve learned about things that happened 10 years ago will be a story for another day. All of the events are very relevant.

Tomorrow I have to travel and the only real purpose of this post was to make me write something so anyone still reading knows that it’s summer and I hope to fill the next two months as often as I can with posts about silly good times.

 

 

Honestly ... Nothing is wrong

It’s been almost two years since I’ve felt this helpless, hopeless, and absolutely unhappy. There is NOTHING wrong. Let me repeat that for anyone not listening; NOTHING WRONG!!! Well almost nothing, telling someone over and over and over that nothing is wrong you are just “sad” and they continue to try and find the fix, well that can just piss you off.

I am so annoyed with those I love the most, and that is the most frustrating part. Certain voices feel like nails on a chalkboard, and nothing ANYONE can do can solve it. That’s the maddening part for all the “fixers” in my life.

What is really hard is that it has been two years since I felt like I was being sucked in a black hole. My mother’s upside was that it’s been two years!! I mean that’s so much better than I when I was younger, but I feel like FUCK it’s been two years, and again here we are.

The person I feel the most for is Smitten. I am pretty sure more than once I have told him to R U N while he can. I feel bad that he wants to fix it, make it better and it kills me that all I do is snap at him. I’ve sorrta explained where I am, but I know it does nothing for him. He understands, but doesn’t.

I talked to my mother today who probably felt the same frustration that Smitten feels right now years ago when this whole adventure. She said she remembers how irritable I was, and how all she wanted to do was ANYTHING to make me happy; even for a minute.

It will take a little while to get this under control but until then I am working really hard on not imploding me, or my relationship.

One day at a time, or some random cliché like that …

Hello Stranger ...

It has been a while since I’ve written anything that was for me. Something that wasn’t going to be graded and or discussed like I wasn’t in the room, although those things don’t bother me they don’t give me the satisfaction that writing like this with errors and all does. *see there is probably all kinds of errors in that last lil bit (won’t call it a sentence) and I don’t care because well you are the internet and not my professor*

Life has been interesting, hard, confusing and the only thoughts that I really had this morning is that Duke lost to Villanova and I wanted to do a victory dance is Wanderlust’s living room. It’s the little things that keep me going, instead of the big things like dropping out of math that keep me down.

Smitten and I are just that; smitten. I don’t even know where to begin except that we’ve now been to therapy together. OMG, no we aren’t breaking up. I swear if I get asked one more time what is wrong I’ll start making up all the reasons couples go to therapy like I dunno “I think he might be gay?”, or “I think maybe I’m gay?.”

No, all is well and the therapy is really just foundation in learning to communicate because while I can tell you everything you’ll ever need to know in a day or two,  he needs time to think about it, mull it over and maybe he’ll actually figure out why he did or didn’t do what he said.

 I know it was hard for him; I could see it as soon as he picked me up and could tell by the silence on the way home but last night we really talked about the session itself. (Note we’ve already started doing the things that were suggested as a way to learn even better communication skills) He said that he didn’t know it would be that hard, told his own therapist that even, and in return his therapist was impressed he even went.

If it’s been said once, it’s been said a million times he really cares about me and it shows when he does things that is so out of his norm. The hard part for me is that I always want more. It’s not that I want him to do more; it’s just that telling me a childhood story is not the same as sharing your life. I know I sound greedy, but I AM.

The more I get the more I want. I’m sorry folks it is, what it is. I don’t plan on changing that much in the way I don’t plan on changing. The simple fact/facts are that every time Kyle Busch EVER wins a race, or Duke EVER loses in the BIG DANCE I am going to want to do one helluva a victory dance in Lust’s living room, and that in itself make me … well ME.

However, the fact is I’ve grown enough and continue to grow and learn and even at times ACCEPT that it’s never going to be all my way. Also, as an FYI should it EVER be all about me the entire world should worry. I think I’d make Hillary look like Glenda the Good Witch.

No, I understand that life is about give and take, and right now I should be more worried about what I’ve been given instead of taking what I have not.

 

If this is 2009 you can keep it!

I am so sick of being sick! It’s not January 3rd and I’ve yet to leave my apartment except for cold medicine and chicken noodle soup. I also made it to Arby’s for a shake which made my throat feel better for a lil while. I have also done nothing but sleep and watch crappy TV; lots of crappy TV actually.

Smitten is also sick and since our symptoms are some what different we’ve avoided cross contamination. He’s got a whole stomach thing going on, and I’ve got a whole throat thing happening. We probably both have been running fever. When we talked about the New Year, being sick to start things off was not in the game plan.

I wish I could find a place to grab a B12 shot on a Saturday, and should a have maybe tried to see my Dr. yesterday for one. I am getting ready to take the mother of all cold medicine and will get some fake energy in order to get up clean, and run an errand or two. Tonight is FOOTBALL and the best of the four wild card games this weekend, and I want to feel good enough to watch and enjoy. I guess only time will tell.

I’d like to ask that the Universe please back the fuck off, and restore my health so that I can save the last two day of my vacation which has turned in to no kind of vacation at all.

No Reason to Whine ...

There is something to be said about change, and this year the change was saving myself the cost of a bottle of Advil and Gatorade.

The two weeks leading up to New Years was especially rough on Smitten and I. We both have very different feelings on New Years Eve and the tension about if we would or wouldn’t be together ate at both of us. We would have these half conversations yet never really decide if we would spend the evening together or not.

Looking back we just weren’t communicating on the whole event in itself and probably caused each other more grief than it should have. The thing that we are both learning is that with a 10 yr age gap, there are some things that we hold very differently, no matter what we see eye to eye on. I was already aware of Smitten’s rough holiday spirit in the first place due to things that have nothing to do with me, but I didn’t get that it could bleed into New Years. I also didn’t take in account that he’s had his fair share of New Years, and big shin digs or even little ones that included the elements of big ones like fancy shoes or something.

What he didn’t understand or take in to consideration is that I’m 10 years younger, a silly girl and didn’t give a damn about getting dressed up. That overall if it was grilled cheese, video games, and cheap champagne it wouldn’t matter. My point for New Years was a way to celebrate the changes in our lives in the past year; the new jobs, the growing relationship. None of it had to do with shiny shoes at all.

All those points once talked out, and an actual plan in place fore the evening became moot when a conference call on Tuesday late in the game came in to play; he was booked on a plane to Denver for NYE. I’ll admit I was mad, but I understand work. I understand the last quarter push, hitting numbers, maxing compensation or barely making the cut. I could be pissed about silly hats and streamers but there was no way I could be upset about work. So my silly girl New Years with the person I love was off the table.

So, what does a girl do when all her “plans” fail and she doesn’t get her way, an only child at that? If she is me then she ends up with her extended family playing with kids, and laughing so hard I couldn’t breathe. It was junk food for 10 and Taboo because really what could be better? My family was amazing at being miserable with me, which was their plan on all along.

No, New Years wasn’t anywhere close to a repeat of last year. I was awake at 7 am this morning, no hangover, and no second hand kisses. All in all it wasn’t bad either. It was just another reminder that I am growing up, and what is important one year won’t always be what is important the next.

I’ve got a sick Smitten on a plane headed home now where the hard part will be convincing him to let me feed him Nyquil and force some rest, regardless of which bowl game might be on today.

Another old year turns into another new one ....

I wish that last year I’d written a real New Year’s post on my last blog. Something that I could look back on and see if I really cut the mustard in 2008, but the only thing I really said was “DAMN I’M HOT”. Yes I was feeling VERY shallow come the end of last year.

 So, instead I will highlight 2008 old school bullet style:

• Had my friendship with Lust flourish and fizzle while learning so much about myself. I am lucky to know him, and will be happy when someday we can meet in the middle. Just because I don’t think we can be close friends now doesn’t mean that I don’t look forward the future where we can.

• Changed jobs successfully and upgraded my pay scale. I don’t feel any richer, but the change was much needed. I feel it was a step up even though at times I miss my old job like crazy.
• Continued to further my education and keep my 4.0 in place.
• Got a trainer and at least for a good while kept up a good pace of course the past month I’ve crashed burned, but that’s what is great about New Years and getting to start all over. (I still think I’m hot though, don’t be fooled)
• Turned 30. Nothing else needs to be said.
• Found a real relationship with an amazing man who still believes that mix cd’s make girls swoon,  never calls me cute and thinks football is a religion. (all qualities that I totally lo It’s not always the easiest relationship, but it's not that hard either, although sometimes my posts might not always just say that.

 What will I do in 2009?

• Work on my finances and become more stable even with the economy taking a nose dive.

• Continue to spend time with my trainer and remain healthy. (and HAWT)
• Work hard in school but try to remember to breathe, and not always take myself so seriously.
• Rekindle friendships. There are many people who may not know that I think of them almost everyday and miss them dearly.
• Work on both my emotional and spiritual well being.
  
• Spend more time with my family immediate, and further out. I always want to make sure to spend plenty of time with BMOC before he's grown, and leaving for school.
  
• Continue to build my relationship because any man who throws this on a CD full of other “love songs” makes me smile in ways that I can’t even begin to put in words.
  

 

Happiness & Bliss? The stuff that fairy tales are made of ....

The thing about happiness & bliss is that if every relationship was always rainbows and sunshine we’d all fall in love with the first person we ever dated. It would all be easy and we’d marry at 12 and live happily ever after.

The truth is in the same day you can totally blog about what a g33k your boyfriend is, and how much you love him; later in the day you can totally be on the verge of wanting to kill one another and questioning it all.

Today is one of those days when things are tougher than they normally are, and I have to continue to remind myself again that if it was all easy then there would be no Only-Child and Smitten in the first place. Today is one of those days when you just keep breathing even through the tears.

I know that as hard as is today for both of us, that tomorrow will be another day and we will pick up at happiness and bliss and will be better for the rain of today.

Relationships take a lot of work. A lot more than at times I’ve been prepared to expect or even give but the rewards are worth it. Happiness and bliss might only live forever in fairy tales and candy land, but I've decided that I’ll take my chances with some hard work and the love that grows because of it. At the end of the day that’s the love that makes it thru thick or thin. 

I'd love to stay and chat ...

I am happy to report that I am a VERY lucky girl, and I’d love to stick around and tell you all about it but I have an evening of unknowns to get to and absolutely nothing to wear.

I hope you all have a great weekend and I’ll try to post something of substance next week!