This will have to be a very fast post. I took two Ambien in order to fall asleep tonight...I have had them for a while and not used them, and I knew I would need them. My dog was just writhing in pain on our kitchen floor. Squealing. He is always in pain - he's old, and has arthritis and walking problems. He's deaf and blind. But he's never been like this. We all sort of wish that he would just die while sleeping at home I think. No one wants to have to make the decision to put their dog down. I love that dog. He is the best. He's been with my family since I was about 8 or 9, and losing him is going to be like losing a part of me. It's so strange...when I wasn't living at home, I know it would have affected me, but something changed about me being home. It's almost like, I moved home for this. I needed to be here. It sounds crazy I'm sure some people would say, for a dog. But he's my dog, and dogs are not like people. They don't discriminate. They love you absolutely unconditionally on and on as long as they can. Just to see my dog in pain, and knowing I can do nothing to help him feel better kills me. Why should he have to be in pain? Why should he have to suffer? I wish people could learn to love like dogs. That requires openness that people don't have. People are afraid of unconditional love because it hurts when it's not reciprocated. We expect reciprocation from every action. If I do this for you, you do that for me. There is something expected to get back from helping someone do something, even if it's simply a feeling that you get that you helped. I can't think of the word I'm looking for and head is starting to get fuzzy from Ambien but that is what I mean. I'll figure it out tomorrow and edit this. For now, my eyes are getting tired and I need to go to sleep so I can get up in the morning and hope my dog is still alive and then drag myself to work. Everything feels very heavy right now. That must be a sure sign I need to pass out.

Just some current thoughts

I just learned that my grandfather has had a minor stroke. He is 94 years old, and these things happen. Death is inevitable. I am worried, but there is really nothing I can do. I hope he gets better, but hoping for those things is like denying the obvious. I love him and I will miss him, but eventually all life comes to an end. We just don't know when it will happen.
I miss my other grandfather immensely. He died last Summer. I have a ridiculous amount of respect for that man. He was truly a good person, with a good heart and soul. I see so many heartless soulless bitches day after day that it is hard to believe that anyone could actually have a heart, but he did, and I will always hope that I can be half the person he was. I want life to be worthwhile. I don't intend on wasting it being miserable and scared.

I cannot graduate when I thought I would be able to. I am taking three week courses over Winter break to make up for it. The end of January can't come quickly enough. I don't know what I am going to do. I wish I had enough money so that I could volunteer for a while and not work for money. I very much want to become a certified counselor for battered women. I am taking a class in women and violence, and it makes me want to help in whatever way I can. Women in this country need to have a place to turn when they have no other options, and no one to talk to and nowhere to go. I feel like in school I am doing nothing but a very good job at fading into the background. I don't especially want to be in the background. I don't want to be center stage either, but I want to be doing something worthwhile with my time. I don't care how much certain people argue for education, there are so many things wrong with it and the way we learn and the things we learn in college. There are many useful things, but none of my four and a half years in undergraduate education has even begun to prepare me for a job. Since we are forced to have a job and make a living in society, you would think they would do a better job in preparing you for a real-world job. Mostly all I have gotten from school is to get very very angry at all the injustices and inequality in the world, and to learn that there are even more problems and more injustices in the world than I was aware of when I started. When I think of it on a grand scale, it frustrates me, because there is only so much one person can do. I have focused my education on mental health, and I can only hope that at one point I am in a position where I can actually help people. So many people think that mental health problems are either very easily solved or don't exist at all. It's frustrating because they're very real, and so often the people who have mental problems are just chastised for being "crazy" or "insane" or for not "manning up and dealing with their issues." Wouldn't it be nice if instead of chastising these people, we accepted that they had a problem, helped them to solve it, and in doing so, made the world a slightly better place?

I don't understand why people are so bent on hate and fighting and anger. I don't understand why people are so closed-minded, and will never admit they are wrong. I don't understand why some people seem to never grow up and prefer to instead stay stuck living in a happy little bubble where nothing bad can touch them. I don't understand why people preach a whole load of bullshit and never follow through on it. Every day I wake up and want to be a better person than I was the day before. Isn't that really all we can do? We can just keep going, keep moving, and make life worthwhile. Our country feels like it's in a state of turmoil with every side pointing fingers at one another. There is so much ANGER everywhere, in everyone. I think people don't even really know where the anger comes from. They're just angry, and when you're angry, you don't really see things clearly. You are simply angry, and nothing will satisfy you except a release for that anger. Too often this release is not brought about in a proper manner, and it makes otherwise intelligent people speak or act in very foolish ways. I feel as if things would be much easier to deal with if people learned to be honest about their feelings, and also accepting when other people are honest about their feelings. We are afraid of feelings because they can hurt us in ways that we have no idea how to deal with. You can't put a band-aid on a broken heart.

Rain and More Rain

Basically that is all this summer has consisted of weather-wise. With the exception of a couple days, it has rained and rained, and it's still raining. There hasn't been any ungodly hot weather at all. Where is summer? Why have I not been going to concerts? Why haven't I been to the beach? Am I really complaining? Not really. It's just been a different summer, that's all. I am starting to remember what I did when I was at home in Stafford. Listen to music, read, decide to do things like learn to play guitar because I get overly motivated. Talk seriously with my dad about finishing the house - cleaning everything out of here and laying down the floors, then putting real doors on, finishing the siding, etc. To do this, everything in this house needs to disappear. All of my mother's stuff. Junk piled upon junk piled upon junk. Most of it could be thrown out or recycled. Do we use it? Not really. I can only imagine if this house was the beautiful house it should have been. My dad walked me around and explained what it was supposed to be like. I wish it had been. My parents deserve it. Time for dinner.

Home Again

Sometimes I think everyone needs a fresh start. It's what I've been needing for a long while. Also, a break from all the parties and nonstop craziness. Don't get me wrong, I love parties and partying. Sometimes though, you need to get away from everything. There is no better place to do this than in this humble corner of this small town. I am enjoying being home for the moment. The shower is terrible as always, and there are far too many bugs to suit me, but I missed the space, and not being bothered by people whose lives I could give two shits about. My landlady can suck it - so glad I don't have to deal with her anymore. I do not plan on being here for a long time. Longer than the two months I was here for last time, but not for a long time.

Some other random thoughts:

- I appreciate things so much more now.
- I'm currently completely and totally head over heels.
- This means I am in danger.
- I am simultaneously loving and hating every second of it.
- Hopefully I will be visiting Kansas in the next month.
- No one that I know will be happy about it, or think it's a good idea.
- Fuck reason, and fuck their opinions.
- I want to go back to school so I can get it over with now.
- I don't even feel like the same person I was a month ago.

Twilight Zone

Right when I think my life is awfully boring, then bam...along comes something that forces me to think otherwise. I'm definitely in a transitional period right now. I don't know what it is or why every time I have to move in and out of an apartment there is change happening that is not just my living situation. Usually it has nothing to do with me moving at all, and once again, this is the case. I don't know what to make of it except that mostly it makes me feel like I am constantly living in a strange Twilight Zone - someone else's life that can't be mine but is so very mine at the same time that it couldn't possibly belong to someone else. I do not care about other people's bullshit problems or their immaturity. It doesn't seem important. Probably because it really isn't. My parents did call and stress me out earlier, but a few beers and some leftover stuffed shells should solve that problem pretty quickly. I haven't been sleeping enough.

I have learned how to drive my car decently well...certainly not perfectly and tonight on my way home from work I regressed. I stalled three times. I haven't stalled at all in three days. That's what overconfidence does to you. I do just need to keep doing it, though. I have been doing better. Not perfect, but much, much better. I absolutely and positively ADORE my car. Pretty much everything about it is amazing. Most people were much happier for me about it than I anticipated. I have developed a habit of expecting very little from people. Sometimes it's a good thing and sometimes it's bad. I know exactly where it came from and why. It's good because when people don't do nice things I don't get upset. If someone treats me like shit, I can just let it roll off my back and have no worries - I wasn't expecting anything more. On the other hand, if someone does treat me well and is nice to me, I am questioning them as to why I deserve them to be nice to me. I know it's a bit fucked up, but it's a bad habit I can't get out of. I am always appreciative, but I guess after meeting so many fucked up people in life, I have lost my faith in goodness a little bit. I need to work on that. I think I'm going to see if I can get my internet to play some TV shows since I no longer have a TV here, and try to not think so hard about everything and enjoy my beer. Worrying is such an unnecessary waste of time and energy.

So Michael Jackson died today, along with Farrah Fawcett. A little weird, I suppose, but major celebrities just seem to die young so often. Michael Jackson was pretty fucked up at some points I guess, but it certainly doesn't stop him from being some sort of pop legend. He does have some truly great songs. MTV was doing a tribute to him by playing all of his music videos. We watched Thriller all the way through. I think it's a comforting thought to realize that we still remember people the way we should - for all of their good points rather than their bad. People will still talk about the skin color change and the nose jobs and the nose melting off his face, and the weird stories from his Neverland Ranch, but what will truly hang on are his songs. Music is great that way. It keeps on keeping on, forever. It changes through time, but yet it's still a constant. I don't get people who rarely ever listen to music. It's like a necessity in my life. If I don't have any music, I'm lost.

STRESS!!

Look, there's another title. Rather fitting, seeing as I am massively stressed and frustrated with the way things are going lately. I am backward and forward, one town to another, and I don't know what to do next. I suppose it's better than being bored, but it is grating on me. I just took a shot. Thank you, Jagermeister, for calming me down.
It's true, I would not drink nearly so much if I didn't work at a package store, but I figure that I am young and I may as well have fun while I can. It's entertaining to me, the myriad of different drinks that you can buy. Really, it doesn't matter, if you consume enough of any one of them, you have reached a common end. Pick your poison baby, and drink it till you can't taste it anymore. It's really rather fun though, to try different kinds, and have some things that are really delicious rather than cheap, etc. You do begin after a while to drink for the taste rather than the feeling. I feel as if it is an adventure. I like trying new things, and while there are some things I won't touch with a 50 foot pole (i.e. Boone's Farm, Daily's Alcohol Already In It! Strawberry Daiquiri, Colt 45 Malt Liquor, Bukoff Vodka, etc.), there are plenty of affordable things to drink that are rather tasty. I enjoy being able to tell the differences between beers and have a general knowledge of them. The wine is a bit more confusing, but even that I have developed a taste for. Hard liquor is the only thing I am still picky about, and I drink far less of it than I did when I was, say, 18 and had just started drinking. Anyway - sometimes I stand at work and think of how many people you could kill with all the booze in there. We get slow sometimes on weeknights, and I get bored. The amount of alcohol in that store is enough to give thousands upon thousands of people alcohol poisoning. I really truly wonder...if you took all the booze in the store, and served it to people in one night - enough to give them alcohol poisoning, how many people would that be? There is no clear cut answer and will never be, but it's still an intriguing question. Obviously it's one of those things that could probably be estimated with time and some careful mathematics, but the fact remains that every single person is different, so there are some people who would get alcohol poisoning from just a little booze and some who would take much much more. Definitely the regulars who come in every day and buy a whole handle of coffee brandy would have a much higher tolerance than the lady who buys three little tetras and a couple of wine coolers once in a while.
The variance in tolerance of people does not just vary with alcohol, but with anything. As always, there are some people who always have a smile on their face, and some, when asked how they are doing, instantly scowl and say nothing. I guess that's why it's so hard to test things to begin with, because of so much variability in the population. Different opinions, different intelligence levels, different healthiness levels...it all becomes very confusing when you start to think about little details. I suppose that it doesn't matter really, since even if we were able to figure out how many people we could poison in one night with a lot of booze, it wouldn't really make any difference in how much or how little people choose to drink, and it certainly wouldn't solve any problems except that my curiosity about the matter would be appeased, and I'd have a very interesting little fact to tell people at parties.