What's Going On

It's been almost two weeks since my last post and I feel guilty about it. Here's a post to help us catch up some.

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The biggest thing keeping me from writing has been the sheer amount of pain I've been living with recently. Lucy's last day of work was over a week ago and ever since then I've been absolutely miserable at work. I've been unhappy in the store for a long time, but I've stayed on because it was a place where we were guaranteed some time together. Even if it varied from week to week and even if it was hell trying to behave and not be too flirty or touchy-feely, it was the bulk of our time together. Now that she's gone I don't know where or when I'll get to see her again. It's killing me.

She has managed a couple visits this past week, during times when her husband has gone for classes and she keeps the car to run errands. (Sure, her husband has his own car, but he only drives her. His car doesen't run well from disuse, and there's even weeds growing from it. The hypocrisy is that last winter he made a special trip just so he could bring this car from his parents.) These visits are absolutely wonderful. Heavenly. But they can only last a few hours and then she has to go or I have to go to work. The loneliness sets in quickly once Lucy's left.

Loneliness, this is where most of my difficulty comes from. I'm extremely lonely. So lonely, so pervasively alone that it's been near impossible for me to much of anything at all. The pain has been unmitigating.

To cope, I've withdrawn myself into my DVD collection. Complete TV show seasons, more specifically. It's still small so I replay the same few things over and over until I get absolutely sick of them. For example, I have the first four Aqua Teen Hunger Force seasons and I haven't watched in years because I overdid it in the past. Nowadays it's been Space Ghost: Coast to Coast Volume Three and Family Guy Volume Four.

I can't watch anything too serious, either, because I'm in a really sensitive and fragile position. Today I put in Young Frankenstein on a lark and that was almost too much.

These are tactics of avoidance, I know, but I don't have any other way to manage yet. Therapist J suggested I turn to the internet and an online community somewhere to fill the emptiness somewhat while I work on making real-life friends, but I find the online world very frustrating. I find myself lost in the ocean of posts and comments and replies and I don't have the patience to sit and read everything.

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Things were only made worse this past weekend when I drove to Cleveland to visit with a couple of old friends and to help with their Halloween party on Saturday.

They're good friends, but not close ones, really. Not as close as I'd like. I was awkward around them as we got ready for the party Saturday afternoon but as soon as my older brother and his wife showed up my anxiety skyrocketted and I closed right up. It wasn't until my brother and his wife left the next day (we stayed the night in Cleveland) that I was able to relax and talk and have fun in my friends' company.

Of course, having fun with other people just made it all that much harder to come home. As soon as I said goodbye and walked out the door I was in agony and I felt like breaking down. The four hour drive back was absolute torture.

***

Now that Lucy has left the store, I've been feeling the urge to leave too. I hate retail and I hate the store and I can't stand the managers and I dislike my coworkers. I hate the bullshit tasks I'm given and I hate the corporate nonsense.

But do I really want to find a new job? Job hunting is one of the hardest things for me to do. Searching, making phone calls, applying, and interviewing—the entire process is so stressful and draining and full of unknowns that I'm afraid to begin. Actually, the search itself is really daunting. I'm so sensitive and have such a low threshold for stressful situations and human interaction that most jobs are out of the question.

What I really want to do is teach. With my degree I'm qualified to teach at the college level, and I've taught five or so photo classes for my grad assistanceship. When I met with a former profesor almost a month back (not this one) she said another university in town had an opening for an adjunct to teach photo and she gave me the name of someone to get in contact with. I had my hopes up on getting this job, but the position was filled while I was waiting for them to reply to my emails asking what materials they wanted.

I'm disappointed that I didn't even get a chance to apply. And now that I've got the idea in me, I really do want to teach! But it's going to have to wait now while I try and get a job that'll pay the bills. Teaching as an adjunct doesn't pay well at all and I'd have to teach several classes in order to make ends meet, which is won't work for me, especially since I still have doubts about my ability to teach one class. My plan now is to get a different part time job first, one that pays better than what I'm earning now, and then branch out from there.

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I've been working on this post on and off for over a day and it's gotten a little long, so I'm going to make this a multi-parter.

Take care, y'all!