It's My Life of Mediocrity- Its now or never. I mean it's probably never.

I'm in over my head. It's my life. It's too deep for me. And the really sucky part? There's no shallow end. And the even suckier part? I can't swim.  Another tricky day for me.

I'm thrashing around looking for a floating piece of rubbish to hold on to. If I could just sit up above the whirlpool and look around I might could see some higher ground to shoot for.

Nevertheless, I'm treading the storm. What else is there? The sun will come out tomorrow, won't it? I'll wait for the sun. The light in here is awful right now but I'm sure when the rays of sunshine hit me, I'll bask in the warm glow of hope.

How I got here is just the normal progression that started way back when. WAAAAAAAY back when. I was able to float around then. Put my feet on the bottom a time or two. Decide which way to go, which way not to go. Apparently, my sense of direction was just as crappy then as it is now. But at least I got to chose. Right now, I see no choices. Just what is.

Ok, I'll go with what is and hope what ain't comes around soon. Because I will hop right on the good ship "What Ain't" so fast my head will be spinning...and spinning...and...

Srsly? When I have a bad day I REALLY dramatize.

A Mind Is A Terrible Thing...

Don't mind me-I'm just thinking out loud.
Well, ok, not actually OUT LOUD because then I would be just like the crazy folks around me. Although, sometimes, it seems that crazy is the new happy.

I don't know if people are really happy these days-they just have a form of mental illness that allows a prolonged manic phase. I've been trying to contract this condition almost as long as I've been trying to catch anorexia. Oh, sure, you can gasp in disgust but you probably don't have a full spectrum of sizes hanging in your closet.
But...here's the thing with people: some of us have certified, diagnosed conditions for which we are receiving treatment and medications; some of us have the same conditions, undiagnosed but self medicated. Self medication can be a lot of fun- like the time I took my husband's cymbalta. It wasn't doing him a whole lot of good so I didn't think it would have too much effect on me, either. The paperwork his doc gave him said the meds could take one to four weeks for results to become noticeable. I cant' say why I bothered to take one 60 mg pill, except that I get a little envious of people who are allowed to have mood altering drugs. So, I shook one out of the bottle and swallowed it. Later that day, I dissolved into a fit of the giggles for no reason I can pinpoint. It was a little difficult to control my mirth but I managed to get it handled. After I stopped giggling, I had a really nice day. My face probably looked like that yellow smiley button we all know and love. Except without the yellow.



So I decided to repeat the whole sequence again the next day. Nothing. Conclusion: Cymbalta is only good once (like some men i've known in my life). Unlike Grey Goose which is good every time. I don't see why people spend so much money on mood altering drugs when vodka can do the same thing for less. And with vodka, no psychiatric evaluation is needed for a prescription.
That wasn't the point I was trying to make to myself here. My concern is that there are people right here at my job, many of whom I have to deal with directly, who have undiagnosed, untreated mental illnesses. I'm not dismissing myself but I've been aware of my conditions for some time now and although they may not be professionally diagnosed I've got the treatment part down to a science. I am talking about people who get paid to apply their insanity on the job.

Unfortunately, or fortunately, whichever is appropriate, these people do not know that their "condition" is obvious to the outside observer. For instance, Lester (not his real name) must think he looks completely normal when he says that the government wants to pay him to write a book about all of his covert experience with explosives. Yes! Let's put this guy in a vehicle with special needs passengers. In a VEHICLE, people! I wouldn't let this guy drive me to the portapotty at the corner, let alone put him in charge of transporting people who don't have the ability to run when they hear that their driver is either delusional or some sort of government paid assassin. I don't which would be scarier.
The bane of my existence is a woman who is so dysfunctional she actually has one of those little black clouds over her head following her everywhere she goes. Nothing ever turns out right for Lee Ann (not her real name), even though she does all the right things. There's always an insurmountable problem looming over her day which she is going to try to drop in my lap, every day, without fail, unless i can duck her before she sees me. Her insurance information isn't right. Her paycheck is short. Her uniform doesn't fit. The battery is falling out of her bus. She is in trouble with the IRS because the unemployment people didn't take enough tax out of her check. Her car has been in the shop for six months and she can't afford to get it out. And if I wanted to know any other little details of her miserable life, she's available to share. If anyone would benefit from the cessation of existence, it's this ditz.


How many people do you know who have actually gotten into an elevator that fell three floors to the bottom?
Me?
One.
How many people do you know who have run over their own foot with their car?
Me?
One.

How many people do you know who's boss tells them to please quit their job on a daily basis?
Me?
UNO!

And it's all the same afore mentioned Lee Ann (not her real name).

From the first person I see at my job every morning to the last person I have to lock out of my office in the afternoon, there is a diagnosis waiting to happen.

Or maybe its just me. Maybe I'm the diagnosis and everyone else is normal.Maybe its normal for a grown man to leave work crying from a "tummy" ache. (Do men actually say TUMMY in public?) Maybe its normal for a boss to rant and rave  for four years about that ONE TIME on his first day at the job when I asked him to unclog the toilet. Who knew he had a Cinderella complex?



I think I'll do that stuff my feelings with food thing. It's almost as much fun as vodka but with uncontrolled weight gain thrown in for a nice bonus condition!

Romeo Doesn't Live Here Anymore

Love. In all shapes and sizes, colors and hues, romantic or platonic, love is a pain in the ass of enormous proportions. The bigger your ability to love, the more of yourself you give away. Love is never patient, usually not kind, but the biggest lie of all is that love will conquer all. Not so. Love conquers nothing. Love is the enemy. The battle lines are always drawn when love comes into the picture. Love is to be conquered. To be sublimated. To be caged and put in a zoo and never fed by the public at large. Love will bite the hand that feeds it and feed on the hand that reaches out to it.

Keep your hands out of love's cage. It is not to be trusted. It looks so idyllic when you first set your eyes upon it. It curls up around your ankles and purrs. It sits on your lap and swishes its tail as your stroke its silky coat. You feel so warm and fuzzy. Then one day, you turn your back for a minute and love sinks its sharp little teeth into your butt!

That's love.

Still, you feel that maybe it was your fault that this love was so panicky it had to grab onto you. Perhaps you made it feel threatened. You think maybe you could have been a bit kinder and gentler. So you aim to keep love happy and secure. And so love behaves, purrs, wags it's tail and uses the litter box at the appropriate times. You are so happy. You have love. Love has love. It's a win-win situation.

Until the day you feel those razor sharp love bites on your ass again. You turn around and look at your beloved love with the pain of betrayal in your eyes. Love can't stand to see you looking at it through the eyes of truth. So what does love do? It sweet talks you into believing it wasn't the one who bit you. YOU are the one who bit you.

"How can that be?" you say to love.

"I dunno. You're the one who did it", love says with a baffled shrug.

So you sit and puzzle over how you did such a terrible thing to yourself.

And you apologize to your love for thinking this erroneous thought about it.

Love forgives you. Because love never holds a grudge.

You fall into that false sense of security. You know in the deepest part of your brain cells that it is false. In the place where you are really you, the place you dare not go, you know that there is no security when you let love lead your life for you. Still, you sit back, love on your lap, swishing and purring; only leaving your presence for short trips to the poop box and all is well because love always trusts.

But one day, love stands up on your thigh. Out come the claws and it kneads your flesh. You ask love "what are you doing? Look, I'm bleeding!"

"I didn't do that", love says. "You're the one whose bleeding. Why look at me?"

And love jumps down from your bleeding thighs an sashays right on past the litter box and out the door - where there is another warm and inviting lap waiting, minus the disgusting blood.

You are left alone, bleeding and in pain. You cry. Infection sets in. It stinks up the joint. You sit in shocked stillness until someone comes along and gives you a shot of antoboitics.

It takes some time but you heal. You forget the pain. And you stop looking for love in all the wrong places.

Then one day you feel something warm and furry around your ankles. So begins another terrifying bout of love...