In a word.

I've been absorbed in the throes of my own drama. I've had so many realizations, but no true solutions come to my mind. Since I wrote last I read the book Eat. Pray. Love. I'd recommend it to anyone that's going through a serious crisis of wills... In the book, Liz Gilbert, the author, tells a story about every place and every person having a word.. I don't remember what hers was in the beginning... in the middle of the book she's "in-between" although I suppose that's 2 words actually... and in the end it's atraversiamo (if I spelled it right).. which means "to cross over".

If you asked any clinician what my word was.. it would probably be "depressed". Although I would never admit it or condone it. Depression still has negative connotations in my mind. I still don't think it applies to me. Perhaps malcontent.. but that's not right either.. although a bit more accurate as it's true - I'm not content with my life. Even more accurate would be words like "stuck", or "waiting". Because even though I know I've been moving forward, in time or otherwise, I feel like I haven't gotten anywhere - or at least closer to my "goal" - whatever that is.

I shouldn't say that, because I actually do have goals. I'm just not sure they'll make me happy. And therein lies the problem. What IS going to make me happy?

I keep waiting for something to happen. I put the thought out there.. sometimes even the actions - or at least get the ball rolling... and then I wait... and everything seems to fall apart in the meantime. And at the end, I feel even further behind than I was when I started. Perhaps that's because I've now exhausted another possibility - thus chalking off one more thing that I now cannot do.

It's become painfully obvious to me that I'm doing far more waiting than "doing" towards getting from point A to B. Perhaps a Life Coach is in order, and yet that requires something I don't have - cash... what number is that problem in the scheme of problems I'm dealing with right now? 1, 2, 3, 8?
I know it's in there somewhere.

I've considered all of the metaphysics of it.. not sure that I find much value in any of that. What are my options? I need to think harder? purify my thoughts about it? project into the future what I want? try to see myself doing/being it? set the intention to the Universe?
I didn't have as hard of a time "manifesting" things, before when I didn't spend all this time thinking about manifesting them. That seems backwards... or at least a big step backwards.

I have no idea what I'm doing. I know that I'm affecting other people - my decisions and my actions are. This may not be a good thing. I've caught myself doing things over the last week that are "made for TV movie" shit. Why? Why? Why did I enter into something that I KNEW was not only going to blow up in my face - but ended up blowing up in other people's faces too? I'm sure I've seriously fucked things up.. I'll let myself off the hook a little. They needed to know what they were dealing with. But man, they didn't need that baggage. I don't know if it really made things worse over the long haul - but short term it sucks ass. Did I do it because I wanted him to show how much of an ass he is? Maybe. Bad motivation.

Actually, that wasn't my motivation going into it at all. I hoped that he would show some shred of compassion for me and the boys. I'd forgotten how selfish and confused he is. Well, "confused" is another word that could describe me. I'd forgotten that he'd never showed me one shred of kindness while we were together. Why would he do that now? I guess maybe I thought he had changed. I have. It made/makes me sad. I don't know how to resolve that.

It's also become painfully obvious that I have no one to turn to. I have no lover - nor do I currently want one. I have no close friends. I have my mother. I can't call up my mother and say "hey mom, i'm having problems resolving my issues with sex. you see - you told me it was bad and dirty and so part of me still believes this. I won't tell you how many people I've slept with, but it's more than one. Because of how I was raised, I'm not ashamed of this. So what should I do?". Not a conversation that I can have with her.
I only ever had one person that I could talk to on this level. He was my lover. He hurt me deeply, and I let him. And even still, I couldn't talk to him. It occurred to me today that I should call him. I won't. I don't even have his number anymore. Nor could I find it without talking to some other people that I don't have any business talking to.

So, I'm alone. Not just literally, but figuratively. I like it better, and I don't like it better that way. No disappointment. No loss of expectations. But there's also no one to brush your hair out of your face and no shoulders to cry on. No one to bounce ideas off of or to build excitement with. There are good and bad sides to being alone. Besides the fact that you only have to pick up your own clothes off the floor and you can literally sleep on the entire bed, you have to write down all your thoughts in places like this - because well, there's no one else to hear them but you. Blogs become therapy. Facebook becomes your only link to the outside world. You no longer really "know" anybody in person. And all the physicality of the human condition is lost. "Lost".

"Trapped"? Maybe that's a good word to describe where I am right now. But I did it to myself. I did. And for the most part, it was conscious. You see, all this "aloneness" was entirely manufactured by yours truly. And I've made it stay that way - despite the profound feeling of lack of connection with everything and everyone. I've sequestered myself in this place, and I've sequestered myself in this body. I've made myself untouchable - whether it's by lack of physical availability or by emotional. It doesn't matter. I know that I've done this. I know that I'm doing this. But I can't seem to bring myself to change it. I want so badly to BE someone/something else. I want so badly to DO something else. But yet I sit here and do nothing.

It's all so fucked up.

In the last year, I went from thinking I knew what I wanted to do and how I was going to get there - to maybe knowing what I want to do - but having no clue how I'm going to get there. Every plan that I come up with seems to fail - at least in the short term. I've never been very patient. In the last 10 years I've changed almost everything I know. From my marital status to my appearance. Some things have come around. I'm fat again. I'm pretty sure 10 years ago I was fat.. or close to fat. I'm back doing web work.. something which I loathe. I didn't swear I'd never do it again.. I just didn't want to. I feel like it's a waste of time - as if me spending time doing that is time taken away from doing something more important and meaningful. .. whatever that is. The boys are still here. But they're getting older. Monster the cat is still alive... but just barely... and there are a few other consistencies.. but not much. I never thought I'd see myself in this place.. in this space/mindset. It upsets me that things have gotten this out of hand.

My ambitions seem so far away from where I am. As if there's nothing I can do, short of dream/fantasize about them..as if there's no way that I could ever achieve them with where I am now.. And I think that's right. I can't. I can't achieve what I want with where I am now - with my schooling, with my brainspace with my circumstances. Something has to give.

It occurred to me that maybe I want too much. Is that possible? Unrealistic? Some people aspire to be multi-billionaires.. I'm not quite that crazy. But I certainly didn't think I'd be in my mid/upper 30s and not have any clear cut plan or prospects. I've literally started over from scratch - except scratch is a step up. I've got a 'family'. But my family is 2 pre/teenagers, that soon probably won't want anything to do with me.. and frankly will probably be more fucked up than I can fix given what they've had to deal with. I have no house of my own. No career. I don't have anything that I really want. There's no security. No plan. If I had a plan and things appeared to be moving in the right direction, maybe I wouldn't feel so uneasy about everything. But I really don't have a clue where things are going. "Clueless". That's another word.

Looking back a couple of years ago.. In the time between the separation/having to take a break from school, and starting back again.. I had a clue... I knew what was happening next. I let myself go. Granted, I did some pretty irresponsible things as well.. but I felt so free. It was all laid out for me. But that really changed when I went back to school. I tried to hold onto some of that freedom, but really struggled with being locked in. I think some of me just wanted to be free - to live my life recreationally and without any real restrictions. it was easier that way. I'd never had that before - not even when I was a little kid. It was nice. I think it was attractive too... to others.. or at least it appeared so.. but I felt better about myself than I do now.

Everything fell apart last summer. School died. My prospects died. My libido died. I talked my brain into total destruction and walked further away from, at least in a lot of senses, independence. This was the opposite direction from where I wanted to go. It's the opposite direction from where I want to go now. I want to at least feel like I'm working toward something - to be able to see progress. My mother says that we're further along the path just because time has passed. I don't really agree with that. I think often we can take steps back, at least partially. That's where I am. "Backwards."

I keep thinking I should write a book. But what would it say? People have told me I should write about my stories with men. That would have to be published under a pen name or after my parents were dead or too crazy to be able to read it and remember. I'd have to go back in my mind and talk about every dysfunction and every disappointment. I don't know that I can do that. I think most of the disappointment was in me than in the guy. Not to say that the guys weren't disappointing.. but you have to love yourself and give yourself credit before you can expect to attract someone worthy, right? I was into guys that were into me. That's how the story went. The only one I ever cared about was one I was into for myself. It turns out that he just wasn't all that into me. Sound familiar? Of course that made me doubt myself all that much more. "Doubtful."

Only once did I ever think that I attracted the kind of guy that I wanted. Turns out he wasn't.. because he left. Maybe I don't know what I want. Maybe that's the problem. I didn't used to worry about it. It didn't occur to me.. I did some research, made a decision, and I carried it out. It's not so simply anymore. I miss the simple days. It wasn't so much instant gratification, but it was closer. It wasn't this long, drawn out, painful process that may or may not be realized. It really was simple. 3 steps.  Wham, Bam, Thankyouma'am. just 3. think.make.realize. That's it. And somewhere in between that and this I lost that. Whether I lost the ability to act that way because I loaded myself down with so much bullshit or whether I just somehow became incapable of being that succinct. I don't know. Maybe it was never that simple, and I just have selective memory. Either way, it's not what I want.. Ah, see.. I know what I DON'T want. That doesn't help me.. the wanting part is more specific I think.

the next step is everything. I'm at a cross-roads. "Cross-roads." oy! what I do next will impact my life and the kids' lives forever. As if that doesn't happen on a daily basis anyway.. but seriously. My "plan Q" is something that I'm not all that excited about. It feels like I'm being forced to take on the family business, which just happens to be a funeral home, or working in the family hardware store - even though I don't want to. In reality, I wouldn't mind working in a hardware store - not as a career, but I think it might be fun. Not so sure about the funeral home thing though - dead people give me the willies. The thing is, if I take plan Q, then I'm settling in a sense. I don't know if I can be ok with that. I feel like I've spent most of my life settling. Whether it was settling for something or someone less than what I deserved or settling down. I didn't much care for any of those options. Now I think I've found what I want to do - what "might" make me happy (yes I know - only I can make myself happy), and I can't seem to bring it together. This makes me very frustrated. "Frustrated." That's a perfect word.

I do know one thing though. I can't stay where I am. "Stuck." may be appropriate for how I feel, but it's not somthing that I want to perpetuate. I'd much rather have words like "Healthy." "Creative." "Passionate." "Driven." "Loved." I'm sure there are a few more that would be appropriate. Maybe I can choose a word in between for right now. Although it's still not "where" I want to be - at least it's in the process of something. Perhaps that word should be.. "Thinking."