P for Procrastination

This seems to be a running trend in my introductions to the post.  I'm basically on here because I don't want to be doing whatever it is that I'm supposed to.  In this instance, it is catching up on the 4 chapters of Orgo that I have neglected for the past 2 weeks, a lab report that is due next Wednesday and a Pop quiz that is most likely going to happen on Monday.  Basically, I'm really tired and haven't had enough caffeine to keep me going through the rest of the night.  Combine that with the knowledge that I've got about 11 hours of driving ahead of me tomorrow, I'm not really excited to get up and do things.

"Why the long drive?" you may ask.  Excellent question, I'm so glad you asked!!!

I'm heading down to see my brother's new apartment in Myrtle Beach.  Little brother has made the long and arduous journey back from California (this time managing to make it cross-country without being robbed) and has settled himself into his new job in the lovely resort area of Myrtle Beach.

Things I know about Myrtle Beach:

1.  It is a beach.
2. They play a lot of golf.
3. The word "Myrtle" is hilarious.  Like a matronly turtle. Myrtle.
4.  Let's not kid ourselves, that's all I've got.

On the bright side I'm really looking forward to seeing my brother.  While he can be absolutely infuriating in his lack of description and one word answers, as well as the straight up smart assery that he adopted in California, he's still my twin and I genuinely missed him.  Maybe now we'll call more (most likely not, please see the previous note involving "smart assery" and "lack of description"). We all know how I feel about descriptors.  I will give you every last detail about the day if you give me the chance. Whether you want to hear it or not, you will know.  EVERYTHING.

So Mom and I are going to go on a road trip, meet up in Dover, and head on down to see the only male offspring.  And while we're at it, we're being put to work straightening up the place, helping decorate, and things of that ilk.  Hurray for being free labor.

With that, dearest Internet, I will be signing off for now. Please come up with something interesting for me to read or waste time on the next time I pop by, I'm fairly disappointed with the limited array that you have provided thus far.

Hugs and snuggles,
L

Chem Break

Hello All,

This post is brought to you by the letter "P" for "Procrastination."  Procrastination has been the theme of this weekend.  Why do today what you could put off until the last absolute minute and then panic and put out a crap result?? Exactly.

This weekend I have barely accomplished anything.  Laundry is done and all put away (a feat that took me only TWO FULL DAYS to get around to.) Everything was dry by the end of Friday night (as was the bottle of wine that I had opened), but for some reason all of yesterday just slipped into oblivion. I can't even remember what I did yesterday.  I think it involved several hours (read 6+) of Cartoon Network.  Between Fairly Oddparents, Dragonball Z Kai (a blast from the past by the by, my brother and I were cracking up), and Avatar: The Last Air Bender, I just couldn't be bothered to do anything about life in general.  Oh, and then Annie Get Your Gun (with all of it's aggressively racist slurs towards Native Americans) was on.

I think there is a permanent indent in the couch from where I sat/laid yesterday.

Either way, I'm still behind on everything today, but have discovered that I am far more productive when thrown into someone else's home (My aunt and uncle are gone, I'm "baby sitting" which is laughable, V can take care of herself, but it's better to have someone who can drive at the house.) It's so much easier to do work when someone else has homework, too.

Even with all of that motivation going on, I'm still here, writing away.  I guess the truth of the matter is that after 2.5 hours of chemistry homework, I need a mental break.  And some food.  Time to rummage.

XO,
L

Mac Daddy

Halloooooo

This post is brought to you by a fine bottle of chardonnay that one of my coworkers brought me from a wine trip in New York.  This is the last of the bottle, hello from glass-number-four-Liz.

As you might have noticed, I haven't updated in a really long time.  That's for no real reason.  I have no excuse to offer.

It doesn't matter much as far as I see it, no one reads this anyway, so what's the difference?

Either way, here's an update on my life. Please excuse glass-4-Liz since she's a little inebriated.

I got a Mac! Woo commercial whoring.  I love the new computer, but I'm a little slow at learning all the new mac-ish ways.  I love how quick it is, and how everything just works the way it's supposed to.  It's just a matter of rewiring my PC based brain.

I'm exhausted though.  In life in general.  I'm taking a night class 2 days a week, organic chemistry, no less, and that's just a little tiring.  Tuesday's I'm working at the museum and helping TA an independent study for graduate students, so that's really exciting.  Thursday's I'm back in the bowling league which has been good so far, minus the fact that I'm trashing my average by trying to learn how to "properly" bowl.  The rest of the days are sucked up with studying or hanging out with friends.

I've got someone somewhat special in my life, we'll see if that goes anywhere before my fantastic track record of relationship-fuck-uppery kicks in.  I think it already has, effectively crushing everything before anything comes of it.  EIther way, I really like who he is, and that's all there is to it.

I'm going to go now, hopefully there will be more to write on sooner.

Hugs for everyone!
Xo

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

So much for being more consistant.

Either way, here's the update:

I didn't get the job that I applied for, so the major move that was supposed to get me on my way isn't going to happen.  Instead, I moved back into my dad's house and we're settling in to a careful balance for the moment.  I'm still unpacking box after box, and as long as I'm making progress he doesn't complain too much about my stuff taking over the entirity of the left side of the garage.  He can still park.

I'm trying to be optimistic about this particular situation, it's difficult at times, but I've discovered that Dad spends most of his time out of the house, on business trips, meetings, dates with a lady that I really like, that kind of thing.  I've got plenty of time to myself now, which is kind of nice and a habit that I adopted in Delaware with my old roommates off schedules.  I miss them a lot, especially Mary.  Letting go of the puppies has been hard, too.  But on the bright side, my commute is down to about 30 minutes one way, as opposed to the hour and a half to hour and forty-five.  I'm only putting 40 miles a day on my car instead of 100+, and I woke up at 7 this morning and had plenty of time to putter around before having to leave for work.  I'm exhausted, but that's for a completely different reason.

A week from now is the major Conservation conference.  They're actually holding it in Philadelphia and I managed to get a day off to go and see the talk on wooden artifacts.  I'm trying to be more proactive than I have been recently. It's easy to get sucked into the abyss of mediocrity when you feel like you can't do any better.  Or that people are telling you that it's impossible, or that it feels impossible. 

I'm enrolling in an organic chemistry class for the fall, night classes twice a week to work on my grades. If I do well this semester, I'll add an art class to retaking the secondary part of it.  I miss being creative, I feel stagnant and I feel that it's contributing to my overall indifference to the world around me. 

Sometimes I feel like I'm just waiting for what the world is going to throw at me next.  Or take away from me.  What more does it want?  What more can they do?

I try and I fail, and that's all there is to it.  But I'll keep trying, that's all I've got.

I'm looking forward to not having to think for a few days.

Miss you all, wherever you may be.

Cali, Baby!

I just booked my flight to California to visit my brother at the end of July!!! Heading out on a Wednesday, coming back on a Monday, I'm ridiculously excited about it. It's the 6-Man Tournament that weekend, plus there's an international surfing competition at the beaches, too.  I'm mostly looking forward to having a full weekend out there (sun, sushi, Santa Monica... I'm just looking forward to all of it.)  It'll be good to see my brother, hopefully everything I'm working on will fall into place by then, however, I am instating Operation: Get Ready Go.

This consists of me picking the healthy option 95% of the time at the restaurant, drinking more water, eating small, healthy snacks and smaller meals, and getting my large backside to the gym on a consistent basis.  I was doing well for a while there, then everything kind of went to hell.  It's now Friday, I haven't been since Saturday of last week, and I'm not going to get a chance to go before Monday, and might not even on Monday depending on how late things run.  If all goes according to plan, I could safely lose up to 30 lbs by my flight out, something that would be an amazing accomplishment for me.  I'd like to make it a solid 20, but I'm going to aim high and work my ass off.  If I can lose those 30, then I 'll be back in my realm of "healthy" weight for my height, I'd like to lose another 10-15 after that just to get myself safely within that boundary.  I feel like I say this all the time, that I'm going to "really" do it this time, but for some reason this feels different.  I've got a lot going for me right now in my life, I'm on the brink of making a major life change if all things go accordingly.

Why not create a new me physically while I'm reinventing the me I want to be?

More news to follow!

Something Exciting :)

Oh I've got my fingers crossed a thousand times over that what is currently in the mix works out. If all goes well I'll be set for at least 2 years, moving to a new city, and completely free of any financial dependency from my parents.  I'm about to explode with excitement!!

I'm trying not to get too excited, there is the possibility that they won't take me, but they seem interested at the very least and would like to set up a phone interview.  To think... I might be on my way.  The only thing that worries me is that my boss will be upset with me for leaving.  I know how much she really wants me to stay, and I really do love the people I work with, it's just not my calling by a long shot.  I want to look forward to every day and be fulfilled by something.  I think that this might be my shot at it.

I am a most Happy Liz :)

April Fool's

I have to admit, this isn't one of my favorite holidays. Generally, I'm not too good at pranks, I just can't think of any that aren't completely lame or highly offensive.  I leave this holiday to the pros.  However, I am exceedingly glad that my office has chosen to participate (as did the weather today, thanks Mother Nature for throwing snow at us on the first of the "spring" months!).

Today:

My boss sent out an email to all of the territory managers and commercial salesmen saying that there had been a major transformer blowout and our location was out of power/phones and would not be able to process orders.  (She did include an "April Fools!!!!" at the bottom of the email, but it still got quite a few people.)

One of my coworkers, B, kept calling my cubicle-mate saying he wanted to order 19 rooftop units and giving bogus information.  Poor CM was so confused over the whole thing that when he turned to me to talk about this "mysterious caller" I lost it and cracked up.

Sam changed the screensavers and backgrounds on everyone's computer.  Mine said "I LIKE TURTLES" with a drawing of a turtle.

All in all it was a pretty uneventful but pretty humorous day.  And it's not even over yet.

For Jessica (I just want to get this off my chest)

This is hopefully the last time I will talk about this in such detail.  I felt the need to put that weekend into words.  I'm hoping it will help me.

December 9th.  I had just finished getting the dogs into their crate for the night. It was late, after 10, and I liked to go to bed early because 6 am always came too soon.  Besides, the next day was Friday, I had plans to spend time with Sam, I figured hanging at her place and drinking away our sorrows was the best way to repair the shambles of a friendship that was left after the whole John debacle.  I didn't want to be exhausted for that.  I heard laughter and footsteps coming down the hall.  There was a knock on the door, and there was Jess, eyes laughing, a glass of wine in her hand.

"You've got to try this!! It's so good!"

So I did, and it was, and I asked her what it was.  She said it was a wine she got from Homegrown and promised me to bring some home the next day after work.  I gave her $20 and watched her dance back down the hall.  I closed the door.

That was the last time I saw her.

Friday came and went without incident.  I went over to Sam's and watched Sailor Moon and drank white wine sangria.  I drank too much, felt awful, and drove home at 4 am.  At approximately the same time,Jess was having a seizure, accelerating into a brick wall, metal streetlight, and finally coming to a stop in a ditch.  While I was crawling into my bed, she was being rushed to the hospital by EMTs who were trying to figure out who she was. 

It wasn't until 9:30 that I even knew anything was wrong. Sitting in the waiting room at my car dealer, waiting for my car's oil to be changed, Mary called to tell me that Jess had been in a bad accident.  She told me to come to the hospital as soon a s I could.

At that point I started making the rounds of phone calls.  Letting my dad know I might not make it to the show that night, depending on how the situation was, telling my mom what was going on.  I didn't know what to expect.  Broken bones, painful recuperation, but nothing really prepared me for what it actually was.

 Matt came down and met me at the hospital, explaining what had happened.  Jess had hit her head, but she'd be fine.  They had taken a part of her skill out to relieve the pressure on her brain and to insert a monitor.  By the time I got upstairs to where Mary was waiting, I was convinced Jess would be up and fine in a few days, joking about the whole experience and fuming over the loss of her brand new car.

Mary's face said differently.  She and I walked down to get coffee from the lobby and she told me what the doctor's had told Jess's family.

Jess's body was fine.  A few bruises and scrapes from the impact, but no broken bones, no serious problems of any kind.  Her brain was a different story.  She had severe damage to the front cortex and there was no brain activity.  She was hooked up to machines to keep her going.  The odds of her coming out of it unscathed were minuscule, if she came out of it at all.

At that point I couldn't stop the tears.  It was a constant stream for what felt like hours, between racking sobs and slow tearing up (which was the best I could do to control myself in front of her already grieving family).  I finally drove home, my Dad came and picked me up to take me back to Dresher for the weekend.  There wasn't anything I could do to help her now, and the doctor's didn't know how long it would take to know if she would pull through.

That night I went to "A Christmas Carol," while Mary paced fitfully around the hospital waiting area.  I slept in a comfortable bed while she slept on a floor for a few brief hours.  Sunday I wanted to go home but Dad advised against it, since I had no other mode of transportation, I stayed.  I should have fought him on it, I should have been home.  Monday he dropped me off at work.  After lunch I asked Mary if there was any news. 30 seconds later I got a phone call.

Jess hadn't pulled through.  She had started shutting down her own organs.  They had tried everything to save her, but were now in surgery, harvesting her organs to donate to patients in need.  Her death saved 7 people's lives.

I sank to the ground out side of work, crying hysterically.  One of the girls I work with brought me my coat and a box of tissues.  My boss came out and tried to comfort me and told me to take all the time I needed, just to let her know.  I didn't want to go back to Dad's, I didn't want to go back to my house, so full of what was left of her and so full of loss.  Sam drove me back to Delaware, where I packed and waited for my mom to drive down to Bethany.

I spent the next two days drinking, eating, and ignoring a pain that I had no idea how to deal with and could not comprehend.  I drove back up on Wednesday, went back to work on Thursday, the viewing was Sunday and the funeral Monday.  For a week solid afterwards, I was haunted by the feeling that she was outside my door, staring, questioning, demanding to know why I hadn't been there.  Why I hadn't been there for Mary, how could I have been so selfish.

It still haunts me, that image.  Her standing at my door, demanding why, if I loved her at all, did I not stay. And if I didn't love her, then why didn't I love Mary enough to see that she needed me to be here?

I want you to forgive me, Jess. I want to know you understand that I didn't know what to do, my brain stopped working logically and just shut off.  I want you to know how much I loved you and how cheated I feel at not being able to know you better.  For being robbed of such an incredible person.

I'll always miss you.

Where to next?

It's been a while.

I have a new resolution, I'm going to write in this more, and I'm going to try to be more positive.  Monday was Jess's 24th birthday, and I've decided that she wouldn't want me to be unhappy.  She'd want me to go out and live and experience everything that I can.  That's just the kind of person she was.

With that in mind, I'm trying to take a positive outlook on next year.  Since grad school is not in my immediate future (read: did not get in), I'm free to do other things.  I'm looking into internships and jobs in conservation to try to boost my application, I'm also looking into taking an art class or two and maybe a refresher chem course to get back in the game.  I'm also trying to decide where  I want to live next, which depends relatively heavily on where my next job is going to be.  As much as my boss would really like me to stay where I am, I think it's time to move on.  I'm not as happy here as I should be, and it's not getting me anywhere closer to where I want to be.

That being said, I'm keeping my eyes open to different job opportunities that may not neccesarily be linked to conservation.  I'm taking an aptitude test to find out what my natural skills are to help me see what other kinds of work I would be able to be satisfied in.  I've learned that I am not content in a desk job, but I do like interacting with people much more than I originally thought I would.  I definitely know that I need something more intellectually stimulating than my current job, and I would really like something where I can see physical progress at the end of the day.  Either way, it'll be interesting to see what the results are, I'm open to new ideas.

All in all, I'm not too unhappy with how life is.  I can wish for it to be different, my drive to be shorter, my roommates to be home more... but things could be so much worse and have been before that I'm actually feeling pretty hopeful about the whole situation.

Hope you all are doing well :)

Looking up?

I am starting to feel better.  I've calmed down a little, I've started to go to the gym, which surprisingly helps me relax a little more.  I've decided that I've been really proactive over the past couple of weeks and that I really deserve a break.  I'm done with forcing things, I'm going to see what happens if I just let the fates that be take care of me, and to not freak out about making sure things work the way that I think that they should.  If there is one thing I have learned, it's that I have no idea what I'm doing, and that I should listen more to my heart and my gut and less to what my brain tells me is the way things should go.

So far... It's been pretty successful :)  I'm happy, probably for the first time in months.

I'm Trying

I've been away from this for a long time.

A month has passed, and in some ways it's easier.  I'm not spontaneously crying any more, we're slowing pulling our lives back together.  I joined a gym, I've started to change my diet so I'm eating things that are better for me and that will help me be a stronger person.  I got my application for Delaware in and I'm almost done the one for Buffalo.  I feel more like me than I have in a month, possibly longer.  I'm tired of being depressed, I'm tired of being exhausted, I'm tired of not having the emotional stamina to get through the day.  So I'm working to change my life and change myself and change my situation.

In some ways, it's so much harder.  It still feels so surreal, like Jess just moved out to some other country.  I can't really remember as well as I used to.  I try to picture her face and voice and laugh and it's all a little bit blurry and off.  I don't like that.  Mary is having a worse time now than she was before.  I think her heart is broken and her life is broken and she's had to just gather her broken self up and drag it forward just to keep moving.  I think she's tired of it, I think it's absolutely exhausted her and I think she is angry.

My anger's died down a little.  I'm not as angry as I was, I'm exhausted and I'm sad.  I feel like life is brutally unfair.  I need to stop being afraid, though.  If anything good has come out of this it is that I've realized that no one is promised tomorrow.  You've got today, and that's it.  I've got to stop being afraid of tomorrow.  I've got to stop being afraid that things won't work the way I want to and I need to just go for them.  I'm trying to stop procrastinating.  There's no guarantee that you'll actually get to finish it later.

So this is us, trying to pull our lives back together.  We're bringing in a new roommate, we'll see how it goes.  I don't know if we're all ready for it or not, but we all know we're not ready to pay more than we can afford to keep her place empty.

I miss her.