October 31
From my brain
Contents |
2008
Me 21:40, 31 October 2008 (EDT)
Unlike last year (below), there was no jingling bells to keep my spirits up. I realized yesterday morning that I had the day scheduled off (since the beginning of the year) in order to do the usual decorating of the house. This year we're broke as hell and so there wasn't any funds to decorate with (not to mention I'd probably use the garage which was jam-packed full of crap).
I missed our old house to no end last night. Halloween -- work anniversary aside -- brought a joy to the child inside of me that I can scarcely put to words. It's my day to really truly be a kid again. Sure every dad does it to some extent, but I dress up, I decorate my house, and scare the bajeebus out of some kids (young and old). I can walk in sunshine for a week after Halloween.
A friend of mine showed me a cartoon with the "Haunted Houses of 2008". It was a picture of an entire street of empty houses with foreclosure signs in front of them and kids with empty bags. Kinda looks like my old neighborhood actually. Lots of people had to move out...voluntarily or otherwise.
So, we're down just short of 15% of the population of the guild from where it was at the beginning of this month. I've lost some close friends, some people I thought were close friends, and then some class-act guildies. None of it is easy. You speak on your mistakes, you come clean with what you can, to whom you can, by whatever means you can, but in the end...people have to make their choice.
I was asked though if there was anything that could be done to help, and all I said to my one friend was, "Watch your back." Sooner or later people show their true colors. You can found a guild with a few really great people, but when you also have a lot of sour apples, and some less savory produce among them...you're just asking for trouble. I hope you all don't learn things the hard way like I have.
Today I made an update to the main page:
- A Disclamer
- If you really know me, you will be able to take everything here at face value of the person you know.
- If you don't know me at all, you either won't care, or will dismiss them as the ramblings of a lunatic.
- If you think you know me, you might find somethings that surprise you, some that will make you think differently, and some that might just scare the hell out of you.
- A Disclamer
And also:
- Don't accept things for face value though. I all-too-often make things worse than what they are, and sometimes make things the way I might like to see them. We all have our fantasies. :)
Someone did take something at face value. If you've read this blog for long enough, you know that when I speak in italics for long periods I'm either quoting something, or I'm on some weird rambling fantasy trip. Context. Complete content.
I'm not perfect, I never claimed to be. Read this blog enough and you'll see me smack myself around enough for not being perfect. It's a goal, but I'm nowhere even approaching it. I've never asked to be on a pedestal because I've seen people to often thrown down from one...or at least fallen on their own.
The crux of the issue is having fallen in people's eyes...hard. I've caused as many tears as I've dropped on my own and then some. People have seen my actions to be false to my words just as I've seen that same dichotomy in others. No amount of explanation will do unless people see it first hand, and see all of it. I can't give them all of it, so they just walk away angry at first, hurt the second, but overall disappointed and at a loss.
Last night I managed to get in bed by 9:30. A week of less than five hours of sleep a night and walking around the neighborhood trick or treating and my body AND mind was spent. I was out. I woke at 5am and willed my body back to sleep until after 7am. Somewhere in there I had a horribly symbolic and pathetic dream.
- A friend and I were in some sort of government facility. I have no idea why, but perhaps we were on tour, perhaps we were there to work. Anyway, while we walked along we got to meet people at the place (bunker?) and we seemed to get to know people.
- I lost track of my friend for awhile. At some point, I find out that some high-end director of the place has gone missing. They're leaning toward kidnapped, but they're saying "missing". I was watching it on the TVs there, and the next thing after that, some MIBs come by and are arresting me. He was my friend, I had to know what was going on, and so I'm tossed in with the lot of them.
- I get to go into [Federal pound me in the ass prison]. My mind has taken the liberty of seeing all what happens there, but my trial date comes fairly quickly, and I've been granted visitation with my wife and kids who I'm overjoyed to see. I've apparently picked up a few prison tricks, and I'm a little taken back at this point that I know them. I look up to see if my family notices.....and I wake up.
There's far too much imagery here. There's that favorite quote that's mis-attributed to Freud that "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar", to which George Carlin said, "Oh yeah, well sometimes it's a big brown dick." Lot's of cigars up there.
There's my friend who I've lumped in with the people who've all ran off. He's quite possibly done nothing cross other than to have seen something wrong, spoken up for it, and been told that his viewpoint and mine are extremely not aligned. Others seemed similarly misaligned and so they've all gone off to new horizons together...good apples and bad.
There's all sorts of Zejan related imagery in there as well. He's picked up entirely too much lingo and mannerisms from his time in Jail. I worry for him. A lot.
Then there's the -- guilty -- feelings of me being trapped. Zej really is in prison, and yet here I feel trapped at a job I hate and no signs of getting out. Fourteen years today and I'm still there. I have no house to call my own. I don't know if we'll even be able to keep this apartment much longer. We're barely putting food on the table. The bank is not liking us using that cash-advance any more. Toss in Scouts going weird and the guild issues, and it's amazing I'm not locked up somewhere...and I'm not talking a criminal institution.
The core problem is what I told my officers the other day: I. Don't. Quit. I'm a bizarre mix of stubborn, pigheaded Sicilian and dumb as rocks Pollack. I'm caught between refusing to give up and too dumb to quit. The center between the two keeps me grabbing the bull by the horns and just holding him there.
I'm not going to quit on any of them. I will ride each one out until I'm damn sure they're all going to work out or just collapse on top of or underneath me. I can't quit. I can't do that to any of those who do count on me.
They're all stuck with me...for better or for worse. I'm gonna keep working at better, but only time will tell.
2007
Me 08:47, 31 October 2007 (EDT)
Another Halloween, another year I've spent at ThePit. Every year for the last several years of my disgruntlement with the company I've worn a jester's costume. I have no qualms about telling people "It's my anniversary today, every year I play a fool!"
The costume's bells keep a smile on my face while inside part of me realizes I'm still stuck here. Try as I may, I just haven't picked up any leads from three separate consulting agencies, and Monster / CareerBuilder are mostly useless.
Alright, I'm just gonna listen to my bells jingle for awhile.
2006
Me 01:02, 31 October 2006 (EST)
- Hagbard Celine knocked an ash of his long Italian cigar. "Everbody is a nice guy, underneath it all," he said. "What we become when the world is through messing us over is something else."
- The Eye in the Pyramid
- Robert She and Rober Anton Wilson
Must sleep now. Still much work to do in the morning to get ready for Halloween kiddies.
