Nightmares and Escapes

I had another nightmare last night. Not the kind that leaves you terrified, just the kind that make you feel bad.

Again, I was desperately trying to escape. The people in my life were either passively trying to help or indifferent. They did not feel the same sense of urgency that I did, they did not seem to understand and I was unsure who to trust.

I ran into an old man who I served in the army with. I did not recognize him at first, but beneath the lines on his face I saw the familiarity. He seemed so happy to see me, and for some reason, I felt safe and happy seeing him too. He and a woman were trying to sell a stolen helicopter, they obviously had left the military. They woman was not a soldier, perhaps an army wife. She kept trying to apologize to me. I told her, “No, you helped me escape; you helped me escape from that army prison. Don’t apologize to me”. I suppose no one else understood like they did. They made me feel better, but I was still on the lamb. I was still running.

I awoke and was greatly relieved that it was Saturday and I would have sufficient time to recover from this dream. The only problem was, it was actually Thursday. I rushed out of the house to the office.

I was deeply unhappy that day. Though with the closing bell rung, I felt a pep returning to my step. I was just so tired. There is no relief in sight as my job ramps up. I take comfort in the hours I spend away from that place. In those hours I am free. It was with that thought in the back of my mind that I set out to treat that blasted Thursday like it was in fact a weekend day. I had drinks with Em in the East Village, wine with Gus in Tribecca, then a whirlwind evening of bar hopping throughout the city with a rowdy group of EWI members and out of town visitors. I ran through my evening, push push pushing until the morning light let me know that it was time to again relinquish my freedom and go back into the coffin of my work life.

Needless to say, I went too far this time. I was not able to rally and make it through my workday. I can function on very little sleep, but not no sleep. Thankfully, I am really good at what I do, and my track record allows me to take my sick leave when need be.

I hope I find the answers soon. I would like to know what it is I am running from. I am much more prone to fight than flight, so it is with tense curiosity that I look for the headless horseman on my heels.

Dr. Stranglove: VA GYN

I went to the gynecologist at the VA a couple weeks ago. I had a bad experience last year with a fellow who literally drew blood during my PAP with his barbaric methods, and I was relieved that I had a different doctor this time. My relief was short lived.

The tall sallow-faced doctor began asking me standard questions until he came across my IUD in the chart. With an eyebrow raised, he asked me why someone who did not yet have children had such an invasive birth control device. I told him that I suffered from migraines and the hormones in the pill don't agree with me.

He was still perplexed.

He asked me flat out, "So, do you ever want to have children?" A bit startled, I muttered something about possibly wanting them at some point, but not now. He then asked, "Do you want children with your current partner?". Startled further, I explained that I had just come out of a 4 year relationship and was not currently seeing anyone. This sent him into a lecture on the fact that getting an infection with an IUD can make one infertile. I stammered that I was not sexually active, but would definitely use a condom if that changed. He was unmoved, he went on to tell me to think long and hard about any future partners, sleeping with them was risking my fertility and "they better be worth it".

Thankfully, the Q&A section was almost over and I was getting ready to disrobe. He then realized that my period had just ended and said their might be some, "residual still up-in-there". He swiftly asked me to reschedule. Seriously? Well, he is the doctor, maybe there is something about blood and tests that I don't know about. I went out front and reschedule for today.

Making my way down to the basement where the VA banished the gyn clinic, I was not looking forward to another meeting with doctor strange love. After chatting with the nurses and patients and re-filling-out all the damned forms, he finally called me in. He looked puzzled, he said, "you look different, I don't even recognize you!" Confused, I told him I dyed my hair and perhaps it was styled differently last time. He continued to stare. Finally, he shrugged and said, "Well, whatever it is, it looks very complimentary". Weird.

I was careful during Q&A, not wanting to set him off again. I made it through relatively unscathed and was taken to the exam table. It got weirder. During my breast exam he began making awkward small talk, asking about where I was from etc. Moving to the "main event", he decided to mention that my IUD string was quite long. Okaaaaay. He then asked me, "has anyone mentioned your IUD string to you?"

What the fuck?

I told him that my ex once told me he could feel it. He proceeded to ask, "with his fingers?" I was a bit taken aback and said, "No, while he was, um, inside me".

He nodded and said nothing.

I then asked if it could be a problem or an indication that it was coming out. I fully expected him to laugh, like all the other doctor's had when I asked similar questions, but no, he looked at me with a strait face and said, "It's possible, but you haven't gotten pregnant yet."

After this startling proclamation, he simply went over to his computer and began typing notes.

I was aghast!

"Well, I would like to know if there is a problem BEFORE I get pregnant! That's the whole point." He shrugged again and told me he would schedule an ultrasound so they could look at the placement. He said he wanted me to come back to see him a couple weeks later so he could read me my results.

Now, the first thought through my mind was, "if this guy is making all this up just so I will come in for a follow-up to see him, there will be hell to pay!" This thought was quickly replaced by a deep concern that I was becoming cripplingly paranoid.

On my way out tonight I stopped by Little Boss's office. I make a habit of coming in to shoot the shit and gossip about other employees with her. I began telling her about the dungeon of GYN and how awkward my visit was. It was only after my story left her gripping the desk in fits of laughter that I realized, "I'm not paranoid! This guy is a weirdo!"

I don't know how I find these people, or why, but my life seems to be a zoo of strange and bizarre individuals. Interesting that the first man to see "The Cat" since my breakup would be a crack-pot gynecologist, at least I was able to wait until the second "date". I guarantee there will not be a third!

Through the Looking Glass (or the ER)

Today the powers that be aligned in the hallway outside my office, that's right, the unholy trinity of Little Boss, Middle Boss and Big Boss were united. Looking at them together made the irony of the names I have given them all the more clear. Big Boss is an Athena-like, statuesque woman who towers over the other two. Middle boss is a round, grandma-looking woman, shorter than Big Boss, but significantly taller than the tiny Little Boss. Little Boss is a pocket-sized Latina, who is absolutely adorable with the air of a Chihuahua.

They certainly act-out their persona's to a tee as well. BB knows she is the master of the universe, and to her credit, she is a brilliant, ferocious force to be reckoned with. MB is the petulant middle child, bobbling around without enough power to matter, but enough to cause trouble (which she enjoys doing between her triads against whoever has demonstrated themselves to be "an incompetent idiot" on any particular day). LB is happy and bubbly, like the aforementioned dog, pleasantly wagging her proverbial tail and osculating between BB and MB.

I can't really say I find my stature to be comparable to theirs. I feel taller than MB and LB, but definitely a bit shorter than BB. BB is the only one I take seriously, and even she does not strike fear in my heart. Respect yes, fear no. I suppose I feel rather removed from their trifecta of earnestness. This job has felt like a temp position since I started. When they talk about "My future at the VA" I simultaneously shudder and smirk. No ladies, I will remain like Alice in Wonderland, a girl who happened to fall down the rabbit hole and is just passing through!

On the other side of the looking glass there are many strange creatures; The Trinity, Tweedle dee and Tweedle dumb (I don't quit know which is which, Is the rotund cackler dee and the pervy reject dumb? I think they may be interchangeable.), there is the chain-smoking, food dribbling ogar of an IT supervisor(the only outright hostile woman in the place), and a bevy of other freaks, crazies and lost souls. Because their fate is not my own, they are all completely harmless. I am able to walk through the circus with an amused eye.

I appreciate the fact that I have never had a "normal job". The Army was a complete insane asylum. The restaurant was a political hotbed of felon line cooks, temperamental chefs, coke-head fairies, aspiring artists and down-on-your-luck southerners. RRA was run by the single strangest woman I have ever met and was wrot with delicious madness. The VA makes sense. What would I do in a normal office? I wonder if they even exist. Are there places that are professional and drama free? Maybe not.

As long as I can escape from inside these bizarre worlds, sit back and enjoy the show, I think they will continue to serve as anecdotal souvenirs of this life of mine. The key is seeing the story in the chaos rather than living it and truly immersing yourself in the good.

Coming Home to N Y U!

I scheduled a meeting with my advisor today, and in typical Felicia fashion, I ended-up getting lost and arriving late and frazzled. I went to 35 E 4th Street, which was an abandoned building. I circled said building twice before deciding it was the right address, but clearly the wrong place. I did not bring the phone number, because I am a fool, so I wandered and cursed and kept calling 411 until I finally got a hold of a woman who informed me the office was 35 W 4th Street. As I roamed around I kept telling myself “you are the customer, you are the customer”, but it didn’t matter, I still felt like a douche!

Dr. Ray had taken his next appointment early, so I sat down to wait for her time slot. I happily read a pamphlet about the NYU Library food collection, a welcome distraction from my shoddy nerves. After reading it twice, I slipped it into my purse and started flipping through a culinary trade magazine. The receptionist called me back and sent me into his office. He was a handsome Indian man, with whom I was already dually impressed with after reading his bio online. It is rare that smart men I am attracted to on paper actually turn out to be so good looking. I guess today was just one of those days.

I was completely unprepared for the meeting, forgetting the forms containing my student number in my office (and the aforementioned phone number!). He was gracious and said he would see if he could locate my file.

When he left the room, I began running my eyes across the stacks of books and the blasted pictures of children, which I am sure are his (how could this man be single?), but the books are what really caught my eye. Sociology, history, cookbooks, novels, for some reason they made me so quietly ecstatic, so deeply happy I wanted to cry. I suppose it is like seeing home for the first time, you spend so much time imagining it that when it appears in front of you it doesn’t seem possible. My vision of “home” is still a blurred watercolor, but something about those books, all the adventures they represent, they felt like my first glimpse.

My file had not yet arrived from admissions, (I did just get in on Friday!) but he said we could do a broad advisement now anyways. That would allow him to clear my account for registration. I already knew exactly what I was planning on taking, but I coyly said, “Oh, I have a few ideas”. (I didn’t want him to feel like his job wasn’t useful, or that his advising skills were not appreciated).

I explained my choices and he laughed, “You certainly are easy to advise! I suppose that must come from your prior training”. I replied, “I think it comes from all the waiting!” He commented on how difficult it was to get in this semester. He printed me some information on how to register once my account cleared and gave me his business card. He told me that I could write him anytime if I needed help. He would even walk me through the online registration if I needed him to. He then mentioned for the second time how difficult it was to get in to this program this semester and how proud I should be; I just reiterated how excited I was. We said goodbye and I floated out to the elevator and back down to 4th Street.

Walking back toward the VA, I again felt the seemingly permanent smile playing across my face and felt the tears begging to come out of my eyes. This flux of emotion is new and familiar to me, I can’t quite place it.

Back in the good ol’ “mental” hospital, I decided to e-mail Dr. Ray my student number, and let him know what a pleasure it was to meet him. He promptly replied, saying the number would help and that it was his pleasure meeting me today and he looks forward to working with me. That e-mail was followed by a CC to his assistant, asking her to clear my account. I am in Love!

Now it is time to get back to the present, back to discharge rounds tempered with dreams of things yet to come! There has been a shift though, rather than living with possibilities alone, hope is accompanied by anticipation. I got into NYU!!!

Everyone keeps telling me my life is about to change, I have no doubt. The future is bright and therefore backlight, I have no idea what is to come, but I feel like it is going to be beautiful.

Working in the Nut House

Sometimes it is hard to see the humor in a situation when you are the one in the middle of it. Well, I found a way to see the now obvious hilarity of working for an insane, cat loving, cougar at RRA, and like before, I am beginning to see the clear comedic value of my current job working for "The Man".

Ironically, I actually work for three women at the government institution that is the VA hospital. Yes, three. I have dubbed them little boss, middle boss and big boss. Little boss is a boss in name only, acknowledging that we are really more peers than anything else. Middle boss only appears to praise me to my face or to stir-up drama behind my back, depending on which way her bipolar pendulum is swinging on any given day, and big boss is the one who gives me my assignments and the one who usually protects me from middle boss's tantrums.

More about the holy trinity later. The most recent source of insanity has been provided courtesy of what I call our "rehab hires". I always wondered how the morons roaming the halls actually acquired the coveted government positions. In an enlightening conversation with Little Boss, I found my answer. There are several avenues to government employment; you can be an extremely qualified military veteran with a perfect record and a college education (like me), you can start working at the hospital while in high school as a part-time helper and simply stay put until they offer you full-time work, or you can get hired as part of a rehabilitation/ADA initiative. Yes, many of our blue collar employees are recovering drug addicts and mentally deranged individuals. Why they think a mentally ill person is the right guy to courier medications between floors or sort the mail in a hospital is beyond me. It does answer quite a few questions though.

Up until last Friday I was merely bemused and a bit wary of these particular employees. There is a medicine courier in our Brooklyn hospital who looks remarkably like the hunchback of Notre Dame and has the interesting penchant for screaming inappropriate rants at unsuspecting bystanders. Entering the elevator one day, he was able to screech out "Fucking fat-ass" at a woman who just missed the closing doors. He continued mumbling to himself as the elevator descended and exited the elevator just in time to scream another unintelligible insult at the first person he saw. When I asked about this peculiar man, all anyone would say is, "oh, that's just Allen". Okaaaay. This was before I learned about the "rehab hires" and I was left a bit confused.

Back at the Manhattan branch, I was sent to the basement on a supply run one day. The rather fascist supply girl barked at me to come back after 1:00pm. I learned that we are only allowed three of any given item and supply is only open one day a week from 1-4 in the afternoon. Okaaay. When I returned at the appropriate time, a line had formed and everyone was waiting anxiously for the disgruntled clerk. While we waited a man kept wandering into the hallway screaming "Do you know Paul Smith? Where is Paul? Where is Paaaaul!?" Everyone ignored him, which was my first indication that perhaps he was not addressing us directly. After he disappeared into the mail sorting room, the screeching began. The noises brought to mind the cries of Sloth from The Goonies. I was more than disturbed by the animal like noises coming from behind the wall, but what I found equally disturbing was the lack of response from my fellow line inhabitants. "Am I the only one hearing this!?" Seeing the zombie-like stares of those around me, I thought it best to keep my concerns to myself. Talk about Twilight Zone!

A short while later I learned about the unusual hiring practices employed by our great bureaucracy. I have not returned to the basement since and thankfully I have been able to avoid these employees except for the occasional lurching woman who pushes an empty cart around the hallways, until last Friday that is.

After conducting discharge rounds on Friday I grabbed a coffee and began reading over my notes on the way back to my office. I was walking through a set of double doors when a man emerged from them, holding the door behind him. Taking a sip of my coffee, I passed him with out a word. He turned almost immediately and shrieked "OH, you're not going to thank me for holding the door?" I glanced over my shoulder and mumbled "Thanks" and went back to my notes, thinking this was the end of it. I was mistaken. Half way down the hallway I heard the man come back through the door and he promptly began shouting his objections. "I don't hold the door for nobody and you not even gonna thank me? What is your problem bitch?!" I spun on my heels to face the barrage. Not today homie, not on a Friday! "Excuse me? I obviously was thinking about something other than you and I did not notice you" I began as he continued ranting, "You need to relax, calm it down man!" He continued grumbling as he retreated back out the door as the large travel clerk from my office came through. Her eyes became even more enlarged than usual as she asked me what the hell was us with him. She was rather impressed with my aggressive stance, commenting that "Felicia's the wrong one, she'll buck up on you!" Cackle, Cackle. I wonder what type of hire she was....

Let's recap: Crazy people and drug addicts roam the halls, the clerks I work with consist of an obese cackler who often is unable to complete her tasks because of the errant globs of cheese from her danishes and a man who sings to me under his breath. The office I inhabit is a storage room for another department and the man who runs that department likes to come in and simply hover. I have yet to figure out if he is trying to intimidate me or hit on me. He might be gay actually. I have three bosses, two of which exist only to alternate between befriending and sabotaging me and one who assigns me outlandishly huge jobs and they tells me that my good work is making other employees jealous. A large part of my position is to manipulate the other employees into giving me information to bring back to Big Boss and into thinking that I know what the fuck I am doing. Oh, and I am the lowest paid employee in the department.

One definitely flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, the question is who is crazier, the patients on the 17th floor psych ward or the employees making a larger salary than I am? Perhaps I am the nut, I am finally starting to see the hysterical reality that is my 9-5.

The Dead Zone

I found myself asking a familiar question today as I drudged down the gloomy gray staircase at the hospital, "How the hell did I get here?"

Yes, I have asked this question many times over the last few years. Today it was spurred-on by a meeting with my boss, a meeting that confirmed my paranoia was well placed and left me angry and deflated. Basically, I am doing a great job, but I need to do more menial work so other people in my department don't get jealous. Politics. She tried to reassure me by saying, "Don't worry, you have a great career ahead of you here, the rest of them are not going to go any farther." Wow, that might actually matter to me if I wanted a career in a government hospital!

Trudging back down the stairs to my shitty office (that I was told is not actually mine and will be recouped as soon as they can find another hole for me), I began to bitterly ask that tired old question. Immediately I heard my mother's voice in my head: "You wanted to live in New York. You are living the dream and this is just how you a paying for it!" My mother is not big on pity parties. But really, when am I going to start working in a field I actually want to grow in? When am I going to be able to answer the question, "what do you do", without giving a "but soon I'll be...." at the end of my job title? I hate to put all my eggs in one basket, but that seems to be precisely what I am doing with NYU. I just pray I get in, that my eggs don't all scatter and crack.

I signed-up to be a mystery-eater. It pays a whopping $15 per article plus the cost of the meal, but hell, if it turns out that it isn't a scam, it is a great way to practice my writing. Perhaps it can be a good preview of what life as a restaurant critic would be like. I am not sure if it will appeal to me at all, but as with most things, you won't know until you try.

Other than that little project, the rest of my day went by as usual. I left the hospital feeling utterly exhausted and dead inside. The government, or any uninspired work I suppose, can truly gnaw at your soul. I wandered down 1st Avenue to my CSA's Meet Your Farmer's event. There I heard two people talk about their food and their passion. It was nice to see pictures of fresh vegetables that made my mouth water. I began to feel a bit livelier.

See, when I get in "The Dead Zone", all I want to do is lye down and phase out. Bring on the coffin! I have to force myself out into the world where the pretty things I love, like food and friends and New York herself, can nurse me back to health. Spring seems to be here, but there are still some icy winds blowing through me.

One day I hope that my job, my day to day pursuits, will bring me to life instead of forcing me to fight-off spiritual death. I don't know what that will look like, but I am going to keep searching and experimenting until I do. For now I will cling to the remedies of gastronomical dreams and fanciful friends, for now I will bring myself back from the brink as best I can.

Bouncing Back

Well, it was one hell of a week! I had the most atrocious look of misery plastered on my face, there was no rallying. The gig took a huge turn for the worse when I was stripped of my office and put in a little box with two clerks, phones that never stop ringing and not an ounce of privacy. My foodie group was being somewhat unresponsive and I was feeling very bleak. Nothing could pull me out of this funk, not a wine tasting, not kind words from Gus, not a damned thing!

Well, I hit rock bottom today and miraculously bounced. Things began to turn in my favor when I spoke to my "big boss" about the unacceptable office situation and she was as outraged as I was. Then I got a surprise call from a fellow in our Brooklyn office asking if I would be willing to come conduct some cooking classes for his PTSD patients. This pleased me immensely.

I wandered down to the 14th St CSA and met the lovely woman who runs the program. I should have know that she would be great, she is after all one of my "food people"!

All this positivity was enough to prevent a complete brain aneurysm when I received a call informing me that I was going to be stuck with an outlandish car repair bill. Yes, I took that one like a man.

Feeling almost human, I went to my bodega and bought some "almost real" food. Nothing much, just some soup and a frozen Kashi pizza, but it's a start! It is baby steps with me and my oven. The thought of cooking is starting to feel a bit less nauseating. In my mailbox I found my gift subscription to bon appetit, inspiration! This made me smile.

I suddenly felt excited about the new possibilities. This weekend I am going to get my home back in order, relax in my own skin and maybe, just maybe buy some real food to start cooking again.

I smiled effortlessly for the first time in days, not a cynical smirk, but a summertime, breezy, heartfelt smile.

I know it seems crazy, my current aversion to my greatest pleasure, but the idea of cooking for one, pouring my heart into a dish with no audience in mind; it is heart wrenching. Last summer was different. Each dish was for me, but I also knew that the great successes would be repeated for D when he got back. Cooking is an art, it is meant to be shared. Cooking for yourself is more like painting your walls. I must start thinking of it as a way to live well. I typically begin to eat simple, healthy food when I am alone. No great effort or creativity put forth. It is utilitarian, not artistic expression. It pains me to think of cooking a beef burgenon in my new Le Cruseut for an empty house. Perhaps I can learn to create beauty for me though. I am at least going to try to begin sustaining myself!

I am feeling hope anew today. On one of the harder, uglier days the sun seems to have peeked through the clouds. I suppose it feels as though the hole in my chest is beginning to be filled, one grain of sand at a time. That has been my overwhelming ache this week. Emptiness and anger.

You see, I did not realize what a huge, gaping hole D. would leave in my heart. The excitement and contentment I felt coming home to him, cooking for him, laughing with him. I have tried to fill that blasted hole with cocktails, food (Poor fattie Fi!), friends, work, but it all just disappears in the void. This, of course, leaves me starving for more: more attention, more carbs, a better job to lose myself in. When it all fails, I truly feel like I have nothing. That's where the anger comes in.

I have been so angry at myself, who else is there to blame? I am angry about my paranoid delusion that my neediness is poisoning my group, my heart and everything in my life. I am angry about screwing up, because only a screw-up could have such a shitty life. I am angry that I am stuck in a stupid job that doesn't even serve as a distraction for me. I am angry that I thought things would be for the best this way. I am so damned angry for not knowing how hard this was going to be. I am furious that when it comes right down to it, I have nothing real in my life or on the horizon. That's how I felt anyways.

The rational side of my mind knows that I am starting a new part-time culinary job on Saturday, I have an EWI Bo Ssam Event on Sunday (and no one is turning against me, there is an ebb and flow in participation in the group), NYU is still a possibility, Keith is coming in March, Jo is coming in May, Gus has already planned me one birthday outing. Basically, things are good in my life, it is just my pained perspective that is discoloring it. Guess what though? The rational side is finally gaining the upper hand!

My heart is starting, every so slowly, to see the beauty, to allow for genuine smiles. I know this burst of euphoria will probably not last, but I have gotten to the point in my life where I realize that it is not the unwavering durability of happiness that makes it valuable, any appearance it makes is worth savoring. I no longer live in fear of disappointment (well, not all the time!), I relish the good moments, knowing they Will not last indefinitely.

Life is long;long enough to see us through the bad times that seem interminable, and long enough to allow us to revel in the good times that we wish would never end. Who knows what kind of day tomorrow will be, but for tonight I will cherish my easy smile and glimmers of hope.

The Gray Waiting Room

Waiting rooms can be places of anticipation, of fear, of boredom, of detachment.
The gray waiting room, with mere sadows pacing back and forth offers little joy. Looking out the window for a glimmer of beauty I see only gray clouds, no sunlight or signs of life to distract me. Distraction, that is the order of the day.

I move to another waiting room some days, this one is beige. There are a few distractions here; a joke, a smile, meaningless banter. Between these rooms, I search for signs of life beyond the walls,but those here with me seem to have found their home here. Even their dress reflects the monotone palate of the space. They are here and they aren't going anywhere.

I come to this place in the shadow of darkness and leave after the sparse rays of light have gone. My hours are good, much more limited than I have ever had before, but the weariness I feel seems to lengthen my days and steal my time away from this place.

I have been working here for a month now. I paint on a smile like a warrior puts on camouflage; just part of the uniform. I am good at my job, but I always am. My heart is not here though, it is too busy doing somersaults inside my chest. Watching the parade of sick old men come through my office affects me in ways I never expected.

I have never been squeamish before. I spent time in the hospital in Mosul, Iraq. Never was I taken aback or nauseated. The young wounded and ill, my brothers and sisters, they did not frighten me. The deteriorating lives I see on the wards and the infectous disease warnings that flash across my computer screen make my stomach jump. My compassion is stronger than my reservations, I touch the patients- a reassuring hug or pat on the shoulder, but this is always followed by a large dose of hand sanitizer when I am back in the confines of my little office.

I help them as best I can, but in a large bureaucratic organization, I am just one tiny piece of the machine. Reading the files I am filled with sorrow and rage as I read about men who destroyed themselves and who were destroyed by others. My job is not hard but it is heavy. I am just so tired.

I built my new life this year on the knowledge that your job does not define you, that life can be lived around your 9-5. I am struggling though. I need the life, the beauty, the hope that springs from my pretty past-times, but the gray exhaustion has consumed some of that. I find it hard to come home sometimes. I work a second job, make plans and go out, the gray exhaustion waits for me when I enter my apartment, throwing me into bed and pinning me down for anxious sleep.

My glimmer, my shining star on the horizon is starting school at NYU in January. Yesterday, as the impatient admissions aid told me that I had been wait listed, I felt my heart drop into my stomach and I felt my hands begin to shake slightly. For some reason, through all the little sorrows of the last few months, tears have not come for me, and yesterday was no different. How I long for tears, but my eyes are like deserts, instead re-routing all the anxieties in my life to the pit of my stomach.

Wait listed is not a no, I know that. I need this so badly though, I want to cling to it like a life raft when the gray walls begin to close in on me! I need a place in my life where intellect, creativity and passion can take me out of this waiting room, help me soar above it and see it as merely a tiny piece of my world, not the hulking megalith that stands before me now. But it is not a no. I will move forward as though it WILL happen. There is always a sweetness to painful longing, it is the knowledge that you have found something to desperately desire, kind of like being in love.

Perhaps it is not the room but the season. Winter is a gray bitch indeed. For now I will cling to my sweet distractions, continue to paint-on a smile and pray for the warm sun of springs yet to come.

Holy Shit It's Humpday of Week 7

Wow, time does fly! Every year it seems to go faster and faster. It scares me. I have always been so fearless and I think that came from the beautiful youthful freedom of believing in your own immortality. I'm not so sure about that anymore! Anyways, it's humpday and I am trying to get caught-up, trying to get the birds-eye view of my week. It helps my concentration having my boss on a cross-country flight to Alaska!

Well, I have done nothing but go home and sit on my ass so far this week. Hey, thank goodness it's only Wednesday! I have been working-out religiously, I have an EWI event planned for Sunday, I am writing right now, I need to work on my food studies personal statement. I need to figure out my recipe of the week, NYC experience and try to do something social. Looking at my calendar I have quite a bit of sitting-on-my-ass time scheduled. I guess that is good for working on my projects, but I am afraid of falling into old habits.

Hopefully, this week I will find out what the next step is for the VA job. I am not totally sold on it. It is better hours, a bit better pay, and a better title. What's not to like, right? I suppose I have gotten comfortable here. My job is silly and frustrating, but I have a few friends and some days are good. I guess I also don't want to feel bad when I quit to go to school. I would feel like a jerk if I took the job and then quit a few months later to go to NYU. What am I saying though, I did take the job. They offered, I tentatively accepted, now I need to start the pre-employment process. Nothing is easy or fast with the government! I am going to do what I always do, flog my fear by diving in headfirst. It is much easier for me than indulging the whiner within, the one clinging to the familiar. I do hope I can allow myself to cling to the familiar someday. To have a place to call home, a place where people know me and love me and are not going to be deployed or moved away from me on a two year rotation. Until then, I am going to cling to my other nature: brazen adventure and change.

Well, the day is young, we'll see what I can come-up with for the rest of the week.