Day Six: Sad but true

A friend posted a story to his Facebook wall this evening about a boy who threatened to shoot a girl who had turned him down, repeatedly, when he asked her out. When the boy was arrested for having a gun...the girl was vilified by her classmates for not just 'saying yes' and going out with him.

After my sigh of 'this happens all the time' cleared my lips, I responded thusly: Unfortunately the victim blaming is so ingrained into society it will be nigh impossible to eradicate. The idea that we, whatever gender we identify as, are solely responsible for our actions is foreign to so many of all generations. And society in mass propagates the idea through all forms of media. This is not a new thing, victim blaming, the response of standing up and shouting 'Fuck you,' to those who blame the wrong person is also not new. What needs to happen is a concentrated effort on the largest scale to force the victim-blamers to see that what they are doing not only harms the victim but also the perpetrator.

Thoughts?

Day Five: Borrowed Time

Think of the last time you saw that one person and you knew the next time would be when you said your final goodbyes. No I'm not trying to make you cry. I'm not trying to upset you. I'm trying to make you see that we're all living on borrowed time. We've borrowed time from the cosmos we've borrowed time from our souls. We've borrowed time from wherever we can get it so that we can be together. That time needs to be precious. That time shouldn't be spent arguing about the petty things. It shouldn't be spent hating one another. That time should be spent in love and friendship.

Now, if you will excuse me, I have borrowed time to spend.

Day Four: Grief

On Friday evening a close friend of my husband passed away after a short but intense battle with cancer. I never met the man but I grieve for his passing. He was important to me simply because he was important to my husband. The sense of loss that radiates from my life-mate is undeniable and palpable, tinging everything that he interacts with while his heart breaks over and over again as new memories surface to mingle with the others that have already shone forth.

While I was never blessed to meet the friend in person, I met him through the effect he had on my husband and for the memories he was able to leave behind I am grateful.

Death is a new beginning, a new adventure. I tell myself this whenever I lose someone but there are times, like today, when those words are a cold comfort because I cannot take away or even lessen the suffering of a family I came into only a short time ago.

Day Three: Hot Wings

Just a public service announcement...They never look this pristine when I get them home...

One of my favorite traditions that I have been able to indulge is the Thursday night Buffalo Wild Wings feast. While not the healthiest of choices, I find comfort in the medium buffalo sauce slathered over the five or six wings that I eat before placing the rest in the fridge for my husband to eat as leftovers.

The important part of the meal, to me, isn't the food. It's the fact that I get to have that time with my husband where we share something we both love with each other. We both love food. LOVE IT. He has a broader palate than I, and that's fine by me. Slowly I am working my way toward more adventurous meals but it's a process and I'm stubborn. I have learned that I like raw spinach so that's a start. Brussel sprouts still aren't food. Neither are lima beans.

(Credit to Buffalo Wild Wings for the photo)

Day Two: Health!

Chronic pain is just a part of my life that I have come to realize is not a part of 'normal' lives. (I use the word normal with reservation.) Do normal people wake up with the ability to roll out of bed without having to wait for their back to unstiffen? Do normal people not have to stretch their feet before placing them on the floor first thing? Do normal people have searing abdominal pain for NO REASON AT ALL randomly throughout the day? What about chronic headaches? Bronchitis in the middle of summer? Some sort of weird malaise that seems to coat everything with an 'eh' vibe? Huh. I guess that's just a part of life that 'normal' people get to miss out on.

Lucky bastiches.

Day One: I'm Not Sorry

I meant to start this on the first day of August. I mean to do a lot of things. But I also overextend myself more often than not. The first day of August was during Gen Con. It was also the one and only day I had to spend with my husband before we were divided again by that great sea called Graduate School. So, I opted to spend my time with him wandering around and looking at shiny jewelery and spiffy game stuff all day instead. I'm not asking for forgiveness, mind you, because I'm not really sorry.

That is something I have been working on, you see, not feeling regret or sorrow for times I choose one thing over another. I chose my self and my happiness over stressing out trying to get everything done just to make an imaginary deadline. Screw that. I want to be happy and I want to help those I care about be happy as well. If me missing a deadline means that I get to see one of my husband's epic smiles, I'll do whatever it takes.

So, I'm not sorry that this is late. I'm not sorry that I had a hell of a good time at Gen Con. And I'm not sorry that I bought a dragon-style bracelet that is just too awesome for words.

I am sorry, however, that I am too tired to post more tonight.

Broken But Still Good

A series of memories flooded my mind this morning as I read an article about a woman who mercilessly tormented another while they were both young girls in middle school. I remember being made to feel inferior every day, no matter what the circumstance or the others with me, I was the one singled out as the target and it started even before middle school.

Top Row, Middle (The only girl). First grade me.

With one of my only middle school friends

To be honest I have never forgotten those days or how they lasted all the way through my entire career in the Franklin Community schools to the end of my junior year at Indian Creek. I see my tormentors here on Facebook; mutual friends here and there tell me that they are doing fine and I'm glad they are doing well. But there is still a part of me that will always be that scared, hurt, emotionally devastated girl who just wanted to be left alone to read her books or listen to her music or be with the few true friends she had that wouldn't turn on her at a moment's notice to be one of the 'cool kids'. I want to ask those people who encouraged me to commit suicide (daily) why they did it. What did I do to warrant being their punching bag? I was tall, awkward, smart, and painfully naive. All of those things combined to make me a social pariah for too long. Even to this day I have trouble meeting new people and I by default assume that even those I consider my friends are going to stab me in the back and that somehow, even if I don't know how, I will have deserved it. Those few friends I have held onto since the early days know how I can be when it comes to betrayal, how I always expect it and am rarely surprised when it does finally happen.
To those who made my life hell I also want to ask them if they knew what they were doing at the time. Did they know that they were systematically degrading my emotional foundations by treating me that way? Did they even care in their hearts or minds that they drove me to the brink of suicide more than once?

I am leaving this as a public post so that those who tormented me to within seconds of suicide can see that while they might have shattered me more times than I can count, they did not destroy me.

That's right bitches. I'm still here.