Burn in hell. I wish I believed in hell so I could hope for you to spend eternity burning. Instead, I hope you die a slow, miserable, cancerous death. Thanks, boss. I have 12 more days eating your shit and I only work with you 5 too many. Do your worst…provided you aren’t already.
Archive for the ‘otiose’ Category
At my heaviest, I weighted 100kg (220lbs).
That was a long time ago.
At my least healthy, I weighed 58kg (128lbs).
That wasn’t quite as long ago, but it was still a long time ago.
I didn’t even want to lose that weight.
It crashed from 81kg (180lbs) in a year and I could see upper ribs
lower ribs
hip bones
It was just as gross as any extra rolls ever were.
I just didn’t fucking care.
My body has been through a lot, and the most unhealthy images are what stick with me.
At either extreme.
It’s a struggle to give a shit.
I don’t know shit about shit.
I’m quick to admit it in this kind of confrontation.
Don’t make this about me.
In a pretty direct way, you’re right.
I wasn’t there.
I haven’t lived your life.
I’m not inside your head now.
I honestly don’t know shit about shit.
Is that enough of a reason to push me away?
Do you think you know everything there is to know about me?
Is it fucking necessary to know?
Why is this such a common issue with people?
Hey asshole, we’re all fucking damaged goods.
We’ve all had some kind of dark, ugly shit that pops up from time to time.
Talk about it or don’t.
Lose your shit once in a while, but don’t you fucking take it out on me
Expecting me to internalize it and spit out an airtight solution
to your fucking problems
because I don’t know shit about shit.
You keep killing the rabbits
but everyone trusts you.
I don’t like that.
I don’t want to hurt you, but you leave me very few alternatives.
What would I be like if I didn’t express my road rage?
I paid most of the bills late this month.
I like ice cream.
I care about the rabbits, and that’s my downfall.
They don’t talk to me.
We’re not friends.
There simply is no trusting you.
I guess I’ll be looking forward to that 1% tax fee tacked onto 2014.
When it’s three in the morning, I don’t want to hear about how fucking amazing it is hanging out with Dave.
Fuck Dave.
If you’d rather expound upon Dave’s brilliance in the drunken hours of the morning than talk to me at a normal time, fucking hang out with Dave.
Hang out with him exclusively for the rest of the goddamned week, because I don’t fucking want to hear about you and Dave.
Dave
Dave
Davie what a crock of shit.
Fuck you.
I’m going to go buy paint after midnight on a Friday morning. Sure. Why not? What you think is a national spectacle is a fucking joke.
You said I could quit today.
Wait.
But if I really wanted to.
If this is what I need to do.
I won’t.
But I do want to.
I’m sick of humoring people
who genuinely think
“There really is something to that
whole
2012 thing.”
Even though it’s 2013.
I’m sick of explaining your taxes
and your insurance policies
when it’s all written out for you.
It’s all right there.
I’m reading the same papers you are.
I don’t want to manage people.
I don’t want to train.
I don’t like the high turnover.
I’ll stay, but I’ve pushed it to the back burner.
Welcome home.
I hated my credit union, so I switched to a bank, and now I hate my bank.
This is one small thing I miss about the small town where I grew up; the little state bank still residing there.
I despise junk science
and the people who uphold it.
At 10:30 every night an alarm sounds.
I organized crayons today
separating off brand and naked crayons
from Crayola crayons.
I pronounce “crayon” as “cran”
because of the regional dialect of my youth
not ignorance.
During the routine maintenance on my car today
the $40 service charge ballooned tenfold
and I had to make small talk about a collegiate sports team
I don’t care about.
The shirt was free.
I’m obligated to prepare for your arrival tonight
even though I work early in the morning tomorrow
but I can hammer nails into the walls after midnight
because I don’t have to share them with people who sleep.
I am five years and four months away from being completely debt free.
That’s three years behind schedule, because I couldn’t tolerate working 80 hours a week.
You think I’m more responsible than you, because I’ve enveloped my debt in good credit,
but I’m not.
A third of my debt is from one fuck up; one three month stretch of time
when I really should have changed my mind instead of hesitating.
Maybe I could have saved a lot more than money.
An additional several thousand dollars in interest and three years of my life are from a single move.
I’m impulsive and neurotic…and I don’t always take care of myself.
You work harder than me.
You make more money.
You care a hell of a lot more than I do.
I just pay my bills.
You actually have significantly fewer debts to default on than I do.
I’m trying to help you.
In seven years, creditors will lend you whatever you want, and in five years and four months…
I might consider myself a responsible adult.
I was prompted to fix your malfunctioning game console.
Fine.
“Fixing” this thing included dissecting the box, killing the roaches, cleaning up the bug shit, and reassembling.
…and, yes, I did scream like a girl when I opened the fucker up.
I just saved you a lot of money.
Invest in an exterminator.
I have a managerial position now
and a significant other.
I have a house
and a car title in my own name.
I have withdrawn from therapy
and feel more alone than ever.
The writing left a long time ago
with you.
She has track marks running up and down both arms
and she’s proud of them.
You’re fucking a 50-year-old gutter whore
and think you’re King Shit.
Unfortunately, I know you’re thinking about me.
I might be the only one here she hasn’t slept with already.
He’s been stalking my every move
since the day I showed up.
You’re a shitty fucking drunk
and if you can’t learn to hold your liquor
I recommend you stick with beer.
I’m confident I’m the only cunt here
who hasn’t felt the burn of cheap drugs
or gonorrhea.
Yes, I’m fucking better than you.
Damn right I am.
Hell yeah, I’m fucking judging you.
You bring this shit into my house.
You threaten my safety.
You want to fuck away your life that’s fine, but you’re not fucking up mine.
Are you having a good time now that my room has become locked storage, and I sleep in the fucking woods?
Like I give a damn.
My lease is finally up this month.
I’m back to collect my things and get the fuck out.
That’s it.
That’s all.
Stay the fuck away from me.
Yeti’s Jersey girlfriend has some sort of cat fight complex. She seems to be convinced that I’m a sexual rival here to steal her boyfriend.
Kid, I promise, I have no interest in your fast food devouring, seven foot, hairy monster. By all means, have all the vanilla sex punctuated with, “Oh shit,” and hoard all that shitty lovey-dovey “music” he plays for yourself.
I just say hello to be civil where I live. I folded his underwear because he left it in the washing machine, and I didn’t notice until I took my clothes out of the dryer. What was I supposed to do with it? I have no use for boxer briefs. And yes…I’m openly curious as to what kind of creature doesn’t even poke his head out of his door if he’s home when the water heater explodes. What if he had been the only one home? Hey, mister I’m a genius computer science musician, I have a college degree, too. The difference between you and me is that I give a shit when the front door is left wide open or there’s an inch of water covering the entire hallway floor.
Keep him.
Leave me out of it.
I just live here, and by the way, I moved in first.
He was upset about the tree, and when I asked him why, he told me about benzene in the water
Exxon and Chevron and “The State.”
All non-sequitur ramblings with naught to do with paper.
Republican doctor.
Republican boss.
Republican plumber.
Republican stalker.
I shut the window and took a cold shower.
It is giving me frequent, incapacitating headaches
heightened insomnia
anorgasmia
severely reduced physical stamina and chronic muscle fatigue
heart palpitations and nausea.
My short-term memory has improved, and my mood has leveled slightly.
My brain is mad at me and having difficulty adjusting to my recent decisions.
Be patient.
Inpatient ECT waits just around the corner.
I’ve been avoiding all of the people where I live as if they all have an airborne contagion, and I’ve been successful.
Someone blindsided me with a handful of CDs at work, however. We refer to this antiquated storage medium as the circle tape.
Strange creatures.
Giving Trainspotting another look for some reason…
I think I first watched it while still in high school.
All I could remember from the first viewing to the second was the bathroom suppository scene.
I’m fairly certain, my second viewing was as a freshman in college.
I was somewhat indifferent to it, or maybe I didn’t like it.
I read the book, decided I didn’t like it, and forgot everything but the dialect.
Late in college, someone I liked and respected recommended the title.
I couldn’t remember anything about it except that I’d decided somewhere along the way that I didn’t like it.
I picked up the book in the library about a year later while browsing.
I don’t know why I just rewatched the movie.
I’m not sure why I decided that I didn’t like it years ago.
Maybe I identified with the character, Tommy.
Maybe I lumped it in with shit like Requiem for a Dream and American Beauty.
Sigh…maybe, I still identify with the character, Tommy. I’m just a little further along in the storyline now.
I won’t remember later.
—
There was a dog at the bottom of the steps a few weeks ago, and I thought I was losing my mind.
I listened to the dog and the sound of someone breathing
thinking
at the bottom of my steps.
I didn’t go outside.
I didn’t want to know if they were really there.
I was afraid they wouldn’t be.
I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to handle opening my door and finding emptiness.
There was a man sitting at the bottom of my steps with a dog that wasn’t his.
He was concerned about the dog and contemplating what to do.
He sat out there with the dog for most of the night, and I sat listening.
A few nights ago, I woke up to pounding on the door.
Pounding followed by shouting.
Pounding followed by shouting followed by near silence
with a man sitting on the bottom of my steps
thinking
without a dog.
It wasn’t you.
I’ll never see or hear from you again.
Evidently, my mind is having an extremely hard time getting over that.
There was a dog, however, and there’s still a man
sitting at the bottom of my steps
thinking.
Americans do not call it aluminium, but the rest of the world does.
The crazy cat lady pronounced, “It’s illegal to take those cans!”
She should know better.
It is not.
“Contact your property manager,” was all the man offered in response.
He took my cans away.
I bring the cans home from work once a week, and I put them in the recycling bins where I live.
I fill the bins to the brim.
I would collect them and take them in for the deposit myself, but I have nowhere to store them without the roaches finding out.
I bring the cans home, because no one else where I work is willing to shoulder the minor inconvenience.
Only cardboard is recycled there.
I do not mind the can collectors.
Aluminum is very easily recycled, and very difficult to mine.
That is why a deposit is still offered for its safe return to the recycling facilities.
I wonder what made the crazy cat lady so territorial.
She does not collect the cans.
If she did, I would simply hand them to her every week.
I have an abnormally long QT interval…which essentially means my heart is slow with electrically recharging and prone to arrhythmia.
I’ve been ignoring this freshly gleaned information for the past few days and lack the motivation to start dealing with it now.
You were with me last night for the first time in over a year.
I know better.
I know it wasn’t you waiting at the bottom of my steps, and I know.
I know better.
This morning, I traded my car for a rental that flashes “eco” at me whenever I go over 5 miles per hour.
Tomorrow morning, I will be taking this odd little car to a 3.5 hour evaluation to determine, legitimately, if I might be
bipolar
or schizophrenic.
This will be the fourth and longest evaluation in a recent series.
They’re like hurdles I must jump in order to acquire free, privately funded, medical treatment
complete with blood work, counseling, and (possibly) medication.
Such things are not offered to the uninsured very often.
You don’t have a choice.
You have to.
That’s very comforting.
Thanks.
No one feeds me the, “It will get better,” line.
I wasn’t born with that option.
I keep trying to make it happen for myself
but I’m a miserable fucking failure.
My first impulse is to throw things, break stuff, and ruminate on killing something.
My second is to become uncharacteristically social and sleep with anyone within close range.
Third, eating…eating until throwing up.
Fourth; sedatives, liquor and complete abstention from food, socialization and sex.
Fifth, suicide.
These are my stages of coping that I count out on my hand.
Number five has obviously never been realized. I’ve been told it’s not a solution.
It sure is fucking tempting sometimes.
My eye has been twitching for four days.
It’s 73 degrees outside, so I opened the windows and turned off the air…which we keep at 72.
You not only shut all the windows and turned the air back on, but you moved my shit without asking.
Fuck you.
You just moved in. I cleaned that kitchen and made it functional. I keep it clean. That’s my shit in there. If you think for one second that I’m going to tolerate smoke billowing up from the stove every time I try to boil water and cockroaches everywhere because you’re a fucking slovenly asshole, you’ve got another thing coming, buddy.
Fuck you.
I live here, and I’m stuck here for five more months. Don’t be an asshole your second day in. Don’t fucking do it.
Apparently, by the nuthouse music piping through my phone receiver at the moment, most people do not call their creditors inquiring about mysterious $20 credits on their accounts.
I, however, would like to know why anyone
at all
ever
would give me $20 increments
for nothing
even if it is just a series of unauthorized electronic blips on the screen.
This from the girl currently restructuring her budget to live on little more than oatmeal for the next six months
to pay for a hit and run car dent.
Life is fascinating, isn’t it?
You’re not a good writer.
Your fantasies are mundane, and your expression of them is not getting me off.
You should be ashamed of yourself; not for writing smut, but for failing to do it well.
Making plans to move to a decently sized city that isn’t fucking Chicago…not that I ever lived in Chicago long enough for it to count.
Just long enough to know I have no desire to live there.
Excited.
Something lodged under the thick skin on the heel of my hand, and I started to pick at it until the flesh sloughed off.
Maybe the debris isn’t even there anymore.
I can’t tell.
Where I work at the moment, the men rate women by numbers.
They make obscene comments about strangers amongst themselves.
I have, yet again, been deemed a non-entity around these boys.
This is how I function best.
I have been termed “smart” and “cultured” as opposed to “beautiful.”
Sometimes, I peek my head out into the soup of happy lives to glance at the beautiful objects of their vulgarity.
I quietly wonder what it takes.
It’s not a desire to emulate the pretty, decorous exterior.
I know those rules.
It’s not envy, although I may sometimes harbor empty aesthetic admiration
or awe.
It’s not even a curiosity about her personality.
I don’t care who she thinks she is.
I go back to working quietly, without comment to my obnoxious coworkers, and I wonder what it takes.
What does it take to seek
desire
accept
demand
objectification
only to go through the motions of rejecting it for a perpetual show and dance?
What sort of mindset does it take to deal with being beautiful with any sense of grace?
Is it odd that I started making my own bow ties to compliment my underwear and then started making my own underwear to match my bow ties?
Or maybe it’s just strange that I go to all the trouble when I rarely wear either?
These are the vapid thoughts that pop up sometimes…
“Tom!”
“Tom! Open the door!”
“Tom!”
Who the fuck is Tom?
Leaving for work way too early in the morning to be even remotely happy about it, I met Tom; a shirtless old man with crumbling teeth and thinning hair. He walked with a cane and talked about his sister…although I hadn’t asked.
Yeah, Tom not only woke me up in the middle of the night by failing to open the door for whoever the fuck wanted in at that obscene hour, he also made me late for work.
Oh well. Now I know who the fuck Tom is.
I shook Tim’s hand, even though mine was sweaty, and he said, “Welcome to the jungle.”
I looked up the steps to my door and offered up my name as acceptance of this greeting while turning down help with my belongings.
“This is no place for a girl like you.”
We’ll see.
We shall see just what I’m made to weather this time.
Dealing with a lot of shit right now…
Posted: July 25, 2012 in otioseTags: Heartless Bastards, Sway
It makes me feel like I’m attempting slow motion correspondence with early ESL students.
I call you a year and a half after we last saw each other.
I say, “Hey,” with a pause that you’re too caught off guard to fill, so I fill it.
“Let’s fuck.”
Word of advice: Don’t give me flowers when I show up.
I’m not used to being skinny and weak
so I still think I can do things
I evidently can’t do anymore.
I am perpetually the third wheel
which is odd
because I don’t socialize or do anything in groups.
I should not find myself in this awkward and superfluous position so often.
My living situation, however, almost always renders me the third wheel
and this has been the case since I made the financial decision
that I cannot afford to live on my own.
At any rate, I feel like I’m a child in the middle of a divorce right now
(and this is not the first time I’ve been in this position even though my original parents are still comfortably, if not always happily, married)
as I sit in an off the books civil union that’s entering into the fisticuffs stage
of an illegitimate custody battle over large screen televisions and kitty cats.
No joke.
While they brood and brawl and occasionally embark upon a verbal assault through me
I’m left to watch over the well-being of the kitty cats
fend for myself in relocating
and don’t give a flying fuck about the TV.
In short, I’m moving.
Moving two miles from my original relocation
on extremely short notice
once again
and I’m sick of moving.
I’m sick of seeing relationships crumble from the inside out.
I am not in a serious relationship, because I am not in the mood to put forth the effort
or emotional investment needed to make such a thing function.
I’m also still disgustingly ensnared in a tussle with unrequited love
Or delusions of such a thing.
Regardless, I definitely do not want to experience the drama that goes with a serious relationship that is not even mine, even if I’ve made a cameo appearance.
Sorry, kitties.
At least, in the end, someone will take you along and continue to love you.
I’m going back to a doggy household.
I once made a list of some of the things I like most about life
including only things that can be easily enjoyed for absolutely no money.
I made this list for a guy that complained that I didn’t like anything.
Then he complained that the list was too long.
He said I was never happy
but that if I did certain things, I’d be happy.
I believe they were things that would have made him happy with me
while detracting from my overall possibilities for happiness
even though he was adamant that he was already happy
and while I will admit that I am not a naturally happy person
for the most part
I am just fine with whatever current state of unhappy I am
for the most part.
He constantly told me not to complain about my poverty
although I did very little complaining.
I merely stated that I could not afford to do a great many things
and that statement is entirely true.
Only regarding a few points, do I lament my poverty.
Namely, I can’t afford to pay someone else to teach me Calculus
and I’m not sure if my frustration with this is in the lack of money
or more likely
a simple frustration with my own lack of aptitude to handle it skillfully
on my own.
Eventually I responded, because all of these assessments were starting to weigh heavy.
I told him that he was full of shit
and that he would make me happy by shutting the fuck up.
Of course, he didn’t listen.
I’ve been saving loose change for approximately a year and a half to replace an expensive sheet of glass that a former housemate broke.
We’re talking about a $200 sheet of glass here. We’re talking about a lot of change. We’re talking about picking pennies up off the street when I go for walks at two in the morning.
Sigh…
Well, I didn’t budget properly this month, so I’m $100 short on a rent check that I already signed and handed to my housemate a week ago. Mind you, a week ago, I had enough to cover rent and four days from now, I’ll have enough again. Now, however, I’m coming up short. This is all due to an impulsive trip I took over Memorial Day weekend…which is now costing me a year of penny pinching.
I could ask my housemate not to cash the check for another four days, but I don’t feel like I should do that. Rent is my responsibility to pay on time, and I have always paid on time. I have done crazy things just to pay my rent on time. Usually, I have enough foresight to know when I’m going to be short for the upcoming month, but that trip I took was just…impulsively stupid.
This is what poverty really looks like, so fuck you for whining when you can’t pay your bills. You buy stupid shit all the time. I forfeit food when I want liquor, and I walk to and from work (an hour each way at a brisk clip) if I need to buy bird food.
So, no…I don’t sympathize with you at all, and I don’t expect you to pity me either. I put myself in the situation I’m in, and I will eventually climb out if I stop doing stupid, impulsive shit.
I will probably never stop doing stupid, impulsive shit.
Sn…eaked out of house to avoid housemates’ invitation to cookout.
Tried to sleep at a rest stop for four broken hours Sunday morning.
Woke up surrounded by motorcyclists talking merrily about how I must have had a wild night.
Got into a fight with some spoiled rich kids on top of a mountain at dawn.
Took a shit in the middle of the trail for them on my way down.
Stumbled into the strangest town ever filled with almost nothing but affluent gingers and blondes.
Locked myself out of my car on top of a different mountain…keys and phone laughing at me through the window.
Hitched a ride with drunks to a ranger station. Thought I was going to die with every drunken mountain corner.
Had a mini-meltdown.
Kissed a very scrawny seasonal maintenance worker that found me a locksmith.
Tipped the tow truck driver 20% for scratching my car and showing ass crack.
Decided I’d had enough of the mountains and started towards home.
Got sleepy. Afraid of dying. Pulled into an overlook parking lot. Tried to take a nap.
Interrupted by more spoiled rich kids…and then more potbellied bikers.
Drove home with absolute dickwads “sharing” the road.
Had to make smalltalk with my stupid housemates.
Couldn’t sleep.
Came online to stalkerish emails from somebody I fucked around with a flippin’ year ago.
Hate everything.
Need a bath.
Never, ever doing anything on a “holiday” weekend again.
Machined white noise kicks up from my overclocked computer tower drowning out the murmuring beyond closed doors
both real and imagined.
I watch the other side of humanity while sitting on a step stool
supervising
but I spend most of my time sectioned off
out of sight
quiet
with the internal white noise hissing so loud that I forget the right words.
When someone interrupts me with a commonplace question, I ask them to repeat as if I hadn’t heard anything at all
just to buy enough time to fan the words out into a coherent translation.
It’s as if I don’t even speak English anymore.
I spend so much time trying to drown out incessant muttering that I’ve wiped away a little too much.
And I’m not sure I give a fuck.
Except to pay bills on the 5th, 9th, 12th, 18th, 25th, and 28th each month.
Yes, I’m aware that the dates are frequent and nicely spaced.
They correspond with my income, because while I am living within my means, I have very little wiggle room from payment to payment.
This may also become the new permanent time table.
The 28th doesn’t actually apply. I don’t pay my rent online.
Also, if I’m doing relatively well, I double up payments.
For example, I’ve already paid next month’s bill for the 9th.
The internet and I need to establish some new boundaries while I make a few important life decisions.
The three most annoying things to read about that so many incompetent people feel compelled to expound upon:
Dating
Health
Psychology
That is all.
My job makes my mind crawl, and thinking too much makes me moody as fuck.
I decided to walk home from work to clear my head.
It’s about an hour.
I ended up shoving a drunk that didn’t like the way I said “Hello”
in response to his, “Hey, how ya doin’?”
I hate suburbia.
I feel old today for no apparent reason, and not in the usual detached way.
I just feel old in that ugly, negative, useless way.
It’s abnormal for me to care, because I’ve never partaken in youth culture…even when I was 15 or 21.
I’ve just never cared much, opting to read in my room or collect and grow as many variations of coleus as possible
instead of sneaking out of my parents house as a kid or going to the bars during college.
I’ve been out of college for four years…doing nothing…working with migrant workers and 16-year-olds that think they’re amazing.
Fuck.
A hangover is not a migraine.
Get your sorry ass into work.
Showing up late
asking stupid questions
getting in the way of productive people
and making snide comments will not get you on my good side.
When you say something so fucking ill conceived that I’m left speechless…
Saying shit about me…
about me…
about my inferiority?
Ha.
“You’re fired.”
That’s it. That’s all there is too it.
Jesus fuck.
I crawled around on the floor for a pale pink pill that did not belong to me, and I stood up empty handed.
I’m sorry.
The concern for what would happen without it was genuine
even though I had the comfort of knowing it wouldn’t happen to me.
I think that means I care about you…
box of ugly words
Posted: April 26, 2012 in otioseTags: condone, fundamental, literal, literally, sneaked
I’m insanely sick of the term, “fundamental” as popularized by the current Presidency. I’ve tried and tried to forgive its occurrence, but I just can’t listen to it anymore.
Note to self:
Put it in the box with “literally” “condone” and “sneaked” as another word that is just too fucking battered to acknowledge anymore.
I’m waiting for May so that I can ask you questions you put into the back of my mind late last year.
I told you I’d wait.
I spend a lot of time waiting, but this time hasn’t been idle.
My factory warranty is about to expire, and the sky has turned dark with rain.
In half an hour, I must leave my room.
For a mid-day social visit…with an intellectual snob.
The cacti seeds are sprouting.
Johnny Cash’s cover of Trent Reznor’s Hurt has nothing to do with revenge.
Worst misappropriation of lyrics ever.
I left my mp3 player to die
on accident
and was left to listen to the radio.
Left thinking how odd it is that Green Day
always
transports me back to Goldmann’s Department Store
even though I was introduced to them years before ever setting foot in Milwaukee
and that shit never
ever
played within the beautiful walls of that building.
Funny how memory works.
Listening to Green Day and Nickleback is not my idea of a good morning, however,
so when he showed up and offered his music for a listen, I accepted.
After all, he introduced me to Pretty Lights.
Fancy.
Touch screen.
Evil.
iPod.
I scrolled through the options and chose.
“Good choice.”
“Good option.”
Most of it was mainstream rap, although I do like Common.
Silly little suburbanites crack me up.
I chose an anomaly with Neutral Milk Hotel.
I went to choose again and couldn’t help but stifle a smile.
A name popped up that he could have only gotten from one of my own random selections
a few weeks ago.
It was so out of place, and it made me happy to see it.
The Beautiful Girls.
So…you’ve found a way to mine data from me after all.
I wouldn’t have expected that.
Sneaky little bastard.
Enjoy, and thanks for letting me listen to something other than Goldmann’s.
Washington Post email headline: “Is the tea party still relevant?”
Deleted: Was the Tea Party ever fucking relevant?
Pause.
Yes, that would explain…everything.
Love triangles are tricky things, much more complicated than young adult fiction makes them out to be…or so I’ll assume, since I have only gleaned the plots of the current books written for television vicariously.
I mean…film?
Fiction at any rate, and it falls flat.
When did you have a kid?
I’ve been out of touch for two years.
Stagnant.
Trying to recuperate.
Evidently, the rest of the world is doing just fine.
It’s impossible to ascertain this from “the news” which has devolved into a poorly cited, vastly unsubstantiated kangaroo court of media spun disaster obsessed infotainment.
Also, I am not fine and have projected my personal state onto my surroundings
to simplify and marginalize abrasive differences.
I get unreasonably upset when people tell me, during this lieu in interaction with the outside world, that I’m still sick.
The judgment, while likely valid, does not promote anything but further withdrawal.
In other words — Fuck off, Captain Obvious. Who needs you?
Congratulations on perpetuating your particular flavor of superiority, obtaining that elusive sense of productivity coupled with pride…and a satisfying sense of higher worth, no doubt.
Who lives too close to a nuclear reactor to safely grow their own produce?
Yeah, that’s right. Buy local.
I’m just bitter, because I don’t have a garden anymore. I spend most of my time in the corner of one room.
Cooking up strange new hobbies.
Yesterday, I decided to buy cacti from my neighborhood green thumbs.
I’m not entirely sure why.
Oh well, so much for the rest of April’s grocery money.
I used to be so ashamed of this common type of scarring that I first started to refuse to wear bathing suits, and then shorts, and then short-sleeved shirts.
I’ve had these marks since around the age of ten. I first noticed them on my chest, and then my upper arms. Followed by my thighs. My stomach. My inner elbows and my calves. For me, these marks are essentially everywhere, ranging in size and direction, prominence and abundance.
I’ve been told that they’re the result of all kinds of faults from dietary deficiencies to excess weight to hereditary skin conditions, and I’ve been told just as many stupid ways to diminish their appearance or magically get rid of them all together.
I used to envy much larger people than I’ve ever been who somehow managed not to have nearly so many stretch marks, but I’ve grown accustomed to them. I’ve met many people of all different sizes and fitness levels that harbor secret stretch marks, although I’ve never met anyone else sporting as many as me. Honestly, I still don’t love them, but I haven’t been ashamed of them for quite some time. I’ve never bothered to do anything but hide them, and I gave up on hiding them a long time ago.
I have stretch marks, and cellulite, and wrinkles and body hair. My skin is pocked with moles and freckles and visible blood veins.
I am not beautiful, and people have commented on all of my physical transgressions from standard femininity.
People have made many callous, hurtful critiques, but they’re only able to say anything, because I will fuck with the lights on.
I have never been kicked out of someone’s bed in disgust for having these flaws, but I’ve gotten a lot of comments.
I’m okay with my imperfect body and most of the decisions I make regarding how I treat it.
I don’t want to be a man.
I don’t hate pretty, high maintenance, idealized and socially idolized women.
I am a feminist, but not a man hating sort that adopts traditionally masculine characteristics in some contradictory attempt to assert equality.
I’ve been asked repeatedly why I’m like this.
There’s just no sense in hating my body. I can’t rationalize being ashamed based on standards that undermine reality.
I am not beautiful, and I do not strive to be.
If this bothers you…don’t fuck me. Then you’re not close enough for it to matter much.
Problem solved.
I still break down for hours at a time and rub the skin on my eyelids raw when I’m sleepless and sober.
I stop eating, because the thought of feeling sick makes me sick before I’m sick and then I’m sick
and I want to be sick, so that I can focus on physically feeling like shit.
I pretend that my new Land of Make-Believe friends can distract me from the ravages of sharp thinking
pounding against a dull, dim fog spreading from behind my left eye to crack my jaw and roll down my spine.
Crank the wheel up, up and away, and slam into the curb, but I’d rather backslide
slip down
pass out in the cold dew covered grass of a soft, well manicured lawn where I’m unwelcome come sun up
but you’ll hold me till dawn.
Shut up. I caught myself telling you to shut up.
“I don’t care. Shut up,” and I turned the power on and the static off before someone notices
I’m fucking arguing with myself aloud in the back room where we keep the broken merchandise out of view.
Damn right, I’m still broken, but you’d be so fucking proud of me, because right now, I’m sober.
“You look like you lost your best friend.”
I used to steal from department stores.
Then I stopped.
He asked me if I had a heroin connection.
“No,” without hesitation.
Not for you, I don’t.
They titter and flirt.
I just want to do my job and lapse back into solitude.
She told me not to be ashamed of being different.
Evidently, I’m “different.”
Thanks for that.
Turmoil must equate to shame.
Bitterness and grudges.
People used to say shit to and about me
just to try to hurt me.
I don’t think I’ve ever fully recovered from that.
Nothing changes the past.
There simply isn’t enough time to give everyone the benefit of my doubts.
Check.
Double check.
I’ve made it pretty clear how I feel.
Who I struggle to be.
Come on, man.
There’s nothing to see here.
I had to work today, which is normal.
Fine.
I had to leave early to stay under overtime.
Okay.
I came home to trash strewn everywhere.
Damn.
I cleaned it up.
Vacuumed.
Swept.
Took out the trash
And aired out the main floor.
I took my mail and retired to my rooms
Talked to my bird
Let her out
Changed her water
Refreshed her food
Spot cleaned her cage
And decided I needed a fucking shower.
After my shower, I opened my windows
Because it was a pretty nice day today.
I towel dried my hair and sat down in my chair.
Then I picked up the small package I received in the mail
Yesterday
But found on the kitchen counter today.
I knew it would be a book.
When I pulled the cardboard tab to open the package
Out poured a butt load of ants
Scurrying around
Carrying eggs.
I
Naked
Flustered
And exhausted by the day
Flipped the fuck out.
My longtime companion. The precursor. The warning sign. The red flag ushering in self-destruction flaring up from the mire of depression that came to stay in the ebb of its wake.
Sure. Of course, I’m aware of it.
breaking it down from an internal perspective
Posted: March 22, 2012 in otioseTags: mental-health, society
Here are the top ten reasons why we will never get along:
1. I know what I want, like what I have, and I’m an uncompromising bitch when it comes to conforming to outside ideals. I don’t think I’m better than you, but that doesn’t mean I have to like or respect you either. The two lines of thought are mutually exclusive.
2. My mood changes with high intensity at low intervals, and I do not consider this a hindrance or flaw.
3. I have no tolerance for your hackneyed, unsolicited, or otherwise nonsequitur guess work, and all opinions are not equal.
4. Talking is superfluous and uninteresting under most circumstances, and any situations where it’s deemed necessary should be minimal.
5. You cannot find me via Facebook, you cannot text me, and I will not respond to you at all unless there’s a legitimate reason…or I’m being reimbursed to pretend I give a fuck.
6. My sleeping and eating habits are cyclical, extreme, and erratic. When in close proximity to me for any length of time, this will cause problems.
7. I never go out for the fun of it, and I will not feign having a good time if coerced into a social outing.
8. I won’t invite you in, and if you invite me in, there’s a good chance I’ll decline. If I do accept your invitation once, don’t expect me to accept it a second time.
For a good time, leave expectations at the door.
9. Social etiquette is nothing but condescending pandering in an egocentric daisychain. I will accidentally, but repeatedly, say the wrong thing, mean it, and stick by it. If I’m wrong by my own standards, I will apologize and take the oversight as a personal failing. If you say the wrong thing, I will generally and genuinely overreact in an inconsistent fashion.
10. I’m an openly unhappy individual with emotional baggage, flaws, scars, dirty misconceptions, and an established but unrealistic personal code of ethics. I’m not looking for someone else to make me happy, fix me, or complete my fantasies. I am whole; ugly, jaded, worn, constantly changing and full of contradictions, but whole.
This was my favorite cartoon when I was little, until I took the VHS outside and left it in the rain.
I also thoroughly enjoy the Simpsons version.
drunk idioms
Posted: March 5, 2012 in otioseTags: caustic, cliche, drunk, septic, superficial, whiskey
Come back to it.
Come back to it again and again.
Maybe it’s like an infected puncture wound.
Should I worry that I haven’t had a tetanus shot since childhood
when I’ve stepped on countless nails and caught skin on plenty of jagged rusty edges since then?
The newest scar is still red, although it’s been healed for months.
It will take years to fade from the delicate, translucent skin of my inner arm
on the left side.
Wounds are too cliché for this facsimile of simile.
Similarly, maybe it’s like a distracted page of text
trying to read and listening to the people in the next room instead.
Rereading.
Lacking comprehension of any words regardless of the source.
It’s superficial.
It’s a tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick tick tickticktick.
Not of a clock
but of an engine block cooling in the hot sun
after a hot day
in a hot parking lot
after a long, empty search around the block.
The same block.
All day.
Everyday.
It runs all the way through and bottoms out.
Come back to it.
Back, back, back.
Reach back down inside and turn sideways to the back of an overactive
undernourished
series of thoughts that are septic at best.
Caustic.
Comforting in their self-destructive familiarity.
—
“Have you ever been drunk?”
I looked up from what I was doing, taken aback.
Is that a trick question?
You should probably ask me if I’m drunk now.
I’ll drink all of you under the table right now.
I heard one girl: 4 parts cola:1 part whiskey.
That’s not drinking.
That doesn’t even make sense.
How are you going to taste the whiskey?
One likes her “boxed wine.”
Christ.
I don’t even like “good” wine.
“What kind of drunk are you?”
The kind with active taste buds that wants to kill them.
Everything.
Inconsistent.
It depends entirely on my motives and mood beforehand.
I’m a dangerous drunk.
I’m the kind of drunk that will fall over from alcohol poisoning before standard signs of drunkenness emerge.
I’m the kind of drunk that has successfully distilled my own vodka without going blind.
I’m the kind of drunk that’s fermenting inside.
I’m the kind of drunk that decided it’s best not to drink.
For the most part, I abide by that decision.
I’m not a drunk at all. I’m a fucking addict.
Ask the rabbits.
I refuse to drink with people I don’t trust, which includes you.
That doesn’t mean I don’t drink, and it certainly doesn’t imply that I’ve never been drunk.
Fuck.
Some of the trouble I could have dodged.
Go ahead. Ask me what else I’ve done to myself
or have had done to me.
I think, given your odd question, that you’d be genuinely surprised.
Then again, it’s none of your fucking business, is it?
—
It’s strange to me, but the innocent, virginal guise isn’t an accident.
—
You’ve done more to help me accept my past than anyone has in a long time, because you’re so much like her.
I don’t know if I should tell you that or not.
Down to disquieting detail.
You’re so similar.
The shape of your lips.
The makeup line at the jaw.
Everything…except you’re a lot smarter.
You’re more beautiful.
You’re not even remotely as trashy.
Thank you for existing.
—
It’s hard to mute the past.
—
I keep coming back to it.
I wish I could have meant something to you.
It sits in the back of my mind on good days.
I sit with it knowing
knowing
the weight is just going to slide back down.
Fuck.
Fuck.
It always does on the bad days.
Usually it takes two years.
It’s taken ten with the only other person I ever completely trusted.
Ten.
I’ve got seven and a half more.
You know, this is some kind of neurosis.
That fucking number.
That fucking meaningless number that somehow attached itself
as a toe tag identifier
tow the line – pull weight
Fishing for compliments.
toe the line – follow rules
You are not qualified to quantify a turn of phrase as incorrect.
Crawl back under your rock and die.
Out of sight, out of mind.
Remind me again later.
a fucking book review at 5 in the morning
Posted: March 3, 2012 in otioseTags: soft science, son of a bitch, stephen jay gould, writing
I’m not even through the revised introduction to Stephen Jay Gould’s, The Mismeasure of Man, and I already know that the fucker can’t write.
I came online to figure out why I even have this book in my possession, and the first bad review I read still says his shit is well written.
This is the worst analytical writing I’ve read since college.
It’s fucking awful.
I agree with the son of a bitch. That’s the worst part. I agree with his position on soft science, but I can’t read this shit.
I suspect the whole book, all 424 pages. consists of nothing but the same sentence restated thousands of times.
Granted, introductions are almost always annoyingly repetitive, but I’ve also read an essay in the back.
I read the essay in the back, because I was directed to read it at some point during the introduction to the introduction, and then in the essay, I was directed to read something in Chapter 7.
This isn’t a fucking children’s choose-your-own-story book. Why don’t you just write the fucking thing in the order you want it to be read, motherfucker?
I’ve already read the same fucking sentence two dozen times, and I’m only 30 pages into the shit.
He uses “big” words in nonstandard ways, and he uses awkward variations of normal words repeatedly. He’s obnoxiously haughty.
Ugh. Well written? Well fucking written? Relative to what? What the fuck?
This is going on the stack with Thoreau as unreadable. Thoreau is better than this. I’ll finish Thoreau and restart Milton before I even consider coming back to this shit.
I paid off a credit card today.
If I weren’t in so much debt, I’d let myself feel accomplished, but there’s still one more card, four student loans, a car, rent…
I’m never going to be worth anything.
Still feel like death?
I bought whey protein today…in a big jug. It tells me not to use it for weight reduction.
I was really hoping it would help keep me alive in conjunction with my emergen-c.
Vitamin C in tap water with some chewing gum and jelly beans…I think I’ve been downright delirious.
It tastes awful, and I felt like an asshole buying it.
Life is so overrated.
I met you in Jacksonville
Florida
not Arkansas.
You wanted to tell me that you’re happy now
with a steady girl
and
a band
which is preposterous, or so I thought it was.
Maybe it’s not.
Now it’s stuck in my head.
I know that you’re capable of being happy
whereas I’m not.
I also thought about Synecdoche, NY
which is something I haven’t thought about in a long time
namely because it’s unpleasant to think about.
Anyway, I can’t compete with Jacksonville
North Carolina
not Florida.
I’m a dull individual.
Hopeless.
It’s not about the current class war;
vilifying the rich
or persecuting the poor.
It’s about accountability and basic economics.
“How was the shower?”
I want to call and ask.
I’d also like to utter, “I’m sorry.”
No one wants to see their kid the miserable
bitter
failure
that I am, so…I don’t call.
I get angry with my manager
because I think she sincerely wants to be friends
with me.
With equal sincerity, I don’t want friends.
At all.
The one thing I want to do is financially barred from me at the moment
so I get frustrated
with the spoiled rich kids
that constantly tell me that they’re self-sufficient.
No.
They’re not.
I don’t really hate them.
I just want them to shut up and leave me alone.
Reciprocity, I suppose.
The word still stings, but I suppose it’s what I crave.
I leave them alone with their delusions; I expect them to leave me to mine in turn…
Money is not really the problem anyway.
I honestly hope that other people are happy.
You.
I want you to be happy and successful and rich and beautiful and brilliant.
I miss you, and I’m disquietingly sorry that I can’t share the lighter moments.
I won’t call.
like clockwork
Posted: February 18, 2012 in otioseTags: bowling shoes, little hole in the wall, stupid games
There used to be a shitty little roller rink in the next town north from my home town.
The next town north of any size, anyway.
They had a system for promotion there that allowed our small
poor
school community to sustain skating “parties” on a monthly basis for free
disregarding all the money we wasted on stupid games
and terrible food…
and the gas money our parents spent to get our asses there.
This was before cliques had fully solidified, but they were on the cusp.
Messages could be sent
and received
through invitations to a classmate’s skating party.
One girl in particular loved that nasty little hole in the wall.
She went more often than anyone and usually instigated the rash of free parties that would go around
before everyone lost interest again.
She was different, in that she paid to go.
She invested in her own roller blades, instead of renting the plain, tan skates that were provided free with the tickets that got the rest of us in…
like bowling shoes. You pick them up at the counter when you’ve verified that you’ll be purchasing at least two pitchers of beer
to get through the fucking boredom of these particular social trappings.
Sometimes, half by chance, she would be at parties others had quite deliberately intended to exclude her from.
She always thought she was smarter than everyone else.
Better.
I bet she is, but if her gummy grin is my incentive to log onto Facebook…I’m still going to pass.
I’ve decided to accept the invitation to live with a middle aged diesel dyke and watch her cats for her while she’s on the road.
Kitchen, no internet.
I’ll take that exchange rate.
A government link to a government PDF form regarding firearm laws provided this ridiculous font in the footnotes.
I disagree with this choice.
Maybe it’s because it’s 20 degrees colder
or that the moon is waxing.
Maybe it’s because of six fish with yellow tails
long breaks
and refraining from physically attacking
a cloud of condescension.
Maybe it’s just because I’ve fucked up my whole life
have been living on sugar vapors and delusions
and just can’t fucking handle it anymore.
I was awake until about four in the morning tinkering with perpetually unimportant things.
Managing to get my headache to go away, I felt rather successful.
Then I went to sleep.
I woke up sick, threw up, and went to work anyway.
This shit happens. Generally, if I ignore it, it improves as the day gets worse.
Not yesterday.
Less than an hour into my shift, I had to call in a replacement.
Thankfully, we’re currently in the position wherein a replacement is available
for the first time in at least six months.
This was my first sick day in over two years, and here’s why:
I was not coherent enough to do anything but tussle with my blankets, stagger to the bathroom and sip water for an entire day.
I went home where my temperature started at 96 and progressed to 102 at around three this morning.
I lost 11 pounds.
That’s over a gallon of water.
Today, my headache is back. I’ll assume it’s from dehydration. My temperature is happily back down to 97. (I don’t run at the average 98.6 very often.)
Lucky me.
Back to work in an hour.
From Social Security, huh?
Interesting.
Very.
I’m not going to complain, because the holiday is over; but I had to listen to my fucking boss complain all year about something that was a slight perk for his Libertarian ass.
What kind of bullshit is that?
I paid off one creditor this morning!
That’s three in the clear with…nine to go.
Fuck this bullshit.
Do you ever just stop short and wonder what the fuck your life has decided to do to you while you weren’t looking?
I don’t mean the piteous, What the fuck happened to my life, shit. I mean…what the fuck.
Just…what the fuck?
What the fuck?
What the fuck?
I willingly reached into an old mans front pocket today at work
on the day job.
One closer to my own age scrawled half a dozen band names on a piece of paper for me.
This slip of paper is something someone should have given me twenty years ago when my sister was giving me shit about my favorite color and lucky numbers.
I don’t want to see my sister.
I haven’t seen her in almost three years
she’s been nothing but nice to me for the past ten
and I don’t want to fucking see her.
I don’t want to pretend to give a shit about her stupid little family.
—
If I had been patient…
I’m not going to chase after you.
I don’t care.
You hate it when I say it, but I don’t fucking care.
Why should I?
What’s so irresistible about you?
—
I’m older than most of the girls I work with
and I’m not as pretty
and I’m not even good at what I do.
—
She’s normal.
She’s picket fence normal.
She went to school
and married her high school sweetheart.
She has a career
in a field
which she went to school for.
She has a dog
and likes yoga
and loves soft science touted as fuzzy fact.
She can pay her bills and buy organic groceries.
—
Fuck off.
—
If I had just been patient, you would have lost interest.
She took your money.
She took a lot of people’s money.
People just like you.
Why?
Why were you interested at all?
Because she’s pretty?
Clever?
Unattainable.
—
I don’t want to see her.
I don’t want any more pressure to be someone I’m not.
I don’t want any more pressure.
—
The prick said he was open minded
while judging everyone in that pretentious philosophical way.
If you’re wondering what stopped me from fucking him
that was more than enough.
—
Why are you with a 21-year-old girl?
I’m just curious.
—
New Orleans is the new trendy place to be.
You don’t have any originality, but you lie well.
—
I lied, too.
I don’t want to see anybody anymore.
I don’t want to see you.
You’re flaky at best, and nothing you can offer me is worth
bending back
jacking up
painting on
or shaving off what I’ve got going.
I don’t really care that much that you have a drunk girl in your bed right now
while everyone on the day job just found out today
that I sleep on my floor.
I put up with a ten minute exchange about how I should get a bed
and why it’s weird that I don’t have one.
On nights when I want one, I borrow
and on particularly shitty nights, if you’ll recall,
I’ll make you volunteer to take your own floor while I feel out a place on your mattress.
When I want someone to choke me and spit in my face, I don’t come to you.
I don’t expect to be for you what that drunk girl is.
We’re not in competition.
I don’t have sparkly vanilla mango lotion bronzer
and I don’t even know what to do with women that do…
I’d rather taste salt from sweat than cocoa butter and wood alcohol,
so I don’t have a drunk girl from the club passed out in my blankets.
That you know what to do and want to…
Telling me about it is a little bit sad, but…thanks.
I’m going to keep what I do predominately to myself
because you’re not involved, precisely because I don’t want you involved,
because just like I know that I have very limited common ground
with the girl you’re with now
I’m also filling in gaps with individuals possessing qualities
I enjoy
that you lack.
I don’t know what you want from me.
I haven’t met up with you in months
since you asked me to be a specific way that I’m not,
and despite recanting in the wake of my stubbornness in an attempt to salvage an ever malleable potential
I’m still not.
I’m not sad because I’m alone, getting ready to attempt sleep after the flip of an arbitrary Gregorian calendar year. Yes, I’m an unhappy person, and you’re right that I dismissed any celebratory actions over the weekend.
I actually worked the entire duration much like any other weekend, but you know.
I work a lot “and still no money,” because I’m one of those strange birds that pays the bills before buying dinner.
Thanks for calling though.
For thinking of me while you’re happy without me.
I’m sure she’s beautiful and all that thrillingly satisfying jazz.
I’m sorry if I somehow…detracted from the joy of your life
by sitting here completely minding my own business.
Substitutions make poor replacements, but feel free to call again when you’ve decided to openly admit that I’m what you want.
Otherwise, I’d rather not hear from you again.
It leaves me with a slightly acrid, empty feeling as if I’m awake and alive solely thanks to pumping too many stimulants into my system.
This is why I easily topple into dependency issues with depressants.
Pretty much exclusively depressants.
I don’t care what day it is. I just want some fucking sleep.
I visit the Craigslist Missed Connections board when I need to cheer myself up.
I am not the only pathetic creature prone to maudlin sputterings of absolutely trite and useless sentiments. Sometimes, it helps to remind myself.
Eventually, I won’t have to take my frustration out on strangers.
Things that I used to collect and have since discarded:
stuffed animals (probably the first thing I started collecting)
sporks
dragon figurines
broken wrist watches
cardboard
candles
costume jewelery
trolls
kool-aid points
leaves
fancy soaps
stickers
loose change gathered from the ground kept separate from all other change (five years)
buttons
puzzles
erasers
socks
educational pamphlets
letters
hair combs
makeup
pillows
Things that I used to collect and still have in some portion or entirety:
milkweed silk (four years–forced to stop because it doesn’t grow here)
missing persons mail blow-ins (five years)
nail polish
house plants (lost almost all of them through various moves)
wasp paper
pens
novelty lights (like lava lamps–I used to have a lot of lava lamps)
alligator paraphernalia
porn
homework assignments
rulers/measuring tape
yarn/twine/string/cord but not rope
popsicle sticks
magazines
legos
beach glass
instruction manuals (I have finally convinced myself to stop collecting these recently.)
hats
Things that I used to collect actively, have kept and still add to occasionally:
rocks
crayons
maps
artwork from people I have met
chocolate wrappers/packaging
ribbon
beads
paint
different types of glue (There have to be over 50 specialty glues in the other room.)
Things that I have been collecting for over a decade:
shiny paper
insects
paper billing statements
books (Although I lost almost all of them about four years ago, the collection now makes up about half of the bulk I move each time I relocate.)
glitter
glass jars
feathers
snake skins
shells
foreign currency
…
your skin peeled back.
You woke up to ask me what the fuck I was doing.
What the fuck is this?
In a better world, you would have slept and let me sleep.
Why the fuck do I suddenly have a sidebar posting goal?
I’ve once again sidestepped the automatic double spacing, but…
you’re making it very difficult for me to ignore you.
Shouldn’t I be able to ignore you?
If I “Upgrade to Pro” will you let me ignore you for a fee?
Is that the new exchange rate?
Does this wasteland need sponsorship?
I just want to write some shit down, and you keep interrupting me.
Granted, nothing I have to say is even remotely important, but…
I would still prefer to jot it down in a cursory fashion that I am not prompted much to think about.
I woke myself (and likely my housemates) up screaming like a deaf elephant getting murdered this morning.
I hope you’re happy.
Posted: November 13, 2011 in otioseTags: dog, sex puppets, tact, Thanksgiving, whores
How many people have accidentally clogged their toilets with damar varnish?
Should I pour solvent down there?
It’s in the carpet, too.
I didn’t even paint anything.
That’s the tricky part.
Don’t worry. My plunger solved everything
except for the deep seated psychological trauma
that woke me up to damar varnish oozing into the carpet in the first place.
For some reason I’ve combined my disdain for most musicals
with the joys of chopping up ten-year-old girls and stringing them into
marionette sex puppets.
I think it’s best not to ask, and I should probably delete that.
Hmm…
I wish my parents had taught me how to tactfully tell people to leave me the fuck alone.
No, I don’t want to sit with your family for Thanksgiving.
No, I don’t want to watch your shitty little dog again.
No, I’m not going to shave it off for you.
No.
What do I have to say to get it to sink in?
Blunt honesty doesn’t seem to do it.
I really do want to spend “The Holidays” alone.
It’s not my responsibility to recommend someone else to you who might want to watch your fucking dog.
There are plenty of bald, freshly powdered and painted whores out there who would be more than willing to leave quietly with all of your money in the middle of the night.
I don’t want to wake up remembering anymore.
I don’t care if you’re better than me.
Good for you.
Why the fuck do you consider it worth your time to remind me?
Do you need a response that fucking badly?
Here.
I’ve responded.
Tactless as usual.
I changed a flat tire this morning
setting me back twenty minutes
late for work
and I’ll be riding on the spare until tomorrow morning
where I’ll get set back on my heels $350 for new tires.
Clearly overdue.
“If you liked your job, they wouldn’t call it work.”
I hate so many things about that adage that it’s nauseating.
Why are you speaking for me?
Who are they?
I actually like hard work, but I hate you.
If I could pay my bills, I wouldn’t get so irritated.
I sleep better when it’s cold.
A month ago, I would have cried about it.
She’s moving to the west coast.
He’s building a house two months after he said he’d come back.
They’re not going to help me, because they can’t.
They, in this instance, are my parents.
I suffered through a ten minute confrontation about why I don’t like Halloween.
I don’t think there’s a holiday that I do like anymore.
Juneteenth?
One person told me that I’m “denying all fun in this lifetime.”
Simply put, I don’t find most things enjoyable that the mass population has deemed fun.
I’m not going to apologize for that.
I don’t consider it a problem until I have to hear about how I should consider it a problem.
Fuck you.
Peers
Posted: October 29, 2011 in otioseTags: 99%, adult candy, college, corporate America, journalism
“You wouldn’t be doing this if corporate America…”
and the rest washed out in a high pitched monotone.
You have no idea who I am…or why I do this.
You’ve grown your pretty blonde hair longer than you should
and put a sweatband through it
as if you’ve decided to mimic the 60s.
I once stumbled across a picture of my dad looking similar
although, he also sported facial hair
and witnessed what you romanticize while getting high.
The local college students stand outside the capitol building
smiling
planning for a holiday they should have grown out of a decade ago
but it’s reinvigorating to add sex and alcohol.
They stand in a huddle, none of them strangers.
They stand with hand scrawled signs telling me that I’m the 99%
but I bet they didn’t bother to look too hard into anyone
they may or may not have voted for a few weeks ago
Going down the party line on the ticket for a sticker.
I guess it’s better than the small mobs that used to accost me
for utilizing any woman’s health clinic.
Four square and a few tweets ago I ran into you
while I was working third shift.
You said you were attending the local community college to become a journalist
and I tried to hide my reaction.
Your hair was short then, and you were drunk.
I hope I never run into you again.
I should be sleeping.
I work in a few hours.
Do you know what I’m doing instead?
First, let me tell you how it started.
It started, because I finished reading shit by an author you recommended when I couldn’t stand Thoreau anymore.
This is all your fault.
It progressed when I couldn’t remember how to spell that girl’s last name.
The one you said wrote better than me…over a decade ago?
Typing it into google brought me to a website featuring two amazing people I would love to forget.
Thanks. Thanks for that.
They…paint, if you want to call it that. I don’t. I’ll call it shit. I’m sure it will be very successful.
All shitty things are
very successful.
Somehow, this led me to another successful venture of a former associate’s entrepreneurial business stints.
This reminded me of the wonderful [Censored] I gleaned that information through the old-fashioned efficacy of Small Town, USA.
I know you couldn’t care less about these people. I personally hope for your sake that you don’t even fucking remember them, but I have to stomach the fact that they are my contemporaries. These are the people I am measured against. I am measured against them, and they come out leaps and bounds ahead of me.
They do not suck at life.
They are not horrible, wretched, festering balls of caustic failure such as myself.
Even if they are…even if they’re losers; hopeless, worthless pathetic wastes…they’re still better than me, because they haven’t resigned to it. They don’t know yet or haven’t acknowledged the possibility that it could be true. They’re still thriving, dreaming, ambitious creatures overflowing with vitality.
Fuck. My spirit was crushed when I was a kid, and I stopped fighting before I hit adulthood.
I’ve got nothing.
I can’t tell whether I’m jealous or disgusted. Am I dumbfounded or repulsed? Do I really hate them, or am I just so fucking downtrodden that…resentment isn’t even remotely satisfying anymore.
Clearly they deserve happiness where somehow I do not.
I need to be more drunk.
The revelation of the moment is that I am not drunk enough.
I cannot be drunk enough to make the world spin right!
Drink up.
Stop now.
Posted: October 15, 2011 in otioseTags: goodbye porkpie hat, missing boxes, packing, ultimatum
You have to stop now.
Fucking listen to me for once.
Stop.
You’re smart.
Testing told you long ago, and everybody knows.
That’s not the problem.
You know.
You’re clever.
You’re driven.
You found him.
Stop.
I need you to stop now.
You’re being completely irrational.
It’s madness.
It’s sickening, methodical obsessive self-destruction.
You have to stop.
He’s an asshole, and you know that, too.
You know what happened.
You made a decision. It was the right decision.
It was right.
You were right.
Stop going back to it.
Stop going over it.
You have to stop.
—
Every time I move, a box or two goes missing.
I haven’t bothered to fully unpack in close to four years.
The cups are missing.
The records.
Somewhere, someone opened a box
or it still sits unopened
filled with nothing but pamphlets handed to me on the street.
For the past two days, I have been searching for a box containing nothing but clear, glass plates.
Have you seen it?
In good news, I found the bag containing the back speakers to my surround sound…so that’s nice…you know, now that I’m in the process of packing things up again.
—
I gave you an ultimatum.
I was serious.
You have four more days.
Don’t disappoint me.
This is my Wasteland
Posted: October 12, 2011 in otioseTags: neophyte, self-absorbed, sycophantic, vacuous
If you’re looking for a screed on politics or fashion or literature, you’re quite simply looking in the wrong place.
I lost interest in contributing to the clusterfuck of “shared knowledge” around the age of nine, and I stopped forcing myself to produce the shit under the guise of information before hitting 20.
This does not mean I am a vacuous, self-absorbed, sycophantic neophyte; but if you would prefer to think of me as such, it makes very little difference to me.
I don’t like the way you interrupt me
when I’m clearly busy.
I don’t like how you congregate where I’m working
and expect me to entertain you.
Where’s my tip?
I don’t like it when you watch me
and then act like I’m not worthy to demand
and acquire
that eye contact that makes us both uncomfortable.
Be uncomfortable for a second, asshole.
I don’t like the things you say
or the way you say them.
I don’t like you, but I guess that’s all on me.
I don’t think I’ll be losing any sleep.
You were supposed to arrive
12 days ago.
Pity.
I could have used the affirmation.
Now
it’s simply too late.
Playing poor for a month or six or four years of college you can attend without a merit scholarship or maximum government assistance doesn’t mean you know what it’s like.
Walking a mile through the lifetime someone else claws through is insufficient field research on something that should never
never
be treated as a goddamned anthropological study.
Get your “Like” button bullshit off my Amazon.
Amazon, I’ve always been aware that you are a data mining giant, and I’m completely fine with that. What I do not understand is why you would overhaul a more accurate system for a goddamned “like” button.
Pass/Fail is just fucking lazy. It’s lazy in academia, and it’s lazy regarding information compilation.
Google has beaten me into submission, but you, Amazon? No. Even after eight years, I can get what you offer elsewhere.
You make me sad.
Irrevocably sick; that’s what I’ve been reduced back down to, a thick simmering illness
that’s aged with me
and faultless.
Great.
I’ve had trouble sleeping longer than I’ve been any other combination DSM crossreferenced statistic.
I dream.
My dreams have their own history.
I don’t want to dream.
Talk
Scream
Walk
Kick
Convulse.
There haven’t been many people willing to hold me
through the worst of it.
I lie awake.
I meditate.
I stare at the fucking ceiling.
I sleep quietly with strangers.
I don’t want to dream.
I just crave a little distance
a little darkness
a little silence
a little rest.
I’m not an addict.
I’m not a whore.
I don’t want to sit down with any more text book judgments.
—
I don’t want to be sick.
Wells Fargo woke me from a nap.
I answered only to be put on hold and then they disconnected.
I suppose I received the intended message regardless.
You can reassert however often you like, but debt is debt
and I’m a human being.
Submit three times daily.
It’s supposed to be five.
Five.
Five is so high.
Three.
Three times daily.
My first earthquake followed by my first hurricane.
I’m supposed to gush about both
but I’m underwhelmed.
My room smells like vomit, but I can’t bring myself to throw up.
I need a drink.
Let it go.
I still miss you sometimes.
I can’t afford to stay alive.
I stopped counting the days after 1000, but I know what day it was
even if I’m not clear on what day it is.
It doesn’t change.
It doesn’t get easier.
I don’t have a “lifestyle” to change.
I’ve been lying to myself for awhile now.
I revisited a high school crush the year after I graduated college.
He’s probably a really great guy.
I know he is
and he’s a lot more attractive than he ever was as a kid.
I ended up calling him an asshole anyway…
…
…
…because I have problems.
I tried to figure it out for a few months;
what went wrong
but it’s not worth figuring out.
I just didn’t belong with him, and he took that extremely personally.
It was personal.
It’s not that I intended to intrude and make him mad
but that’s how it happened.
I still think he’s an asshole.
Maybe I should have taken the sugar cubes.
—
“I can hear it,” and then he told me all about how he can tell me all about where I’m from.
First of all, if you can hear it, then why did you ask me about local shelters and persist until I told you I’m not from the area? If you can fucking hear it, why did you have to ask me where I’m from?
Can you see my socioeconomic status stamped across my face as well?
“I know people.”
No.
You don’t.
Secondly, I hated Chicago, and I hate a lot of the people from Chicago that think of the entire Great Lakes area as their personal amusement park. I’m nice to you, because I’m paid to be nice to you. This, surprisingly, doesn’t make me a whore.
I want this job.
I like it.
I’m not doing anything I don’t want to do.
Third, I don’t give a shit who you are, where you’re from, or what you think you know. I don’t care. The more you talk, the less interested I become.
You’re blind to anything that’s not a mirror image.
Stay contained.
Be happy.
Finally, if you’re going to hit on me in front of your seven year old son and use phrases like, “Girls don’t usually…” I would sincerely like you to reprioritize your life
and leave me out.
I do not give a flying fuck what you think girls do, like, think, or want. I don’t care if you’re right about most girls. You are not going to tell me jack shit about myself in relation to what you expect or have seen before from other girls. If you are talking to me, I am the only benchmark; and if you don’t know me, don’t fill in the gaps out of your own impatience.
You will fuck yourself over.
—
I’m sick of unsolicited advice and disgusted with the failure to offer it when I directly ask.
—
I do boring things when I’m bored, but I am no longer taking requests.
Papers have this way of breeding
while I have my head turned.
Apparently, I save instruction leaflets for everything from
macro camera lenses
to assembly pictographs for a shark kite.
Small appliances, simple furniture…
At one point, I think I was amused by the accompaniment of these sorts of instructions with a product, so I started saving the outlandishly worthless along with the almost necessary.
It does not appear that I save the preparation instructions off of food packaging (although I do read them even if I don’t bother to follow) so there is some unknown discriminatory filter in play.
All collections are incomplete
with a two year gap
as if my life went through a fire.
I guess it did, although I set it.
Financial records are the only complete collections.
I’m almost to the bottom of the pile, although, I’ve created new
shorter
stacks.
Some of them can be filed now.
Around half of them are still refugees of my life
and my mind.
There’s just no place where they belong.
I hate going through the papers.
These papers are predominately from before the bugs.
They’ve been boxed up and unseen for years.
The latest date I came across was situated in 2008.
Those papers must have been from a newer box
but they’ve been shuffled several times now.
This is my second attempt at filing since arriving here
and I made one attempt when I first arrived down the road
to, at least, combine the papers into a concentrated headache.
I don’t know why I bother.
After the papers, I just have to go back to the boxes.
Constantly attempting to cull down
weed out
groom my personal waste.
Most of the time, I ignore it.
Sometimes, I just want it to go away,
but I don’t like to think about it sitting in a landfill.
I don’t like to think about it at all.
This collection of instructions is massive.
It could fill an entire box on its own.
It seems wrong to discard it now.
Should I put the obsolete software with the obsolete instructions in a box with the obsolete hardware, or should I just throw the whole works out?
I’ll start small.
Anything pertaining to something I no longer have, I will throw out.
Anything pertaining to something I have but no longer use, I will organize and mark for further consideration at a later date in a different frame of mind.
You made fun of me a lot.
That’s all you did.
Aside from the chew tobacco, that was the only thing you did wrong.
You had a temper, but so did I.
I still do.
You were irresponsible, and you lied a lot
about stupid things.
You constantly critiqued every little flaw of my body.
That gets old pretty quick.
I’m not gorgeous. I already know this.
You never stood up for me
and yet you told me the horrendous things your family would say.
Why did you do that?
You bought porn on my credit…without asking or telling me.
You broke expensive things that were difficult for me to replace.
All you did for months was play video games.
You used my cell phone
that I paid for
to call chat lines
but not me.
You ate my food and then complained about it.
It made you sick.
It made you fat.
You lived at my place but made fun of it.
You titty fucked me and still had the audacity to…
You fucked up.
You just…fucked up.
It’s gratifying that you’re no longer above groveling.
Damn right you miss what you had.
and so we meet again 