I no make words go good. English hard.

I’m running out of icons and pretty colours on my little sidebar.

I’ve decided to scrap the third draft and start over again…

Welcome to draft 4, which is already filled with random notes like this one.

TBH, I don’t know which one of us was completely shitty when that was written, but my money’s on me. Beka seems like he’d be straight-edge. (When he’s not statutory raping a fucking 15 year old, that is. KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS, BEKA.)

Yeah.

So much shit on my mind and instead, I’m tearing apart a story that I’ve already written three drafts of to play with new point of views and - hopefully - get them to keep it in their pants. I DO NOT WRITE KIDDY PORN, GODDAMNIT.

At this rate, I’m going to have to age them up… and I hate that. I like AUs, but that’s totally not the story I wanted to tell.

Yearning. Slow burn. A love story spread over three years.

That’s the story I want to tell.

And the one I am completely incapable of telling.

Oh well. The 4th time’s the charm, right?

 

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I’m trying to keep myself distracted.

The pending war in Ukraine. The new job. Life in general.

I’m a big ball of stress right now.

So, of course, the Sims released a new game pack today.

By all accounts, it is buggy as fuck, even despite being held back by a week. (And wasn’t that a week - the short version is, EA self-censored and refused to release the game in Russia. All hell broke loose. EA backed off and held the release a week to ensure that the game would launch globally at the same time. A whole lot of stupidity ensued.)

Still bought it. Haven’t even bothered playing yet.

I probably won’t get a chance until the weekend.

Maybe EA will patch it by then. (Or not. We still have bugs in the game that are several years old and well known by everybody. Like, there’s no way the SimGurus don’t know about them. Why they aren’t being fixed is anyone’s guess at this point.)

Also not helping is the fact that the 2023 NHL All Star game is being held in my backyard. At that place. That I used to work at. Before I got fired for being bipolar.

I’m torn between wanting to go and staying home. I don’t know which option is healthier.

I’m just glad that life is starting to become closer to normal again… I have a half marathon towards the end of March and I just signed up to run a 5K in early March. I have a Boombox concert to go to, and I might head to Universal on my birthday to see Gavin DeGraw.

Who the fuck knows.

All I know is that I’m stressed to the gills….

I need a nap, a cookie, and a hug.

When you lose something you cannot replace

reminiscin’ this ‘n’ that ‘n’ havin’ such a good time… oo-de-lally, oo-de-lally, golly, what a day

I’m in a few Disney running groups, but my favourite is, hands down, #runDopey. The people are so great in there. It’s truly one of the safest Facebook groups there is, everyone is friendly, and there never seems to be any conflict. (Can you imagine that? A Facebook group without the token asshole? I KNOW!)

So anyway, a while back, they created an offshoot, called DFF. One of the mods has had some pretty debilitating depression lately. He’s so open about posting it that it breaks my heart. It hurts to hear what he’s going through because I’ve been there / I am there / I know I will be there.

Behold: twelve years of psychiatric care records.

I haven’t had the heart to go through them - I had them sent to me when I was going to pursue an EEOC violation against that former employer. I didn’t, in the end. The money I would win from the lawsuit (and I was told I had a textbook case) wasn’t enough to justify keeping that wound open for however long it would take to go through the EEOC process and subsequent legal bullshit. In all honesty, I don’t know how much would have been enough… No matter how you slice it, it wouldn’t give me the closure I still so desperately need. I’m not sure that’s attainable. I’m always going to be bipolar. I’m always going to carry that stigma. Getting fired because of it was unavoidable considering how fucked up that job made me. So yeah.

It is what it is.

Acknowledge. Move on.

But, to circle back to the DFF… we may run hills on Tuesday and flex on Fridays, but Mondays are mental health days. So many people unload their issues and we all reach out to comfort each other / share coping skills. It’s beautiful. I’ve been pretty open there. Even more open than I am here sometimes, because they understand in a way I’m not sure you all can. (I don’t even check my stats… I could be screaming into the void for all I know.)

They give me hope when I’ve lost it. When I don’t know how to talk about the noise in my head, they sort through it for me. Nobody tells me I’m crazy. Nobody tells me I’m broken. Nobody tells me it’s all in my head and I should get over it.

Depression is a bad-ass motherfucker and I don’t mean it in the ‘good’, Samuel L Jackson, way. Lately, I’ve been struggling. A metric fuck-ton. That group is my safe harbour. That group reminds that depression lies. That I am a bad-ass motherfucker, in the good way. (I mean, fuck, that man could teach me a thing or two.)

It’s good to find those places online - anonymity is awesome. People just know me from the little bit I share in the group. I love it. Face to face therapy does me more harm than good, because they want to dig, dig, dig until all my wounds open and I bleed out all the defences I’ve built over the years. Plus, half of them want to change my meds right off the bat. Um, no.

I don’t know… I guess all those words just to say that I love my DFF family. They keep me sane when no one else can.

Alphabet Soup

the boxes (and bags) OF DOOM

I don’t know what started it, but there has been a trend among my friends to post articles about ADHD.

I’ve already been diagnosed with a few things, with bipolar being the #1 diagnosis - from several doctors, and even a few therapists - so bipolar is the benchmark.

Anyhoo… one of the things I’ve seen several times is the tendency to put clutter in boxes so that it doesn’t have to be dealt with immediately, but it’s removed from sight. And, oh, holy fuck, does that make so much sense. I’ve had clutter boxes my entire life. Once I found out I was bipolar, I decided that this was a symptom of it. I clean during manic phases and I box during depressed ones. What happens when I’m forever depressed? MORE BOXES!

So, yeah. In the spirit of full disclosure, this is about two or three years worth of clutter boxes (and several bags). We painted my office last year and I’m just now finally working my way through the Boxes of Doom!.

Why the Boxes of Doom!, you ask? Because, half the fucking time, they’re filled with memory landmines.

You know, those things you randomly stumble across that rip open wounds that had been slow to heal in the first place? Yeah. Those.

I’ve gone through three boxes this morning and I have cried during every one. My offer letter from the Cats was in one box, photos of my parents and I at Disney World in another… just weird shit that I am not equipped to deal with right now.

And, can we talk about that photo with my parents? The photo is of myself and my parents in front of the castle and we are wearing matching Mickey Mouse shirts. OH. MY. GOD. We were that family back in 1980. We were wearing MATCHING SHIRTS. (I’m pretty sure it was my idea, too.) I make fun of those families now… and I am obviously the one that started the trend. Fuck. Me.

I still have boxes and boxes of clutter - and memory landmines - to get through, but I’m pretty sure this is what the articles are talking about.

I feel both seen and attacked, and I don’t like either.

(I suppose the joke’s on my most recent former employer… I had two clutter boxes at the office and a clutter folder on my desktop and a clutter folder in my inbox. In my defence, those things did not appear until Ida decided to visit Louisiana this year and I was overloaded with minutiae. Oh well. I hope they have fun with that.)

I’m full of contradictions and hypocrisies

I may run at the speed of turtles swimming through peanut butter. But I run.

My Christmas present to myself was the top medal hanger… I haven’t done the #threewords in a long time, but I’ve been using Twelve’s words / the unofficial motto of the Whovian Running Club to guide me. Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind. Sadly, the only thing I’m good at is laughing hard.

We didn’t celebrate Christmas at all this year. Not one bit. No special dinner, no last minute “I feel like I need to buy you something”, not even a bone for the dog.

I don’t know. Neither one of us is feeling it this year. Which is fine.

Everything is fine.

 

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When you’re young, you got time
When you’re old, you built a life
In between you’re just along for the ride
Nothing’s in a straight line, like the wrinkles on your eyes
Try to take it one candle at a time… - Pictures, Matt Nathanson

I’ve been on a steady pace of a new job just about every year and a half, two years for a long time. That’s when the honeymoon period is over, and the bipolar starts to affect things. Which, at this point, is probably a good sign to start seriously thinking about disability.

This job change completely blindsided me. I’d actually been doing well, and was mostly happy, but… there’d been some… hiccups. Definitely wasn’t expecting to be forced to choose between engaging in ethical behaviour and doing what was expected of me. I have a very odd moral code, but the things I believe in, I do not waiver on. One of those things is taxes. I am, apparently, on the side of the government because I believe they should be paid. The owner and I had several differences of opinions, but this last straw was the last straw. I’d already been looking for freelance gigs I could do on the side, and it was easy enough to find a real 9-5, so I’ll be back to normal after Dopey.

But anyhoo… it’s the reason I’m kind of stuck in my head.

We watched Emmet Otter’s Jug Band Christmas, as I’ve done every year since 1977, and it felt different this year.

I’ve been missing my father a lot lately. This year has been a bad one - I’m the same age my mother was when she died, and April 30th was the 20th anniversary of my father’s death - and I haven’t been able to get through it. Not that turning the calendar to a new month is going to make a huge difference in the facts of the matter, but there are no major milestones in 2022 that are triggering. Unless celebrating our 20th anniversary is a trigger… which it kind of is, but we will unpack that baggage in August.

I don’t know anymore. I know I blog a lot about being bipolar, but for every entry there’s a ton of things that I never say. I never really work through my shit here, in real time, and I probably won’t start any time soon. It’s easier to dissect it, in writing, well after the fact. But that doesn’t mean that I’m not tempted to do so.

So with that said… Christmas is hard. It is always hard. This year seems harder.

2022 is around the corner and I can’t be more thrilled for a fresh start.

In the meantime, I’m going to take it one candle at a time.

I think about this world a lot and I cry

UConn’s last pure white husky has crossed the rainbow bridge…

I’m a fucking mess right now.

I can’t even deny it… tear tracks are running down my face and I haven’t been able to stop the tears for days. (Other than when I need to pull my shit together for work, of course. They can’t see how broken I am.)

It started with the announcement that Jonathan XII had died.

Yes.

A dog that wasn’t mine… that I wasn’t even close to… is dead and I can’t deal with it.

I suppose, all things considered, I should have seen this coming.

I’m past exhausted.

I’m not sleeping.

I’ve barely been eating.

And, I’ve been waiting for this day.

My complete and utter breakdown.

The day the depression brings me to my knees.

Catharsis.

Why was the death of a dog such a big deal? How could something like that move me to the tears I so needed to shed?

Easy.

Despite my… complicated… relationship with my mother, she was a UConn grad, too. There was always a little bit of me that wished - that still wishes, if we’re to be honest (and when have I ever lied here?) - that she could have been there for those years. She was already dead by the time I was applying for colleges. Didn’t know that UConn was the absolute last school I wanted to go to. Because of her. Didn’t know that it was the only school I applied to. Also because of her… and that’s a story for another time. I’m already fucked up enough without revisiting that time of my life.

Standing at the practice field, staring at the Towers dorms. Dating a guy who actually lived in her fucking building. Having to walk past what was her room. She had left enough of her behind in a scrapbook that I was able to find her fucking room. And I don’t think I ever told the boyfriend that… maybe in passing, but not in enough detail.

SO. UConn. It was a place where I was able to finally define myself as something other than Helen’s daughter (even if I carried that weight around for four years). I lived through so much craziness over four years and I don’t regret a moment of it. We always wind up where we’re supposed to be, even if we don’t know it at the time.

Going to UConn was the beginning of a wild ride… again, it was a decision I will never regret and I will always be proud to be a Husky… and a hussy, because we’re Bus 4, after all. And a white Jonathan will - even after all this time - be my husky.

And the last white one is gone. With a generic husky taking his place.

My UConn is gone.

My mother’s UConn is gone.

Replaced with an imposter.

And, while you may not understand why, it hurts. Badly.

To make matters even worse, I just finished a piece of Drarry fan fic that has brought me to tears over the past two days.

Fuck, I wish I could write like that.

Seriously.

It started with Draco in New York, recreating himself, working with at-risk kids and turning his back on all things magical and Malfoy. He ends up sharing dreams with Harry, and it is like the slowest burns of slow burns. Of course, I didn’t cry when Evan killed himself. I didn’t cry at the too real emotions that Draco was going through. Nope. I bawled like a fucking baby when Harry showed up in New York. And then I cried harder when he left. And then I cried even harder when he came back. It. Was. Beautiful. I love when fics break me like that. I really do.

Oddly enough, that level of heartache spurred me on to clean up the mess I made in the Otayuri fic I’ve been working on… until that vicious editor in my head decided to speak up. Yes, editor, I gave up on the slow burn. No, that wasn’t what I wanted to do. No, there won’t be any age-inappropriate scenarios. Yes, this is all Otabek Altin’s fucking fault. Three drafts, three fucking drafts, and he’s all ‘eyes of a soldier’ and Люди могут забыть, что вы сказали. Могут забыть, что вы сделали. Но никогда не забудут, что вы заставили их почувствовать. People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.  (God bless Google and Russian language blogs for giving me the ultimate apology quote…)

But the editor did what they set out to do and, well, imposter syndrome.

So, I just wasted a bunch of time rereading all seven of my published fan fics, all the comments, and just started at my statistics.

I’m never going to be a Sara’s Girl, or bixgirl1, but they all did better than I would have thought.

For me, not you, I submit the following for those days when I feel like I can no longer make the words do the thing good because englishing is hard: