Year 2, Day 79: 11/29/12

The Things that Haunt Us.  It's amazing to me when I think about the memories that haunt me.  I remember some of the smallest things - things that would be inconsequential to most people.  But to me, they linger and fester and I can't shake the memories. Today, it was the memory of all of the times I've fallen down (literally, fallen down).  I remember falling as I came home from work while I was in high school.  It was raining and I was rushing to get into the house and slipped and fell on the gravel.  I cried like a baby for that one because I felt so stupid and klutzy.  I remember when I fell playing softball (when I played for Pepsi).  I was running from 2nd to 3rd and just tripped over my own big feet.  I remember when I fell running home after hitting a homerun during practice.  I was just going too fast to control my own weight and fell.  I remember knocking my friend Angie down during a fire drill at the University of Oklahoma.  There was ice on the sidewalks and as I slipped I grabbed Angie - I really felt stupid that day.  I remember falling as I was crossing the street in Chattanooga while leaving school after my class.  I fell and my books went flying right in front of four lanes of moving traffic.  I remember the first time I fell when I was running - I was nearly done with my run around the UTK campus and I tripped over an upraised section in the sidewalk and hit the ground hard.  I followed that up with a trip over my own feet about three weeks later - same area of my run but it was closer to the beginning rather than the end.  Messed up my knee, hand and elbow.  I fell again running when I lived in Raleigh, on the running trail around the lake.  That's all...yes, I remember all of those and they linger in my memories, reminding me of how ungraceful I am, how much of a klutz.  I use those reminders as a way to bring myself down from cloud 9 when I start to think that I have something to offer anyone.  Who would want to be around someone as klutzy as I am?  Just another strike against me.

Year 2, Day 78: 11/28/12

Are We There Yet?  I witnessed some of the worst behavior I've seen in the workplace in a long time today.  Someone actually threw a temper tantrum, like a child would.  No, they did not scream and kick (that would have been too much), but they did talk over people, then make a smart ass remark, before crying.  Yep, a full-on temper tantrum.  The sad part?  They were fussing about something that should have been seen as a positive, and which was presented that way.  Instead, they tried attacking two or three people they felt were causing the problem and went for the jugular.  I'm sorry, but calling someone out by name and asking them if they are doing their job (in so many words), is not being collegial, adult, or anything else that belongs in the workplace.  Follow that up by a meeting where people who have nothing to do with your department decide that you need to do more work, and you've got one hell of a day.

Shipping Woes!  I had to drive down to the UPS customer center to get my package today because I was never home when they tried to deliver it.  This was after I called them because online my package was marked as "return to shipper" even though I had already asked them to hold it.  I then dropped by FedEx to get my other package (I had them hold it there since it was near the UPS location), and then came home to find my other two FedEx packages had arrived...and were delivered!!  Why didn't anyone tell me they would actually leave the damn things under the stairs where they were well hidden?  Why did I have to spend money and gas and time picking up my items?  Lesson learned.  Now off to find a few more things to have delivered.

Year 2, Day 77: 11/27/12

Short Fuse.  Maybe I'm just tired, but I was seriously on a short fuse today.  Part of it was justified - people who really need to get their heads out of their asses, grow up, and stop acting like petty children!  I almost yelled at someone today and I don't do that - especially not people who report to me.  I do worry that I will snap one day and just walk out (not that I can afford to do that!).  I'm thinking I need to get a lottery ticket tomorrow and hope for the best.  Because right now - this career, this life, they are not working for me at all.

I Cannot Begrudge You Your Happiness...Though It Breaks My Heart.  Another friend with happy news, and I'm truly happy for them.  Yet, I died a little more inside today...there is not much left of my heart...

Year 2, Day 76: 11/26/12 - "Everyday"

I got lost, couldn't find my way
And I guess there's nothing more to say...

 But I'm here and here I will stay

So everyday I cry
Yes everyday I fall...

So everyday goes by
And everyday I fall
It makes me wonder why,
My life's worth nothing without you

You'll never know, no, no, no ,no ,no...
No you'll never see

And so the light fades away
Try, try, try as I may
I can't stop thinking about you
It seems my life's worth nothing without you

Everyday, everyday you know I try so hard
Everyday, everyday it gets a little harder...

-"Everyday" by Phil Collins

Not Sure Why...I woke up an hour before my alarm was set to go off, shaking as if it were 30 degrees in my apartment, and crying.  It was not a good sensation and I found it to be downright frightening.  I tried to stay in bed and figure out what had triggered this and I finally narrowed it down to two things.

1. Feelings of being overwhelmed.  I know how much I need to do at work and I feel as if I don't have the time or the means to truly do it.  I'm sure this is part of what prompted my temporary nervous breakdown.
2. Feelings of inadequacy.  I went to bed thinking that my efforts to get to know someone long distance were stupid and futile, because once they met me in person, they wouldn't be interested in me any more.  I don't blame them and I almost wish there were a way to meet them before that day, so I could get the disappointment over with and just move.  I think this is the bigger part of what set me off today and really made me feel as if I just couldn't get up.  I know I shouldn't place so much of myself into this process of meeting someone, when I know how it is likely to end.  But a part of me is still a dreamer and that dreamer has reared her ugly head.  The naysayer in me is trying to knock her back down and this is what I think is causing my emotional and physical suffering.

Year 2, Day 75: 11/25/12

Sun Life Stadium and NFL Football  I got to cross something off of my bucket list today - I attended my first NFL football game.  It was at Sun Life Stadium, which is in North Miami, closer to Ft. Lauderdale than to where I live.  I got to go with my friend "V" and her family and friends.  Her mother and sister were part of a group that sang the National Anthem. The game was supposed to be partially dedicated to celebrating organ transplantation, but that never seemed to happen.  We still wore our shirts in support of organ donation and transplantation. 

I did have a good time, though there were a few things to be learned here:

1. Late November in Miami is still hot, especially on a cloudless day.  I had no sunscreen and no hat.  $24 later I had a brand new Dolphins visor that I will now wear for other things...like running!
2. Food is way too expensive at all parks, and the food at the stadium was pretty bad (at least at the grill).  The lemon chill was fine though (and usually is).  The black bean burger was blah.  The fries looked soggy. Barbecue looked good, but I don't eat that.
3. Parking is terrible and expensive and they made someone who was disabled pay $25 to park when there wasn't even a space available.  
4. Don't plan on getting out of the park and home at a reasonable time.  I didn't get home until after 6 and the game ended a little after 3!

Here are my pics of the fun and game(s).

View of Sun Life Stadium

Another view of the stadium

A little bit of football action...or time out action to be exact.

Looking at the jumbotron

Friends having a good time.

Cheerleaders

Bush on the board

And the sprinklers came on...

The Dolphins inflated mascot.

Year 2, Day 74: 11/24/12

A Day Late...A Dollar Short?  Not sure if that works for my Saturday, but that's what my Dad would have said.  I chose not to post lat night (please take note of the word choice here...chose).  I did not forget, I decided not to post.  Why?  I'm not sure.  Maybe I just didn't feel up to it.  Maybe I didn't want to spill my guts to my online journal (and the few friends who occasionally read my posts).  Maybe I didn't feel I could be truthful enough to write what I really felt so I chose not to write at all.  Today I'll have to make up for that.  I hated yesterday.  And the sad thing is, I don't know why.  I spent most of the day doing normal things - I went for my run, I did laundry, I did some cooking, I got some writing in.  But the whole time I just kept thinking, "I hate this."  The problem is, I don't know what the "this" is that I'm referring to.  Do I hate my apartment with my loud neighbors?  Do I hate feeling lonely though I'm surrounded by people in this world?  Do I hate my job, and dread going back on Monday?  Do I hate my life in general?  Yesterday, I think it might have been all of that and then some.  But as I went to bed last night, I couldn't help but to cry a bit...and not understand why.

Year 2, Day 73: 11/23/12

Back Home Again.  I made it back home form my short Thanksgiving trip and though I have a lot to be thankful for, I also had a few things that I could have done without.  Here they are, in no particular order:

• I forgot to take out the trash before I left for my parents on Tuesday.  The apartment does not smell very good right now!
• My uncle is a childish jerk (I say this with love).  My dad asks him not to smoke in the house when I'm visiting (cigarette smoke bothers me a lot), he ignored my dad, chain smoked the first night so that I woke up six times that night and wound up just getting out of bed early and going for a run.  He went almost all day Thursday without doing anything and again smoked during the night when I was trying to sleep.  And then today (Friday), he didn't even try to pretend that he wasn't smoking in the house.  Like I said, a childish jerk...but he's family, so what can you do?