Goodbye 2014: May you rot in hell.

This past year has been tough. The struggle seemed never ending. The bills never stopped. The guilt of the impending year anniversary of us living with my grandmother came and went. Sadness, panic and dismay was the theme of 2014. We spent over a thousand dollars this year on storing our material possessions. Just thinking about that alone makes me want to hurl.

I don't want to dwell on the most terrible of this past year though. I try not to let the gloom and doom consume me. I try not to feel like I'm waiting in line for something to happen. Earth is not a big waiting room for some mystical place after we die. I loathe that paused feeling. 2014 was more or less my screeching halt and reality check. I'm happy that it seems to have brought Hubby and I closer instead of farther apart. As a newly married couple (Fuck. We were pretty brand new in the whole relationship thing, much-less the marriage)  I feel like we came through pretty clean. There was some definite rough patches and we had our first real arguments ever but beyond that we still love each other and still want to be married... which says a lot in today's approach to marriage.

Middle Finger Thrown.

The problem with being a free thinker and someone who doesn't want to conform to the universal idea of how to get money... I find myself broke, extra picky about finding a job... and constantly turned down because of my tattoos.

Okay, so technically I haven't been turned down directly about my tattoos but I've applied to a job, got the interview and everything seems koshery-good until she brought up covering my tattoos. Okay, I get it, socially a lot of "suits" don't like their peons covered in ink. I got it but I don't understand it and I find it offensive. I, of course, didn't let the interviewee know all that. I smiled and promised to cover my tattoos as needed. None of my tattoos are out-rightly offensive (Unless you don't like Disney movies, non-expletive poetry or find flowers and stars the bane of your existence.) I also have my lip pierced but haven't had a lip ring in just because I'm lazy. I often forget I have tattoos. Not because I feel they are unnoticeable... just because I don't feel like they define me. My tattoos are equivalent to make up to me, I just can't wipe them off and they don't smear when I cry. It's like your favorite necklace you don't take off, mine is just poked deep into my skin tissue. So... how would you feel if you went for a job interview and they liked everything you  had to say and finished up with a squinted expression, "Everything seems great... except that necklace. Can you tuck it in or cover it up while you're on our time? That'd be great, thanks. We just don't want others influenced by your ideas of beauty, that's all." I feel like they're asking me to put a bag over my head.... Who says a white girl never gets judged by her skin?

I get asked, "Would you have tattoos if you had realized it would cause people to prejudge you, especially in a job setting?"
My answer: "Yes."

That's my short answer, anyway. Yes. Yes, I would cover my skin in beautiful markings. No, I don't give a fuck if that means certain jobs won't take me. I don't want them, back! Yeah, take that! Middle finger thrown. Yeeeeaaaahh, I'm mature and stuff.

Sigh. Okay, so it does bug me. I really think I didn't get the job I got an interview for because of the manager's disgust with tattoos. So now I'm trying to find non-mainstream-esk jobs. So far I'm finding non-degree counselor for disgruntled and/or mentally-disturbed kids, middle man for placing exchange students and nanny for hire. I don't really want to work in a kitchen although working in Louisiana and working my way to Sous Chef in a creole kitchen sounds like a life-goal. I am also thinking of applying to Daiquiri bars.

But anyway. I am feeling this intense need to flex my music muscle. I want to get back into a music theory class. I want to learn the scales and be able to just pick them up from nowhere. I want to do something with that knowledge somehow. It may be all the coffee talking-- but I want to get a headache over sheet music and correct the wrong scale in a piece of music. I want to be able to visualize in my head the correct flow of tunes no matter what instrument is being played. I'm getting rusty and I don't like it. I feel like a has-been of what never was.




Also, all of my "dream job" ideas tend to return with little to no money.

Figures.

I want both.

Ten days. One Zero. Ten. Ten days and I get to wake up next to him, cuddle him during a thunderstorm and nag him when I'm feeling bitchy. Sigh I cannot wait! I can tell that he's excited too, since his smiles are bigger on Skype as of late.

"You're going to miss those babies!"
I keep hearing from... well... everyone. It's true too. The twins I babysit have quickly become my entire life. My reason to get up in the morning, my smile when I feel like crying as well as my hair-pulling, snotty nosed cry babies when I'm already at my wits end. They cry when I walk out of a room, they make me feel needed.... they snuggle me close when they're feeling bad. I'm going to miss those little bobble heads like no other. It's not just the twins though, I'm going to miss their older sister, their mom, their dad, their Mama C and PawPaw. All of them. This family has been with me through the thick and thin. They have given me a place to stay when no one else wanted me. This family has given me a job when I was scraping by at a sandwich shop. This family has done absolutely everything for me, without hesitation, without asking for anything in return. Leaving them breaks my heart. I can't help but cry at the idea of leaving them at all much-less in need. The boys are still too young for daycare and too expensive to have in daycare, anyway. The boys don't like strangers but they took to me the first time I met them. Their older sister asks if I'm out of the house for longer than twenty minutes. I feel more apart of this family than I have any family, ever. Yes, even my own. They accept me for who I am and always wish me the best. They have showed me unconditional love (Not required by blood relation) and now I have my chance at also creating a family of my own. It's the dilemma of a life time. I've tried not to think about it. BFF (The twin's mom) and I don't speak about it... It's the elephant in the room that no one wants to acknowledge. I worry about them thinking I'm abandoning them. Is it too selfish to leave now? But staying hurts too. I feel like I'm happy with a thorn in my side. It's like gnawing my arm off to live another day. I want both things equally. To stay and be apart of this family and to go and start my own with someone who I've always had a very strong emotional attachment to.

I want both.

I want both.

I want both.

I've been going through the motions since I got back from my short visit to Louisiana. Sometimes I'm in the moment [with normal every day routine] and I'd think, "I've got to remember this, take a picture, cherish it... I'm about to move" and it still wouldn't feel real. As I'm nearing the single digits on my countdown, the realization has settled heavy somewhere in my pelvic region. (You know, where IBS lives.) I feel like it's a backpack when I run, a fly in my ear as I play with the boys and a heavy beating drum when I'm hanging out chatting with BFF. I don't feel doubt in wanting to live and be with Hubby, I feel guilt for being happy. Does that make sense? How can I be happy about something that will be taking me away from this new family that has stood by me for so long? Guilt because I've lost friends along the way and it doesn't bother me. Guilt because I'm so happy and quite frankly, I'm not sure I care who I lose in the process. (Well, accept the twins and their family. Everyone else can go fuck themselves for all I care.) Hubby means that much to me.... I hear that's suppose to prove you do have real love. The fact that the ones that matter supports us the most seems to be the shining factor.

This isn't a thinking decision, this is a decided matter. It's finally sunk in. It's real. This isn't a fantasy anymore. This isn't a day dream on a hot summer day in Greensboro... or a last thought before drifting off to sleep in the middle of winter....

This is real.

Holy shit, is it real.