Subtitle

Warning: Expect foul language. I often blog when sleep deprived, and even when I'm not sleep deprived I cuss.
Warning the second: TMI often occurs. Read at your own risk. Feel free to laugh at my expense (I know I do!).
Warning the third: I suppose I should just put a general Trigger Warning here. I talk about mental illness (Anxiety, panic disorder, depression, social shit), abuse (rarely), and my fucked up relationship with food. And...other things. Actually, just consider this a general warning: If you might be triggered by things, you probably should read no further.

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Beginnings

So I've had my first couple of classes and HOLY SHIT THIS UNIVERSITY IS INTIMIDATINGLY LARGE. As in the number of attendees is a couple hundred more than the population of the CITY my community college was in. HOLY FUCKING SHIT. I kind of was aware of this, but being aware and suddenly realizing how many people are actually there is a whoooooole 'nother ballgame.
I got lost two and a half times yesterday and ended up wandering for (accumulated) hours. I had to stay home today because I wrecked my body a bit. Not as bad as it would have been in the Puget Sound, but I also have blood blisters on my left foot (as well as regular blisters on both feet). I know where my classes are now though, so that's something *sigh*.
My crazysauce is having trouble with the amount of people at the university. But I think I can manage...hopefully. It should only be a problem at one point during the day. I get to my first class super early and there aren't a whole lot of people out and about on campus at that time. Then I leave to eat and stay at the library for a few hours (theoretically doing homework). When I get back to campus I am going to park near my last class of the day, then walk to the second class...that's the tough one. The simple route (that won't get me lost) is both long and goes through "the mall" which is super busy and full of students. After that class is over I backtrack, but there are fewer students (though still a shit ton) out at that point. Leaving my last class I can walk out the back and get to my car with minimal social interaction. This is two days a week. The other two days are simple in and outs. So it's doable. Still stressful, but doable.
I ended up walking in front of sorority girls twice and shamelessly eavesdropped. It was kind of boring, but still kind of funny. Though mad props to the girl who has a boyfriend who's thinking marriage. Why? Because she doesn't want to support him. Way to break stereotypes chica! Seriously, she's a young thing who definitely has a grasp of what she wants from life. I have no idea what she looks like, I thought it might be creepy to turn around and look.
I am too tired to be funny right now. Insert your own joke here.

Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Oh the places your brain will go

My fundraiser ( ) has been distressingly disappointing. If it weren't for the girlfriend of a friend I would be screwed. Thankfully, in spite of a lack of money or caring (guess which one the crazysauce tends towards thinking it is?) I have still got the most expensive part covered. She gave me a desktop computer and monitor that she is no longer using and he gave me a new keyboard and mouse. I don't have the money for some of the other things I REALLY need for this potential job (Like, y'know, a PHONE for the dedicated phone line.) but I have the desktop. And that is good. I don't know for sure that I'll get this job, but I fulfill all but one of their preferred qualifications, so I'm hopeful.
My brain is dwelling and flitting about. I'm mopey about the fact that so few people helped. I know that a lot of people are dead broke, but it hurts that they couldn't even spare five dollars. Silly, I know, but there you are. I would say a handful of people helped, either through signal boosting or contributing, so that's something anyways. And some continually boosted the signal, which made me feel good.
Then I come across stuff I missed due to crazysauce. Like that solidarity is for white women or something hashtag? I felt kind of lost because, as always, I just don't realize what white women don't know. They really don't know that the color gap is bigger than the gender gap when it comes to wages? How is that even possible? I mean, this facts keep popping up ALL OVER THE INTERNET. The internet that they are using. Just...HOW?!? And then I found out how shitty parts of the feminist movement are and I think to myself "Thanks, I'll stick with the old-school feminists who care about motherfucking equality regardless of race, religion, or lifestyle kthnsbye." I mean, those are the white feminists I think of when you put those two terms together.It makes me sad that there's another kind.
It made something pop to the top of my head again. I've pondered a lot about why I'm more comfortable with non-white folk, but less so for why I'm uncomfortable with a lot of white folk. The fact is that they have expectations that not only can I not fulfill, but that I don't even comprehend. There's some sort of white code that I just never got the book for. So I walk into an interaction with an unknown white person EXPECTING that one or both of us is going to be uncomfortable. Self-perpetuating thingamajig.
I'm excited for school, I'm excited for the potential of ACTUALLY getting to see Pacific Rim on the big screen without murdering my budget, and most of all I'm excited for change. Scared out of my wits, but excited.

Monday, August 5, 2013

Grief

Someone I know died yesterday. She was 36. I don't know if I would say we were really close friends, but we were comfortable talking to each other about most anything. I was there to cheer her up through divorce, custody battle, and just life in general. And she always made me smile. We shared a pretty awesome taste in friends. We were Whovians together, and whenever I saw a cute Tardis dress I'd send her link. I don't know who I'll send it to now.
I got to go to her wedding. It wasn't the official ceremony, that had happened awhile before. But this was her grand shindig wedding. It was Doctor Who themed and I took my two closest international student friends with me. We helped set up. I helped her mother-in-law maker her bouquet. I suggested making a bouquet for her husband, and that ended up happening. When it came to the pertinent part of the ceremony I joined in with everyone else "Mawwiage...Mawwiage is what bwings us togethwa today..."
She never found out who the Twelfth Doctor was, and that makes me sad. I think the fact that he played the Angel Islington in Neverwhere would have made her giggle. I never got to have that conversation with her. I'll never send her another dirty meme, or pretty dress, or geeky song. I'll never cheer for her when something awesome happens. I'll never be able to tell her I miss her again.
I don't know if we'd be called close friends, but we were GOOD friends.
I am far from the only person feeling this loss. You'd have to have known her to understand. She was just...light in the darkness. No matter how low she got, she would always fight her way back to the light. She'd often credit her friends for her success, but so much of it was just her. She had this grin that just sucked you in, a mischievous spirit that just made you want to cause trouble with her, a joie de vivre that was just captivating. Knowing she was in the world made it a better place.
I feel like I should be more like her now. I mean, in some ways we were a lot alike, that's why we got along. But...I lack her willingness to take chances on people romantically. I lack her ability to accept that kind of love. It scares me. It would take a whole lot of therapy to get me even halfway there. So I guess that's motivation. I can never be her, but I can embrace and accept more fully the things that we shared. I can learn to be more confident by remembering her delight in herself. Perhaps I can follow her example in health. I can use her as the impetus to FOCUS more on getting fit. I don't know. I just feel like...I just feel like I want to do something to make her presence remain.

Friday, August 2, 2013

Pondering crazy

My crazy swells and falls, waxes and wanes. It's a constant part of my thoughts, mind, soul, identity. It's an integral part of how I interact with the world around me, for both good and ill. My crazy allows me to experience life in a unique fashion that only my fellow crazies can hope to comprehend. But even my fellow crazies cannot fully understand what it means to me. The ecstasy of being is incomprehensible, unknowable, infinite, awe inspiring, beyond words, beyond thought, beyond reason, even were we able to exchange thoughts I would not be able to fully convey it. Because it just...is. Every moment of my life, every breath, it is all...imperfect perfection. It's not easy, it is in fact very hard (that's what she said). But how would I trade it for a stunted way of living? For that's what normality would be for me, barren. I've only ever lived in this state of bizarrity, of otherness, if I were to suddenly be sane my world would be empty. The universes inside my mind create a pleasing border that encompasses the world around me. Others hear me speak of snippets of experience, and perhaps it's bad, unsettling, panic inducing at the time, but when they express sympathy...When they express sympathy I have to admit that, in my heart of hearts, the depths of my mind, all that goes through it is "You feel sorry for me? Oh, sweetie, you don't know what life is until you've embraced it fully because you don't know what the next moment may bring!" Yes, sometimes my brain thinks it's being chased by zombies, or serial killers, or evil of one stripe or another. And yes, that can be frightening. Extremely. But in the midst of those moments I can laugh at the insanity of my own brain, and when the crazy passes I take a breath of the most invigorating air, figurative or otherwise, that can be experienced. Adrenaline junkies might have a chance of understanding me, or poets who glimpse the divine. But all I can tell you is that even in the midst of panic, anxiety, depression, I know that my moment of bliss is coming. I know that I will wake up one morning, blink, and realize that the bad has subsided and I will breathe deeply, freely, joyfully...and I will live so completely in that moment that I will experience heaven.
Never pity me, even though I often pity you.