I haven’t posted here for a while. There are a few different reasons.
1. I had to move. My stalker situation got way out of control. And for a chick that collects swords, knows 15 ways to kill a person without a weapon, and has a fully registered and legal gun, that is saying something. I bought a new house – my own house with my own money. And I love it. I do still occasionally wake up not sure where I am. I seldom think I’m back in the ghetto, but sometimes I remember a place that I’ve never actually lived in. It is a little strange to wake up thinking that you’re looking out a bay window to realize that you’re actually looking at your bathroom mirror. For reference, I’ve removed all of the doors in my house (with the exeception of the guest bathroom, because I don’t want to watch people use the restroom – ever). I’ve also replaced about half of the flooring and repainted everything. It has potential. And it is built like a fortress. You do not get to my front door unless I have given you express permission. No surprises. No unknowns. Also? Lots of solitude.
2. This is different from the solitude before in the old house in the ghetto (which I still think of fondly). I was reduced to hiding in that house – between my neighbor constantly watching me and doing his stalking/threatening thing (he actually threatened to kill me at one point) and the rest of my neighbors always out on the street watching each other, it became very difficult to do anything without worrying what would happen while I was gone. This solitude is healthier, though still not good for me. As in, I no longer feel threatened, but it’s been over a week since I spoke to someone who wasn’t my mother.
3. I’ve had health issues. I finally decided to get my nose fixed. If you know me, then you know that I’m accident prone. Ok, maybe not accident prone, but definitely injury prone. Turns out all those times I suspected I’d broken my nose? Yeah, I had. The damage was so significant that they had to do surgery to correct it. I get the splints out tomorrow. Hopefully, if everything heals right, I’ll be able to breathe through my nose again, which I haven’t been able to do since some time in 2011. I’ve also had to accept the fact that I will never run distance races again. Three miles twice a week is the limit. After that, I start hurting too much to do anything. I hate the limitation – I remember those 10 and 12 mile runs with so much affection/appreciation – I’d give most anything to be able to do that again. But it isn’t happening. Not unless I want to go back into a cast – or worse, end up needing surgery on my foot. I HATE limitations.
4. Work has been insane. I work so much, so hard, that by the time I get home I can barely think. My brain feels like mush most days. And if I haven’t either worked out or drank until I was numb, I’ve played guitar and piano until I can’t think. I wonder how long I can maintain a job that drains me this much. It has gotten so much better – I only work a few hours overtime each week, and my assistant is contstantly learning and taking on new tasks, but I am still so behind. I wonder how it got like this. And I wonder if it is worth it. As much as I like my workplace, and as much as I like parts of my job, there are things that I hate so much that I would willinging walk away on almost any given day. The inefficiencies and the impracticalities of government work… I have a theory that is becoming increasingly supported by my daily experience. Government can be either trasnparent or efficient. It cannot be both. Transparency is slow and very expensive. Efficiency is quick, but by default opaque. Yet government is expected to be both transparent and efficient. It is an unrealistic – nien, an impossible expectation. I’m just happy when I can help one person. And most days, I can’t.
5. I’ve been really making a mess of my personal life. The rules that I promised I’d never break? Yeah, I’ve been bending those to the point of no return. And the alternative – dating and relationships and all that – I’m actually ready – for the first time in a very long time, I’m ready. I feel more emotionally stable and more sane than I’ve felt in a long time. But I don’t know where to start with other people. I really do not want to go back to the internet dating. I’ve had no good experiences there to show me that it is worth it. But I don’t know where else to go. I work too much for social time at a physical location. I workout too much for social time at the gym (I’ve been getting in 2 to 4 two per day workouts a week for a couple of months now, not counting surgery downtime – it is amazing, but it means that I’m at the gym when there is nobody else there). And I don’t know where else to meet people. The fact that it is starting to become a real issue means that I’m actually doing really well in my life. I only worry about this sort of thing when I’ve got all my other basis covered.
6. This spring I will finally be graduating from my graduate program. My thesis is a monster, and much of it is publishable. I’ve had to eat quite a bit of crow and pay an exorbitant amount of money to get here. I don’t know if it was worth it yet. I just know it wasn’t easy. Then again, for me, nothing is ever easy.
I owe a lot of people apologies for dropping off the radar. I don’t know if I should apologize now, knowing that as soon as I am back at work (Friday) it is unlikely that I’ll be able to correspond again for a long time, or if I should wait until I have enough of my life under control that I can actually be a friend and correspond then. I’m a horrible person. If you didn’t already know that, know it now. But even so, I know I owe people appologies for being the way that I am. I cannot describe how difficult the last year and a half has been. I won’t even try. I will say that it means something to me that I’m no longer contemplating suicide on my daily commute. I call that an improvement.
Any which way, I know I need to get back to myself – and a large part of that is writing here. It will happen, eventually. Slowly. Gradually. And probably after I fix my broken computer. This is a pain in the ass on my laptop. Just sayin…
And that is all for now. I have pain pills calling. They sound like cherry cough syrup. Yeah, I’m not looking for sense.
SecondHand Saint 