Freshly Pressed Conundrum

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blog, blogging, humor, life, thoughts, writing

When I joined WordPress I suppose I was cocky, confident, or naive about the ability of my craft. That isn’t to say I am alone, I am sure many people join expecting a following just shy of a miracle, but how would they know it’s a nearly impossible dream to grasp?

I read WordPress’ advice on how to advance in this market and in doing so, found a great many blogs that I really enjoy, but alas a goal I assumed I would have attained nearly a month into writing has evaded me for over a year.

The Freshly Pressed ticker, ever changing, as one lucky soul is chosen to shine for a day, but in all honesty shines for nearly a month or so. I wonder if it is as thrilling as I expect it is… like getting the final Golden Ticket to Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, but maybe no. Perhaps it is more pressure to be the Freshly Pressed; coming up with ideas that no one has ever thought of before, speaking in a completely unique voice, and adding photos to the post that have to correlate with the subject matter and originate from their own camera (or scanner… some people know how to draw I have been told).

The only thing one can do in a situation where they are constantly overlooked, but still maintaining some type of belief in their abilities, is to ignore the Freshly Pressed and acknowledge that they will more than likely never end up there.

I have accepted this fact and I am no longer consumed by it, but a thought struck me yesterday; for years I hid my love of writing. Scribbling nonsense in a journal about a life I was living, without understanding in the slightest what living meant. Once I started living, I would drive for hours into the mountains nowhere near my University, to reveal secret crushes and clandestine betrayals I committed or (once revealed) that were committed upon me, on loose-leaf college ruled paper. I distinctly recall including a friend on one trip, as we had decided to write a book together, she egregiously misquoted me and to this day it pains me that I am unsure of my exact wording and sentence structure.

Over the years the secrets have become set in stone, those that remain secrets should forever stay that way. I fear an avalanche would occur if any of the perfectly laid slivers should be shuffled about in a memoir type situation. Years ago I wrote a promising nonfiction story about my Grandmother’s house and the ghost of a Grandfather I was sure beyond a shadow of a doubt still resided in the establishment (well into my teens). My creative writing teacher boasted about it, and worked with me tweaking errors here and there until finally I was ready to share my passion with someone that truly mattered, my Mom. I sat at the edge of my seat with anticipation, hoping that she would love it, but quite sure there was no way she couldn’t. When she finished reading, she rolled the papers up and handed them back to me neatly, stating “It’s funny how people remember things isn’t it?” Her demeanor deadpan, her features contorted. My heart broke a little in that moment, she hated it. More than hated it, she loathed it. She no longer had to coddle me, make me believe that I could be something I am not, and she made that quite clear in a matter of moments.

I switched my focus towards a fiction story based on something that happened to my (basically) stepdaughter. My boyfriend was thrilled by the idea, she was less so. I poured my heart into that story as well. One day while out with some of my boyfriend’s friends, he informed them I was writing a story; intrigued by that his friend Joe pressed me to tell him more, claiming to be an avid writer too. Two things transpired in those few moments; first and foremost I explained that I did not believe in writing nonsense day in and day out (in a journal), because I had done that in a day-to-day journal filled with uneventful times that basically consisted of me staying inside from the rain or walking from the sidewalk to the street, but not crossing because I was not allowed to. Until the last entry somewhere near the middle, which read “Today my Grandfather Died.” It was powerful and heartbreaking; I still mourn the death of my Grandfather as it was completely unexpected to me, he was one of my favorite people, and frankly I just do not handle death well. Joe looked at me furiously, explaining that he believed writing the trivial nonsense of the day to day was the only way in which to write in a journal, genuinely offended that I had even spoken of my writing beliefs, which in no way matched his. As if I had broken into his home, found his journal, discovered the way in which he liked to write and decided to snub it sometime later in our lives. In an effort to evade the discomfort Mike tried encourage Joe to ask me more about the story I was writing, the underlining theme is bullying, but we (Mike and I, as it was a verbal collaboration on where to take the story) decided to make his daughter’s character somewhat of a super hero. When Mike finished explaining the basic premise Joe’s eyes flicked widely “So, you are writing Harry Potter.” It wasn’t a question, it wasn’t a compliment, it was a cheese grater insult intended to knock me down a peg and knock me down it did. The implication being, my story is a carbon copy of other stories in existence (and what stories aren’t really), it will be overlooked before it is even considered for anything, I am wasting my time, and he won. Powerful words calling someone’s work Harry Potter.

I tried to force myself to continue to write it, but slowly I began to realize that no one wanted to read it… my stepdaughter hated the idea as a whole and Mike would avoid reading it without reason. So I put the story away and joined WordPress, where I can write to my heart’s desire and most in my physical life are unaware of the blog’s existence. Those that I hold most dear want nothing to do with my art, and for that they have become the brunt of it… now even if they wanted to read my dirty little secrets or random thoughts, they would be hard-pressed to find this WordPress. So maybe I like many others am overlooked by the Freshly Pressed, but my little following makes me far happier than those closest to me and I do not have to plead to be read, perhaps that is the gift of WordPress; not quantity but quality.

Technically I Didn’t Knock Your Teeth Out…. you did FINALE.

Tags

acting, childhood plays, diary, friendship, friendships gone south, health, humor, journal, kids, life, losing friends, losing teeth, memories, mental-health, teeth, writing, youth

Part 1

I met up with Blythe a day or two after the play. She hadn’t been in school since the second accident in a month that ended her up in the hospital, so I really wasn’t sure what to anticipate.

Blythe ran up and hugged me, she was crying like a baby but all of her teeth were intact. I thought maybe it was an apology for missing the play, or relief that she hadn’t lost her front tooth, but I was so very wrong.

***
We talked for about an hour about her brother doing some ninja kick bullshit in the air where he ended up kicking her in the face. She looked so sad and broken. She let out a really loud sigh and said “He knocked out my front tooth, Sonya.”

I looked at her horrified and almost disbelieving because she most certainly had every adult tooth in her face that she had had a week ago.

“The dentist had to pull my other tooth too because of some injury I sustained either during the kick or after the fall off the bike.”

One of my worst nightmares was coming true, only it wasn’t happening to me it was happening to her. I dragged my tongue across my two front teeth, as if her talking about losing teeth would make mine fall out.

“Do you want to see?” She asked me.

I so did, and so didn’t. I wasn’t sure what to say so I just stayed silent as she popped her fake teeth down, like dentures that weren’t glued in, nor very large. The doctors had glued two very real looking adult teeth to a retainer that she was able to click in and out of her mouth until all of her baby teeth fell out and then she would get real fake teeth that wouldn’t come out of place.

***
One day at lunch some boys were making fun of the way Blythe ate her food, I guess she chewed differently than most and it makes sense her front teeth weren’t really a part of her mouth. One of the boys asked her “Why do you chew like that?”

“You really want to know?” She asked evilly and I egged it on.

“Yeah, do you REALLY want to know?”

Both boys leaned forward like we were going to flash them our boobs or something. “YESSSS SHOW US!!!!!!!”

Blythe didn’t swallow her food, she clicked her teeth down and the boys looked like they were going to throw up on the table. One of them ran away screaming, the other one spit out his food and covered his eyes.

“That’s why kiddo.” She said putting her teeth back in place and finished her food.

“Awesome.” I said giggling.

***
Blythe and I lost touch, as children do when they no longer attend school together. We didn’t see one another again after that year until we were in high school. By that time Blythe hated me, pretty much blamed me for everything that happened.

In so many ways I was actually surprised, after all I didn’t knock her teeth out she did, but I guess we all look back on things differently. If her brother hadn’t kicked her, if we never found that Yosemite Sam card if she never met me she would (more than likely) have her real teeth.

,
Our experiences make up who we are, but we don’t have to keep swimming in the past – dwelling on what used to be, maybe I am just the face of what used to be.

My Coworker Thinks I am Mentally Handicapped

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blog, coworker, humor, life, mental-health, writing

As a secretary one is expected to do all the little things that people deem “below them” which is fine, I wouldn’t have a job otherwise; however one guy that has that mindset also believes that I am too slow (in the brain not movement) to get the job done correctly.

 

“S-o-n-y-a, I       will need         a       h-o-t-e-l    for the night, as      well         as         a  car.”  Both facts were already written on the paper he handed me.

“Ok.”

“Can you             book the car            for   Monday morning at                9am, I will need it until                5pm the next day.”  He said even slower than before, these facts were also written at the top of the paper he had handed me.

I looked at his itinerary, he was to fly in Monday at 8:30am and out the next day at 5:30pm; I could have come up with those times for booking the car on my own, as well as the fact that he needed a hotel.  I shot him an angry look.

 

“S-o-n-y-a, it is no longer            D-a-y-l-i-g-h-t     S-a-v-i-n-g-s     t-i-m-e    you should e-mail     EVERYONE in the office to inform them.”    He smiled at me exuberantly, so proud that not only did he get to tell me what to do, but he was helping the masses in the process.

I walked away, seething.  A. he could e-mail people himself, and B. just cause he was a dinosaur that was unable to comprehend an hour difference didn’t mean anyone else in the office couldn’t either.  I sent his stupid e-mail and not one person responded back, because duh our clocks reset themselves, and we aren’t living under rocks.

 

“I need you to order some of these.”  He spat at me (not on purpose his jowls seem to promote spitting while talking).  He held up a clear three ring binder pocket divider.

“I just did the order, so I will have to put it on the next one.”  I said.

He looked rather disappointed “I need the clear kind, when you do.”

“Got it.”

“It will need to have these pockets; I put stuff in the pockets.”

“Got it.”

“Can you get a few; I will need more than one.”

“They sell them in a pack.”  I raise my eyebrows, as this conversation never needed to go this far.

“Well just make sure you get more than one.”

 

“S-o-n-y-a can you order me yellow printing paper?”

“Yes, on the next order.”  He always seemed to wait until after I ordered supplies to ask for more supplies.

“Get this color.”  He handed me a yellow post-it.

“Yellow.  Ok.”

“I think its canary yellow.”

“Will you be upset if you get another type of yellow?”

“No.”

Good God.

 

Yesterday he came up to me and without saying a word he handed me a note card… it read.

 

theses?

Waste of a card.

“Will you order me some of these?  They are called note cards.”

You don’t say!

“I use them to write notes.”  Maybe he is mentally handicapped.  “Get the kind that have the lines will you?”

“Like the one you just handed me?”

“Yes.”

 

This complaining is a moot point as he was let go late yesterday afternoon.  I must not have been the only person he talked to like their brain was going to explode at any moment.

What I Should Be Doing Instead of Blogging

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college, focus, humor, life, papers, research, studies, time, writing

Paper due in three hours, research scarce, ideas keep flowing in as perfect avenues for a blog post.  Must write research paper that is due, but it is so very boring and the things that make my life what it is right now are so very interesting.

Write a few lines.

Decide to check status of blog.

Write a few more lines, wow papers are so impersonal.  One might believe they are also a waste of time.  Recall that if I use the word I, points will be deduced and rightly so, I am not a freshman… I am a senior.  Ok focus on the task at hand.

I wonder what my blogging friends are doing right now?  Check on them, have opened many awesome looking posts but have yet to read them.  If I start I will not stop and now my paper is due in less than three hours.

Focus.

Repost a blog I found quite funny.  Decide to write about how unfocused I am.

The birth of this post.

It must end as I am sure to get a very low grade if I turn in nothing.  I shall research until the cows come home (aka one hour) and hopefully I will have time to write for my blog tomorrow.

I’m Sorry What?

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diary, humor, life, me, people, personal, thoughts, writing

Remember Sex Ed videos in grade school?  More like what’s happening to your body videos that our parents had to sign a permission slip for us to watch? 

 

I think both of my parents were really excited that they didn’t have to be the ones that told me all the nonsense that comes with becoming a woman (glad I watched those videos before I watched Carrie or it all might have gone over differently). 

I had one friend, Caitlyn that did not get to join us for the videos; I suppose her parents thought they would prepare her in her own time… stupid.

 

Caitlyn didn’t understand how babies came into being and one day in 7^th grade after a pool party, she looked at me horrified “I think I might be pregnant.”

To which I thought, holy fuck we are in seventh grade (yeah I have been cussing since third grade).  Though I am sure I conveyed more of shock and horror than ridicule.  “HOW?!  With who?  I….?”

She looked at me with tears in her eyes “I just swam by Josh.”

I looked at her for more information, but there was none; she was convinced that just passing by a boy in the pool would get her pregnant.  Holy lord.

 

The next pregnancy scare happened in high school, this time she sat on her boyfriend’s lap.  We were seniors, I don’t even know how you go through high school not knowing how a baby is created but it is possible.

 

A few weeks ago my boyfriend’s daughter was talking to me as she just watched one of those educational videos, she looked at me a little concerned saying that she was pretty sure she wasn’t ever going to want to use tampons.  I asked her why and she said “They go in your butt!”

It had me rolling. 

Apparently we can be pretty clueless even after the educational videos, I am just waiting for the day she asks me if she can get pregnant by sitting on a boy’s lap.  I’m gonna say yes, thinking that seems to have worked for Caitlyn, she is 28 with no child at all. 

The other redhead in school

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diary, humor, life, love, me, people, personal, thoughts, writing

Yesterday I ran into a guy from grade school, he looked great kind of thug life, but cute.  He spoke genuinely excited to see me and referenced the fact that we had not seen one another since 6^th grade (which I did not actually remember, nor register.  Had he told me we had graduated from the same high school I would have believed it).    During the conversation he said “Do you remember when I bought a ring and you liked it so much I gave it to you?”

Without even thinking I said “No.”  Because I am honest, and didn’t take into consideration what that might possibly have meant, not to mention the fact that he recognized me the second he saw me, beaming from ear to ear. 

He looked at little dejected and I knew I should have said yes.  Why couldn’t I just say yes, or even been like OH YEAH that was really nice of you, or said something positive.  No I had to revert back to the old me, the childish me that didn’t know shit about boys and didn’t know how to not hurt their feelings mainly because I believed that no boy would ever like me.

We parted ways and as I walked to my car I thought, he probably had me confused with the other redhead in school. 

Broken Occurances.

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diary, life, love, me, people, personal, poem, relationships, thoughts, writing

Remember me?

I was the girl that caught your eye,

the one that jolted your heart as it lay dormant.

Swimming like a fish on land

Glistening in the rays of the sun.

 

Now, I am shinning alone for no one.

It’s blinding and exhausting,

pointless and painful. 

So I’m dimming the lights.

I feel faded and worn

my sparkle is dull, but others can see it.

It’s just the one that matters can’t or won’t.

 

Your skin drives me crazy

your hands and muscles do too.

I would give anything to wrap myself into the you I knew, before I knew you.

Your shell has me bound to us.

 

I understand it is difficult with the hands you’ve been delt.

But you can’t blame the hand when you are the house.

Strength reads like ignorance, and sheer pigheadedness,

when you pretend to fix broken occurrences.

 

Years of this;

of dimming my lights

and shining less bright.

Blaming nothing,

but recognizing…

I have been here before

I thought I was a diamond in the rough,

only to find 

 I was mere sand.

 

Maybe I shine better alone.

I remember me,

the me before you,

Maybe she’s better.

Maybe she’s better.

The pimple that ended it all!!!

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blog, diary, humor, life, love, me, people, personal, thoughts, writing

Zits, pimples, bumps filled with pus… whatever you call them, they are annoying and gross!

My first boyfriend (we will call him Fox cause that is basically his name, it’s just about that stupid), anyway we were close, as close as a 19 year old could be to a 31 year old, but mind you he was seriously immature and I took that as us connecting, if I would have been just a bit older I would have taken it as a sign and left him.

He rode a motorcycle year round, which made his face look warn and tired, his thinning hair sun bleached and his back full of zits.  The first time I woke up to see a major pimple on his back I asked him if I could pop it, mainly because I couldn’t look at the thing throbbing trying to explode all over the bed on its own.  He was much obliged and somehow we fell into this comfortable area with no holds barred… I will pop yours if you pop mine kind of nonsense.  LOVE if you will… Love to get rid of shit that makes your body unappealing.

After about two rocky rocky years together a girl moved in town; Alice was engaged to Fox’s and my mutual “friend”, and soon Fox began hanging out with her, sharing our life with her and I didn’t know how much so until one night after a car got broken into at UofA (where we all lived).  The car was demolished, the roof had been bashed in, the inside gutted and BITCH spray painted on the side.  While Fox called the nonemergency police to report the crime a zit glistened in the setting sunlight, I didn’t even think about it I just went for it like a monkey mother trying to get all the bugs on her young.

Fox whipped around still on the phone and yelled something to the effect of “Back the fuck off!”

So I did.

He glared at me, like I had shit in his bed or something.  He finished the phone call, then he told me never to do that again.

To which I shrugged, fine.  I probably won’t touch your back much more but that’s freaking fine.

Two days later I went to a club with Alice, just the two of us… getting away from it all, things were majorly falling apart with her and her fiancé and I couldn’t have been happier cause he was a dick.  He cheated on her every day she didn’t live in Tucson and I knew it, I just didn’t know how to tell her.  I also didn’t feel like it was my place to say so.  I sat in silence listening to her every tiny fight about plates, allergies, cost of living; you name it they fought about it.

As the night began to wind down, and Alice was driving me back to the apartment my boyfriend and I shared, she began to tell me things about my own relationship… as I had not actually opened up to her about any of it.  I am not even really sure how the subject came up but she mentioned the engagement ring that Fox had been sitting on for something crazy like eight months (but showing absolutely everyone myself included the baby rock suspended in a moon shaped golden clasp, I hated it).  She mentioned that he felt like it wasn’t enough for me that I deserved more, and I listened silently thinking something to the effect of yeah I probably do, but I knew that he was the man I loved so I could deal with a ring I didn’t LOVE (he may have broken that little understanding – loving bit of me, but maybe it is for the best).

Then the conversation took a dark turn, which I wasn’t expecting because I didn’t even know it was dark until it escaped her lips. I won’t even be able to capture the terminology nor her disgust as she allowed the words to trickle off her tongue but it was something to the effect of “Fox told me that you attacked him!!!!!!!!!!!” then quietly she said “and popped a zit on his back out of nowhere?”  Which is so utterly stupid, and not really out of nowhere I had been doing it for years, just not in a majorly public setting.  I couldn’t help it if the zit was taunting me.

I sat there dumbfounded; I think I didn’t think it was as big a deal as it was until she told me what I had done.  I was trying to come up with a million ways to defend myself and then I recognized that I shouldn’t have to (it’s just pus after all), but I was embarrassed beyond belief and she sat in the driver’s seat judging me.  I thought to myself You told my secret, and I didn’t even know it was a secret.

For whatever reason, her knowing this information made something click in my mind… maybe because it was such a small insignificant thing that she was reacting to on such a large scale that I realized he and I were falling apart.  I tried to hold the relationship together but it was sand slipping through my fingers and it was just as worthless.  We broke up within a month and haven’t spoken in over six years, so pimples are good for something!

Holy Christmas Balls Batman…

Tags

blog, diary, funny, humor, life, me, memories, people, writiing, writing

I ran into a guy from high school at Fry’s the other day.

He looked the same –exactly the same.

Neither one of us could remember the other’s name, while my boyfriend Mike stood awkwardly half inside the next aisle waiting for me to introduce him to the guy who’s name literally evaded me until almost three days later.   

“I haven’t seen you since Tucson!” He exclaimed.  The memories came flooding back; his long greasy hair, his tan skin, his odd smile and his best friend that was madly in love with me (who I coldly turned down in high school because I thought he was coo–coo bananas, and who’s heart I once again crushed when I moved back home from Tucson because I confirmed that he was in fact coo–coo bananas).

“Tucson, yeah that’s right.”  We stood in silence for a bit and then I asked “What have you been up to lately?”

He didn’t hesitate, which made me think he had a great life story “Well we are in a recession, the economy you know?”

Holy Christmas balls batman, does he think I have been living under a rock…. should I have said “WE ARE?!”  How sad is your life now that you have to tell people you have not seen in ten years that your life is made up of a recession.  Maybe his car just got repoed or something because it is balls out crazy he said that and nothing more.  He just walked away. 

 

Is that why I have no money in my pockets… I thought I was just unlucky these past few years.

Baby Talk

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blog, diary, family, humor, kids, life, people, personal, thoughts, writing

I am in my late twenties, and I have no intention of having a child at this point in my life or anytime soon…

Four weeks ago I went to my parents’ house just to hang out have some food and talk about old times when my Mom walked up to me with a magazine called BABY TALK.

The subscription at the bottom of the mag listed my full name and parents address.  “Is there something you need to tell us?”  My Mom asked jokingly.

“Not unless the mailman knows something I don’t!”

Yesterday I went back to my parents’ house, as I am watching the cat while they are away.  I checked the mail to find yet another BABY TALK magazine and a RAISING BABY magazine plus an informational packet on what to expect when you are expecting.  WTF is going on?

This is either the best April fools joke (done to me) a little bit late or something seriously strange is going on.  Every part of me is trying to shake the feeling that my ex did this; I mean he is bat shit crazy but we haven’t spoken in over six years…  Good one dude, good one.