Feburary 3, 2009

So the bartending job is gone.  I waffled back and forth on whether or not to stay.  Didn’t want to, but some pay is better than none, right?  Then last Tuesday night around 9pm the worthless manager called me and told me not to come in; he was training someone else for day shift.  He said he’d call me Wednesday night about working on Thursday.  That pretty much clinched it for me.  Done with that place.  Wednesday I got up and my cell phone was turned off, which was the only number I had given him to contact me with so that really made it done.  Fortunately, that same day there was an ad in the paper from the dinnerhouse; they were looking for waitressess.  I got in touch with the manager and he agreed to let me back on the schedule.  In a round-a-bout way I’m right back where I started about three weeks ago.  Making the right choice this time.

I’m finally ready to let Jim’s truck go.  I’ve held on to it all this time because I couldn’t stand the thought of someone else owning it and driving it.  But I can finally let it go.  I imagine it’ll sell pretty quick; it’s a damn good truck.  That will also give me some much needed cash to get back on top of the bills again.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Haven’t updated in awhile.  Don’t really know what to say; my life is pretty boring.  The cleaning business isn’t taking off like I had hoped.  I think people are more concerned about heating their houses this winter rather than cleaning their houses.  Fuel prices have dropped dramatically all over the country; except for here.  Even though we have a refinery in our back yard, we are still over a dollar more a gallon than the Lower 48.

I’ve been pretty down lately.  Seems like no matter what I try to do, it just ain’t good enough.  Then there’s the feeling of ‘why bother?’ that penetrates most aspects of my life.  I can’t seem to find motivation to do much of anything, and that does bother me.  I have nothing to work towards, no retirement with the one I love, or anything like that.  I just go through the motions, day after day.  No joy, very little happiness.

I think that if I could, I would simply pack up and move.  Alaska has been the best experience of my life, but anymore I am feeling so isolated.  My kids and grandkids are so far away; immediate family consists of a dog and two cats.  My phone never rings anymore.  The supposed ‘friends’ that I had a year ago are long gone.  Left about the same time the money did.  Interesting, but oh so predictable I guess.

The thought of facing yet another set of holidays alone is, daunting to say the least.  I barely made it through last years’ set.  I don’t know if I can do it this year.  Or if I even want to.

December 31, 2007

This is it – the last day of an incredibly difficult year. Hard to believe that he’s been gone for nine months. Hard to believe that I could (even want) to recover and learn a ‘new normal.’ One thing is certain; I am so ready to put the year 2007 to bed tonight and move into 2008. A fresh, clean slate, just waiting to be painted on with whatever I choose to do. Pretty exciting, yet sad when I think that he will never see this year. Hell, he never really saw ’07, to be honest.

I think perhaps one of the biggest indicators that I’m moving forward was when I was offered the chance to either be mean and petty or better than that the other day. Jr. and bubblebutt didn’t give shippers the correct address on something they had ordered, so it ended up being delivered to my house. To be honest, the urge to either send it back or throw it away was very strong. Instead I decided the other day to just leave it on their porch, keeping my karma going in the right direction (I hope).

No list or resolutions that won’t be kept. My only goal for this coming year is to stay focused and continue moving forward with as few setbacks emotionally as possible. That should be enough work for one year…

Moving Forward

Nothing disgusts me more than sexual predators.

Thursdays’ training was a very stressful, awful day. My btw trainer has always had a tendency to displays of inappropriate behavior, but since he’d never done more than just make verbal comments to me in the past when I worked for the company before, I had already planned on just ignoring him and his comments so I could get the training done and move on with life. Thursday changed all of that.

I won’t go into all the details, but suffice it to say that I came away from that days’ training feeling raped and violated. In addition to the verbal comments, he managed to get physical with me while I was driving the bus. At first, when I parked the bus that afternoon, I tried to blow it off. “Only two more days with this asshole, then I’ll be done with him,” is what I kept telling myself. However, as the night went on, the more I thought about it, the more upset I became, until by midnight I was hysterical and in full-blown panic attack. Once again, thank God for friends. I called one who is also a driver and knows this guy, and he stayed on the phone with me for over two hours listening to me scream and cry, just listening. I asked him to call the branch manager for me and explain to her that I wouldn’t be able to make training that day, but I would be in to file an incident report. I had every intention of walking away from the job also. They have promised me a full investigation, and knowing the branch manager, it will happen. However, the asshole has been with the company for almost 20 years, so most likely nothing will happen. Which will leave me with a decision to make on whether or not I want to stay and work at the same location as him. Chances are not, as I know from past experience just how bad sexual predators can get, especially if they get away with it.

Meanwhile, some very good changes are happening in the mudpit I call my mind. I think I’m beginning to see the reasons why my subconscious wanted me to go back to driving. Already, I’m feeling more disciplined in my head, and starting to get the forward momentum that I had when I first got back from The Road Trip. My hope is that asshole will get fired, and I can continue to move forward. I have the chance to walk into a very sweet route, hauling special ed kids, which means that I’ll have an attendant to deal with the kids while pretty much all I gotta do is drive. The route is more hours than I wanted, almost 7 1/2, but that’s ok too. My biggest mindset that I’ll have to guard against is the mindset that a lot of busdrivers end up with – that of not doing anything more than the busdriving. They get up, haul kids all day, and because of the mental exhaustion associated with the job, never seek to expand anything more than their butts. It’s easy to become mentally stagnant because as a driver hauling kids, you have so many mentally stressful aspects of the job, so your mind just goes stagnant and you quit learning. It happened the last time I worked there, but I don’t want it to happen again.

Driver Training – Day 2

Ugh. 5am. What an awful time of day…

I suppose I’ll get used to the early mornings, much like I did last time. I will not, however, ever learn to enjoy them. The driving is coming back quickly; all the different steps to picking up and dropping off students, doing the r.r. crossings, etc. My b.t.w. (behind the wheel) trainer is cool. Yesterday he just kinda let me get used to the new buses. When last I drove, we had the TC2000 style. Now we have conventional style buses. Big difference in turning and reference points. At least I don’t have to deal with the DMV stuff other than getting the school bus endorsement added to my license. That will be the first of two endorsements I’m getting this year.

The other will be my motorcycle endorsement. After being the owner of a motorcycle since 2004, yet only putting 300 miles on the thing, I’ve decided that it’s time to just get over the fear of the thing and start riding it. Not real sure what clicked the fear about riding it; I’ve never been afraid of learning how to drive anything. No matter; that little bitch sitting out in the garage will not defeat me. I will get on it, and ride it until the fear is gone.

Too bad it’s not summer already…

A Step Backwards

Well, I finally did it. Went down to the bus barn and got my job back as a school bus driver. Feels like I’ve come full circle from 2000; living alone and haulin’ kids. I think perhaps the worst part is that I did go to school, I did graduate, yet all I’m doing is haulin’ kids again. Yep; it’s grinding on me. At least everyone will quit bugging me about going back to work now. Maybe I’ll look up my friend C on the University website and see if he’s got any cool classes he’s teaching next semester. That might help.

I can honestly say that once I dump all this stuff I’ve got, I never, ever want to be so loaded down with material possessions again. I’ve never had a lot of stuff, and this is just overwhelming. To date, I have sold both boats and the Maverick. Got what I wanted for all of them, too. Still got folks bugging me about his guns, and a couple people that just won’t leave me alone about his truck, even though I’ve made it clear that I’m keeping it. It’s too good of a truck, and owning a truck up here is pretty much mandatory.

Called the airline and fortunately the tickets that I bought for J and I last year are still good. I’M GOING TO MEXICO!! I can’t wait to get into the warm darkness. My friend down there is already setting me up with all kinds of things to do, and I get to stay with her, so it’ll be a fairly cheap trip, but most welcome. I’m toying with the idea of taking some of J’s cremains with me to scatter on the Sea of Cortez. I did promise him that I would, so I guess I gotta do it, but that will be a hard one. Maybe I’ll do it on our anniversary. Get some closure.

Been asked out on a date. Part of me wants to go really bad, I gotta get back into life even if I have to force myself out there. Part of me just wants to come home and tell J about it and have a good laugh like we used to.

Have I ever mentioned that figuring out your ‘new normal’ after losing your spouse really, really sucks?

…yeah, it does. Big time

Dreams

I had the strangest dream last night. Dreamt that I was diagnosed with cancer and would die, except the cancer was very slow-moving and would take another 30 years to kill me. It wasn’t too hard to figure out the corollary to real life when I woke up. The entire dream, though, I had the same fear and sadness that defined my life last year while J was dying from cancer. In a constant state of fight or flight, yet not knowing who or what I was supposed to be fighting or flighting from. The feelings were so real, so vivid, that I carried them over to the day when I woke up. Total, complete anxiety attack. Yet while I was in the midst of the attack, my brain was processing the dream and figuring out what lesson my subconscious was trying to send me.

Pretty much, it was this – if I were to die today, would someone be able to step into my life and close up my final business, or have I left a mess much like J did? You would think the answer would be yes, I’ve made it easy for my Personal Rep to take care of my final business, but sadly, that’s not the case. I don’t even have a will, even though I’ve seen the mess it creates when there are no well-defined instructions for the survivors to follow. If anything, I’ve created more of a mess in this house than I have cleaned up, and I would feel sorry for the poor soul that would have to muddle through this horror flick that is my home.

I’d say it’s well past time for the clean-up crew (of 1) to show up. Don’t want anymore nightmares like last night. Starting the day off with an anxiety attack is just not the way to go…