The road less taken Wednesday, Nov 2 2011

I’m finally getting what I’ve always wanted. But it seems to be all wrong.

The exciting part: I’m finally moving out of this city!

The bad news: I’m moving to a place where I don’t know the language  and from what I can gather, my nursing career will go down the toilet.

The friendboy that didn’t pay attention from previous posts turned into boyfriend and now fiancé (he still doesn’t pay attention, though). We both graduate in December. Our wedding is at the end of the year. Then we will start our new lives in some quaint town in Europe. It’s exciting and terrifying and horribly sad all at the same time. While my classmates will be orienting at a new job, I’ll be packing my life up. When they are earning money and getting much needed experience, I’ll be learning a new language and culture. Once I finally find myself in a position to be able to work, it seems that I won’t be able to do near as much as I would have liked. The salary leaves much to be desired and the hope for advancement seems dim.

Great!

Leave a Response »

 

“Because” is not a good enough answer Friday, Oct 28 2011

I once wrote this:

“Woman, do you not know the daughter you raised? You used to be a strong person, and it rubbed off on me. I actually like myself, love myself even. And I don’t ever want to go back to a relationship that painful. Where my opinions don’t count. Where I am not a person, not an equal. Where I am merely a pretty object.”

I sit here, just wallowing. I can’t seem to be able to express myself in the simplest ways these days. I open my mouth to express my opinion and it doesn’t come out. I can’t tell if it is fear or just being tired of fighting? I don’t think it is apathy (mostly because with apathy there is rarely a feeling of pissyness included).

I think it is mostly that I know my opinion won’t be listened to. It will be heard, just as one can hear the mosquito buzzing around their head. But the words will be blocked out to the point where they have no meaning. But really, all I want is an honest answer. Why would you ask for advice when you don’t plan on following it?

Leave a Response »

 

gagghh! (Ever had a day/week/life like that?) Wednesday, Apr 6 2011

I find myself writing when I can’t find my voice. When there is so much inside of my mind but it bottles up at the back of my throat and won’t leave my mouth in an orderly fashion. When everything is so wrong, that I feel like that stupid cat picture where he’s literally hanging at the end of a rope. meow.

I am trying so hard and I feel so passionate about school, but I feel like it doesn’t matter. I will never be able to have a career that will take me to the full potential. I’m not even given that option. It’s off of the table. Hooray for a long safe life of mediocrity!

And the wedding. Oh dear lord, my wedding. I fear that already the people in my life who have a tendency to suck the fun out of things are already at work. My mother is basically trying to make up for the wedding she never had. Well, fortunately for me, my father is paying for everything but the flowers/decorations (that’s mom’s part since she is a florist after all). But it’s not me, it’s all so wrong. It’s almost like she doesn’t really know who I am. I mean, I am reserved, I keep a lot of myself locked away. But, damn. Crystals? Really? And I swear to God, if her retarded-ass boss doesn’t figure out how to listen, I will shove his cell phone so far up his ass he will hear me from inside of his head.

Leave a Response »

 

How did I end up with this stick up my butt? Wednesday, Mar 2 2011

RedStick Ragazza has gone back to school! Unfortunately, it seems lately that the people who have the most power to make my life miserable, also seem to be wanting me to fail.

Ok, so let me step back from being so dramatic and re-phrase that. It seems these days that my pathway to reaching my goals is inconvenient for others. Therefore, they just don’t do anything to aid me along the way. Even the dog seems to be laughing at me as she pisses on my sheets. Maybe if they don’t make it easy I’ll give up and go back to what I was doing before? Umm… No, boo-boo. If anything, it will just make me try that much harder. I’m pretty damn stubborn that way.

I mean, I get it- you have a business to run, you need to have long-drawn out conversations with me about nothing, you want me to stay home with you all day long, etc. I’m clearly abandoning you to do something that is only for my own self-serving purposes. I mean, I could talk all day about how I feel that I’ve been called by God to do this until I’m as blue as my uniform, but it doesn’t matter. All you will hear is blah-blah-I find it so rewarding, It-makes-me-so-blahblah-happy.

I’m hoping that this perceived disdain for my return to school is only in my head.

Leave a Response »

 

Twice in one lifetime?? Tuesday, Feb 9 2010

Now, I’ve had the good, the bad and the ugly, when it has come to roommates. There was the perky and fun, pre-meetings and 12-step plans alcoholic Junior year of college. There was the overly stressed engineering major who would slam her physics book against the wall shared between our bedrooms at least once a week. And then there was the crazy one, the one that lied about having a miscarriage. Wait, which one? Yup, that’s right. I have now had not one, but TWO blessed crazy souls who have shared their tragic made-up miscarriages with me.

What are the odds of that happening?

Leave a Response »

 

One of many reasons… Sunday, Jan 3 2010

I have just discovered that skype keeps your old conversations. I think I also discovered one of the reasons why I am not married. This was one of the first conversations between me and the Italian:

A: If I were a magician I think I were there

Me: I think I would have to clean my apartment before you came

What the fudge? Cleaning your apartment is not the appropriate response when a guy you actually would want over says he wishes he were with you. Unfortunately for me, this sounds about typical for a conversation involving me.

Leave a Response »

 

Merry Christmas! (I know, I’m a day late and a dollar short) Saturday, Dec 26 2009

Christmas is really one of my favorite times of the year. I love hanging out with my family- when they are behaving. This year, everyone was on their best behavior. My mom and aunt even teased each other jokingly in the kitchen. I thought at first maybe I was still at home asleep in my bed. Only in a dream could they pretend to be so cordial. But no, they carried on the rest of the day. We played the White Elephant game like every year and everyone laughed and teased each other like we were a normal happy family. I was seriously beginning to wonder what alternate universe I had been sucked into on my way to Gonzales. These were not the bitter angry people I had braced myself for. But I was so grateful. I don’t think they have truly buried the 100′s of hatchets they need to take care of, but they put on a good show. Maybe it was because it was Christmas. Maybe it was because it’s the first Christmas without my grandfather and they just wanted to keep the peace for my grandmother. Maybe they really are just trying to get along. I’m not sure. I almost felt a little better when late in the afternoon, my aunt pulled out a bottle of champagne and got toasted because my other aunt was blocking her car in and wouldn’t let her leave. That seemed a little more like what I was expecting…

Leave a Response »

 

The power of song Monday, Dec 21 2009

I drove around this afternoon. After sitting in my house all day like a recluse, I had decided that I needed to at least be away from it for a few minutes. I had been indoors, battling the internal conflict that has been raging inside of me all weekend.  So I left, hoping to get a little air. But the more I drove, the more lost I became within my own thoughts. I’ve lived here and driven these streets for so long that I was barely paying attention except to notice when the car in front of me slowed or put on his brake lights. I was stopped at a red light, internally berating myself for pretty much every wrong I’ve committed in my life, when an old favorite song came on the radio. The first lines of the song broke through the fog surrounding my head. Instinctively, my hand reached out and turned up the dial. The melodies of Rascall Flatts flooded through the car. I turned the music up until it drowned out the negative voice in my head. The intersection was deserted, so I sat there through another light cycle just to listen to the words. Each time the chorus played, I felt a little bit more determined. They were right, my life has been a series of struggles, and this one was no more likely to kill me than the last. I’m pretty sure the guy in F-150 stopped next to me at the light on the third cycle thought I was nuts as I crooned along at the top of my lungs, but I didn’t let it get to me. I have more important things to concern myself with.

Leave a Response »

 

Five Years Ago Tuesday, Dec 15 2009

Today’s Holidailies prompt is “Five Years Ago”

Five years ago… hmmm… let’s see….

It would be the year that I lived in my own apartment. I use the term “lived” rather loosely, as I spent 65% of my free time over at my boyfriend’s apartment which was literally just across the street. He was an engineering major and mommy and daddy paid most of his bills, so he had cable and a washer and dryer at his apartment. I washed his clothes in exchange for letting me use his washer.

I spent Christmas Morning and New Year’s Eve alone that year. Daddy still lived in Shreveport and the ExEngineer was in Vegas with his own father. I was a bit of a wreck emotionally anyway, so it was just as well.

It would also be the year that I cut down my very own Christmas tree. I was broke, so ExEngineer took me to a Christmas tree farm near his parents house. His Stepdad knew the owner, so I was able to get a pretty nice one for free. ExEngineer kept offering to help me, but as usual, I insisted on cutting it down myself. It probably took me longer than anyone in the history of Christmas trees. Most people will saw a few times and then let the guys that work there finish the job with a chainsaw. But not me. I sawed my heart out.

I loved that tree. My mom loaned me some red glass ornaments and wide gold ribbon from her shop. The boyfriend even bought me lights. It was the most beautiful thing sitting there in my usually abysmal living room. Christmas passed, but I couldn’t bring myself to take it down. My friend teased me in January when she stopped by the apartment and saw it in the corner. It was wilting, but I was still watering it. Sometime around Spring Break, ExEngineer offered to haul it out to the dumpster. I feebly admitted defeat, taking my time to pull off the ornaments and wrap them up, one by one. I went upstairs to my room as he took it outside. I couldn’t bear to see him casually toss it in the garbage with the rest of the trash.

Leave a Response »

 

Some days I’m just so darn nice Saturday, Dec 12 2009

I like to think that I am enlightened and tolerant. But every now and then, I think things that would probably appall most people.

Today, for instance, I was entering the restroom in a local restaurant. There was a sign on the door that read, “Please do not throw paper towels into the toilet.” At first, I thought, What a stupid sign. Then I remembered that I saw that same sign in several public restrooms recently (what can I say? I hydrate often). This lead me to ask, “Who are these people that throw paper towels in the toilet???”

Seriously, no one throws paper towels away in their toilet at home. If they do, they learn a rather expensive lesson when the plumber comes. So why would they do this in a restaurant? It makes no sense to me. I tried to think of how this would happen.

1. Wash your hands

2. Dry your hands with paper towel

3. Instead of dropping the paper towel in the wastebasket by the door, walk all the way back over to the toilet….

See, non-sensicle. Maybe there’s another reason people try to flush paper towels down the toilet?

Scenario two:

1. Relieve yourself on the toilet

2. Leave the toilet to get a paper towel?? What? Why would anyone want to do that? Might as well use sandpaper…

Nothing could make this seem right in my head, which led me to the conclusion that these perpetrators are clearly stupid. They are so stupid, someone should gather them and send them on a space shuttle to be the first inhabitants of Mars. Let them go fuck up another planet.

Leave a Response »