March 2005 Archives

The results of my work last week:

Paper #1: Oral Interpretation Analysis: +20/20
Project #1: Oral Interpretation Poetry Performance: +50/50
Paper #2: Science & Religion Midterm: unknown
Quiz #1: Science & Religion: +25/25
Paper #3: Modern Religious Thought Extra Credit: complete
Assignment #1: Article for Modern Religious Thought: done
Paper #4: Analysis of video for Modern Religious Thought: +35/35
Assignment #2: Lab workbook for Chemistry: unknown
Paper #5: Stress Management Article Analysis: +10/10
Assignment #3: Take-home re-do of Chemistry exam: +104/100 (bringing exam grade to 91%)

As much as I've been overrun, I've been very greatly blessed lately. Truly, I don't know how to begin to express my appreciation to the following people for the following kind deeds that have occurred recently when I really needed it:

• Sheila, who bought me my dietetic book. I'm still dumbfounded by her kindness. (What have I done to deserve this??)
• My dad, who sent me $100 "for Christmas" only a couple of weeks ago and then, last week when visiting from Ohio, slipped me another $100, just to help. Geez, wow, I'm still taken aback by this, too. Wow.
• My mom, whom I ran into just as I was arriving at Walmart today, at the exact same moment and location that she was walking in. We went shopping together and had a good time, and that in itself was super great. But then at the checkout counter, my cart laden with food and goods, she surprised me by insisting on paying for everything.
• All my friends--Chuck in particular--who were there to listen to me whine and #itch some more.
• TNG, who spent his entire spring break saving me from dishes and laundry. He cleaned both of the children's rooms, picked up, swept, mopped, vacuumed, cooked, bought groceries, took out the trash, and waited on me patiently. Coming home at the end of a long day, being greeted with a clean house and a hug, annointed with kisses, not having to worry about a thing... understanding, love, and encouragement were always right there... You have no idea how much all of this helped.

  I'm not out of the woods yet, but at least the week of particularly bad hell has passed.

I've had so many good things to write about with TNG's visit--perhaps I'll sum it up in another entry--but here I am feeling not-so-good, so obviously, it's time to write, eh?! Sorry.

I missed my weight lifting class this morning, and for the first time this semester, I really have no excuse for missing class. This is going to hurt my grade as it's more or less solely based on attending the sixteen classes and this is the second I've missed. I'm really bothered by the fact that I may have already dropped to a B just because I couldn't get out of bed this morning. Now I'm skipping my other classes, too, which won't hurt me as badly but still isn't good, and doesn't feel good.

And why? Well, dang it, I don't know how many times I have to say it, but it's been a hard week. My dad came in from Ohio, and I missed getting to do all sorts of fun things with him and the kids, including the museum exhibit I've been dying to see. I missed most of my family's big party for my beloved aunt. I missed a million and a half things I wanted to do with TNG. I didn't get to have my kids. I feel like I've sacrificed way more of my life for this job than I should have to--so much life missed out on-- and today, I'm a little begrudging of school, too.

So last night when I got off work, I did nothing but pleasurable things. I rejoiced in my "only having to work"! I watched a movie with TNG, stayed up late, had two glasses of wine. This morning, I was barely conscious and not feeling like lifting weights. I dread that class anyway. So I overslept. Partly the alarm's fault, but mostly an expression of my not-so-sub-conscious.

Today is TNG's last day here, and I'm just so childishly mad that I didn't get the time with him I wanted that I could cry. (Not over my "woe is me/it's not fair" phase yet.) I had so much I wanted to do! And I'm mad about it, and I don't want him to go. So I'm pouting. I'm crossing my arms and refusing. I will not go into work if my boss calls (and she's already asked). I am not going to school. World, leave me alone!

Six papers and two assignments (one large) due this week, and I've been scheduled for 29.5 hours of work, on top of the (coincidental) 29.5 hours I have to be on campus.

Cried myself to sleep last night. Man, was I tired. So tired, in fact, that the alarm which I'd set for 6:30am didn't become apparent to me until 8:06am. I still have a paper to finish, and the two I completed need heavy revision, title pages, and printed. I'm in trouble. Again.

Woke up sore and feeling leaden, I guess there's nothing I can do but *try* to find happiness. It's sure not coming to me. So I will look for it. I know life is full of it, and there's no reason to let everything get me down any more than it will. Whatever ridiculous thing I have to hold on to--yay, clean socks!--I will. I'm not joking. These are my favorite socks and they feel good. Yay for that.

I'm so longing for comfort, encouragement, and reassurance I'm practically begging. I feel alone and like I can't go any farther. I just want someone to cheer me along.

Thank God TNG is running the house for me or I'd never make it through this week.

I just get tired of it.

Here's what TNG bears the brunt of, that helps explain why you may think more of me than he does.

When I got to work and saw that my newly liberated schedule has reverted to the ways of old and I'm working long shifts the next five days instead of being off--a time when both TNG is here and my dad, who drove all the way from Ohio--I was upset. I called TNG, and he told me it was okay. "It's not okay!" I exclaimed, nearly crying.

And then when Nimmers called to see if I was going to get to go to the Sesame Street exhibit with Dad and the kids on Friday--the exhibit I've been mega-excited about since it opened--I had to say no. Not only am I going to miss out on all the fun (and what great fun it would have been!) but I'm going to miss the exhibit entirely, because I can't get away from school and work. School and work. I sat on my steps and cried some more.

Because I feel sorry for myself. Because I'm tired of it. Because I'm tired of heading off to school at 8:30am and not getting back home until 9:00pm, and only then being able to start my homework. I'm tired of struggling to pay my bills. I'm tired of not getting sleep. I'm tired of missing out on everything.

I just keep asking what I did to deserve this. TNG, he's got this lucrative free-lance job, and zero personal expenses, and free time galore. I don't mean to be jealous, but I look at everyone else I know and I wonder why they're not running from morning to night. I can't help but wonder and wonder what I've done to deserve this. What have I done?

And here again is the ugliness in me. The ridiculous self-pity, the jealousy, the irrationality, the weakness. But dang, I'm tired. It's 1am again. I had four papers due tomorrow, and I can't get them done, and there's no more getting up early in the morning to salvage them because I already get up early for my new classes. When? When? I'm always devising, always seeing how much can be scrapped. "On the fly", a friend advises, I think, and I do, I feel like everything I do is half-@ssed. I never study enough, clean enough, write a good paper. Everything's last minute, everything's shoved into the corners, dragged around in my pocket, scribbled when I've got a second. Everything that had to be is sacrificed. I barely get by, I barely manage, and I'm so tired. And pathetic, I know, I hate myself so much for being like this, wah wah wah. And yet I'm just so tired of it. I can't help it. I want to cry some more and ask why I don't get to see the Sesame Street exhibit, too. Where's my free time? Where's my money? Where's my good job? Why don't I get to have fun, or even freakin' watch a tv show now and then? Why am I tormented by this mess, this eighteen hour day, day after day...and why do I have to work so hard, only to continually be fraught with this worry, with this inability to buy anything? I'm tired of jealously eyeing people who eat fast food, tired of scraping the bottom of my purse for enough money to treat myself to a bag of m&ms once a month when I *really* splurge, tired of dreaming of a cup of coffee. Yeah, I feel sorry for myself. Nothing's wrong with my life whatsover and I feel jealous of everyone else and sorry for myself.

This is the first Saturday I've had off in 17 weeks. Indeed, I've worked the last 17 Saturdays! Oh yes, four months' worth, every Saturday since I started this job, including Christmas. All until today. In fact, I'm fairly sure this is the first day I've been able to have my kids one entire day in these past four months. It's so nice, and so weird.

I'm blissfully happy. TNG is here. As for today, first I planned an "Oatmeal Extravaganza" for breakfast. The kids and I compiled a list of things we have on hand that could be added to oatmeal--brown sugar, bananas, coconut, etc.--a good twenty items in all. Each child made a "menu" of what they wanted in their oatmeal, I made a big batch, and we all doctored up our bowls. Delicious. I had peanut butter-chocolate chip, Bri had banana-almond-vanilla, and Shay had peanut butter-vanilla-powdered sugar-chocolate candy-cream. TNG had banana-brown sugar-cream. Okay, so the additives took away from the healthiness, but it was fun.

Next we had a meeting to discuss how we should spend our fine Saturday, and we decided to go on an adventure. We headed to the state park, and TNG took us to a gas station first where we had fun picking out edible supplies. Then we trekked and climbed and skipped rocks, sat on a "beach" and picnicked, explored a visitor's center, identified tracks, and more. Upon coming home, TNG and I curled up together on the couch and took an afternoon nap.

Next, the girls and I went to my school to see the senior show of a friend of mine. (The guys stayed home.) We saw some friends there, congratulated Drew on his talented work, and ate delicious refreshments. Then I mentally concocated a dinner menu, ran to Walmart, bought supplies, and came home. I found TNG cleaning the girls' room. (Since he arrived a day ago he's fixed my light fixture and garbage disposal, taken out the trash, done laundry, picked up two bedrooms, done the dishes twice, and generally been of help.) I turned on the Beatles and cooked hot sandwiches (sliced beef sauteed in mayo, onions carmelized in Italian dressing, topped with Swiss cheese and served hot on a grilled garlic parmesan roll), corn on the cob, Italian pasta salad, and an ameretto peach tart for dessert.

After dinner we rocked out to karaoke. Boy did I ever laugh! I couldn't stop. We were dancing, singing to each other, belting out tunes at the top of our lungs. TNG experimented with singing some hard rock style. We in general experimented with all manner of comical behaviors until we were all karaoked out.

We're winding down now. Bri's been reading, Shay's been drawing, and--shocker--TNG and I are on our respective computers. It's been a day chock-full of goodness, much more than the bare bones idea I've laid out here. Hugs and laughter and snuggles and jokes and lessons and love and happiness and teasing and cooperation and creativity. Mostly happiness, laughter, love and affection.

Today, not so good as yesterday. I almost pulled yesterday's entry for being so cutesily optimistic and possibly pointless, but instead I'll just balance it with this one.

Can't really bring myself to write anything, there's a difference. I don't know what to say.

Yeah, in fact, I'd better go. I have a big chemistry test tomorrow and I've only got a few hours to prepare a class presentation on monopoly culture.

If life were a benevolent force or a god or gods existed, something more than coincidence, I could almost point to events that have strangely all fallen into my life at once right now, as if to combine forces to help me. I'd say it's really weird (like all three girls I spoke to today happening to talk on the same topic, which is directly related to concerns I have right now, without them knowing anything about it, all relaying the same message). It's uncanny, but I guess to be reasonable it's only coincidence, only shapes I'm seeing because I'm looking.

Too many entries in one day? Nah. It's been a good day, and I don't write about those enough, eh? And hey, I just fixed the water filter on the aquarium (go me!), and got the living room picked up!

I apologize for writing "Ugh. I don't feel good", since removed.

I hope it only goes to highlight my flaws and imperfection, and does not serve as any sort of poor reflection on TNG.

My last comment on it is temporarily attached.

I apologize for writing "Ugh. I don't feel good", since removed.

I hope it only goes to highlight my flaws and imperfection, and does not serve as any sort of poor reflection on TNG, my best friend, whom I love dearly.

My last comment on it is temporarily attached.

Oh! I just came across this entry and it made me cry. I'm sitting here in the computer lounge with a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes. It says so much, doesn't it? (See below)

I come to my place of revealing, on a day I've learned from a bulletin board here at school is True Confessons Day, and I confess this--I want to have someone to tell but I don't, specifically, so I'll confess publically:

This morning I was in a bit of a hurry on my way to class--first day of Stress Management--when I saw one (and seemingly, the only) parking space. I hurriedly began to parallel park there before the other sharks could take it. It quickly became apparent as I was easing back into the spot that it wasnt big enough for my car. I, as I said, was in a hurry, and I'm stubborn, too, so I thought, if I just ease it a little further back--all the way back to the car behind me--then ease it all the way forward--all the way to the car in front of me--and repeat and repeat, I can get the car parked well and I can leave. I kid you not, there was no room to spare, surely six inches or less. Well, I finally get parked with five minutes to get to class when I see these two women standing on the porch of the house I've parked in front of. Maybe it was just my imagination, but I swear from my glance that they were standing there in mid-motion, jaws dropped. I don't know how long they'd been watching. Had they seen me tap their car?

Suddenly, I was in no hurry to get to class. As they stood there staring at me in astonishment, I drank my coffee. I pretended I didn't notice them while I waited for them to leave. Eventually they got into the car behind me. Oh, gee, wasn't there something on the floor I needed? Anything but look back at them. Please, please leave. They just keep sitting there. I think maybe they couldn't get out because I'd parked so close. So they're sitting there in the car behind me, feels like they're staring at me. I put on lipstick. Oh great, I think, this is just the thing they want to see. I do this dumb parking job, I'm probably bumper to bumper with them, and I'm nonchalantly putting on lipstick while they sit there stuck.

It was so, so, so embarrassing. Eventually they left and I made it to class not quite really late. (Great class, it seems. My next entry has to be more about philosophical, moral, ethical, spiritual thoughts and why I keep thinking them.)

Aw shucks. I was going to come and write this triumphant entry about how I fixed my garbage disposal, but I've used all the tricks in my arsenal to no avail. It's pretty gross, to tell you the truth. I kinda need it to work.

Then I tried to help my sick fish by changing the tank water, only to stir it up and make it look really nasty. I took as much water as I could out--a long, tedious process by trips back and forth through the kitchen with a plastic pitcher. My son, by the way, has a running water phobia. What a mess. It took forever to get the tank refilled, and all the while he was truly panicking. It's interesting, watching someone experience such striking fear. My heart went out to him, of course--I can't say I've ever seen a real phobia in action before this--but I couldn't comfort him because I was trying to fill the tank. Words were having no effect. I thought maybe talking to TNG* on the phone would be a comfort or at least a distraction while I worked, but that's a no go, so luckily I was able to get his dad on the phone, although it didn't help. I doubt anything but shutting the water off would have. (What a reaction! You'd had to have seen it to believe it.) In the end, we're all up way past our bedtimes and the tank looks no cleaner. (Oh yeah, and I can't get the filter to work, either, just when I seem to need it most!)

Plus, while I'm incapable of fixing things, my windshield wipers are still broken and there's rain in the forecast two days this week.

Not to worry, it'll all work out. I'm just not feeling very SuperWoman-y. Or sort of, I guess, it's been a sucessful day, but I'm smelling kryptonite.

My lifelong "don't harm others" philosophy has been questioned by a few. For one, I don't think self-defense is a legitimate counter-argument. Many people would kill in self-defense who are adamantly opposed to murder and who would never do so under other circumstances. Sure, I'd defend myself, my children, or others.

Someone passed along this interpretation of Jesus' "turn the other cheek" scripture--you can see this below.

Further, I don't believe legal means violate my principle. If someone robs from me, I'll make a police report. If you injure me, sure, I may have you arrested. If you're a threat, I'll get a restraining order. I don't think that's mean, injurious, vengeful, spiteful, or unjust.

What I try not to do (and of course I do, I'm far from perfect) is be mean or spiteful just because you've hurt me. You don't have a right to cheat on a bf/gf who cheats on you, or destroy their stuff when a relationship ends. You can't be mean to someone who's unpleasant to you. Or like at work--if someone leaves their duties unfinished so that I have to do them, I, unlike my coworkers, am not going to intentionally leave my own duties undone for them as "payback". Maybe there's nothing wrong with such actions, but this is and has always been my guideline, my goal. I have to judge my own actions.

In fact, a friend helped me quite a bit today when I asked, "How does one step back and know for sure that they're "right" in a given situation? I can't say, "Oh, you're just being stupid" without great doubt. Maybe I'm just being stupid." Advice from a pastor-to-be:

I think that you need to make your own decision on what you decide is right and wrong. If you want to get philosophical about it, Socrates also did not believe that you should compromise your own values and beliefs just to appease someone else. He held up those beliefs to the point that he ended up drinking hemlock over it. You have to be willing to stand by something or some belief, and not back down. However someone responds, you've still got to stand by what you believe is right.

It's got me thinking, I *don't* know what's definitely right. Even a religion like Christianity can leave doubt as to the "right" action in a given situation. All I can do is what I think is right, and stand firm in that. I'll never cease examining my actions, but sometimes I have to look and then lay it to rest.

I want to drop my Ancient Greek/Roman Literature & Philosophy course. I'm taking it purely as an elective, because I love the professor and thought I'd love the course. I don't. It scarcely interests me and doesn't excite me. I feel terribly out of place and overwhelmed among these well-studied, well-spoken intellectuals who never cease to say the most amazingly pretentious things. I usually don't have a clue as to what they're referring to.

Things have been compounded by my lack of money. First, my credit card (check card) was missing, so I couldn't buy my books. By the time I got that straightened out, the current financial situation arose. Now I can't afford to buy the books. And of course, in this course, we need eight.

Thus, I haven't done much of the reading. Some of the classics I've found online, but I have a hard time getting through them. I haven't read all that I should have by now, and what I have read, I've sort of skimmed. And I have nothing to say about it anyway. It doesn't interest me, and I don't have the background in literature that everyone else seems to have, to allow me to make lofty commentary. Ho hum.

And now, with my 22 hours of school, dropping this class I've dreaded seems excusable. I didn't drop it before because I wouldn't shrink from the challenge. But really--I took the class for fun and it's far from it--in fact, Tuesdays from 3:30-6:15pm are miserable, and are sure to be even more so now that my school day starts at 9am.

The problem with dropping is, well, mainly, that it'd be dropping the "challenge". (Our first exam is Tuesday. I promised myself somehow I'd get caught up in the reading, and read enough Cliff Note-type aides to get some sort of grasp on the material. HA.) Secondly, I wouldn't get my money back. All this financial struggle, and I'd have just dropped over $500 on a class I didn't finish. I think there's no way I can make an A, so why bother taking the class if it won't help my GPA? I don't know what to do.

J: UGH! I spilled milk on the floor!
Shay: So? Clean it up. You don't have to tell us about it.
J: I can't reach the towels!
me: (hands J a paper towel so he can clean up his mess)

This is what I consider ideal. We all need help sometimes, but we have to take care of ourselves in this world. You can't expect anyone else to do it. It doesn't even work out logically: one person can only take care of so many others, and if you're dependent on others, what happens if they're not there? We all have to do what we can for ourselves, which includes a five year old boy wiping up his own spilled milk. Or even pouring himself a glass. He can't fix himself dinner, but he can pour a glass of milk if he wants one. (Iffy topic. Am I doing everything I can for myself? No.)

We are sitting here eating a recipe of my creation: cherry vanilla bread with streusal topping. I made four mini-loafs, full of cherry craisins and whole grain flour. We are learning. Here's lesson two I try over and over to pound into their heads, which I just delivered once again:

There is no excuse for doing wrong. If someone calls you names a hundred a times, it doesn't make it right for you to call them a name. When you call someone a name, you're doing wrong. It is never, never okay to hit your sibling. It is always wrong, no matter what they've done.

This is my philosophy, and it is Socrates', too, I've learned. "It is simply never right to harm anyone at any time," he says. My philosophy was rooted in my self, and strengthened by Christianity. I know people will think it's absurd, and I know some exception can be found, or situations can be pointed out in which I have or would act differently than this pristine gospel I'm preaching. However, I couldn't believe this more firmly. It is never justifiable to hurt another. No matter how stupid you're being, how mean, or how hurtful, you have no right to respond in kind. I can't change others, but I, myself, should strive to always be pleasant, loving, helpful, and kind.

(Oh, don't I sound lovely? Am I always pleasant, loving, helpful, and kind? HA!)

I just got off the phone with TNG and I feel really ugly. Surely this is an indicator of personal error, although perhaps it's the natural feeling that follows strife in a love relationship. I don't know. He called while I was still in bed this morning, which is rather sweet, but I say this because perhaps my response is due to being pulled out of bed--morning crankiness? We got to the point in the conversation where I found out that he has received his first paycheck from his new job, but it's at his parents' house. He tells me he has all his mail sent to his parents' house, which is an hour from the apartment where he lives. I get increasingly frustrated as I try to make heads or tails of why you wouldn't have your mail sent to where you live--what's the point of mail otherwise, asks I?--when he accuses me of not wanting him to have anything to do with his parents. Indeed, his lack of independence has been an issue for me. I'd like to see 23 year old TNG acting independently. It annoys me, for example, when I ask him something like, "What time did you get home last night?" and he thinks I'm talking about his parents' home. Man, you're 23, that's your parents' house. You have an apartment (thank god); you don't live with your mom and dad. There has to come some point in your life where you make this separation, where you have this realization. That's them, this is you. That's their house; you're a grownup now. You don't live with them anymore.

I still can't decipher if it's my own ugliness that's bothering me so (we ended the conversation with his telling me to call back when I was feeling pleasant, and my telling him to call back when he grows up), or if it's that I want a life with this man and things like this make me realize it's probably not going to happen, which is distressing. (Heck, we'd have to live near enough to his parents to be able to check our mail regularly at their house.) I don't think it's his snippy comments about my supposed over-independence and what a "grand success" my life has been; I'd never do anything other than make my way on my own. You can't make me feel bad about that, and I feel only moderately bad about what a struggle it's been. (I'd like to see someone go through all that I have, and do it better.) Maybe I'm an ugly, jugemental being. Maybe I was just caught off guard in the morning. Or maybe that's only all the more sign that I'm ugly and jugmental, that such ugliness can flow from me when I'm not careful. Or maybe I'm just disappointed. I do feel disappointed.

I want to shake it off. Call him back and beg for forgiveness, pummel him with apologies. I don't expect he'll apologize for his ugliness, though. In his view, I deserve it.

(Who has the guts to agree with me that I'm wrong?)

The latest information from my recruiter is that he's been told I won't find out until the offical computer match date after all-- April 20. He says that the release date he was given must be in error.

I don't know. I really need to know before then. It makes an enormous difference. April 20 is only a week before I'm out of school, so it doesn't leave me much time to make plans... I'll need to be able to run in either direction at the drop of a hat, I suppose.

But where am I going to live? I'm thinking about moving out in May anyway. If I get the internship, I need to. If I don't, well, I guess I'll find a new place to live. I'm fairly doubtful I can support myself on my own after graduation without this internship.

TNG asked me to move in with him. It is very reassuring to know I have a place to go if I lose this one. And I've never had someone ask me to move in with them before. Gosh. Seems kind of serious.

It's been two weeks of serious worrying about my gas bill. First came the disconnect notice, telling me to pay $247 now, or over $400 if I'm disconnected. Due by March 4, it said. Coming up with no other course of action, March 3 I called the gas company and informed them of my intent to apply for energy assistance. Could you please hold off on disconnecting me? I asked. I applied, and all that was left was for my employer to fax my income information to the assistance office. I crossed my fingers and waited for a reply.

Wednesday night I checked the mail. I checked it twice on Thursday. Strangely, no news. Then arrived the gas company to disconnect my service. Tearfully I asked if he could take a credit card payment, and he agreed to give me two more days to make payment arrangements. (Turned out my employer never sent the fax, so my application was still pending!)

Oh, I cried. I cried when my son asked me to explain what was going on, and then I cried more when he dumped out his piggy bank onto my desk and told me he didn't really need the money anyway. I cried off and on for a good couple of hours. I got dressed and ready for work with tears. I lay in bed and didn't want to get up again. I felt like a lousy person, a failure as a mother. I was angry at myself for getting into this predicament, like always, for not having done it all better.

Why would I tell such a sad and humiliating tale? For all the good that came of it. For TNG, who repeatedly urged me to let him pay the bill, even though I couldn't pay him back. For Chuck, who assured me he would not let me fall. For my learning to cry a bit, and then to suck it up and be happy anyway. For the phone call today from the energy assistance office, informing me that somehow, miraculously, I have already just today been approved in an amount that nearly pays what I owe the gas company. For weight being lifted, for lessons learned, but mostly, for those dear ones who cared and helped. Your reassurance is a blessing far surpassing what I deserve.

Okay, so it's still a sad and embarrassing tale. At least people love such a loser as I.

I am flat out asking for this. I was hoping to wait until graduation, to perhaps receive it as a gift, or to wait until I had the money to buy it myself. I really can't live without it, though. These are the days I need to be preparing for my internship. Friends and family come to me with questions, and I have no reference. I sit stagnant when I want to learn.

So, would someone please buy me this? I really, really need it. It's the Bible of dietetics.

You will see it on my wishlist as #5 (the 11th edition), but you can see a picture of what the book looks like here. I don't care where it comes from, I just need it really badly. How often do I ask people to give me things? That's how badly I need it.

If you buy me this book you can rest assured I will own it all my life. It will get much use, help others, and, when it's too old to be used anymore, it will always sit on my office bookshelf. It will mean so much to me. I get excited thinking about it. My first dietetic reference book!

I got up this morning and checked my phone eagerly, only to find no calls, no messages. Still no news. So I called my recruiter again, and story is now that perhaps I won't find out until April after all, which is what they said originally. April is the official computer match result release date, the "appointment day" for all dietetic internship applicants in the country. All people seeking internships have applied to the various internships they hope to receive. The programs rank the students they desire in the programs, and the students rank the programs they'd most like to get, and the (expensive) computer matching company pairs them up.

In my case, however, I have applied for no other internship. If the Air Force selects me, I will match with them. This is what I want to know--was I selected?-- and the results were supposedly released last Friday. Why haven't we heard? Are we going to? My recruiter is going to do some emailing here in a minute and find out. Hopefully.

Let me vent. Let me find comfort in my blogging.

I'm going crazy waiting for these internship results! Who has been "selected" and who has been "cut" was information that was supposed to be released on Friday. My recruiter informed me it was possible he wouldn't find out until Monday, though. Fine. I came down here to Arkansas to be with TNG to find out the results. Either way I'm definitely going to need a hug--I'm going to need him to celebrate with, or to hold me while I cry. I mean, whatever happens, life will go on, there's a good side to not getting this internship. But I digress. Monday came and went, my phone by my side, heart pounding every time it rang. It rang once with my recruiter's supervisor calling on an unrelated note. He informed me that there are six applicants and four positions, which is a great improvement over the eight and three I'd been told before. I called my recruiter to find out he had no news and was unable to check his email until today. Today has come and gone, with only a voicemail from my recruiter--and how that made me shake with nervousness!--that said there was no news. No news? No news?? It's almost Wednesday, and there's no news? Tomorrow I have to leave to go back home, so I guess I'll have to bear whatever comes alone. When will I find out? This has consumed my life since January. I can't take this waiting anymore!

I didn't mean to imply that I didn't value the comments that I have received. I must apologize to all of you. I so greatly appreciate each comment I get. I check often for them and smile each time I find one. And please, again I apologize, I was a little overly emotional in my last posting, please feel free to say what you think and to speak honestly. You make me think, and this is of great value. I of course feel supported and encouraged by comments that agree with me or support me, but I need honesty and differing viewpoints (which I realize are usually meant in support as well).

Please comment! Please don't stop! They mean so much to me.

Love to you all,

Mandy

Somehow, I hit snooze for two hours and didn't know it. I set the alarm for 7am, for getting up early was the only way I could possibly get everything done today by noon. I awoke at 9 with the alarm laying next to me on the floor, the alarm still set. I guess I was just as exhausted last night as I felt.

So now what? I awake to this scenario, trying to see what, of all the things that must be done today, could somehow not be done today. I absolutely hate this feeling because nothing is cuttable. I must cook us something to eat. I must do the dishes to be able to do that, and on goes the list. And then I read these comments on my last blog entry. I'm extremely grateful for them; however, they're depressing. Elliot's "If you were a child would you want to travel around in a car all the time, find your socks at 5 am, or play and be able to do things, having some control over your own choices?" could've made me cry.

I'm always pressured by this force regarding my struggle for custody of my kids, to just let it go, let it go, let it go. "You're being selfish; why, you're causing trouble for everyone! Wouldn't it be so much easier to just let Nimmers keep them? Wouldn't it be better for the kids? If you love them you'll stop this nonsense and let them go. Now, that's a good girl. That's right, let go, let them come here..."

That sinister voice, but that line about "wouldn't it be better for the kids?" gets me every time and I relent.

Dang it, though, you don't understand, THESE ARE MY KIDS. These are my kids, and I cannot live without them. They need me. I need them. Please Nimmers, world, all you who stand in judgment of me in both directions, why can't you understand? This is killing me.

I got off work at 8:30pm and drove an hour ($4 in gas) to pick up the kids, to drive another back ($4 more in gas) and get home at 10:30pm. If I let them stay up until midnight I get an hour and a half with them. They'll sleep in until 10:00am, and since Teresa (their grandmother) is mad at me, she curtly informed me I'll have to bring them back tomorrow, too. Usually, she meets me part way. So we'll have to leave at noon so that I can drive another hour ($4 in gas) to Blue Springs and another hour back ($4 in gas) to work. $16 worth of gas--nearly my whole tank--so I can have 3.5 hours with the kids (5.5 if you count the travel time).

I'm questioning myself. Am I being stupid?

It is my weekend to have the kids. Picking them up after work and keeping them until I have to go back again is the best I can do. However, all this time and money spent is not time and money I really had to spare. Which is more stupid? All this hassle, or not going through it?

Tomorrow is the day the decision released, although they say I may not find out until Monday.

Not to pile this on top of everything else and make it seem like I had anything other than a most pleasant day with Shay today, which I did-- a really blessed day-- but rather, to pile this on top of the pizza story:

This morning I discovered that the cats had knocked from a top shelf a dried flower arrangement that was very important to me. It was very fragile, so I'd put it in the most out of reach place, safely nestled. If I didn't know better I'd think they did it just to hurt me. They moved not another thing on the shelf. I don't know how they could have managed to get to that shelf, or knock the flowers from it. It would have taken some maneuvering, for sure.

Anyway, my precious flowers (anything but the flowers!) were ruined. You know what it feels like, don't you?

My windshield wipers are unfixable this time.

I have no windshield wipers.

What if rains? you ask. What if your car is splattered with water while driving? What if it's a moist day?

Good questions, my friend. I will stay home, I suppose. (Worse will be if it starts raining while I'm out.) I don't what I'll do. I'm supposed to drive around to all the junkyards in the Kansas City area asking about a part that I don't know the name of. Doable, maybe, but it's going to be a slow process, as I don't really have the time. (Thursday nights? Weekends, maybe?)

I'm not too worried; it'll get done. I just hope it doesn't rain too much in the meantime. (And pray the part isn't an expensive one!)

There is so much I want to talk about today, but I'll start with the climax.

Thursday, the day I refer to as "my day off", is my day for all the things I can't fit in the rest of the week. Today, I was to stop by two welfare offices, make an appointment, go by the bank, the library, Blockbuster, the gas station, and Walmart. I got to almost none of these, but more importantly I did learn that God loves me. Here's how I know:

At 5pm I'm driving my hour drive to pick up my children. I have Shay with me; we're going to get her brother and sister. We're driving 70 mph down the interstate in the rain. I'd just been passed by a semi and was in that millisecond of blindness you endure from the water splatter, when my windshield wipers broke. Instantly, my windshield became a sort of gray opaque screen. I could see nothing, and I don't think that's an exaggeration.

My reaction, besides whatever I was exclaiming, was to reach my arm out protectively in front of Shay, the way my mother used to do to me, as if to be their seatbelt. (Instinct, or learned?) I also hit my brakes, but not too hard; I didn't want to lock them, hydroplane, or otherwise lose any further control. I tried to keep straight, to remember where the other cars where on the road around me, and strained until I could make out the white line. Maybe this was five seconds or less, I don't know, but a lot of thoughts ran through my mind in the moments it took me to pull over.

This isn't why God loves me, though.

So the cats ate my darling pizza last night, and I was inconsolable for awhile. My pizza! My precious pizza. They ate all of it (with amazing speed, I might add). It was to be my breakfast, lunch, and dinner for today. It was my special treat. I can't stand to think about it. A lesson, I suppose.

Sleep disturbances = bad news.

Even though I had gotten little sleep the night before and had been on the verge of dozing off all day, come nightfall I slept only an hour easily and then could sleep no more. I was awake until after 5am. And what does a sleep deprived person do when they fall asleep? Sleep greedily, hungrily, intensely? Not I. I awoke at 6am, and 7am, and 8am, the last time particularly wide awake. It's weird to sit here and realize I got only three hours sleep just now. Rather than feeling exhausted I feel a little wound up. This worries me.

(TNG kept me company on the phone--I called at 2am-- and read me stories until I fell asleep.)

I am so, so tired of my "woe is me"s. It's a habit that's been slow in breaking. I'm not as bad as I was, but I feel I still tinge everything with negativity, and that's exactly the opposite of who I want to be.

Things in my life are hard, comparably, but it's temporary, I'm tough, and I have plenty of resources. Why do I need people to feel for me?

I'm fine. Fine fine fine fine fine.

I had a cheap, generic pizza in my freezer. I was sitting at home hungry. I thought of the pizza, and immediately thought, "No! Not the pizza!" The pizza seemed like too much of a treat, like eating filet mignon. I realized how sad this is, that a generic frozen pizza is that much of a treat for me. When will this situation end?

I want someone to sponsor me. For $1 a day--only 5 days a week!--you can bolster the spirits of a poor student like Mandy and enable her to get an education and end this cycle of poverty for her and her children.

I'm not even joking. You have no idea what delight I'd take in being able to choose a coffee or a snack from the vending machine every day at school. Little things like that make me clap-my-hands-, squeal-in-delight-, dance-around-happy. Oh boy! But I can't afford $20 a month for such niceties, and I remind myself of that every day. I half-sleep through some of my classes, or excuse myself early for a ten minute nap. I've got to do whatever I can do to save money.

(Is that criticism I hear for the gas money I spent to visit TNG on his birthday? Shush!)

By the way, the alternate sponsor Mandy plan is $5 a month so I could have a pizza. What a treat that would be!