Sorry, I'm a sucker for this shit...

Good Enough

This morning I "woke up" (I use the phrase loosely - insomnia has been plaguing me significantly over the past week) around 7:00 and realized I hadn't passed on some semi-significant information the day before re: someone that I am case-managing. So I turned the bedroom light on and made the call - we are a 24 hour facility. In my groggy state I conveyed the info.

A problem: I am literally case-managing in my sleep, I find myself in a half-sleeping half-waking state each night going over ridiculous, weird, inconsequential minutinae re: my cases. I lie there, twisting and writhing beneath the sheets, and oh yeah, my back is fucking killing me, so I'm negotiating a "comfortable" position, too, a comfort that lasts on average about 15 minutes before I feel compelled to switch positions and blah blah blah and wah wah wah and etc etc etc, oh fuckin' A.

Speaking of negotiating, I'm definitely still negotiating the waters of this job. I have a really bad tendency to cast internal doubt on many of the things I do there, second-guessing myself, feeling uncertain about how I am perceived by others, waking in the middle of the night thinking about the way I handled a given situation and whether I did it properly.

I do have allies at work, tremendous supports who have gently reminded me of the need to relax and do what I can do with the time and resources and knowledge that I currently have.

The other night I was reading from the "Daily Reflections for Lent" that my mom had given me some weeks back. I'm really not into the God Stuff, but am not arrogant enough to say there's no wisdom to be gleaned from some of it. A passage is quoted:

I cannot do anything on my own;
I judge as I hear, and my judgment is just,
because I do not seek my own will
but the will of the one who sent me. (John 5:30)

Yeah, ok, WTF? Quoting scripture now, are we? The author of the little reflections book goes on to mention an unattributed quote:

"I have all the time I need to do all that God intends me to do this day."

This was something I needed to read, I needed to absorb. I have been freaking on some level almost every day recently, and I need to calm. the fuck. down. I never would have guessed that this job would cause and inspire so much self-examination, but it has. It's stressful on one level (ok, several levels) but challenging/rewarding on other levels.

I am where I need to be, for now. And I'm good enough.

Lights Out

I really need to find a way to not dream about work. Another thing - I realized tonight that my blogging habit has suffered not because of TV as I suggested a few posts ago, but because work has been totally fucking draining. This is mostly because I'm learning and absorbing so much, and every day since I started on February 25th has been packed to the max.

It's been stressful. And that's pretty fucking boring. I'm going to take a Vicodin tonight I think, 'cause I'm desperate for the kind of sleep where I don't even realize I'm in bed. I want to be nowhere. Wake up and feel like I've no idea what just happened. Every night lately I feel aware of the bed and the effort to sleep and even when I'm dreaming I know that I'm dreaming and my awareness of the world is never shut off.

So I guess I'm kind of saying don't give up on reading my blog, because at some point it might get more interesting. I don't want to fill it with work talk, and that's pretty much all I feel capable of, and that's not what I want to do. Something's gotta give at some point, and I know it will, but for now I have to just keep on.

Last night I counted ducklings in my efforts to sleep, because they are soft and pure and yellow and uncomplicated. It helped only a little. I have a knack for finding sadness everywhere, even in the fuzz of a duckling.

Ghost

I've been slightly obsessed with this video since I first saw it. It's just killing me.

I'm still kind of hating on/resentful of Blogger. Every time I log in to this blog with my Google account I hate on them. God I just want it back to the way it was, it just annoys me to feel like I've been swept into their streamlining efforts. I did set up a Wordpress account the other day, but unfortunately I much prefer the look/template of my Blogger page - seems easier to view, read, etc. Wordpress does seem more versatile in some ways, and definitely less "corporate". I'll post the link here if I switch. I need to try and sleep and hopefully not do too much case management problem solving in my dreams.

Which reminds me. Tonight one of my "cases" (what a dumb, ugly word for a person) told me, as she stared very intently into my eyes under the garish overhead light in her kitchen, " I had a dream about you, you were in my dream. You were a ghost. You were in the woods. It was your eyes, Clare, it was a nightmare! You were a ghost! It was a nightmare!" I said, "Well, touch me, I'm here!" She smiled her mischievous, sweet smile, and we both started giggling. She raised her arms up, and said "Come here, let me hug you," so we hugged, a huge, hard, bear hug.

Secretly I wondered about the dream.

Flesh

Strange to say,
but my ankles hurt
yup like calcified rubber bands
they ache a bit
my toes are in total disagreement
particularly the nails
pink
the kind that says
Nothing could be better
I'm looking forward to some shoes
something flashy yet demure
something trashy
luxurious
worthy
tactile
that you might secret to the side
why because you like the smell of leather
and perfume, very simple
and the absence of my foot
simpler still
Everyone knows
the power of absence
the negative space
full then empty
and a vacuum is abhorred
as they say
Everyone knows
you're gone
but not for long.

Guilty

Geeked out on Court TV again tonight. The television is definitely bad for my blog habit. I mean, I still completely forget to even turn it on, but when I do, it's not good, 'cause I get sucked into things like E! True Story Jenna Jameson, and Forensic Files, followed by Dominick Dunne's Power, Privelege and Justice followed by Suburban Secrets. OK, look, I know I suck. I should consider swearing off that dumb fucker. But John Waters is hosting a new show on Court TV called Til Death Do Us Part! C'mon, John Waters!

In defense of myself and my newly coined habit, I was also online in the midst of this TV orgy, thanks to the beauty of wireless, and I managed to pen a decent email to this dude who lives in Cornwall, England who happens to have the same muscular disorder as me, Paramyotonia Congenita. He is the first and only person in my entire life that I have ever had contact with that shares the same disorder, so it's been interesting writing back and forth w/ him. This all started last week. He seems like a nice guy, has a wife and a couple of kids. We'll probably chat/IM at some point - I'm just really curious about his experiences, and how they compare to mine.

I had it in mind to write some more free verse tonight, I really want to, but I also really need to try and catch up on sleep. It's been bad this week, my sleep/lack of, and I have so much to learn at work - being sleep deprived is not helping that situation any. I'm sitting and staring at the computer screen. I learned how to play Yahtzee today, for reals. No, I've never played that game before in my life. Now I'm getting all hot for the dice. I started to have an inkling of the weird obsession that a few of my friends have for dice games. I totally want to do at least a half-assed psychological analysis of the dice phenomenon, 'cause there's something about it.

My Yahtzee score was 253. I got the bonus 35 points for totalling 63+ points in the upper score sheet. I still lost. This has to end. The post, I mean.

Commute

High beams
really bring out your gypsy moth rings,
sweet maple trees
you line this road
and I wonder if you remember me
at eighteen, barefoot
the hot, glassy asphalt
punishing
I pushed
on through the public recreation area
a sight
for safe eyes
mothers, children, fathers.
I wasn't safe
still you watched
solemn, indifferent
and I wouldn't have it any other way
no, we needed it
my feet, and me
we
kissed the black ring
scarring your bark
old and tough and
free.

Fuck You, Blogger

Baby Blogger Drama

I'm so totally and completely po'd right now b/c fucking Blogger made me switch. I had been magically eluding this phenomenon that I kept seeing other bloggers bitch about. There was one other time when they tried to make me switch and there was something - something - that I did to prevent it from happening. I'm just used to the old blogger, what can I say. The technology wasn't broken, it was perfectly clear to me, and now I'm worried it's either going to be so dumbed down that it will simply be insulting, or else complicated in unneccesary ways. Fuck. Cranky. Should be sleeping. Worked a 2nd and I'm basically just being a grumpy baby about this blogger shit, but oh well. My posts have been sucking, it's been duly noted in a note to myself.

Addendum! The outrage continues! Now you have to agree to their terms of service when it comes to uploading photos, something I just attempted to do, but then decided against after having read the terms, which in nutshell state that Google has the right to copy any images from your blog to use as they see fit. This is total bullshit. I may need to find a new place to blog. I'll let you know where it is, if and when I find it. I'm not down with this brave new world shit. I feel like my blog has been violated. It gives me the creeps.

Kill Your Television

Just kidding. Thought I'd be a little dramatic, act like I've had some major change of heart when it comes to the TV. I don't need to say anymore other than that I watched American Idol tonight to prove that. But...I then exercised judicious self-control, and turned it off.

All is silent now, and that is good. Like in the before-times, before this Sunday. Tonight I feel stupidly wistful. It's partially an influence of the red wine, something I like to drink when it's freezing outside. And it's partially the influence of a strangely forgiving attitude I have today towards a couple of people I normally feel little softness for, these days. Which isn't to say I feel enough bitterness towards them on a regular basis to ruin my day or anything, just... I don't normally feel very soft towards them.

I don't usually think of good things they said and did and remember the goodness, but tonight I was doing that. I suppose it's not a bad thing. It is a slightly bizarre thing, because I found myself getting annoyed with myself for thinking warm thoughts of these people. Yeah, I know it's totally fucked up, what I'm saying. I'll stop.

Now I have the Tom Jones song It's Not Unusual stuck in my head. That in turn makes me think of The Simpsons Tom Jones Episode, which in turn makes me think of a certain house I lived in during the early-mid nineties, which in turn makes me think of my boyfriend then, and a few subsequent sweet, messy, confused but earnest affairs after we separated.

I think of things I did carelessly, breathlessly, feeling I had no choice. With one person. I had no choice. How something so fervent and unstoppable never ended in sex. Never. This chasteness we preserved. We had no choice. His eyes are still bottomless pools, to me, I could paint his face from memory. His name is still on the bricks of my old patio. He saved me without knowing it, long after the fact of our romance. He plans to marry now, a beautiful and talented girl. He is still my friend.

I wasn't talking about him, in the beginning. But I will talk about him at the end, even the very end. Wistful, I said I was stupidly so.

This is just fucking creepy.

Cheating

Can't write tonight, at least not right now, and who knows about later. So I've had the Smog song Vessel in Vain stuck in my head all day. The song is so beautiful, download it or something if you've never heard it:


I can't be held responsible for the things I say
For I am just a vessel in vain
And I can't be held responsible for the things I see
For I am just a vessel in vain

No boat out on no ocean
No name there on no hull
And it's not a strain at all to remember
Those that I've left behind
They're all standing right here beside me now
And most of them with a smile

My ideals have got me on the run
Towards my connection with everyone
My ideals have got me on the run
It's my connection with everyone

Such free reign
For a vessel in vain

Fully Loaded

OK, so as of this weekend I have cable TV. Do cable guys come out on the weekend? Well, if they're the son of the landlady and a personal friend they do.

I'm totally geeking out on Forensic Files right now. So basically this post is going to suck. I'm not a big TV person, but I got used to certain things like Comedy Central and FF when I rented from my sister for a few years and shared her cable. I've been without it since moving last summer, so I've got this bad sort of TV-junk-food-fuzzy feeling right now.

Tonight The Daily Show is apparently supposed to be doing a feature on a town very near to mine, having to do with a church and a sound system - obviously I'm psyched to see what their take on the town is. A friend of mine hilariously came up with the idea some years ago that the entire Eastern half of CT (east of the CT river) be renamed with this town's name. You would get it if you lived here. I'll explain it in another post.

It's hard to focus when you're watching Psychic Detectives for the first time in 8 months. I said this post would suck. I'm aware of the fact that TV is slightly evil. Junk food, like I said. Don't think I'm enjoying it. I don't care at all if psychic detective Phil Jordan ever figures out this quadruple execution style homicide at a plant nursery/coin dealer. I'm just killing time til the Daily Show.

Other Related Duties

Tonight at work I had to spend over two hours removing fecal matter from a variety of surfaces at one of our clients apartments. I was thankfully assisted by another staffer (yes, TWO of us over there for TWO HOURS) Perhaps my fellow staff/shit-cleaner-upper said it best: "I've lived 52 years and I've never seen anything like that."

If I say it was bad, and I say it was "everywhere" and that the bathroom looked like a shit-bomb had exploded in there, you might come up with an image. Take that image, and multiply it times 10. Really. It was unfuckingbelievable.

I guess, in a situation like that, some other faculty takes over, and you just deal with it. I'm going to leave out the disgusting details. But know that we had to throw out, in double-bagged trash bags - towels, bathroom rugs, a mop, a scrub brush, blankets and sheets, clothing, a, um, ladle. Fuck, you don't want to know why the ladle got involved. Trust. You don't. It's a distinct possibility that tomorrow the entire sofa will be out by the dumpster. Tonight, it's still in the apt., covered in giant trash bags.

Really, really, this isn't what my job is supposed to be about. We interact with our clients, just usually not quite so - intimately. The extent of the mess makes little to no sense to me. We were about as Hazmat-ed out as you could get under the circumstances. I'm still going to take a shower before bed.

I have nothing to drink here tonight except a scant shot of Baileys, which I sipped at and is now gone. I think by nothing I mean no beer. There's one bottle of wine. There's a bit of gramp's whiskey. I still have this smell in my nose. I'm worried it will give me bad dreams. Maybe tonight I'll use Vicks just for kicks. Mmmmyah that and the whiskey. Death to the deadly particulate trapped in my sinuses!

Cases

I've been having a hard time posting lately, so the usual apologies are in order to anyone who checks in here. I started the new job this week, on Sunday. I work tomorrow and then I don't go back til Sunday afternoon. Sweet.

So far it's been good. There is a lot of information I have had to absorb, and boatloads more coming my way. The staff, and my supervisor, have done a good job of making me feel like everything is going to be ok, that I will get it, that it will be fine. So, for the most part, I have felt fine.

The critical part of my job involves documentation and record keeping. Documentation, sure, I can do that. Record keeping, especially as it relates to money, bills, and billing, and it all relates to money, bills, and billing...mm...not my first pick favorite thing to do at all. I will find away to deal with it. It's that simple.

One thing I have noticed is that it is making me pay more attention to my own financial crap, which I am notoriously languorous about dealing with. I mean, I basically pay my bills on time, the ones that count (read: the ones that don't charge too much of a late fee or penalty or send your bills to collection agencies after a couple months.) For instance I lowered the APR on my one credit card last night by 3 points after calling to complain it was too high.

It's a little frightening to be in charge of organizing other people's critical medical and financial affairs. I have found myself fruitlessly trying to ward off invasive and chattering thoughts in the middle of the night regarding the clients I am working with. I am going to have to bank on the healthy assumption that these thoughts will decrease or become less frequent as I feel more comfortable in my capacity to take care of all the affairs I need to take care of. That can only come with time.

If the opposite occurs, if the thoughts don't diminish or worse, increase, I will ultimately seek another line of work. I am decidedly against the idea of "taking work home with you", but there's a slightly built-in clause when doing social work that you end up doing that to a degree whether you intend to or not. Many of the people I work with seem quite happy and not terribly overwhelmed. I just wish I could get there now.

Um, yeah, I know this post is boooorrrring. Sorry. I'm tired. I'll try harder soon.
Happy March!