20 Somethings

I've been chasing down what exactly I should be doing right now for a long time now... and I have yet to find it. I'm not sure what I am amazing at, but I do know I do not want to have a nine to five job sitting at a desk getting more and more complacent... (or complaisant, I can never tell which is which honestly). All I know is  since before I left college with a piece of paper in hand, I've been trying to figure my life's purpose. More than that, I've been trying to figure out what would make me happy. Some sort of life's work / worth. that would take up a lot of my time that I actually gained monetarily from AND enjoyed AND was good at. Something that wouldn't add any more negativity to a negative sort of world.

I've yet to figure out what that is. And I'm starting to become jaded nay I say it, placid at the mere thought of anything other than my current existence. I see the way my boss lives his life....he isn't doing anything...he's just there... I don't want to be just there. I get it, sometimes you get a few responsibilities, maybe some kids, mostly some bills, and then you just start doing stuff that will pay those said bills....

But there has to be someone to do those type of boring day to day jobs. Everyone can't be a freethinker, going with the wind sort of person, right? Some people don't get to choose a path and have to take what they can get to take care of what they have, but I'm not in that position...at all. So why is it so hard for me to figure out what I need to do to be happy with myself? I feel like this is a question I'v asked way too many times. I'm tired of asking it. I'm just ready to live it; whatever it is.

I'm losing hope. I'm losing that feeling that I will figure it all out. I've been trying to figure it all out for years now...and I know, I'm still quote unquote, "young enough." I honestly feel like I'm running against a clock that is moving warp speed while I'm stuck in the slow lane. Maybe I will never figure it out.  Now that just sounds depressing.

Poetry Corner: Like Used Paper Towels

Like Used Paper Towels

Your love,

Is like used paper towels

All crumbled around, to see

There's nothing

Nothing

Left, to clean

There's nothing

nNothing

Left for me.

And I find myself wondering

Why

Oh why, else could there be?

And why oh why me?

Do you think, that I, would ever

Be free?

From your love

Your love....it's using me

Your love, oh

Is using me,

What belongs to you

And what belongs to me

Whomever

Wherever

These tears are to be

No warmth

No,

Nothing for me.

To dry my tears on

No 'sort of'

Just nothing.

For me

Your love

Is like, used paper towels

Nothing

Nothing left for me

To dry my tears

Nothing, nothing

For me.

Let's Not

Short and simple. Let's just not....


I'm sure plenty of you have this same phrase your head for something going on right now in your life. so I'm just saying it out loud so you know, that I know, you shouldn't do that really really bad thing you've been thinking about doing now for a good minute. Let's just not people.

 You're welcome.

What If I Was A Hippie Man??

Can you imagine? Me, a hippie? hahahah....letting my leg hairs grow during the summer and only bathing when I notice my own funk? spending all my time enjoying the present not worried about the future, smoking that wonderful herb and making only enough to travel about, seeing things. Completely withdrawn from the social norms and pleasantries.... just doing me.

O_O my God that would be awesome! -_-' so why is it so hard to actually do? Why do I feel like I need to build something, climb ladders, kiss corporate asses, make lots of money so I can do expensive things that I don't even like to do... Have you ever had champaign champagne ? It's like honestly the worst! instant hang over and it taste like poop. That's kind of a analogy about today's society too. We are working super hard for something that is pretty much expensive, God awful, and shitty. Why? Why why why why why? I don't know... but I am really fighting that need to be one of the Joneses.


I want to get healthy. I have spent more than 70 percent of my life trying to lose weight. to fit into a category that I frankly don't belong in. I still want to lose weight, but I really just want to get healthy, purge myself of all of these toxins. Then live life. enjoy it. Not have to live by the dime but by my own time. travel. eat sleep and breath clean air. I feel like that lifestyle is a lot to ask for even though it's considered not a lot. I think to be a modern day hippie would be harder to attain. not because it's hard to just be, but because there is so much advertisement, eye candy, you name it out there to make you think you need it to be happy.

....End of Rant. LOL

Scrapes From My Youth

Sitting in my bed I happened upon an old childhood scar I got while doing some real daredevil-like things. I remember vividly my brother, some other kid, and myself riding our bikes at high speeds down the hill which was our street, making a sharp right turn into our driveway and plowing straight into the back yard, which was covered in dead leaves and surrounded by trees. The leaves made steering near impossible and their was a fun air that came with that loss of control. We literally would fall off the bike and roll and slide and be covered in dirt and muck laughing and laying beside our noble steeds. We tried to stabilize ourselves to see how long one could go before we inevitably spun out. We made a game of it.  We did it three times, realizing by the second time of how dangerous it was. "Once more than we have to stop." And once more we did it and the last time I wiped out the worst of all of the times; and I remember standing up and looking down and their being a giant quarter shaped hole in my jeans. "woooaaahh." was all that escaped me. It didn't take a rocket scientist to realize that the bike handle--which was missing the rubber grip on it's end-- had stabbed me on my way down. Still, after a split second of shock and amazement, we  high-fived and laughs about how I could have died.

It wasn't until I made it into the house that I realized I was bleeding. As with other stupid things I did in my childhood I didn't come right out and tell my parents. You see, the child mind is quite the interesting thing. You don't worry about possible infection or tetanus or death. No, you think about that lecture and/or spanking you're gonna get for tearing a pair of perfectly good jeans. I can't remember the story after that. I'm sure my parents had to have found out from me limping or even worse an article of clothing with a giant bloody hole in it inside of the kitchen trash can. What I do know is I have a story for the mark it left. For years It was very visible and I got used to it. Then it just became background. A slightly darker splotched that stretched as I grew older into nothing but a passing memory. I probably have at least five or six more stories like this one. A story of how I did something or something happened to me, and either I was amazed at the awesomeness of it all, or ruined by it. Most of my scars hurt and I cried about them. But a few of the stories, well, are just so amazingly cool, The tomboy in me is thinking, "Wicked!" 

I wonder if that is life. 

A living breathing thing made up of little marks and scratches to deep puncture wounds and stitches; things that negatively affect us.... Are their any positive marks?

Yes, we just over look them...I am covered with beauty marks. Little cute dots that formed over the years. One of them is near a spot that my dad has a little dot too, on our hands. I don't remember the exact story about how they formed or when. It happened over such a long period of time...for the most part you usually just suddenly noticed it.  However, I do remember not having them, then having them.  I feel that happy memories are like that as well. 

Maybe it's just me, but I tend to dwell on the sad things more. Remember really terrible things, little emotional scars... But I also know their are beauty marks mixed in there. 

I don't know, I just want to get to a place in my life, where I am one with the world. Nirvana. I want to see all the little beauty marks and smile, regardless of how many scars I have. I want to get to a point where my focus is no longer on the dark blotches on my knees from tripping while running on pavement. No, I want to be able to look pass them, and see that little dot on my nose and know that the world is beautiful, that I am beautiful, and it will all be okay.

Meeting the Rents: A Manifesto

Tomorrow, I meet my boyfriend's parents. I'm not shitting bricks, but I would be lying if I didn't say I was a little bit nervous. Honestly...I'm having a little trouble with the actualization that I really like someone and they really like me. What a crazy turn of events from a year ago. But that's not what this blog is about, it's about his parents

Mind you they seem like lovely people via Facebook pictures and word of mouth. I realized I must really like him because of what a huge undertaking this seems to be. I want to make a great impression. I want them to like me. Sure I want everyone to like me, and parent's I met in the past I wanted to like me....but for some reason I REALLY want them to give me the okay.

I'd also be lying if I said them being Jewish and me being  black didn't make me a little more nervous. Though, by all means, I shouldn't be about that. My boyfriend is Jewish and he is as happy as a clam with me. I'm glad we are all meeting in the city for brunch before my boyfriend's play. At least this way I won't bring the wrong bottle of wine or have to bring a gift at all. Oh God! The day will also come that I have to go to Long Island to have dinner with them!! I just thought about that! -_-' *massive panic attack*

Well we will see. I'm sure everything will go fine. I have no doubt that they will like me, my boyfriend says they will LOVE me. I'm still just a tad bit nervous.... I mean...if there is any such thing as the one...he sure is crossing out a bunch of awesome qualities on that list... I've already told him that I want to take it one step at a time. So let's not even go there!! Let you know how it went later.

Jump Run Pass....

The title of this blog is a dedication to a man I met only once who I found out recently died in a car accident with a parked semi-truck. This is the name of the sports blog that he was editor in chief for. It's really sad.

I received an invite a few day ago on Facebook from this guy to some sort of event. I never read the event right away. Half the time I'm just trying to get the notification symbol to not be red anymore. So like most events it went into hiding until I was bored at work and needed to do something other than watch the same commercials all day. Yesterday, I began browsing through my events and came across his and when I read it, it made little sense to me. "Celebration of Life service?" I assumed it was a religious gathering of sorts and when I clicked on the event to see more, I realized the life being celebrated was the one who added me. He was dead. Someone (I later found out was his mother) was able to use his account to invite all of his friends to his wake. I didn't know how to feel. We talk and post and write as if we will be here forever. As if we all will live well into our 90's....

I only met the guy once. He spoke in the third person and used his own name as a catch phrase often times.  I thought he was full of himself, but it was also charming...I didn't know until recently that he had his hand in so many things: I believe he was a substitute teacher, he trained people at a gym and on the track, he wrote for a sports blog, hell, was editor of it....He did a lot and updated a lot and was traveling a lot and I say all this to say....That for some reason, even though I didn't know him well, his passing is bothering me.

Am I doing enough in my life right now that if I were to suddenly pass away I had anything to show for it? believe it or not, we all want to be remembered in some way. Death doesn't often allow you the time to figure out it's about to happened for you to get your life in order...Much like this guy, it is sudden and without warning. The fact that his event page has 250 people saying they will be there says something about how many lives he has touched. I can not say I've done that much in my 25 years of life... how depressing...

When I read about what happened I was taking a break at work from the mundane. I thought about it for the rest of the day in little spurts; how sad of a story it was. He was in the passenger seat and they ran right underneath the truck at a high speed....the driver survived, but barely. Before going to bed a women outside was screaming the name of someone over and over again. I rolled my eyes and thought, eventually she'll get tired and leave, or the police will chase her off. But at 3 a.m. this morning I was awakened by the hoarse voice of the women from crying out all night. This time the police did show up and I finally looked out the window and saw a very upset woman  and at least eight officers, seven of which were standing around, joking, and talking as if they were not responding to a call....from my window. It looked as if she was in desperate search for her lost teddy bear, and the police we're just going through the motions of writing down the information so they could leave and get back to the real work...

I wrote all this because seeing her--oily hair, dirty sneakers, ripped pants--reminded me of him. She reminded me of life in general. Calling out trying to get someone to take her seriously about what ever it is she has to say...but everyone shrugging her off going about business as if she will always be. Life is dirty and desperate, but it is also beautiful in it's own way. my Facebook friend's life is over and like that, the world turns. For me, it's a scary thought. We dismiss life so easily as an ongoing entity. We have nothing but time. Every time I talk to someone about how I feel like I'm not doing enough, I'm told, "How old are you? 20-something?? You have time!" But do I really? I believe I do and so does everyone else, but we really don't know. This event has caused me to look at what I have done so far in my life and I feel like I've done close to nothing. My friend and I were the same age and he had a hand in so many things and helped so many people....Maybe that was his main purpose in life, but what is mine?

Today his body will be on view at one of the funeral homes in California where I believe he lived. Today is also--according to Facebook-- his birthday. It's not really his birthday. His birthday is in June. What a little trickster he was.

Fat Girl Me

So If you look at a picture from June of last year and look at one of me now you will notice 2 things: 1. my dreads have grown in nicely and 2. Geeezzz I've gotten fat. I know, I know. That seems to be a terrible thing to sit down and look at, but even when I try to pretend like the scale is lying to me, I can't because I have photographic proof that I've gained back 20 lbs. And the excuses! Man, I can't work out because I need to make sure my room is in order. My room's not in order because I have to work, I have to work because if I don't I'll be homeless...well that last one is true, but I do know that I am simply not making time to workout, just like how I was not making time to write because, "I need the right setting to do so" and my room stays a mess so I can't. 

But it's not just the working out, it's the eating. I used to be fine with tiny portions now I can't tell if I'm full unless I'm bursting. I have all of these things to my disposal at work: cookies, chips, soda, burritos. I don't drink soda so that isn't a problem for me, but I've racked up quite a sugar addiction and I literally get an itch for candy or something sweet after meals. That definitely can't be good. I'm starting to think I'm not only addicted to sugar, but to overeating in general. Eating makes me happy usually, and it taste good. I like the feeling of eating something tasty and when I'm bored I always take a quick look in the fridge for something to munch on. I tell you, I need a 12 steps program to lower my habit down to "eating for survival", not for fun...

I don't have to go to work until late tomorrow. I plan on cleaning my room and finishing up an article for the online publication I write for --nerdcaliber.com-- and getting some pilates in. But the truth is...because I don't want to really work out...I'll have breakfast, take a shower, peruse facebook for memes and watch How I Met Your Mother before making a small attempt at organizing my room, only to  fall asleep and wake up just in time to head out to work. *sigh*

Sleeping with a bottle of...

pills.

In this heavily over medicated world we live in, I can honestly say that I am one of the many whom rely on meds to keep my mood stable.  I take prozac for my chronic depression (thought I'm told by a few people that that is not a real disease). For months now things have been pretty okay...that is until I switched doctors and forgot to get a refill...now I have to wait a month and I'm trying to stretch out the last week and a half by slowly self lowering the dose. I'd rather just get a prescription, but doing so is almost impossible which makes little sense...isn't half of the country taking a life long medication?

I bring all that up to say, I'm starting to get a few of those residual feelings that I've stashed away deep down in that tiny little box we all have. Oh who am I kidding...for me, It's definitely still baggage. I wish I could leave it on the curb Wednesday and Friday with the rest of the trash, but I think these attachments to the past go much deeper than just being able to leave it somewhere.

First off, I'm a little hurt that Mr.X didn't move to New York. I didn't ask him to. He asked me...and I thought about it and decided to assist him. Now it is almost like we never had that conversation; like the thought never existed. I want to blame some unconscious fear of his, but it could be anything really. I recently started dreaming of the west coast and I feel I need to sit down in person and tell him how I feel about his abandonment of his big city dream; and essentially of me. Obviously there are a lot more issues surrounding us, but I came to the realization that as much as I love him in my life, eventually we will have to go down separate paths and it makes me sad..

Then there is the 'literal' dreams I keep having. Maybe I really do need that prescription to keep sane, because too often I dream of my ex. It doesn't help that whenever I think I'm fine with the break up, that someone either calls, texts, or says out loud, "SO ARE YOU OVER BLAAAANNNKKK!??" or recently and even worse, "Hey, didn't you used to date a tattoo artist? Was his name Blank? Not to cause any trouble,but...he's now dating my friend." I'm sure you don't mean to cause any trouble...but I also know the last thing I want/need to know is how my ex continues to find these relationships that are one degree away from me. I mean, for crying out loud a few of the girls he cheated on me with I went to high school with...In the end, I'm still in love...and it hurts to know that. It sucks too, because I'm still carrying that huge bag around with me...even though I have...

A new boyfriend. A very sweet, sometimes weird, but always thoughtful MAN who can play the saxophone, write plays, and sing Boyz II Men perfectly when we do Karaoke. *sigh* He's pretty wonderful. But the truth is, I know I can't manage a brand spanking new Marc Jacob  bag  (well...more like Fossil lol) and a duffle bag, AND a freakin' garbage dumpster all at once. Something has got to give...and because my feelings have grown exponentially for this guy...I realize...I am scared shitless of the aspect of trusting him to do anything. But I feel like this guy might be different... I mean, I told him for the next month I couldn't have sweets and when I saw him, he brought me apples, "in case of cravings." I couldn't ask for more of a nice guy.... sigh...why the heck am I worried about this...damn you prozac....