Wuh oh

So, being in school has sparked a lot for me. Like, a lot. I've found "my people". I've found myself. I've found that there is nothing more in the world that I like than connecting with people minute after minute, hour after hour.

For the longest time, I thought of myself as a depressive loner, forever encased in my own self-loathing and fear of connection with other people. And I hated myself like that. I wanted to off myself so many times. It even got to the point that I asked...commanded...my boyfriend at the time to flush any and all sleeping pills and other drugs I could have used to do it, down the drain.

He thought I was nuts. And, in a big way, I was. But now I see that it was so much more than that. In an unrelated note, I recently found that he bought a house with his wife of almost six years. When I say it that way, I sound pathetic still wondering about him. But whatever. My understanding is that they got pregnant in January of 2004 and got married in March of 2004. He never was one to understand contraception.

But I have digressed. I'm making these connections with people and I'm fueling the desire, the burning aching desire within me to connect deeply and authentically with people. I remarked to my step mother the other day that all the drugs I ever did were really my attempt at finding what I have with this program.

Yet, now that I'm in this program, it's reawakening my desire to do those very drugs. The thrill of being with so many people in a real way, in a sacred way, has reawakened my interest in feeling this rush. I never want it to end. It's there in the morning and it's there when I go to bed at night. My coworkers love it because I make them feel wanted and heard. My dogs love it because they get more attention from me than ever before and I just seem to be tuned in to them. My husband loves it because we talk on a level we'd rarely gotten to before (though he doesn't like all the talking in the am). Yet, it's still not enough.

I want to be around these people 24/7. I want to move to a commune and mesh with everyone. I want to blur the ego boundaries and become one with all other people.

And so what do I do? I turn to Ebay. Because there I can find anything I want and have it within several days...usually for a relatively small fee. So, I'm outing myself. I'm an Ebay addict. And it's all because my school is doing good things for me. Fuck. Damn learning!

Tune In Next Week

As I sit here, waiting to fall asleep after a difficult day, I think of tomorrow. After two admissions interviews today, I'm left with the realization that I need to tell my boss that I am going to be reducing my hours starting this fall. Yikes.

I've resisted telling them so far because the last person who was discovered to be engaging in extra-curricular non-appraisal schooling was promptly fired. They stated it was because he had a "split-focus" but that was their excuse for coming up with a reason for firing him. Of course in the state of Washington, there's no need for an excuse to fire someone. It still seems unfair, though, yes?

So I sit here hoping that I'll be put in to one of the two schools, hopefully the one I didn't think I would like. I sit here, on the precipice of fulfilling some of my dreams in exchange for ridding myself of the pain of static life in a job I loathe. Well, gosh, when I put it like that it's pretty difficult to hold off on telling them.

Scary. But good.

Oh, and this coming week I will be going to Hawaii. I won't be getting back for two of our seed phrase weeks. We can take this opportunity to think about how awesome seed phrases are. ; )

Growth in Reverse

I'm not sure what the hell I was thinking when I spewed forth this phrase, but I'm sure it had something to do with graduate school. That seems to be all I can focus on lately. At least until I hear on my admission to the programs. Regardless, the phrase today makes me think of shrinking.

Alice in Wonderland shrunk at one point. And then she grew. But did she grow in reverse at first? Who knows?

I just typed the word "nows" before I replaced it with the proper word. Perhaps I'm growing in reverse, getting stupider. Not sure.

If it were truly growth in reverse, I'm thinking it'd still be growth. I have nothing awesome to add to this post. Here's hoping Neil comes up with a good seed phrase. Mine are generally lame.

How time flies

I just spent the last two months putting together two applications for graduate school. And now the wait. They were both completed as of late last week and I've yet to hear anything. That's not surprising, but it's grating.

I've been noticing how much less I'm interested in working lately. I turned in my most recent time sheet and I had a whopping 28 hours per week! Yeah. I'm ready to go. I've been ready for some time, but didn't have the cajones to man up and put together the stuff to get me in to school.

When I submitted my online applications to the schools (which was the first part of two for both of them), I got a (most likely automatic) response from them saying that they had received my information and that once my files were complete, they would forward them to the admissions committee.

Well, I'm sure they've been forwarded to the admissions committees respectively, but there's a tiny bit of me that is wanting to make sure that nothing was lost in the mail and that nothing was lost in their offices. I imagine that their office is just as disorganized as mine, so there's a possibility they haven't even gotten to it.

But the school year starts in less than two months so they need to get a hustle on it. September 29th for one and October 5th for the other. I prefer the school with the October 5th one because it's got a quarter system (better for coordinating vacations with my hubby!) and it's got regular classes (which I thoroughly enjoy). The other one has a semester system and there are regular "retreats" to go on to "facilitate learning." I know someone who graduated from that school and they thoroughly enjoyed it, but I'm just not sure I like the idea of staying in a hotel when I live so close (yep, it's weird).

On the good side of things, people who I have talked with in the industry tell me that I will likely be admitted to both programs and that both are more "enrollment-based" than "admissions-based." In other words, if I want to go and can demonstrate that I'm not a total nut-job, I'm in. Difficulty there? Demonstrating that I'm not a total nut-job. Hopefully I did it, but I know I come off like a loon in my blog and on my Facebook and on my Twitter, so why would I think I'd come off any different in an admissions essay?

This process feels like an elusive orgasm. I'm so so so close, but I'm just not sure when it's gonna happen. I'm not saying that happens regularly, or even at all, but it has in the past. And I know it's going to be ASTOUNDING when it comes, but for now I have to keep going and believe it's going to happen.

Did I just compare graduate school to sex? Well, at least I have my first case study. Me.

What's in the Middle of No Where

When I was 13 my mother decided to sell our house. My stepfather had been offered the opportunity to move to a different GM plant (he had been a supervisor for 30 years) or to retire. He had enough in his pension to retire and my mother was dead set against moving to wherever else it was they would transfer him.

The house didn't sell incredibly quick, but when it did, the people wanted to move in soon. My sister was old enough to live on her own at 19, but I had to be carted to another state. Though I was in an area that was decidedly middle-class (Garden Grove, CA), there was a lot of gang activity and I knew that the highschool I would be assigned to in the area was riddled with people who would like to see me terrified or bloodied. So moving to a new state with new opportunities sounded comforting. At least that's how it seemed.

It was April 28th of 1993 when my mom and I started our trip from Southern California northward. The creepy mover guys had arrived at our house earlier that morning to haul the boxes we packed and hopefully carefully move all the larger items (such as the circa 1800s mahogany hutch I will receive when my mother passes) to the truck. My room looked much smaller without all my crap in it and I knew I would miss it. I thought of the gangs again and quickly decided I'd be okay without the room.

The trip took about three days and would be the first time I had ever been to or through Oregon or Washington. Previously, my travels only landed me to Texas and Florida, the places my dad had lived where I stayed with him over the summers of my youth. Interstate 5 travels the entire way north, but AAA gave us the indication that there was a slightly better route that was less congested for a portion of the trip. They also pointed out Crater Lake and various other beautiful places for us to stop. The trip was beautiful. At least that's what I remember from the occasional times I would wake from my quasi-coma. You see, about two days before the move, I had contracted a stomach flu. We stopped at many places when I needed to vomit or simply needed to not be in a moving car.

The skyscape changed dramatically from the beautiful spring weather of California to the moderate weather of Oregon, to the dingy skies of Washington. We were renting a house in Lacey until my mother and stepdad would find a place they wanted to live. Note that I, being 13, had no say in the matter. Having raised me the entirety of my childhood in urban/suburban areas, having previously lived in LA County until age 6, my mom got it in her head that it would be wise for me to live in the country. Perhaps she knew about the gangs I would have encountered in SoCal. Perhaps she just wanted to torture me. Any other mother who provided guidanace to her child instead of not having any worthwhile advice would have probably served me well with what I encountered. But not her.

Instead, I was trapped in the middle of nowhere in an unincorporated town with roughly 1,000 people where, at 13, I was having to cope with not only the challenge of starting highschool, but also of a dramatic cultural shock of moving from the big city to...um... a teeny town where everyone knew everyone else.

I struggle to put in to words precisely what made it so traumatic, but even now sometimes the thoughts of it bring to mind the terrifying feelings the first few months held.

Looking back on it now, having achieved some semblance of a normal adjusted life and some perspective, I handled life there pretty well. I did well in school. I didn't piss off too many people. I made friends. I did afterschool activities. I didn't die. But what I am starting to think is that what you encounter in the middle of nowhere is the same as what you'd encounter in the middle of everywhere. Just with a lot less distractions.

Pleaver

While Neil went with the Jenna Jameson angle...I went with the "Hey, pleaver kind of sounds like cleaver" thing. Probably because it would be awesome to chop my work annoyance with a cleaver.

But as I sit here trying to put together a blog club post on Pleaver, I am realizing that I have absolutely nothing to say about Pleaver. I was uninspired when I picked it and chose it for lack of anything else to say. So was I surprised when it produced a blah post by me? Not really.

My mind is completely blank. So. Either Neil will produce a fabulous blog club seed phrase for next week or I'm going to produce yet another blah post.

And it's been really effing hot lately. Like 103 degrees. In Seattle. I actually wore a dress.

What I pretend not to know.

We all have intuition. We all read body language. We all see things that we choose to ignore.

What comes to mind this past week as I've gone over the week's seed phrase is what I should use for the definition of "pretend." To me, I hear the word as suggesting a conscious decision to ignore something or to not let on that I know it. But there's also the subconscious workings that keep me from acknowledging something. That's not where I'm going with this, though.

There are things that I consciously decide to ignore. Some of them are the personal: I eat icecream knowing that I am going to Hawai'i soon. I pretend that it has no calories. Some of them are professional: Often I hear a client asking me to commit fraud. I pretend not to notice that they've asked me and then decidedly do not commit the fraud. Some of them are self-preserving: I know people that I'm very aware of who use their power in an abusive fashion, but so I don't get fired I ignore it for the moment. Some of them are a female's thing: I often see men who I am disgusted by checking me out and I pretend that I don't realize it's what they're doing. I play along because it's just how life goes.

Other than that, I'm pretty sure that I acknowledge everything that comes in my path...that is as long as I have the time. Yep, what it comes down to is me having to ignore a lot of crap because I don't have time to deal with it. And, that's also part of why I am heading to graduate school: most of what I pay attention to is people's intentions and problems. I want to help people and I want the academic training necessary to provide me with the models, etc that can help me help people more.