Chasing Rabbits (and Big Dreams)
I read an article the other day in which a woman said, “A person who chases two rabbits at the same time catches neither in the end.” Thanks Taylor Swift.
It’s 4:10 a.m. and I’m just getting out of the shower. My head is throbbing again; I’m trying to stave off another migraine. I haven’t had a head-smasher in about 6 weeks- that’s a record for me! I ate en entire bag of Swedish Fish though and it’s trying to bite me in the ass: sugar is the enemy! (And I’m slightly addicted to Swedish Fish.)
I’m fresh out of Ambien; hence my insomnia. I was too lazy to go to the doctor, so…here I sit, editing pics and contemplating my future in the early wee morning hours! And on that note, I’m pretty sure I’m only 15 credit hours away from receiving my Bachelor’s in psychology. I have almost 100 credit hours so far; I’m pretty stoked about that. 🙂
I’ve decided that I’m going to try and get into Indiana University Southeast’s Master’s-to-PhD Clinical Psychology program in another year or so. Once I get my foot in the door- it’s a given- I’ll be in. So, it’s crucial that I keep my grades up because the competition in grad. schools is fierce! I’m going to have to really up my game when that time comes. Staying on the Dean’s List is very important. I raise the bar super high for myself so that if I don’t meet my standards and end up falling short, I’ll still succeed. And, I’m thinking about getting a dual Master’s degree- one in Clinical psychology and one in Social Work (M.S.W.); I’m going to need all of the extra tools in my bag that I can get. I’m betting that if I get a master’s degree in social work and a master’s in clinical psychology (minoring in forensic psych.) as well as my PhD in Clinical- I’ll be set. So, that’s what I’m aiming for. It’s ambitious as hell, but I’m an ambitious kinda gal.
In other news, I’m shocked (but not really) that Doggy Daddy hasn’t even requested to see his dog (or spend time with him) – not even once. 😦 It’s heart breaking. Who could walk away from a baby this cute?!
I really shouldn’t be surprised. Same thing, different year. On the other side of the coin though, it’s given Chance and I time to bond even more. I’ve had to fill in the gap and really make sure that he (my dog) isn’t suffering in Doggy Daddy’s absence. And, he’s not. But don’t let me get started on THAT.
Life has been super quiet lately. I can’t say I haven’t enjoyed the peace and quiet and the restoration of sanity in general. It hasn’t been easy! My heart is still raw and I’m still confused and bewildered that Josh and I aren’t even friends any more- we don’t speak. At all. It’s…very weird. But I suppose that’s how it has to be. I’m alright with it. As much as I want to divulge all sorts of juicy tidbits here, I’ll refrain. I don’t owe that man one more thing, but I do owe him the decency of not railing on him if he’s not here to defend himself. I’ll give him that.
Sometimes, it’s a struggle to find my peace and smile throughout the day. I wrestle to do that in the wake of such a hideous breakup. (Then again, it’s only been a little over a month since parting ways.) But I know that I’m capable of great love and great compassion. If I were to lose those two components within me, I’d be nothing. So those are the things that I strive to hold onto more than anything: my love and compassion for my fellow human being. Generally, that’s not hard for me to do, love. But breaking up with the love of your life has a way of destroying innocent things and feelings; it pollutes beauty, and in the end, can leave a thick, evil feeling in your heart. It can be a real battle just to breathe sweet air again- but thank God those feelings don’t last. For some people, they actually become those feelings, until they’re hateful rotten shells of their former selves.
But I know me, and I know my heart. I’ll come out of this a winner. Stronger in love for it. 🙂
I’m not quite there yet! But I will be. And I can still smile and feel like a child inside. That’s a precious thing to me. Life is still sweet. ♥
Spring break is officially over and I have to get started soon on my 7 page term paper/literature review on OCD.
Short term goal: finishing my term paper
Long term goal: becoming a doctor/psychologist
One day at a time.
Mojo
I’ve discovered that it takes me approximately 4 days to get over a man.
Enter Exhibit A
Taken today with my new Carl Zeiss Jena Flektogon 35/2.4 film lens/Canon Rebel XSI
Somebody got her groove back!
Just wanted to take a minute to say thanks for all of the emails, PM’s, and feedback supporting me through this really difficult time in my life! Your love and support have pulled me through some rough waters, and miraculously, I feel 100% back to my old self and very happy. I was all set to follow through with the doom and gloom but the clouds have rolled over me and the storm was gone before it even got started. I love you guys! Thanks again. XO
My Old Friend, PAIN
Despite my courageous front, there’s no getting around the gut-wrenching pain that goes with a break-up. My heart feels like it’s being eaten out by wild rabbits. Raw raw pain.
When Josh and I split up a year ago, it was fairly easy. I just froze everything. I put myself into an emotional cryogenic chamber to protect myself. It worked. I cried only once through the entire winter and shoved him clean out of my mind (and heart) when a memory tried to come creeping in. But not this time. This time I’m in the fire. And, as I foolishly told him in an email, my heart is burning with a million degrees of love for him. This SUCKS.
I thought Joan Crawford would do the trick- Mildred Pierce is like- the best thing ever when you’re breaking up. And when that didn’t work, I jacked it up a notch. Fatal Attraction didn’t help much either! Haha…
I’m scared to think of what I might try next for comfort. Nothing’s “working”, and I know- of all people- that I have to walk through the pain. Feel the damage. Bleed with it.
It’s just too recent still. Not enough time has passed to stitch up the wounds. We mourn people when they die; why is a breakup any different? I’m mourning the death of what we once had. 😦
No, only time can ease this pain. We always knew that someday, we’d have to let each other go. He’s 27, and his biological clock is ticking. He wants to start a family and do all of that good stuff- and by all means- he should. And he has every right to do that and be happy in doing so. It just sucks to “not be needed” suddenly. He’s been “my guy” for 8 years now. It confuses my brain to think “He’s off to find Ms. Right. I wish him well!”
This is hard. Any ole way you slice it. But all breakups are. This time I don’t have my anger to protect me. I’m just all mushy and made of oatmeal and crying 10 times per day. There’s no other place to go than through the fire.
I guess it’s just my turn.
The Crazy Train has Left Town
For the first time in many weeks, it’s quiet here. It’s 3:14 a.m. and I really have no business being up at this time of night; tomorrow’s a school day- in more ways than one. I’m home-schooling my nephew, Johnboy, now. He comes over 3 times per week and we put in about 30 hours weekly. I won’t say where he was academically before I took over, but he’s making great progress and he’s got the grades to prove it. 🙂 Before we began, I made him an irresistible proposition: I offered to buy him a cell phone if he wrote me a report on any book from the library that was 300 pages or more. Over the next few weeks, he cultivated a careful 3 page report on Malcom X and I made good on my promise.
There are other incentives! Such as this:
I made him his favourite pie (cherry) the other day. It looks a little beat up, but it did the trick. 😉 (I also made 2 salted caramel chocolate pumpkin cheesecakes and homemade red pepper and roasted garlic chickpea hummus. It was to die for!)
Earlier this evening, things got a little out of hand, as they usually do, and Josh and I parted ways. I really hope it’s for good this time. I’m exhausted from the emotional chaos and I deal with conflict in a calm, peaceful way the majority of the time. I usually just “go away”. I like my quiet time where I can reflect and collect myself (and talk to with God). But these past few days, I’ve felt this raging sea boiling up in me, because that’s what’s been unleashed on me for weeks now. I just reached my breaking point- I really did. Thankfully, Josh left, taking his things with him.
It’s been hard lately, but I’m eager to explore this new chapter in my life! Even a year ago, the thought of living my life as a single woman was daunting, but I lived the whole winter “manless” and got by just fine. Sure, it was pretty rough sailing for a while! And I was heartbroken. But what I feel now is actually relief. I’ve waited a really long time to be able to focus on me and actually begin a career. (Or, begin to begin a career.)
And now I’m there. I don’t need anyone screwing that up for me! I want to be alone for a good long while. I don’t feel sad at all, but I’m sure those days are coming. Pain is inevitable. I’m just at the very beginning of it all when denial is still at its peak and everything is “just spiffy”. But the gray days are coming.
I’m going to be alright though. I’ve come to a new place where I enjoy solitude- not only enjoy it, but crave it.
I think I’m actually growing up.
The Looking Glass
It’s 2:50 a.m.
Chance is going nuts, ripping and running around the living room. I just gave him a bath. Brian Bob is chilling in his room- Brianna- the same. I should be sleeping, or doing homework, but I’ve just downloaded Tex Murphey: Overseer. Gaming is one of my coping mechanisms, much like millions of other people. Until my heart heals, I’ll trudge along the motions of my life- school, cleaning, cooking, sleeping, etc. and slip away into my game as often as possible. I just can’t process any more raw emotion at this time. Tex Murphy is a welcome escape.
I’m torn between another pistachio and almond ice cream cone and Guinness Extra Stout. I have a 6 pack in the fridge and it whispers to me. I keep forgetting to drink one. I decide on lemon and ginger tea with honey instead. I’ve had a migraine for two days now. (Imagine that.) I can’t do this again tomorrow. After two days, my mind starts fracturing into tiny bits of livewire pain- sizzling every nerve until it’s raw and jittery. It does little good to complain other than to serve as a reminder that I’m still suffering. It too is a welcome escape from the pain in my heart.
There’s nothing one can do but ride the wave of heartache after a breakup. One of my x’s is all over me like white on rice- I’m disgusted. He thinks it might be a good time to squeeze back in. I think it’s highly disrespectful and pretty insulting to me. I know people do that- the rebound thing- but if you’re crawling away from the battlefield of one relationship, why would you hop into the trenches of another? That doesn’t make any sense to me, and it’s the furthest thing from my mind. (And heart.) I think I’ll be alone for a very long time. I’m a one man woman, and I think it’s necessary to experience the pain after a breakup. It tells me that the love I knew was real and that’s why it hurts so much. My friends don’t know what to say to comfort me, and that’s ok. There’s only so much another human being can offer in the way of companionship and support. If it weren’t for my love, relationship, and friendship with Jesus- I would absolutely crumble and die. I have no doubt. I’m not enough to keep myself going- I think of Sylvia Plath- and can understand how a broken heart could make her stick her head in an oven and forget to live. She couldn’t bear to lose her man to another woman. But Sylvia Plath said when she was just a child, “I’ll never talk to God again.” And I suppose she didn’t. So, she killed herself. I think she should have talked to God.
That’s where she and I differ. I love life, and as painful as it is to feel your heart being ripped from your chest, I do have a very close relationship with Jesus. We talk, commune, and just have a good time together. When I think about His love, and how He’s able to reach into every tiny place in my heart- I can’t be angry or sad for long. I smile, and know I’m loved. He washes away every awful feeling, and the bitter tears become bittersweet. They eventually become joyful, and I become like a child again, marveling at the beauty of God’s creation: I rise above the pain.
I’ve gone and talked myself right out of my misery again, and feel a half-smile creeping across my face.
Oh heart, you’re going to make it…
50 MM/manual/ISO 3200/natural lighting/Squire Boone Caverns/3.28.13
10,000 Hours
Chance sits by the window every day, waiting and watching. He doesn’t know that Daddy isn’t coming back. It’s heartbreaking to see. I have to push myself to be bouncy and happy around him because animals are even more sensitive than people sometimes. I feel like an elephant is sitting on my chest, and I also remind myself to be aware of diaphragmatic breathing so my heart doesn’t collapse. But isn’t this how breakups go?
I would have given “Doggy Daddy” total visitation rights! Even overnight. But Doggy Daddy hasn’t asked about his baby.
Apart from the $2,500 that Doggy Daddy owes me, I suppose the thing that pisses me off the most is the damage that man has done to my skin. There’s nothing worse for the complexion than a bad man.
SP/manual/50 MM/natural lighting/taken today
I study my face: I see the wound in my eyes. It won’t last forever.
On the brighter side of things, I’ve been contacted by a reporter (editor) of the newspaper (yes, actual paper paper- those things are still around!) to be interviewed next week. He wants to set me up with one of his reporters to run a featured story on me. I took two days to think it over, and then agreed. Really, what makes me the happiest is knowing that I’m to be featured not because I’m an “artist” or “photographer”- but because they find it interesting that I have been homeless so many times and yet I devote my life and time to others, especially in the area of charity. And I don’t mean “writing a check, dahhhling”. I mean going out and finding homeless people, buying them groceries, and giving what little money I have away. I wish I could do more, but my monetary resources are shy. That doesn’t limit me in the slightest though. Just sets me back.
School is absolutely draining me, and I keep telling myself to just make it through this semester (in-between tragedies) and I’ll be able to take the summer off. Push push push! I can hardly believe I got a perfect score on my Health Psychology assignment several days ago: 50 out of possible 50 points. And that particular professor is not easy to please! She is a no-nonsense, matter-of-fact instructor, but honestly, that’s my favourite kind. I learn from them the most. Regardless, the assignment took days to finish (many hours) and was 12 pages long, perhaps? That was after filling out a 45-50 page questionnaire and summarizing the results.
Fun stuff!
I’m off to drag myself to the couch. All I want in this world right now is cheesecake, an episode of the Golden Girls (go Dorothy!) , and my dog.
xo
Damage
self port. Winter of ’09
Barefooted/evening gown/Gestapo jacket
Abandoned industrial park
(After a bitter breakup)
“Don’t ever be afraid to look inside of yourself and see who you are.”
-my Dad
“You have to walk through your past; through the wreckage, and survey the damage.”
-Candy Finnigan, Interventionist (quoted from the tv show: “Intervention”)
“Don’t ever be too proud to cry and say you’re sorry.”
-Mormon preacher who married me years ago.
(God forbid I should marry a Mormon and share myself with 10 other women, um…NO. I mean, the Mormon preacher who married myself and my x husband. I’m no Mormon, but I’m not prejudiced either. I was down with it.)
“You have to hug the monster. Embrace the pain that rips you up. Hug it. Befriend it. Thank it. It’s only a “bad situation” if you believe it is. Turn it around.”
-me
“You have to take the bad and make it good. Shape it, remold it, take the old and make it new.”
-my Pastor (and dear friend, told to me once in a dream)
“Tears keep the heart soft.”
-me
