AUTUMN

It doesn't matter if I love the cool breezes and the colored leaves.  I get depressed in the Fall.  More depressed I should say.  It shows up everywhere.  My house is a mess.  If I get a row of counters washed, I have to pat myself on the back because, the job itself is not hard--is pleasant--provides instant gratification, but I have to "work" up to it.  To get myself to do it. 

I am sick of this book promo thing and have two more to publish and I think one is not actually "done".  I was having trouble remembering the main character's name the other day.  I am just tired of it.  I know the whole thing was because I was on that crappy Welbutrin, and the stuff I am on now is almost as bad as Paxil, that you totally do not give a shit about anything.   So, maybe I was manic, and after I came back down, I realized I was writing stuff that was practically porn, and I went in and got all fucking sensible and took so much crap out, and now I realize, it doesn't matter.  I opened a book in WalMart the other day cuz this one message board talks about Lora Leigh and I always envied that she did this whole book series about the Navy Seal, and I have trouble maintaining a character like that for more than a few lines in a couple of chapters, and I probably have way more experience with them than she ever will, but that is another story that I probably will never write cuz it is pathetically, fucking sad.  But I opened the book, and the cover doesn't even say Explicit Content and the page I open it to is this guy telling this girl to blow him in a kind of authoritarian cruel, definitely not loving kind of way, and she is so all excited to chow down on this guy and it was just so blah, and what the heck ever happened to the blue oxford cloth shirt as a sex symbol? And she has a whole web site devoted to how badly edited her books are, and how many mistakes she makes, and she probably is rolling in money, her sales are astronomical, and the reason they are not edited very well is that the editors have just read about one blow job too many at this point, and I suddenly realize I should have spent my life writing dissertations on the parallels between the color spectrum and the depression spectrum, or maybe continue, much as they have done  with the very successful Nancy Drew series,  writing the Mary Poppins series and sort of segued her into the Space Age and through the Cold War and into the computer age.  Mary Poppins and the Magic of HTML.

I get terrible attacks of give up-itis very frequently and have throughout my life, and I think it is because just getting through the day is such a huge enterprise for me that I should just not even bother with having something that is mine "to do" as my doctor puts it because it is minuscule and a total fucking waste of time.  I need to spend more time figuring out how to feed my granddaughter the bottle with out falling asleep and having the bottle fall on the floor and the baby roll under the coffee table.  No.  You don't have to report me.  That didn't happen.  But the falling asleep and dropping the bottle part did.

I spend too much time questioning the worth of my existence and not enough time washing  the dishes. And no, there are no dishes that need to be washed either, at the moment, which is why I am sitting here putting meaningless symbols on a plastic screen again.  I was being figurative.  My whole fucking life is figurative and when I understand what it is supposed to represent, it is all over.  

I

Here Comes My Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown

I got the courage to call and make a dr. appt. today.  When I was through my hands were shaking.  I had the same problem calling the dentist last week.  It is totally the phone.  I am not at all nervous when I go to the dr. or dentist.  Anyway, I guess I have to tell her the .25 Xanax isn't cutting it anymore.  I am sure I could go back to "handling" things drug-free if ithe shit wasn't piling up so fast.

I received notice Monday that my driver's license that I just renewed in April is being revoked so I won't be able to drive my wonderful Rendezvous that I love beyond reason, that we put $450 in last month and another $500 the other day so I could pass emission control so I could renew my plates for $112, and today we noticed the water on the rug in the car wasn't because I left the sunroof open, but, in fact, is pouring in from God knows where everytime we start the engine.  My driver's license is being revoked because I sold a car to my daughter's "boyfriend" and didn't take the plates off and he ran up dozens of tickets before I retrieved the plates.  Allstate called and said he was also in an accident, but Allstate took my word about the sale when I sent them a copy of the sales contract.  City of Chicago has received that from me at least four times, but they say I am still on the hook since Jody never retitled the car.  Can this be true?  It seems it is.  Chicago petitioned Illinois to revoke.  And they are.  So I am SOL.

Louie goes in next week for a myelogram (sp?) to determine the exact nature of his spinal damage to prep for surgery and, damn it, they better do a good job of fixing it cuz I have a  bathroom that needs to be  tiled.  We are waiting final word on the mortgage work out and trying to figure out why our electric bill is $350 a MONTH.  Dannie has to move back in,  If my dad tells the story about the lady at the DMV that demanded his DD214 for ID once more, I WILL jump off the porch, which I know will only maim me.  And my dog just pooped under the dining room table without so much as a 'by-your-leave'.

WTF

Pointless Blog Surfing

I surf blogs. It makes me feel very good when I see a family where the mom and dad look like they are both good looking enough to deserve each other. And it's a bonus if they have cute kids. But that's because I am incredibly shallow. But you already know that. And if it is a person who is documenting their fight with cancer or the story of how their baby had to have heart surgery, I often go in and say "God Bless You." Or "I hope you are better." Yeah, I need to get a life, but television is like razors in my eyeballs after about fifteen minutes and I am having such a bad agoraphobia attack and so little will power to shrug it off lately, that I cannot get myself to the library. I knew it was getting bad when three different book clubs started sending me boxes of books.

But if the blog is about the person's relationship with Jesus, or God, or The Holy Spirit, I take a pass. I want so bad to go off and say, "This is how God deals with you. This is what God is really thinking." But they won't believe me anyway, and they are just liable to think I am a little nuts. And then if it is about beauty or fashion, OMG. I NEED to read those when I am feeling I lead a shallow useless life. It is incredible.

There is nothing I can do to change the world. I have no influence. I muddle. I err. I live in a fictitious reality. It has no bearing on my life. It has no bearing on anything. It amuses and distracts me. What else is there? That guy (the one we knew, the one you were classmates with his kids?) that spent thousands and thousands of his accidental fortune on those Indians in the jungle in South America? Did he do any GOOD? Did he think he did any good? Will he die feeling like he did his best? I will die thinking "I played the hand I was dealt. I hoed my own row. I made that bed, so I slept in it" . I never won the card game and all my plants died. Well, no. One plant flourished and put all the other plants to shame. So maybe the rest died of shame. But they died. And I have insomnia.

Cynical and Drunk and Boring Someone in Some Dark Cafe'

My heart breaks for people who have a problem with alcohol, and believe me, I grew up in a household where the problems with alcohol were exhibited to me in painful detail many, too many, times over. But, ya know? I have tried and tried to get into that. Sick, huh? But I can't, just CAN'T get there. Two beers and a xanax can give a nice buzz, and no hangover, but it doesn't last very long. I guess the secret is to keep imbibing before the buzz wears off. But it is so filling, ya know? And, early into my marriage, and actually in my college years, I was kind of into it big time. But the hangovers and the migraines were not worth it. And these people that walk around with these "guts", yikes; no, thanks. Well, there are pills. Yep. I count them and recount them. Just to make sure there will be enough, so I guess that is just as sick as the alcohol thing. And YET:

I cannot write unless I am wired way out to there. And I love that. But, dealing with real life? I don't know about that. Maybe I like it better that way also. I just hate the ups and the downs. And someone is always there to say, "It's better than the alternative." And I have lived with the diagnosis for 37 years, and truthfully, I prefer it to some of that other stuff. At least I am there for the ride. And, I am at a point where I can say, when I am lower than snail slime, I will be back UP in no time, and I even believe it now.

Every time someone gets their life completely fucked up they call on me. Everyone, sibling, child, spouse, neighbor, friend, cousin, grandchild, parent. I am so sick of that. When I feel like I'm getting a little messed up, I turn to the bottle of xanax. Well, actually, they are only .025's and I AM 67, so I guess it is not so bad. And let me confide in you. I've been WAY worse. And I shouldn't have to explain myself, but I always feel like I have to. Catholic guilt? My husband and his family have this wonderful attribute, that no matter what happens, usually a major fucking disaster of more than epic proportions, (tape at eleven) It is ALWAYS someone else's fault. There are NO bipolar people in that family. NONE.

My husband has a slipped disc and is in terrible pain. Even I, who am unwilling to cut him any slack, ever, will admit that it is obvious. So he is taking codeine. And it wasn't helping so he is talking MORE Bigger codeine? And Five (5) five, days ago I said you better start with the fiber therapy cuz codeine is going to block you up big time. Ya know, being married to a huge asshole and then having that huge asshole be full of shit, and THEN, it turns to concrete within his body? Big problem. Epic problem. "Virginia, will you run to the drugstore and get me..." Can't help but interject a 'told ya so'. And I get the "No. No. That's not the problem." FUCK ME. Here I am again. And, ya know? He has to share, every freaking detail. And, then, "No. It's not the codeine. It's the sciatica." Yeah, Lou. Go in there and take a poll. Which molecule has turned to concrete because of the codeine, which because of UTTER complete immobility, which because of diet, which because of sciatica. No. Just fucking argue about it.
What difference does it make. Get that stuff out of there and shut the hell up about it. Yeah, I know, part of the contract is being there for better or for worse, and yeah, I know, I am an extremely bitter person, but WTF. I am so sick of always being taken lightly, being listened to indulgently, perhaps with a gentle chuckle, perhaps with eyes averted toward the newspaper to indicate I am interrupting the reading thereof, or being out and out right ignored and told I am wrong. I am never wrong. Well, I was once. It was in bio lab when that med student TA was flirting with me. I was in love with Ray. Yeah. Fuck Me.