my boring life story

Nothing at all from Neighbor today. Including no pay but I’m hoping he does his usual visiting L this weekend and I can remind him then. Or actually I’m going to send him a reminder tonight and then try Giving A Meaningful Look at him tomorrow when/if he turns up. Bad enough I only got to work for less than half of what I’d expected after sorting on Tuesday night. We’re not gonna give it to me now either? Nah bruh. Pay up.

Pretty uneventful day otherwise.

Now I’m gonna get gross. One of the things about losing this weight is that everything that was bulging in the wrong places is getting squishy and saggy now. Well, apparently I have picked up a skin infection under where some of it is sagging. The infection at least is not bacterial, as far as I can tell. Thank fuck. And I already had skin cream for the other kind and am currently treating it. But I’m starting to wonder what I should do to prevent this happening. I don’t know how I’m managing to feed fungus in the first place. Spot-checked fasting sugar, it was 108 mg/dl. I probably still get dawn phenomenon so I consider that pretty good. I’ve gone as low as the high 80s before, since I’ve moved here. But anyway. What the fuck is up with that? Maybe lowering your blood sugar only plays the numbers and you can still be a sitting duck for yeast and other nonsense? I dunno. I got nuthin’.

I am just paralyzed and sad lately. I basically hate everything, but do not have the energy to scream about it.

I did almost post something really nasty though, and I don’t mean medically. Nuh-uh. I let myself turn into a raging asshole with Matt. I’m not letting anyone do that to me anymore. If you’ve been awful to me, just keep on being awful elsewhere if that makes you happy. Just try to be aware of what you’re choosing and of the fact we can ALL see you. Good luck with that.

L had an eye appointment today. No idea what’s going on there, only that it’s some kind of “emergency” — far as I could ever tell, she sees just fine. I dunno. I’ll likely never get the details on that and I suppose it’s none of my business anyway. (I think I got too used to Matt oversharing about his health problems.) Point is, medical resources in Crescent City are pitiful and she had to go out of town to get this care. And since it’s eyes, Neighbor had to be designated driver. And since they had to go out of town, it was left to me to give the dogs their second feeding at noon. Cool, so I’m paying for the privilege of babysitting dogs now. And I can barely come up with the money.

Went over to Neighbor’s and he hadn’t done any of the three remaining scutwork items yet. I should have just done them all, but I can’t afford to piss him off right now. So I did one and left him the other two. If the universe loves me even a little, he’ll only do one and leave me the final one. I think we’re seeing some pretty good evidence that not only does the universe not love me, it’s a fucking sadist too. At least with this I’ll have forty dollars this week, can give L thirty and get incidentals with the other ten. It’s not a lot but it’s something.

It’s funny that he asked me Tuesday night if I was buying food with my money. I told him no, I was getting things like coffee with it to sort of round things out. Maybe I should have mentioned my fucking phone bill and L’s request for half utilities because I’m pretty sure he was planning to pull the rug out from under me then and just wanted to check and make sure it was okay first.

It boggles my mind that he doesn’t just GO TAKE A FUCKING WALK EVERY DAY. Why won’t he just do that. It’s more exercise and it’s more OFTEN because if this is how he’s going to get exercise then AT BEST he might do it three days a week, and it won’t be three days most weeks, especially if (IF) he lets me keep doing some of it. (I don’t trust this possibility at all. I’m gonna get fucked hard soon, and not even the way I’d wanted to.) I have a theory, though. I think he misses doing this specific thing. If I explained why, you’d get it, but I can’t explain why without running into the reason I don’t describe what it is in the first place. It’s one of those things that shouldn’t be a problem but for some people, would be, and it’s not my story to tell. I may not have the same reservations about it once I am not living here anymore, especially if this sort of nonsense continues to happen, but for now I have to play nice because too much is at risk. I would feel more ownership of it and not want to tell if people were playing fair. That’s not what’s happening.

I know what some people will think. “They’re letting you live there for free!” Have you seen the going rates for dog boarding? Especially of four large dogs? For a week? I know I still come out ahead even with that, getting more than L would have paid for boarding but goddamn it, this situation was presented to me in a specific way and has been like this for everyone else who’s done it and NOW, ALL OF A SUDDEN, it’s a fucking problem. It is ALWAYS a problem with me. It’s not just L and Neighbor. It’s everyfuckingone. It would be one thing if I were playing loud music at 2am or breaking windows or doing drugs or falling-down drunk (or drunk at all) and belligerent or bringing strange men home and then fucking them loudly and then letting them pay me afterwards. I’m not doing any of that. Why do people always end up wanting me dead when I’ve literally done nothing to them? Because that’s what it is. None of you want to face that, but if I have to, you can certainly look at it for five fucking seconds. Casting me out to fend for myself is wanting me dead. No one can go through life alone. No, not you either. Try again, Rambo. People do help you.

I need to quit crying about it though. I’ve made some dumb choices that hurt me, too. It isn’t just other people. Hell, just keeping that job at Quantum last year would have landed me in a better situation than the one I’m in now. I could have cashed in my retirement plan to fix my fucking car if need be. Well, that ship has fucking sailed. Here I am at everyone else’s fucking mercy again… and they have no mercy. And I will never understand why.

It particularly hurts coming from him.

He sent out another rough draft of his current book to try to entice more paying subscribers to his Substack. I’m a free subscriber, so I got the email. So here’s something interesting. I know his mother passed away five years ago. The passage he shared, which is from a book about her death, takes place when her decline began. So let’s say that was maybe six years ago. Maybe sooner. I think she had pancreatic cancer and that bastard works fast. But let’s say six years. Well, I’m pretty sure he met L in 2010. And he mentions a woman named Amanda who had just “left” and therefore he had moved back into his mother’s house. There are two possibilities here. Amanda could have been his mother’s caretaker. But Amanda could also have been a live-in girlfriend. If the latter, there’s a strong possibility he is not actually with L.

And that’s just the sort of person I am that I’ll gloss over a man’s mother dying and use that to try to figure out if he’s single. Jesus Christ, I’m an asshole.

But it doesn’t operate on a switch and I can’t turn it off. The bulb will burn out given enough time and distance, I suppose, and then there’ll be nothing to change it out for, and then I’ll feel better. I don’t know when that will be. Hope it’s an incandescent. I’m sick of this shit.

I just don’t want to feel anything anymore. Life would be so much easier.

[edit]

Neighbor messaged me a little while ago to say that he thinks he might have some other paid work for me to do. Turns out we weren’t done with the cleanup around the outside of his house from the mess Mack left from some work Mack did for him. So that’s one thing but maybe there’s something else. I am trying not to get too attached to any outcomes (shit, he still hasn’t paid me for this week), but I said okay, whatever works for you.

L actually messaged me when she got back from her appointment to tell me about what they found, seemed pretty friendly, so part of me wonders whether she had a chat with him about the situation.

Had a bit of (friendly) back-and-forth with C who says he’s calling his lawyer tomorrow to try and get a timeline on things. I refuse to get my hopes up. All I know is that if this works out it’ll have me set for a bit. I just have to remember real hard this time that I can’t count on any more money so I have to make that last as long as I possibly can. Though if the whole thing happens, I am definitely getting hiking boots and new pants and a fucking bicycle. I have to do that much. I know $1000 in reserve will be enough to travel on if I have to, at least.

Tentative plan by the end of this weekend: figure out the midterm annotation test for the proofreader course and then just do it. I get two free attempts which means I get one retry, and then after that they’re $50 apiece. I can take as much time as I want, though. Sooooo… We’ll see.

Got up earlier than usual and especially earlier than after a meat-sorting night because something tickled the inside of my right nostril and it didn’t feel like a fuzz, it felt alive. Cast about and looked here and there, a neat trick without my glasses, but the baby spider scuttling away from me across the mattress was just big enough not to miss. I pinged it the rest of the way in the direction it had been going and tried to go back to sleep but kept thinking something was crawling on me again. I’m not half as scared of spiders as I used to be, but I still don’t want to be crawled all over when I’m sleeping. And then a larger one decided nothing would do but that she should come down the wall from the ceiling and say hello, so I got my spider-catching tub and put her out the window. And then nature called and then I gave up on sleep.

Went over later to start in on the week’s scutwork and knew there were at least eight items, wasn’t 100% sure. On the way in I saw Neighbor walking Hercules back up his long driveway, and I was going at a faster clip than he was (if you walk a dog properly, that’s a given) and so caught up with him. He greeted me and then informed me that his doctor wants him to get more exercise, so he thought he’d get some of the scutwork done too.

This on the heels of L saying she wants money out of me.

I’m not gonna argue with his needing exercise (no, he’s not fat, though I suppose he qualifies as overweight possibly, but I know he sits a lot) but I’m confused why this necessitates taking income out of my hands; simply going for a walk daily would suffice. I’ve heard no complaints about how I do what I do. All I know is one of these two fine people wants my money and the other wants to give me less of his. No reason given. Just this nonsense. I did what I usually do faced with this sort of bullshit and mentally shut down and did not argue because I don’t know where the fault lines are and I could end up losing everything.

I will tell you what, I never expected for people of this particular background, philosophy, and caliber to put me into a situation like this. They even cost me my job when I finally got one because they knew fucking well I had it and she dumped on me anyway (don’t even fucking tell me she didn’t know about that trip at least a month out, and she didn’t tell me until a week prior) and then he didn’t help. What on fucking earth. And I still feel like she wants to kick me out but is just afraid I’ll raise a huge stink. Well, she should be fucking afraid. You know what? I’ve learned my lesson from what I went through with Matt, though. It won’t be raising a stink the way we normally understand raising a stink. It’ll just be… a review of my experience, with everyone’s names on it and right out where she can see it. If I leave out the loaded language and just describe what happened, how bad is that really? And if she’s still offended or anyone else gets upset… what? I’m just reporting. Don’t shoot the messenger, man.

But yes. If she boots me, I will say something. I don’t know what it is with assholes just thinking I’m gonna keep my mouth shut when they mistreat me. So she would be best served to continue the status quo until either I actually do something wrong or I decide to leave.

Things look better on a couple other fronts:

Doug called last night and it sounds like he’s got EmmaLeah the first weekend of November, and weekends are my least busy time for once, so as long as no one pulls any funny shit with this like they did with my JOB, I should be free too, so he wants to pick me up and go down to see the redwoods at the same place we saw them in 1989. I think I have passed what he’s talking about on 101 and it’s got Paul Bunyan out in front of the gift shop. So that’ll be a gas. I’m curious to see if he’ll be amenable to talks about future arrangements or might even bring up the subject himself. He’s spoken before of trying to get custody of EmmaLeah and if he did, he’d need help probably. I don’t want to live with him, but if he’s changed as much as he seems to think he has, maybe it’ll be all right. But at minimum I’m going to sound him out about options if L kicks me out. I have no assurance that won’t happen, the way she’s moved goalposts on several other things.

C emailed me this morning with pay offers on two specific jobs he wants me to do. IF he gets the windfall he is expecting and that he needs to make that happen, I’ll end up earning a good chunk of what I would have gotten had I been able to keep the Walmart job for that whole month. My only complaint so far is that I know me and I will get my fucking hopes up and then something will happen and then the money won’t. But if that’s not how it turns out, well, it’ll be nice to have that cushion.

Okay. I need to go cook some food. I’ve had several pieces of bacon and some coffee so far today and me being hungry isn’t going to help anything. Maybe add more later, I dunno.

[edit]

I forgot to mention I had nine pieces of scutwork this week — for the new, that’s $10 a piece. I’ve gotten three done. I do not know how many he will do. If he does more than four, I am fucked. I need to make up the $10 from my first weekly payment to L, and then have more money than that: the thirty for week two and then some more.

If I have at least three to do tomorrow I will be okay. If there are four or five I may just do two trips and finish the whole thing, because fuck him. Normally I space it out because one, that’s easier on me physically and two, he said he prefers the work spread out over two or three days. Well quit moving the fucking goalposts and then I might care what you prefer, boyo. Jesus.

What confuses me about this whole situation is I feel like I’m being frozen out BUT, we just got done a few weeks ago discussing some kind of game night thing that apparently we’re going to do… or they’re going to do… whenever the hell that will be. I’ve heard no more about it since but it was pretty obvious I was welcome to play. How did we get from that to this? I don’t understand. Much less him and me having our conversation Tuesday night which was not the sort of conversation you have with someone you are about to tell to fuck off. It was totally platonic — that’s not what I mean — but again, what the fuck?

So I may just be panicking over nothing. But I can’t trust, because people don’t talk to me. And when I try to talk to them I get ignored.

I need to not be here as soon as humanly possible. Clearly this is not the place for me.

When will I ever find the place that is for me?

[edit edit]

I went ahead and messaged him and asked him since he seems to be online. He’s done three fucking boxes. A third of what I was going to get.

I didn’t tell him about L wanting money from me and I wonder if it will make any difference. But I did ask him if I could do the final three tomorrow. And what’s he doing? Sitting there “being online” and not even looking.

He does this when I try to remind him that I’m done and need paid — something he asked me to do almost from day one.

This cannot all be down to absent-mindedness. If it is all down to absent-mindedness it’s a fucking miracle he gets books finished.

[edit edit edit]

Told him about the L utilities situation. “I am also hemorrhaging money. But also my doctor really did tell me to get more exercise.” Okay, so am I too much of an expense right now? Because I need to know that. “You are not too much of an expense. We’ll split the work for now.”

Well then.

Remember (I did say this, right?), he originally offered me a hundred a week. Now we’re at this.

I’m trying at this point not to give in to despair, because I am dangerously close to that.

No, but here’s a funny thing, and I was about to put this in my Substack the other day when I realized that was probably too much of a bore for people to bother with. But there are many reasons I have issues with creativity, or many kinds of issues I have with creativity. Whichever. One of those issues with drawing specifically is that I seem to mainly want to put a lot of work into it when I am extremely stressed out. Which maps: I was there in high school, I was there during the divorce process, I was there as things began to finally deteriorate with Matt, and I dipped my toe back into there when we had that crazy woman with the little girl at the homeless shelter. When you see me crank out awesome portraits it is because my life is ABSOLUTE SHIT.

I need to figure out how to stop being like that because it gets in the way of succeeding as an artist WHILE being healthy and happy.

But for now, this probably qualifies. Oh god.

Sooooo… Working on the art site again. Don’t really have a choice, do I. At least this week I’ll have an extra day off. I would have worked three.

Come on, C’s lawyer. Get that fucking money out of escrow. I’m drowning here.

Yes I could get another job. And then L would go out of town again. Why does the universe hate me?

This morning I saw L had a shopping list ready that included TP and laundry detergent (which we also need and I’d bought the last big bottle) on it. So then came a quandary because she left the house and didn’t come back and didn’t come back and I thought, Okay, if I go to Walmart and do not buy toilet paper, I’ll get back and she won’t have gotten any. We had “cracked” the final roll by then. So I decided to go ahead and bite the bullet. If it turned out she’d bought any then worst-case scenario I’d have doubled the supply; best-case, she’d have bought one of her large packs and mine would just be backup for when we’re down six rolls. Honestly not fussed.

So I finally (I had woken up with a headache and was slow to get going) went to Walmart myself and, la-de-dah, on the way down Parkway I saw what was probably Neighbor’s car zooming past. My brain immediately went oh fucking yay, she’s with him and I’ll meet them there and they’ll abandon me and not give me a ride home. Well, I got there having not passed him again and didn’t see any sign of his car, and I did my buying and I left. After I got back on our road I had gotten… hell, I don’t know. Halfway to L’s gate? Just past the mailboxes? I’m not sure? I hear this car come up behind me and slow down and I think, No fucking way! and turn my head and it’s Neighbor. “Want a ride?” Do I fuck. Uh, I do that too. Interested?

(I DIDN’T SAY THAT)

I don’t know where he had been but it turned out it was without L so maybe she’d gone to Wally World and then gone to his house and then they parted ways and she went home. That’s the only way I can think of to make sense of it, because when he got me to the front gate he said he wasn’t going in because he was running late to head out to the meat pickup in Cave Junction. Okay. I went down the driveway and sure enough, L was home. She’d been home long enough to unload an entire probably twelve-pack of TP into the cabinet under the sink. No drama. Also no room for the TP I’d bought, so I have it in my room now pending the need for restocking. Like I said. Honestly not fussed.

Meat pickup went okay. Sorting went okay. This seems to be a high-scutwork week, which makes me happy because I can catch L up and not be broke when I’m done. Neighbor asked me at one point whether I was still spending money on food or if meat-sorting covers my entire food expense and I said well, I spend money on extras like coffee. No more elaboration than that. He doesn’t know, she doesn’t know. I have no idea what they’d say or do if they did know. I want as little fuss over me as possible. I trust no one to treat me rationally at all.

Couple other things happened that I can’t share, and they weren’t bad but there is either drama potential or misunderstanding potential as applicable. So, the usual. If you want me to tell you the truth, don’t punish me for being honest. Reba and Dad never learned that lesson and I despair that anyone ever will.

I will say that I suppose my adoration of the man continueth unabated and it is completely not his fault because I don’t think I have been this safe with an unrelated man since I went to see Body of Evidence with two guys from my training unit. And I mean that was the most uneventful Going To A Movie with at least one guy and no other women present that I’ve ever done. Considering the subject matter and all. Neighbor is like that, minus the weirdo erotic movie. Just… there. Nothing threatening at all. Not even in a fun way. I don’t want to think the only reason I like him is because he’s not into me. Probably not the only reason. Definitely a big reason though.

I don’t want to be that.

I wonder if it would make any difference if maybe I opened up to him. I don’t mean that in a prurient way. Shut up. But I close off with everybody. What if I stopped closing off with him… what would happen?

It might be interesting to find out. We’ll see.

Today I got up to find I had heard from a guy I’ll call C here, and this is shaping up to sound like a really bad retelling of Men in Black, but at least if anyone googles names, this shit won’t come up in the results. Nothing on the internet is really private, but it can be disguised.

Anyway. Bit of back story: Encountered C after encountering Neighbor and L and likeminded people on Facebook many, many years ago. He won’t remember our early conversations — some of which took place courtesy of my politics-posting sockpuppet account, which still exists but is idle — but my awareness of him probably dates back at least ten years. He friended me more recently, maybe after I moved here, because it turned out we were in the same private group and he’d been meaning to for a while. Nothing to get twisted: he’s older than my father and is quite happily in a relationship, and is in Maine besides. But we definitely vibe on a Potential Friend level. This is totally okay with me.

So anyway, at about two this morning his time (he’s three hours ahead of me, if this needs said) he got a bit of insomnia, and then he got some kind of idea, and when he got up this morning he DMed me through Facebook with a suggestion that maybe I could help him with some clerical and technological tasks for pay. Probably he saw me post the thing about L asking for half utilities yesterday and then things just sort of clicked. He’s an emotional intelligence coach and has done a lot of work in that field that he wants to make accessible for others and also possibly donate to Neighbor’s and L’s environmental organization for their use. But he needs some help organizing it all and doing a bunch of other things. He’s got a bit of a windfall coming, so apparently he’ll definitely be able to pay me. I need to pick his brain some more about what this will all look like, but so far I’m kind of optimistic about the whole thing.

The other benefit of him having this idea was we got on the phone and I had probably the longest conversation I’ve had with anyone in a very long time. While he is not a therapist, he’s sort of in a neighboring wheelhouse and so he’d do the “tell me about yourself” thing and I’d balk because except for things I already say, I hate talking about myself because just about any aspect of it makes me want to cry now and the fact anyone’s asking when people don’t usually give two shits just brings the crying jag nearer to the surface. I notice this is also much more a thing in verbal conversations than in online… it doesn’t feel as ouchy in a text medium. I have no idea why.

But anyway. So, I’ve got an errand early (for me) tomorrow and then apparently it’s meat-sorting night, but probably I’ll chat with C again. We’ll see.

Funny yesterday. Neighbor was over with the dogs again. Unusually, he and L let them into the house because Mist, the boss lady, was not indoors. Turns out it was a mistake anyway. Spot wanted to sit next to Neighbor, and then Duke wandered too close to the couch. Spot was Not Fucking Having It. Neighbor told me later that Spot also gets possessive of him if they’re both on the couch at his house, but this wasn’t his house and he literally jumped onto Duke’s back and was trying to fight him. Spot is an English shepherd. Duke is a Great Pyrenees and about 180 pounds. If Duke weren’t such a gentle giant, Spot would be renamed Splat right now. I should bottle his audacity and drink it when I need a fast cure for chickenshit.

But what really struck me was Neighbor’s reaction. He literally grabbed Spot, turned around with him, pinned him to the sofa (he didn’t hurt him), and kept yelling “NO! YOU DON’T DO THAT!” at him until everyone calmed down. Not ragey, more Angry!Stern. Re-establishing who the actual boss is, which of course is not Spot. He and L both know a dog trainer and I have to think he’s gotten pointers. Anyway, L said he was athletic and I know he used to be a high jumper (hell, I’ve seen photos on the wall in his cabin from his high-jumping days), but it’s still another thing entirely to see it, and him being post-major-heart-attack and post-open-heart-surgery, too. (I’ve seen the scar.) It’s kinda cool.

Shaddup.

L really is going to let the toilet paper dwindle down to nothing before deciding to do something about it; we have something like one and a half rolls left in the bathroom and another couple half-used (or more) rolls elsewhere being used for cheap Kleenex. I buy it most of the time and have sometimes hoped we could trade off but unless we’ve got guests coming, that hasn’t been happening. It is what it is. A six-pack is $7 and some change. I have ten bucks to my name and another five in reserve right now. See, I could have passed that ten bucks on to her and been up to the full thirty this week but OH WELL. I need more drink mix anyway. It’s all good.

So I gotta crash. I’m actually writing this at nearly 2am Tuesday but I thought that if I didn’t write this shit down I’d forget and I didn’t want to. So there you go.

Well, L’s moved the goalposts again. First it was sure, you can eat my eggs, then it was nope, they’re for the dogs. Then it was we’ve got community bacon in the fridge, and now it’s never there anymore. Now it’s I don’t get the subsidy for my health premium anymore so you gotta help with the utilities. I had a real bad moment with that (in my head) until she actually broke it down and it turns out her utilities are actually really cheap, so maybe I don’t have to panic anymore. As long as I don’t get a lot of $20 and $30 and $40 weeks with the scutwork for Neighbor and can find other income sources too. She’s very flexible on how I pay my end, which helps. $30 a week will see it done, or the average of that, anyway. I only managed $20 this week.

I gotta say it rattled me though because her voicing the notion that I might want to move out with the change in conditions rolled just a bit too easily off her tongue. I’ve never 100% felt like she wanted me here — no one else was answering her call for help with the dogs, and this had gone on for weeks by the time I offered, and the only time I hear from her on Facebook proper (not the messenger) is when she’s correcting something I’ve posted — and I now consider the situation decidedly shaky.

Meanwhile, it seems like every time I complain about the general situation with Neighbor, he does some weird thing to redeem it, or at least improve it.

So yesterday I walked to Walmart again, which makes it twice in a week, and I’d have only had to go the one time had he paid me on time for the scutwork this past week. One of those times he was so gung-ho to go hang out with L that he quite forgot himself, OR otherwise he’s so engrossed in this work on the latest book that he’s forgetting anyway. Either way. Same result.

So I was back on our road and approaching the T intersection with the mailboxes and immediately recognize his car as he’s sitting there talking with another neighbor. I had meant to check the mail on the way back, so I had to wait til he was done talking since he was so close to the boxes that I couldn’t properly get in to open ours. Stevie and Spot were with him and were quite happy to see (and bark at) me. He got done with his conversation and then said he’d see me at L’s house. There was no one else in the car. I thought, It’s the dogs, he doesn’t want the dogs possibly getting out, but was still kind of miffed. Because this is not the only time someone could have given me a ride but could not be fucked to do it. Seems to be a chronic disease with the both of them.

By the time I got back to the house I was fuming. L acting almost like she wants to shove me out the door, the total crash and burn with Stuart, J and his fucking weirdness and I still can’t figure that out, Neighbor doing… whatever the fuck Neighbor is doing. I’m tired. I don’t expect to be worshiped but is it too much to ask that maybe someone in the real world actually likes me? I guess it is.

And then I walked through the front door and Neighbor apologized for not giving me a ride. That pulled me up short. I emotionally course-corrected and said to him that I’d figured it was about keeping the dogs in the car and he said yes, and he had had raw hamburger in the front seat, but he supposed I could have still ridden in the back. This whole exchange taking place with him mostly still staring at his laptop screen because, well, it’s Neighbor. But that was better than he’d been.

Then, last night, he happened to be on Facebook and encountered a meme I’d posted about going to sleep in a band tshirt and then waking up with a famous lyric, and he named the band UFO and one of their songs, and this touched off about a twentysomething-comment conversation in which we established that he’s got a lot of stories about personal contact with musicians and bands, and he’d be happy to tell me about them sometime.

I suppose I could have asked him today but as I told him last night, I do recognize that oftentimes he’s got stuff going on that I don’t want to interrupt. Probably it can be something we talk about next meat-sorting night. Kind of hoping Mack doesn’t show up, which would sort of facilitate that.

but damn, boy… don’t put no image in my head of you waking up “too hot to handle.” Fucking honestly.

Sure enough, today he was back with nose in laptop. Don’t think we even exchanged any words, but did do my daily floor-sweeping and here comes Jamie wanting pettings. Most of the time Jamie just wants to chill and take naps but once in a while he takes a shine to me and then he’s all over me until he’s done with me petting him. He was unusually affectionate today, and right in front of Neighbor, too. That was fun. Boy, I could pet you like this too. Better, even. Wanna?

I need to get my brain together. Sunday’s a good day to really work on that, if I even do.

Oh and a small victory today. I let my last four burger patties go too long in the fridge and they had started getting slimy around the edges. You are now grossing out and you’re right, we’re supposed to assume those have gone bad. Guess what. I fucking wrapped them in bacon and baked them for like 50 minutes and then fucking ate them. I’m completely fine. They even tasted okay. I couldn’t believe it. I’m never doing that again — next time it’ll be hospitalization for God knows what — but right now, I kinda feel like I cracked cold fusion.

Now if I could crack the Neighbor situation. Or, more importantly, my income situation. That’s where I really ought to be focusing.

(I did apply for a job again. Will I get it? Fuck no. Moving on now.)

Sorry about the long silence. There hasn’t been a whole lot of interesting stuff going on that I could actually go into great detail about here — for instance, there was a funny moment with Neighbor three Mondays ago having to do with chicken and a deep freezer, but I can’t tell the story because Reasons (nothing prurient, just Reasons) — and for the most part it’s been basically the same stuff day by day.

One sort of difference is that Neighbor’s wrapping up one book — it’s finished but needs editing and L’s helping him with it — and working towards finishing the writing on the next one, so I didn’t think it was possible for them to be even more insular than they’ve been up ’til now but lo, here we are. Actually he reminds me a lot of Matt in his absent-mindedness except for willingness to laser-focus when the object of his affections is around (L), so that’s been a nice self-esteem booster. A couple Mondays back he asked me how things were going with me and I said, “Why?” and he was surprised, but I never did answer the question either because I felt disinclined to share much of myself because although he does strike me as kind, so did Matt in the beginning and a lot of times Neighbor’s “manners” seem kind of rote, like someone taught him social skills late in life and he’s remembering all the rules he’s supposed to follow for good social interactions. Also like Matt. Which kind of tells me that even if there were mutual interest, it likely wouldn’t end very well because I don’t have a lot of patience for that shit — the absent-mindedness, the not understanding that social skills are about more than rules, and me therefore not being able to tell if it’s real empathy or just him greasing the skids.

Doesn’t stop me being wistful, but definitely stops me saying or doing anything excessively stupid where he’s concerned. Because at least right now I’m pretty sure I love him, and I would rather have him in my life in some capacity and not have him be my life partner than try to make him my life partner only for us to end up enemies. God, that would suck. Let’s never do that.

I still have this nagging WTF feeling about certain of his behaviors, because he’s acting towards me a bit like I do around a person I really like but don’t want to admit it. But that could just be his general social awkwardness. But I wish I knew for sure. It would make everything easier. At least after the initial ouch, because no way in hell am I reading that correctly because no way in hell could he actually be interested in me. That shit doesn’t happen. Never mind that a lot of stuff I am living through right now also “doesn’t happen” — that’s been a fluke, is all. I cannot possibly continue having the same sort of luck. I cannot see how that could be.

Okay, I’m lying. If I really did want to know, I’d have asked him already. Shut up, Dana. God. You’re pathetic. I don’t know what it is, then. Just wanting him to tell me of his own accord, maybe? Meh, fuck it. It doesn’t matter. No matter how this turns out I’ll probably be unhappy about it on some level.

It’s just not fucking fair, y’all.

And not for the first time — I just haven’t been willing to write about it — I’ve been questioning my part in relationships anyway. I have this tendency now to be low and mean and jealous and possessive. I know this about me. I feel like it was caused, like I wasn’t always like this, and I don’t know how to stop doing it because I know it’s bad and I know it makes ME feel bad, never mind what it does to the guy in question, but… I can’t trust. I used to. I used to be so open and accepting. I tried so fucking hard. But it’s gotten to this point. And I absolutely despise this about myself. But if I work on it, I leave myself open to getting hurt again. And you have yahoos all over social media saying you’re supposed to be willing to get hurt in order to really love — what the fuck is wrong with these people? If it really is true then I don’t want to love anyone anymore. Unintentional emotional injury is one thing. I mean we all have accidents and get sick and suffer misfortune and we’re all gonna die eventually. Two life/love partners hurting one another in avoidable ways? No. I cannot take another fucking fuckboy thinking loyalty to me is optional. I just can’t.

But even before I got surly about this shit, I wasn’t the greatest partner. There were times I cheated, but in some ways that wasn’t even the worst thing. That was me wanting to get out and being too chickenshit to say so, so that was the end of the relationship in question. I’m talking about while still in it. I wasn’t as mentally present as I should have been. Whether that’s ADHD (minus the hyper?) or what, I don’t know. I think I would make a more conscientious partner now, but that may just be my wishful thinking. I certainly can’t go by on how things were with Matt. First I was poor, and then I was pissed off at him and we weren’t in a relationship by then, strictly speaking, anyway. So I don’t know. I don’t really have a good metric.

I wonder if this is a big reason why I’ve started being a bit obsessive about finding someone. I mean obviously I miss the physical contact but is this about learning more about who I am as a person? Kind of a stupid reason to want a relationship. Or, I dunno, just a really weird reason? Because of course I would have weird reasons for everything.

Meanwhile, I’m in this secret Facebook group where people share memes and stuff about stuff we like in the interests of positive emotional reinforcement (not how the description puts it but that’s what it is) and finally, the guy who started that friended me. I’ll call him J. At first I thought, Hm, this is interesting, and he knows Neighbor and a lot of Neighbor’s people and he lives up in Washington state so it was not inconceivable we could meet in person at some point. But the longer this goes on the more I realize he’s just another drama whore. I’m not sure what he’s after in general with social media but he’s certainly not any more interested in me than he is in other people generally. And anyway, he speaks of becoming a hermit. Well, you go and do that then, dude. Have fun. Let me find some guy who hasn’t given the fuck up on absolutely everyfuckingthing.

I mean what is it with middle-aged men anyway, the fucking old miseries? The kids are grown, were there any, and either the marriage went well or it didn’t, and they’re either close to retirement or already there — in fact, J retired early. They’ve mostly figured themselves out and have gotten to a fairly good place in life AND THEY WILL NOT SHUT THE EVERLOVING FUCK UP ABOUT HOW MISERABLE THEY ARE. In some way. Even Neighbor gets like this. God. If this is what I have to look forward to, no wonder so many middle-aged women give up on men. I don’t fucking need this. I try to empathize with them, I really do, but they don’t actually want that! Had that problem with Stuart. Like (not a quote, I’m mocking), “NO. I won’t let you cheer me up! Fuck off!” WELL OKAY THEN. You can fuck off too.

I actually seem to bemuse Neighbor when I laugh at things. It’s so weird. I miss when people were fun.

Ha, I just posted on Facebook about this. Speaking in general terms. He took the bait. “Well, you cheer ME up.” Sure, honey. So why were you talking about going hermit AFTER you friended me. Whatever.

Honestly.

I’ve taken up knitting (as of late August) and crochet (as of more recently) again. Had bought some yarn off Facebook Marketplace the week L was gone. Am up to various and sundry with that, probably will make myself at least one sweater. I’m tired of frumpy. Or if it’s gonna be frumpy it’ll at least be nice colors. Fuck this noise.

I’m gonna make myself get into portraiture too. I realized not long ago that I’ve mostly used Making Art as an escape from extreme misery. I never wanted it to be like that. What a fucking rip. So we’re gonna redirect this ship before it sinks me.

Enough wallowing. Stuff to do. ‘Laters. Not so long this time.

Well, L’s back. Neighbor came by this morning and picked Mist up because apparently L asked for her, then went and picked L up at the airport. They got back right after I returned from errands, and then I went to get the mail, and then I came back here and his car was here but they were nowhere to be seen on the first floor. I thought, hm, maybe they went to the cabin for some reason, and then I went upstairs, and her door was closed.

So that’s that, then. No fucking reason they’d have been behind a closed door if they weren’t in fact together and having a reunion fuck. So now I know.

I have to act like I’m not angry about it and like I don’t hate anyone, and I’m still not sure I hate-hate her, but this is the first time she’s done this since I moved in here, and it’s really fucking weird. Like… what’s up? Claiming territory? Asserting dominance? Nyah nyah nyah, he’s mine, fuck you? What the fuck was that? Because I could see her doing something like that. She has been acting like I am little more than furniture since I fucking moved in here. Maybe I’ve been too friendly to him and she’s noticed.

And honestly, I’m doing the same shit I always do with men and making excuses for him in my own mind but y’all, he’s been treating me like little more than furniture too. I’m an extra pair of hands and a relatively able body to do shit for him that he’s got less ability to do than he used to, and someone to intellectually entertain him when he wants to have conversations, but I’m not ME to him. I do not fucking matter. I lost sight of that, and it was a mistake. Never again.

It just makes me angry at Stuart again, because he could have been an emotional way out — it is so childish of me, but there it is — but he was too chickenshit, I guess. I dunno. I’m done trying to explain him. It probably can’t be done.

So at this point it’ll be responding in kind. I’m fucking furniture? YOU’RE fucking furniture. Thanks for the free housing and sucker pay. I’m going to focus on getting myself back together and then I’m getting the fuck out of here. I’m not in a hurry. It doesn’t have to be right now. But it’s going to happen.

And you never know. I could get the fuck over myself before then. That’d be nice, because I like Neighbor a lot and I wouldn’t mind having him as a friend. If I could get the fuck over him, never mind myself, that would really make things easier.

Okay. I need to make food or I’ll be an ogre, and then I need to plan out my week. Enough of this random mental-wandering shit. It’s just making me sad. WHAT. DO I WANT. TO DO. Let’s do that.

I don’t feel like filling in individual days, so I will just recap.

The first and only shift I did at Employer went okay, except I was really tired at the end of the shift and still had to drive home, and then things got Interesting. If all I’d had to do was feed the dogs and then occasionally let someone in or out, it might have been all right, but they also barked at random times and when they’re in the house, it amplifies the noise, AND, even when things were quiet, my brain wouldn’t shut the fuck up. Neighbor came over at 4:30 to “set eyes on the dogs,” as he put it, and remarked that I looked exhausted and was not sparkly like usual. I wasn’t sure I had heard him correctly. He repeated himself. I had heard him correctly. I laughed. “Sparkly? Okay…” I had half a moment where I wondered if there was something more to him picking that descriptor, because no one ever fucking calls me sparkly. I hope I didn’t put him off laughing.

By evening I was done. I knew I had to prioritize the dogs and there was just no fucking question. And that’s fine. I’m really sad about the money I have to miss out on, but practically speaking I could not have continued on there anyway even if doing the four weeks with the tag changes did lead to a permanent job. It would have been either a day shift which would have gotten in the way of feeding the dogs, or it would have been an evening shift which would have cut into my sleep. So it was stupid of me to take the job to start with; as it was, when I took it and then went through orientation, I didn’t know L was going to go out of town. I would have kept going had she not done that. But this is where we are. The dogs are how I’m housed, and I’m not a heartless monster, so the dogs come first. The end.

I didn’t need any meat so it was okay that I missed meat-sorting night. I got ten items to do this week for the scutwork which meant $100, or less if I had asked for food, but I didn’t need to. So between being able to get half my pay in advance for that one night of work, getting the rest of my paycheck from orientation, and the $100, I was able to catch up a few things. I still have the other half of that paycheck coming next pay period, too, so that’s nice. I got to see Neighbor walking his dogs the last day I was there finishing the scutwork. The dogs were more outgoing than he was.

Legend had it he was supposed to come by every afternoon to check on L’s dogs. He only came over twice, the time he said the thing about “sparkly” and another time to give Mist a shot. I haven’t seen him otherwise except when at his place, and I haven’t heard from him. I only know he’s supposed to go pick L up from the airport tomorrow because I asked him. He was not forthcoming with the information.

It’s weird because we had a couple moments over Facebook where it was like we connected. I live for those little moments and it is really pathetic. He’s GOT to be with L. Hell, I probably won’t see L until like 6pm or later tomorrow even though she gets to the airport at 3-something in the afternoon because like as not she’ll go back to Neighbor’s place and boink him. I wasn’t born yesterday. But there’s still this nagging feeling that I am missing something and, if he likes me, him avoiding me would be textbook introvert, and he is a BIG one. God, I wish someone would just fucking ask him. Someone not at risk of homelessness for accidentally spooking his girlfriend. I just want to know. Get me the fuck out of this fix already. If he’s single, I don’t want to pass him up; he is one beautiful, compassionate man. Polar opposite of most guys I’ve been with AND polar opposite of my dad. Please fucking God. For fucking once.

But… I’ll have to pass him up. Even if he’s single and interested, if he’s just going to be a coward about it then there’s nothing I can do. He’s the one with nothing to lose if he speaks up. He knows by now whether L has a thing for him or not. I’m the one flying blind.

“What about Stuart?”

Stuart is a self-centered piece of shit who can’t stand to be called out on his bad behavior. I have given him at least three fucking opportunities to talk himself back down from the ledge and meet me halfway and he won’t fucking do it. Message fucking received. I’m done. And what makes me really angry is that he’d have been an escape. Even if I stayed here, I could set my brain at “I am with this guy” and whatever went on with Neighbor wouldn’t matter. It’s not even using, because I really did like Stuart. I was perfectly willing to pick him over Neighbor with not knowing what was going on with the latter.

But of course, as ever, I overestimate my appeal to men.

It just really hurts. I know there are lots of ways to be happy, but I’d like to find a particular type of happiness in this particular sphere of life, and I’m tired of constantly being rejected or even just having the threat of it hanging over my head. It’s like… Am I even here? Will I ever matter? To anyone?

What a joke: Carrie messaged me this morning saying my dad wanted my number again. I don’t want some piece of shit who has put me at risk of homelessness fucking twice now trying to play like I matter to him; we both know I don’t. If he doesn’t know how to treat the people who matter to him then he should just shut the fuck up and leave me alone forever. Forever would be fine with me. It’s always the men who are bad for me who want the time of day from me whether that’s family or a romantic relationship. I’m not fucking sending him my number. I don’t fucking care anymore.

Doug also called… day before yesterday? Not sure. Some shit about a promotion. He might be an out from here if it gets unbearable. I am not going to count on it though. He’s also still having drama with my niece’s mother. I can’t be arsed to summarize. I will later if this comes up again and I feel like talking about it.

Today I did some extra cleaning (L’s gonna shit when she sees the inside of the fridge) and will TRY to mop tomorrow but, at minimum, will get the bathroom clean. I have to be up early anyway because of Neighbor picking up Mist at 10:30, something else no one told me was going to happen.

I’m looking forward to being off the hook about the dogs for a while so I can maybe start getting myself sorted. I think my best chance is honestly going to be getting the transcript proofreading course finished. If I can do that and then pick up work, I might have a chance.

Will I? Let’s find out!

Yesterday I took L to the airport near Arcata, so it was an hour’s drive in each direction. I understand why it made sense for me to drive her and it will actually be easier for me to get sleep and feed the dogs timely, but having to be up at 5am and be able to drive safely meant fucking up my efforts to go later before sleeping. I’m not that thrilled, to be honest, but I will figure things out. The only thing about this is L surely knew this was coming before the DGR conference and could have warned me and maybe I could have backed out of the temp job or refused it depending on when she knew and notified me. But it’s too late to care, really. Unless I absolutely cannot adapt to the situation, I’m in it to win it. It’s only four weeks and I desperately need that money.

Anyway it was a nice little road trip. Times like this I wish I still had my car. There are so many places along 101 where you can just pull over and gawk at the coastline. It is definitely gawk-worthy. If I don’t get around and see things while I am here, I’m a sucker, full stop.

Interestingly, I think bicycles are allowed on 101; definitely for parts of it. I’d be terrified, especially going around those curves (the speed limit is 55mph in some places and 65 in others!!! And then goes down to 30 on some of the curves), but it’s always a possibility, I suppose. We’ll see?

Right. No. Like as not I’ll sit in the house a lot. There is something wrong with me. Always has been.

The dogs are beside themselves. Obviously they miss their mom, but the salt in the wound for them seems to be that when someone gets out of the car, it’s not L. That really blew their minds yesterday, and then they had to see it happen again today. They’re more or less behaving, but they know the bedtime routine is not fucking happening and the girls in particular want to stay outside well past sunset. I liken this to kids with a sitter staying up late because it’s the sitter. I just hope L doesn’t have to do much adjusting when she gets back.

I was wrong about the mint cutting. I had a look at the raised beds today and I don’t know what the Green Being I Had Not Previously Noticed is, but it makes me think of nightshade and is definitely not a mint. L still could have cut it, or maybe Neighbor did or, as was my first thought, maybe M fucking did it when she was here (I noticed it was gone very soon after the conference) after hearing me say I wanted a cutting of it… I have my suspicions about her. But we’ll see. It doesn’t matter. I got my own, and anyway, joke’s on whoever took the one I’d had my eye on, because Neighbor’s big dog Duke pissed on it once. Ha ha ha. FUCKERS. Meanwhile, my cutting’s doing really well. It should root just fine. When I first moved here I noticed a jar with paintbrushes in it on the shelf and L says I can have the whole thing. Glass jar, good size, so that’s what the cutting is in, standing in water. Works great because I can just leave it in the south window (my room’s windows face east and south) and not worry about the curtain knocking it over. Now I just need to remember to get the fixings for planting it when it’s time. I may just get a window box instead of a normal pot and then let it go crazy, except I have reservations about that because plastic. We’ll see. If I could find a metal one, that would work, except I just looked on Amazon and the search is a mess. How do you give me back plastic pots in your search results when I asked for metal? Clowns. But we’ll see. Like as not I’ll just get something at fucking Walmart. The usual.

Yesterday, because I was bored, I got onto Facebook’s little dating feature that apparently you can only get to through the app. Same thing happened that always happens with the stupid dating apps: I came to my senses and realized I have nothing to offer and even if I did, there’s no way I can be myself with a guy. I’m too weird to, like, 95% of the male population. Even if I didn’t look like a fucking troll, that would still be a problem. But I also look like a fucking troll. So there you go.

Part of me wishes things had worked out with Stuart. He was poised to push me away anyhow, though, so I really don’t know what else I could have done. OBVIOUSLY not jumped the gun and unfriended him. I mean aside from that, because it wouldn’t have been enough.

Well, if he ever makes an overture, I’ll take him up on it. He won’t, but if he did.