Campfyre Stories

Ok, here we go, instead of dwelling on the negatives (which I am trying not to do), I’m going to ask the Universe for the help that I need.

One Good Thing.  Not an experience, not an encounter, but One Good Thing to start and continue.  I don’t think I’m asking for a lot…  Really, I just need one positive constant right now to keep me going and to remind me that it’s not all bad and that the bad won’t last forever.

I won’t put specifics on it, because I don’t feel like it needs to be a specific thing, but it needs to be something prominent enough that I will notice it, and that I can fall into it while everything else falls apart around me.  Something I can use as shelter, something I can use as an escape, something.

One Good Thing.  I don’t think that’s too much to ask for, and right about now, I really, desperately need it.

Please?

So Thursday a friend of mine said some things that made me think horrible thoughts about myself and, ultimately, shattered my confidence and self-esteem.  Not that the words were all that bad, but the implications were what led me down a dark path.  I’m trying not to blame his idle conversation for my reading into things, but it doesn’t change the fact.

Friday, after three Wednesdays in a row, I was already in a difficult mood (especially after the shattering thoughts), so when my new (and only) waterproof boots SPLIT and the heel all but fell off, I nearly cried.  However, it was raining, so the sky cried for me, and my feet got wet.  That night I got a phone call with someone close to me making a request.  I’m not allowed to put it on the internet, but the bottom line is that I was asked, very nicely, to do something rather illegal and when I said no, I was made to feel like a heel about it.

The weekend was fine.  Sunday was great.

But Daylight Saving kicks my ass.  Monday I overslept.  I woke up exactly one hour late.  My internal clock knows what time it is, too bad that’s not what time it *actually* is.  I took a cab to work, which cost me $40.  This is something I can deal with from time to time, but I certainly cannot make a habit of it.  Ok, fine, a slight stumble, but I made it in on time and with no real worries.  Then, I got a phone call from one of Spawn’s teachers.  If he doesn’t stay after class on either Tuesday or Friday, he will finish the quarter with a 16, yes, that’s SIXTEEN.  (And, yes, that’s out of 100).  This, of course, leads to a terrible night between the two of us with him falling into a (familiar) combination of guilt, shame and despair and me feeling bad for having sent him into that spiral.  It comes out later that he was having a *really* bad day prior to this, so it didn’t take much to push him over the edge.

Which brings us to today…  when I overslept by an hour, again.  This time I woke up with a bloody nose (???  WTF???) and blisters on my heels that no shoes are really going to work with.  That two-mile hike from the bus stop sure isn’t going to make matters any better.  The bus came and was completely PACKED so I had to stand and get shoved and jostled by all the assholes who are ALSO late for work and taking it out on everyone around them.  Thankfully, I was able to get a hold of a friend on his way into work, so I didn’t have to make the two mile walk, but having got in an hour late, I’m going to have to stay an hour later than usual and since it’s Movie Night, I’m going to be rushed and stressy and BLAH.  Also, my personal information got posted to a very public website, resulting in my having to try to get this asshole banned, or at least his post removed and to freak out even more and try to figure out how to shield this information from trolls who, because of mental instability that a *very* thin skin may try to use it to harass me offline.

And I really just want this to end.  I keep trying to start the day with positive thoughts, but I feel thwarted by circumstances.  One friend told me that this is probably a transitional period and I need to just ride the wave of changes and come out the other side.  Frankly, the other side had better be better than where I started from because this is rapidly getting to the point of unbearable.

It makes me wonder what the almost-butterfly (or moth) feels like just before bursting through the chrysalis.  Do you think it’s completely stifling and unbearable and there’s no other choice than to muster all its strength in order to turn into something more mobile, prettier, greater than it was before?  It’s a stupid metaphor, I think, but it’s the only one that has occurred to me so far.

The one good thing that I can say right now, though, is that I have some really good and loyal friends.  I don’t find it easy to ask for help, and I doubt I ever will, but knowing that when I DO need help, and ask for it, that these people will step up and stand by me makes it less painful to have to do it.

Or, at least, the potential of a hat to match the shoes that were too cute to pass up, even if they didn’t go with *anything* that I owned.  And a hat we found, but we added in dinner and a show to the mix which made it actually worth blogging.

The show was at Caffe Lena and it was one of those things where mom said, "Oh, Fyre, you’re going to LOVE this."  I went to the band’s website and I was completely sold.  Lately I’ve been getting into music that quite a few others think is completely bizarre (like Gogol Bordello and Dropkick Murphys), but this band, Luminescent Orchestrii, was absolutely brilliant and unique.  Not only have I not heard this sort of fusion of so many different styles of music, I can’t think of a performance I’ve seen before so incredibly filled with passion.

It was hard to watch the show, in part because it’s such an intimate atmosphere.  We were very close to the stage and I had a very hard time trying to figure out who to watch, since all four of the performers were so frenetic and passionate about their music.  Everyone was so lost in each song and they were fascinating to watch in that trance-like state.  The other piece was that Caffe Lena is a sit-down-and-listen kind of place, but with a high-energy band that is playing tangos and waltzes and wishing they could encourage people to get up and dance, it hard to not crave that.  There was certainly a moment where I decided that I’m going to have to see this band play at a venue with more (any) dance space available.

We hung around after the show for a while, chatting with the band and with some of Dick’s friends and acquaintances.  It was really nice to hear from Rima and Benjy that they kept looking to our table during their show.  We were (to them) good to focus on and fun to watch because of our unrestrained enjoyment and encouraging, friendly attitudes.  I think that it has a lot to do with being performers and, for me, having been around that for so long.  If you’re doing a good job, I will tell you completely without words as you’re doing that excellent job.  Mom and Dick do the same thing, but I don’t think it’s actually a conscious plan for any of us.

For me, though, the most amusing part of the whole evening was at the very end.  I was heading out and mentioned to Sxip that I really enjoyed the show.  He thanked me and asked my name.  I replied, "[Fyre] and…" I unzipped my coat to show the t-shirt I was wearing which says (and I said it out loud), "I’m blogging this."  You can’t ask for a better moment than that and it completely made the shirt worth it.

One final note, which I’ve often thought, but was brought up last night during the show.  They say that it is an ancient Chinese curse which says, "May you live in interesting times."  I would really like to know how to say that in Chinese.  Then it could really be a curse.

My intention this weekend was to actively do NOTHING.  Well, not nothing, I had plans to go and buy a hat on Sunday, but except for that and my two hours of listening to political pundits yell at each other on Sunday morning, I was just going to out and out ~*slack*~.

Yeah, not so much.

Because I kind of forgot that I had this wedding next weekend, which means that I have to put together their wedding gift.  I can do that tonight, though, that’s fine, I know what I’m doing and while it does take some effort, it’s not like I’m building them a birdhouse or something.  I’m also going to have to do some laundry, but that’s pretty much cake and I generally don’t stay at the laundromat while the cycles are running.

But, except for that, all I really was going to do was buy a hat.

And…  you know…  do some dishes, and try to fix the hookups on the television and clean the bathroom and take a look at the storage room for long enough to create a plan of action for when it’s actually warm enough to spend any real amount of time in there.

But, you know, outside of that stuff, all I planned to do was to buy a hat.

And I figured, well, at least all those other things are being at home and not running all over the place to do this or see this or whatever else.  Except, of course, for buying the hat.

I missed my mom’s call because I had my ringer off, but she left a voice mail about the whole hat shopping adventure.  It’s turned into a thing.  Now it’s hat shopping and going out to dinner and seeing a show.  And, yeah, I AM interested in this band that is playing and, you know, it would be nice to have dinner out with them.

So I’ll keep moving all weekend long, and culminate with a good live show and surely a good dinner, and with luck I’ll actually get a hat out of it.  But when you look at my calendar for the month of March, the only real schedule I have up there is to go to this wedding next weekend.

And to buy a hat on Sunday.

I’m forever giving people presents.  Not major purchases or even things that come with a ribbon on top, but I keep people in my head and often will find a small thing that they would appreciate or have been asking for or that I deem perfect for them.  Sometimes it’s a purchase, sometimes it’s something I make or find, sometimes it’s something to loan (though rarely, and I pretty much always loan things assuming I won’t get it back).

For example(s), with Spawn, it may be a pack of his favorite gum or a patch or sticker of a band or phrase that he’s into;  I brought in a package of Spiderman fruit snacks for a friend of mine who is a Spidey fan; I just sent out three envelopes containing little presents for friends who live far away.  I do this all the time.  Used to be that I would sent out these packages from time to time, and they would be filled with random, fun, stupid things.  I would have several boxes lying around to collect the things over a period of months and then I’d send it out to someone.  My friends call them "Fyre Packages" because there’s no other way to name them, since you really, NEVER know what will be in that box.  I simply haven’t had the time to spend putting those things together, but I think it’s time to find a couple of smallish boxes and start that process for a couple of people who, I think, could really use that sort of thing in the next couple of months - heh.

But it doesn’t have to be a huge production and, discounting holidays and birthdays (which, let’s face it, are personal holidays), I rarely spend any significant amount of money on these things.  I think it comes, in part, from my mother, who is often bringing me (and others she cares about) small tokens of appreciation/love/thoughtfulness.  Every spring (and this should happen pretty soon), my mom makes a point of bringing me daffodils because she knows that’s it’s my favorite flower and, to me, the ultimate harbinger of spring.  Until I start seeing daffodils, either in the ground or in my home, I remain convinced that winter is never going to end.

And the funny thing is, that no matter who it is who’s doing it, whether it’s me or my mom or my brothers or my kid or even one of my friends, it always starts the same way.  "I have a present for you."  And it always IS a present and it generally makes you smile, at least, and even if it doesn’t come with a ribbon on top, or have some monetary worth, it’s generally a match for the person receiving it.

You know, I don’t think there’s nearly enough of that in the world.

Monday was fine except that I was wiped out.  Had Spawn had any more time with me than what he already had, it would have been a fight.

Tuesday I was reminded exactly why I don’t tend to like people until they pass the age of 25 and go through the whole self-identity crisis.  Let me just say, anecdotal evidence is not a valid debate point, and frankly, I wasn’t talking to you when you determined that, whether or not children are losing their childhood at an earlier age, that’s not a bad thing, since you had it harder than anyone else in the rest of the world, and you turned out fine.

Yeah, ok, whatever gets you through the day.  Also?  Taking up an entire row of seats between two people just makes you self-absorbed.  Also?  I don’t care who you are, applauding and laughing at a rape scene makes you a bad person.  Fuck you all (except the one person whose company I seek out, you know who you are) and I want those two hours of my life back.

Wednesday had hardly even started when it went down the toilet.  A portion of the main road had flooded, so the bus decided to turn around, retrace the route for over a mile, take weird back roads that I’m not familiar with and lose 15 minutes in order to get about a block and a half around the closed portion of the MAIN FUCKING DRAG.  Which would have been more than enough to make this particular Wednesday a Wednesday, but no.  The bus also had to smell like funky garlic and the good bus driver in on vacation, so we’re stuck with this complete ASSHOLE who insists upon making us walk even further than the quarter mile we already have to walk.  So we hit the last stop (which we call the last stop because in order to get into my work site, you need to have an official badge) and there are 4 of us on the bus, 2 of whom I recognize (one of whom is me, who I do not need to recognize).

We get to the gate, and the security guy comes on and the 4th person is this old lady who doesn’t work there and, therefore, doesn’t have a badge.  So the bus driver starts flipping out and YELLING at her about how she should know better!  Wait…  No…  It’s the BUS DRIVER’S job to make sure his passengers know what’s going on with the route, not some old lady who is in town after having been gone for 15 years.

At this point, the bus driver, who is yelling at the little old lady (with all her luggage!) tells her that she needs to get off the bus and walk in the rain the mile or more back to the bus stop.  Now it seems to me that the non-asshole thing to do would be to have her get off the bus, stay there at the gate and offer to pick her back up when you left…  maybe it’s just because I’m not an asshole, but why make the little old lady (with luggage!) WALK over a mile when she doesn’t even really know where the hell she is?  It was the security guard who told the asshole bus driver to stop yelling at the lady and just make sure she didn’t get off the bus on site.

That got me into work a half hour late, which is fine, since I don’t actually have any plans today, at least not ones that are dependent on time, but it means staying late and still walking in the rain, only probably colder rain, and blah blah blah blah…  I really don’t need this many Wednesdays in a week.

I’m not a very patient person.  I have very little patience for the shifting of blame and no patience at all for people’s personal bullshit.  I don’t play mind games and I call people on it when they try to play them with me.  I don’t like apologies because I think that if it’s something that you need to apologize for, and is something for which you have apologized in the past, then an apology is meaningless.  I don’t want words, I want you to STOP THAT BEHAVIOR.

All that said, I am an empathetic person.  I will listen with sympathy and (as hard as it is for me to do) not offer unsolicited advice.  If you are my friend, then I am automatically on your side and loyal to whatever cause we’re fighting for in the moment.  I will afford you more patience than most others get.

However…

The people who consider me a friend generally do so because of (or maybe sometimes despite) my opinionated honesty. I try to rein it in, I really do, and make every effort to wait until I am *asked* because at least then they know what they’re in for. Sometimes, though, sometimes I see the same bad judgment, the same destructive behavior, the same shifting of the blame and I am truly COMPELLED to meddle where I haven’t been invited and that’s not good.

You see, it’s not that I’m giving an *opinion*, it’s that I wind up pointing out a very harsh and painful truth and people don’t take that well.

But _I_ get tired of hearing the same drama play out with a new cast of characters. I become drained and rather intolerant. There comes a point where, when the same things keep happening, you HAVE to question the choices YOU make instead of blaming the rest of the world.

It’s like this:  I was a secretary for 5 long years.  I bounced around from job to job and every single job I worked made me miserable.  It was never MY fault, though…  it was always the people I worked for, or the other people in the office, or the people on the phone who were whining or screaming or whatever.  It was never ME, how could it possibly be anything to do with me, I’m wonderful.

Except that it KEPT happening.  And each new job would start out so much better, but within a few months I was back having the EXACT same problems and making the EXACT same complaints and feeling EXACTLY as miserable as I had when I left the previous job(s).  There came a point where I had to face the fact that maybe it wasn’t everyone else.  Maybe it wasn’t just bad luck that I was always finding the worst jobs with people who would treat me badly and want me to do things that made me miserable.  Maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t the rest of the world "out to get me".

Maybe it was me.

And it WAS me.  I’m not cut out for secretarial work.  It has nothing to do with me as a person, or the people I work with, I am just not suited to be in that role.  I need something more challenging and, honestly, less taken for granted.  So I switched careers and made a change, but before that could happen I had to take on the responsibility and quit shifting the blame.

The problem is that a very dear friend of mine is in the middle of this cycle and it’s becoming extremely destructive.  Not only do I find myself listening to the same outraged tales over and over again (with different names involved), but when it finally gets to the point where she simply can’t take it anymore, she runs away.  She literally runs away from the entire situation, packing her bags, leaving her "home" and moving to a completely different location where she no longer has to even consider the idea of possibly running into those people on the street.

For nearly a decade, I have been on her side.  I have been loyal and true and outraged on her behalf, but I only just realized that she’s in a holding pattern and that I am just so tired of having the same damned conversation and listening to the same damn problems and allowing her to shift that blame again and again and again while she claims that she has no fault and is constantly surrounded by emotional vampires.

And again, I have no patience for bullshit.  These toxic people are the same kind of people that I have cut out of my life when they start to drain me, use me, dump on me, treat me badly…  I have NO tolerance for that sort of thing and if all I get in return are mere words and apologies with no change in behavior, I’m done.  I don’t need that.  I don’t have the time or the energy to invest in Other People’s Drama.

And yet…  I do it for those I care about.  At least, I do until it gets to the point where I realize that it’s destructive and then I wind up here.

Because I don’t play games, because I have no patience for this sort of thing, because I can see that this is a cycle that needs to be broken…  I’m trying to figure out what to say/how to say it/if I should even make the attempt and I don’t think it’s going to go over well.  The truth is that I’m pretty sure that no matter how I try to phrase it, I’m going to piss her off, maybe to the point where she stops talking to me for an extended period of time. 

That would suck, but at the same time, I can’t help but wonder which would suck more, losing her for some time because she’s pissed off that I told her the truth, or losing her forever because I couldn’t keep up the patience required to not say anything at all.

This weekend Spawn and I went out and started spending the tax return.  Call it round 1.  We borrowed a car and embarked on a methodical shopping trip with no superfluous stops or purchases.  Heh.  When I am on a mission, I become *very* focused and intent.

I needed shoes for Legal Conspiracy Wedding #1 and Spawn needed a new belt.  We hit the Guitar Center to get a gig bag for Spawn’s bass as well as a guitar stand for my acoustic that finally came home (we now have three stringed instruments in the house).  Then it was on to buy the TV.

It turned out that KMart was having a sale on televisions last week (!!), so that was where we headed.  We first found ourselves a nice looking "Do It Your Own Damn Self" entertainment center for ridiculously cheap.  That was actually really smart because it meant that we now had dimensions to work with in terms of what size television we were going to buy.  Spawn fell in love with a home theater system that was slightly smaller than what we originally intended to buy, but since the price was the same for that as for the larger, but less theatery, and it fit the DIYODS entertainment center, that was the one we got.

Then we went home.

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