Almost Dreamland

I woke up around 3:20 a.m. and couldn't get back to sleep. I decided to make the most of my time and snuggly Darcy, my shared custody dog. I still didn't feel sleepy so I watched some tv and loved on my girls. I drifted off to sleep about 20 minutes before my alarm went off at 5:50.

Somewhere before sleep but when I was not quite awake I thought I felt another person in bed with me. I knew, in the strange way that you know things in dreams, that it was my husband. He laid alongside me and put his arm around me. I could feel the hair on his hand. I could feel his weight against my body. It felt so real. It wasn't a dream in that there was a particular scenario going on. I still knew he had left me, and I had no questions as to why he was in bed holding me. I was thankful that he was there and I felt that there would be a time for questions later.

This vision has haunted me all day long. It's made me cry a few times, in short bursts. I almost had a panic attack while my students were taking a test. It's really quite cruel. It's hard to escape the pain all day long, and have to be attacked by my subconcious as well?

At least I'll have plenty to discuss with my counselor tomorrow.

Am I Now the Man?

I had to watch over study hall for the first time by myself on Friday. The previous day, this study hall made the teacher in charge practically cry. I looked forward to the hour with trepidation.

The point of study hall is to actually study, though the students also can read for fun. The students aren't supposed to talk, or to sleep. I asked a student, who was putting his head down, if he had something else to work on. Student A, let's call him Fillbert, had a snit fit. Because of their behavior the previous day, they were on notice that they got one warning and then detention. Fillbert had already gotten his warning at the beginning of the hour. And thus I gave my first detention.

Fillbert attempted to play upon my sympathies, asking me why I had to be like that, couldn't I give him a break, and it really did make me feel bad. I don't know how many countless classes I wanted to sleep through in high school. But I knew if I backed down, Fillbert and the rest of the troublesome class were going to lose respect for me and my discipline for the rest of the semester. And it worked. He didn't give me any trouble for the rest of the hour.

I am the Man. Stay on task or I will give you a detention. I have the power.

Do Dates Have Meaning?

In honor of my recent birthday. Not sure much of it is true, but fairly fun.

Your Birthdate: January 24

You understand people well and are a natural born therapist. A peacemaker, people always seem to get along when you are around. You tend to be a father or mother figure to friends, even to those older than you. You enjoy your role, and you find that you are close to many people. Your strength: Your devotion Your weakness: Reliance on others for happiness Your power color: Lilac Your power symbol: Heart Your power month: June

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

Pardon Me

But I just discovered blogthings.com. I may put way too many of these cute little survey results on the blog since I'm not feeling creative enough to come up with much interesting new material of my own. I could tell the story of the first detention that I gave out in school yesterday. Or my review of Must Love Dogs, a movie about two newly divorced folks looking for love. Or maybe about my new Kohl's clearance Oscar the Grouch jammies. (See, my favorite book when I was a toddler was How to Be a Grouch By Oscar the Grouch).

But see, I don't feel really much like telling any of those stories tonight. So if one of those stories sounds spine-tinglingly interesting to you, then you'll just have to wait on the edge of your seats until tomorrow or the next day.

Right now what I really want to do is to try and enjoy my movie, my jammies, and my new flannel sheets that I got at rock bottom prices, and my visit from dog 2, Darcy. So I will. So there.

P. S. Cat Power's new cd was worth the wait.
P.P.S. I'm trying to think of a name for my new jade plant. Herbert? Roger? Spike?
P.P.P.S. I'm not reading anything right now besides my school planning stuff. But I did finish the book on Buffy.

Not a Surprise.

Hmmm... could this be me?

You Have a Melancholic Temperament

Introspective and reflective, you think about everything and anything. You are a soft-hearted daydreamer. You long for your ideal life. You love silence and solitude. Everyday life is usually too chaotic for you. Given enough time alone, it's easy for you to find inner peace. You tend to be spiritual, having found your own meaning of life. Wise and patient, you can help people through difficult times. At your worst, you brood and sulk. Your negative thoughts can trap you. You are reserved and withdrawn. This makes it hard to connect to others. You tend to over think small things, making decisions difficult.

What Temperment Are You?

Without a Pot to Piss in... Literally

The title doesn't refer to my aforementioned money problems. Though those are fun. I mean, really. My heating bill was massive last month and the house is freezing. My shampoo is sitting on the bathroom window sill and it is literally frozen. Between class and student teaching and my birthday dinner, I've hardly been home twenty minutes this week. My husband is avoiding my calls and my emails about practical details (he has not paid the car payment for his car this month, which my name is also on....) did not wish me a happy birthday (nor is it a surprise, but still), and I have to teach a lesson tomorrow on a topic I know nothing about. I have done dishes, not had enough time to clean up the mess husband left when plastering Sunday afternoon (I cleaned up after myself when I spent the last 2 days priming and painting, but he works 3 hours one Sunday and forgets how to use a broom or vacuum), and am pretty much out of clean underwear. I should be asleep right now, because I have to get up in another 7 hours.
But the climax of my whole evening- and the connection to the title- my toilet now floods the bathroom and leaks through the living room ceiling upon flushing!!!!
I was looking forward to spending a few uninterrupted hours here tomorrow afternoon since I don't have to stay after school or go to class. Hours I could wash my clothes, wash my dishes, clean up after the remodelling, run (which I must admit, sometimes sends me to the bathroom) and watch a little tv while doing my homework and snuggling my dog. But am I going to do that? No- I'm going to have to camp out with my parents. Admittedly, it's warmer, but I just want to be home!!! The packing alone will leech too much time from my afternoon.
Well, I'm crazy if I stay up writing this any longer instead of sleeping. Wish or pray for my sanity, based on your own personal belief system. I'll need it.

I'm Older Than I've Ever Been and Now I'm Even Older

Today wasn't a terrible day. Listened to some good music. Spent another day student teaching. I'm really busy... class last night, dinner with my parents in honor of my birth tonight, and class tomorrow.... I need to vacuum and wash dishes but I've hardly been home. I feel sorry for my poor dog. She's hardly seen me this week.

One of my favorite bands is gonna be in town next month. I'm really excited that I will get to see them, and I've actually heard of their opening act, too. What luck! Husband also likes them, but I don't want to ruin my evening. I think I might forget to tell him they're in town. And just happen to be wearing a t-shirt from the show when he drops Darcy off for a visit. "Oh," I'll say, so innocently, "I didn't tell you they're in town? I must have forgot. It was a great show."

I don't want to ruin my evening with him there. It's a small venue. I don't think I'm being petty.

I'm still pretty depressed but I vowed to not think about it today, so there. I'm going to push the worry and pain out of my mind for at least another three hours, and I'll be too busy to think of it again before Thursday evening.

Down Day

Today's been one of those down days. I am pretty sad and hurt and angry and don't have really a lot to do with that except pour it out here. Everyone who would listen to me is tired of hearing about this. You all probably are too, but bear with me.
It's my birthday on Tuesday and my only birthday wish is that my husband would come home to be with me, and tell me that everything is going to be all right. Instead, I will probably spend the evening alone doing my homework.
My world is not right. I carry the pain with me daily, and sometimes it's no heavier a burden than a pendant hanging off my neck. Other times it is a millstone that drags me down to the earth with each step, reminding me constantly how miserable my life is and how little the person who said he would love, honor, and cherish me forever actually cares for me.
If it wasn't for my dog, I'd want to die. I can't really imagine my life ever being happy again.

The Late Twenties

Reading: Sex and the Slayer, a book about the gender politics of Buffy.
Watching: The first two seasons of Moonlighting on DVD. I watched it as a child, but at the time I didn't know the facts of life, so I missed a ton of the jokes.
Can't wait: for a new eppy of Veronica Mars and the new CD by Cat Power that comes out next week- on my b-day. The day which I will officially enter my (drum roll) late twenties.

Now I know I will not be ancient by reaching my late twenties, but it has me down a little bit. I feel like I should have accomplished more by now. You can piss away your early twenties, and spend your mid twenties paying your dues, but now that I am reaching my late twenties I feel I should have at least some results to show for the hard work I've been putting in for the last decade.

Score card:
Career- Student teacher and graduate student. No benefits and barely a living wage at 60 hours a week.

Marital Status: deserted

Parenthood Status: No kids. None in the near future, despite the five year marriage. Custody of one dog full time, and part time custody of my other dog, if that counts.

Living arrangements: Living with aforementioned canines, no humans. Preparing to sell my house to move into (shudder) my parents' basement.

What I have to show for my life: a couple of college degrees. My car is paid off....

This is more depressing than I'd intended.
It was a long day and I'm sleepy, so I hope you'll forgive me. And I have a scratchy throat. And I sat through many boring hours of eduspeak today at student teacher orientation.

You'll go blind!

New research links Viagra and optic nerve damage.

Princess Klotilde

My dog, Chloe, has been particularly good today. I managed to clip four of her nails and give her a bath, and she has decided not to put on airs and ignore me or take out her annoyance about the clipping and the bathing on me. In part, this is probably because I also brought home a huge bag of bones in addition to the dog shampoo. Also, she doesn't have my husband to run to and snuggle up to instead of me, and this dog loves to snuggle. Right now she's looking very sweet, shiny, and clean all curled up in a chair sleeping. I wish I could find that kind of peace, though I guess I don't really know what I look like asleep. Maybe I'm just as cute and peaceful looking, though I doubt that I stick my legs in the air.
The bath was quite an experience. Looking back, I probably should have not attempted it fully clothed, as I left the bathroom looking as if I went swimming in my clothes. She jumped out of the tub mid bath (half her body was still soapy) and it took a great deal of coaxing to get her back into the tub- and some heavy lifting. The bathroom now smells more like wet dog than of plaster dust, not sure if that's an improvement. I'm thinking of painting my newly-fixed bathroom plaster a light purple. What does everyone think? It shouldn't be overpowering, since the light grey tile ends above eye level. Okay, short person eye level.
It's been an all right weekend. Went to one of my favorite restaurants with my family in honor of my upcoming birthday. The food was wonderful, but that's the place my husband usually takes me annual for my birthday.
However I must add that things are not so hard as they were last week on that front. I mean, I ache and wish he were home, but after telling him that I wanted him to come home last Wednesday I felt that a weight was lifted from me. I told him what I needed to, and the despair is not there like it was last week.
I've also done quite a bit of cleaning, home repair, and furniture moving. It's amazing how different a room can make you feel when one or two dressers or shelves are sitting in a different place.
It's also interesting how cleaning a room can make me feel- all that dust and plaster detritus kicked up into the air has really bothered my asthma.
Now, I don't really have very active asthma. I hardly ever have attacks, and haven't even carried an inhaler with me since I got in shape a couple of years ago. Yet yesterday, all that dust kept me up at night, having a hard time breathing but not quite gasping for breath. And I can't find a damn inhaler. I probably have four or five, but I have no idea where they are.
Still reading: the book about Austen. Really good, should finish it today.
Watching: The Exorcism of Emily Rose. Run of the mill horror. Better than average, but not really great.
Wish me luck- student teacher orientation starts tomorrow. In just a few days I shall be inflicting myself on about 100 hormone-driven and mostly class privelaged youngsters at "Pine Groves" High School. May God have mercy on my soul.

Update

For those of you who are wondering, based on the musings of former posts-
I am reading: a book about Jane Austen.
I am watching: Angels in America, which is simply brilliant.

The Year Ahead

For those of you who don't know this, more than likely because I have been more focused on emotional than physical states of being in this entire blog, I am a runner.

That is to say, I am not a very fast runner, or a very talented or graceful runner, but I enjoy running fairly passionately. My week feels off if I have not run at least 20 miles. I feel sinfully guilty if I am injured or ill and have to cut back on my running. Stress is worse than usual if I can't find the time to pound out five miles a few days a week. And I have been suffering from bilateral runner's knee since August. This means that I have been running very little, though slowly and slowly more, since starting physical therapy in October. Yesterday, for the first time since August, I managed to run a whole six miles.

This may seem like a ton of running to those of you not in shape, or not as addicted to this sport as I am, but before my knees hurt so much I could barely walk I was running near 30 miles a week, and reaching about 10 miles for my distance run one day a week. 6 miles is a good mark to have reached, since it is longer than my usual runs of around 5 miles a piece, but it is still short of the 10-11 miles I had been reaching and the half-marathon that I'm training for in April. But it's a start.

Anyway, so last year I subscribed to Runner's World, and with that subscription came a free training calendar. Not extremely spiffy, but it had dates and grids and suggestions, and a place to write down and add up my daily, weekly, and monthly mileages. I did not get this calendar for free this year, so I decided, after a year of knowing what I wrote down and what I didn't, that I would create my own calendar on the computer, with my weeks starting on Monday as I usually put them in my running. I have 2 weeks on each page, and spots for weekly running goals (for stuff like distance and speed- useful since I am still builing up my mileage and am governed by the ten percent rule- one should not add more than 10 percent to one's mileage in a week or one will likely get injured).

What really affected me was typing in the dates. I have goals for the first third of the year, which is probably good enough, because I may hurt myself or get sick during that time, and then have to rework my goals for the rest of the year if I tried to make goals through December. But when I started typing in dates I was thinking- How will my student teaching be going by this point in March? Will I still be living in my house at this date in May or with my parents? Will I be running on my treadmill in their basement instead of my spare room? Will I still be married when I reach our fifth wedding anniversary? Will he have come back to me by this holiday? Where will my new teaching job be? Will I be starting it at this date late in August? Will I be thinking about how he will have been gone an entire year on Nov. 1, 2006, or will I be thinking about how far we've come since then? Will I have a new condo? Will we have a new condo?

No matter the answers to all of these questions, it should be a momentous year.

Movies for the Dumped

I am perfecting the art of finding the perfect movies to watch when dumped or broken-hearted. It really is an art- one has to carefully balance the amount of joy and escape one can expect to get from a particular movie and/or genre while considering the amount of painful recognition one might see, thus ruining the escape/pleasure and possibly make one feel worse than when the movie began. So far, here's my score card.

Drama- steer clear of this genre altogether, unless you are assured it's some kind of drama/suspense, or so painstakingly well made that the art of the film will distract you from any minor love story contained within its plot. If it is a love story drama or a break-up story drama don't touch it with a ten-foot pole, unless you are the type that enjoys weepy movies when you're feeling down already. I managed to make it through Brokeback Mountain and The Constant Gardener recently. Neither bothered me too much, though that could be in part because 1.) I'm not a gay cowboy facing a breakup, and 2.) CG had a lot of interesting suspense. It was still sad, but in a general, our world priorities are really messed up kind of way and not in the specific he broke my heart kind of way.

Comedy- This genre is a real toss-up. You could find a really good non-romantic comedy that will give you some laughs and keep your mind off of love gone wrong for a few hours, even an evening. Or you could blanch at an unexpected love story or break-up joke that will leave you jarred for that same evening. In the comedy genre at the moment, I am mostly sticking to tv, so I don't have much to recommend. Scrubs was really funny last night....

Action has never really been my thing to begin with. Since I don't usually enjoy action movies, I run the risk of being so bored that I am not distracted at all from my troubles, and that is no good. I suppose a good action movie might do someone some good, though I'm sure it would be hard to find more than a handful.

Horror seems to be the best genre of all to watch. There's usually no love story (and if there is, it's almost always so shallow and badly written that it doesn't remind you of your own bad relationship). The plot is out of the realm of the ordinary, yet predictable enough to be comforting. And fearing the boogey man (or foggy pirates, or posessed girls in a video tape) is more fun than fearing that you've wasted the last ten years of your life and that you were a complete fool.

I will be watching either Dark Water or The Exorcism of Emily Rose tonight.

Science News

Teen sleep, cloning, and infant circumcision herpes... ewwwww.

Sometime in the Morning

Falling asleep isn't the problem that it was. After a full day I'm usually tired. The problem is the staying asleep all night. The problem is the morning sickness.
No, not the pregnant kind. It's the kind where I slip slightly into consciousness from my warm cocoon-y dreamworld and the realization that my husband has left me, my heart aches all day long, and I don't know when things will ever get better pierces my sleep. At this point the fight-or-flight starts to kick in, and I can't even dream of getting back to sleep again. Then I settle into the morning nausea that comes with the recognition that my life is so far off track and I don't know how to fix it.
That makes 8 hours sleep a problem. Not that I need that, or always got it before. The dogs usually need to go out early in the morning, and when it's not break time, I usually need to leave fairly early as well.
So now it's time to hurry along and face another day outside my bed.

New Format

I know I'm not very snappy with the formatting yet. I promise I'll try and brush up on my programming to find something neat to spice it all up. Don't want to add any identifying photographs, incriminating the innocent and all, so I might have to spend some quality time with Adobe before I can do anything neat.
He's getting out of the hospital today. I know it's not right, but I almost wish he were there a little longer. When he was there I knew I would see him everyday, once he's out it's another story.
Trying to decide what book to read next. I'd like to read a couple more before classes start again next week because my reading time will once again not be my own. It's a toss up between an interesting history book I haven't had time to read (a book about the Salem Witch Trials) and a classic piece of fiction (Bleak House by Dickens). Hopefully I will have time for both. Dickens is fairly wordy, though....

Monster Hospital

It's hard going there every day, trying to be supportive and make small talk, pretend everything is all right. I just want him to come home to me. It would be a lot easier if I knew the flowers he bought were for secret Santa, or some friend's funeral or something and not for a woman. It would be a lot easier if I knew that when the hospitalization was all over, he'd be back here and loving me again. It would be a lot easier if I wasn't going to run out of money in a month.
The hospital is really something, too. They all are wearing these paper scrubs, and the hospital is about 85 degrees. It's a small unit, and there's not an awful lot to do but sleep.
Sleep is what I want right now. So depressed. Why should a wife have to beg for her husband to come home?

Funny story. Sort of.

My younger sister has been in contact with a guy we both sort of dated in high school. It was an interesting situation, complicated, and kind of icky to think about. Since this guy was not the love of my life I tend not to think about it much.
Anyway, this guy was my age and my sister was a freshman, three years younger. They went out a couple times at the beginning of the summer after my and (let's call him) Joe-Bob's graduation. During this time, though he and I had already known each other through a shared class, Joe-Bob began to show more of an interest in me than he had before. After one of their two dates, my sister went to bed and he stayed and talked to me for at least an hour.
Strangely enough, JB started calling me after that. And we went to a movie together once, but the meaning of it all was not well-defined. Still, how many straight 18 year old boys go to a Meg Ryan romantic comedy alone with a girl if he's not expecting some date-like action going on?
After this time, JB stopped calling and coming over. Both my sis and myself. Fine with me, I wasn't really waiting by the phone or anything. He was nice and all, but the situation was too weird for me, and an old boyfriend of mine had just gotten back in touch with me as well.
Now for the present situation: he and my married sister are emailing regularly, he's telling her that she's the one that got away, and that he and I were only friends. It could possibly be construed that way, though he would have had to forget a few things he told me at the time for that interp to work, but really, this was over a decade ago, not a huge deal. He's engaged, though and telling her how she was so wonderful, wishes they hadn't lost touch.
I'm reminding her she's married, and that this fascination is probably more related to him than to her. Real relationships take a lot of work and are a lot harder than merely idealizing a girl he dated twice many years ago. But this sets her off on a whole list of guys and regrets she had about relationships lost or never tried.
This, of course, really starts getting me going. Once again I am in high school, and thinking about how she always had several dates lined up and guys hardly ever paid attention to me at all. And I start fuming, and wondering again, what is it about my sister? Not to sound like a narcissistic bitch, but I'm prettier and smarter than my sister. (Not to mention when I was 18 and she 15, I was the only one with actual breasts...) Why did she always have tons of interested guys?
Can't your family always bring you back to that place, you know, where you feel like a jealous kid again?
In other news....
He's doing okay at the hospital. Brought him books to read, and a card. He seemed happy to see me for a few minutes. They want to put him on one of the older antipsychotics. Errr. Those things are really nasty.

It Happened

He's back in the hospital, no huge surprise there. I know I can't fix him, but I wish he'd stop shutting me out. He just surrounds himself in silence and in isolation, and he keeps getting worse. The depression makes it worse, and if all he does is shut himself away, he's never going to be happy.
I've realized how depressing this blog is- not enough self-deprecating humor to make it more uplifting. Maybe I shall experiment with different tones in order to make the pain more entertaining. I promise, it's easier to do when I'm talking to people in public with which I have a passing acquaintance than it is to the net.
I've taken to comforting myself through old tv shows. Right now Buffy and Full House allow me to cope. FH is the comfort food- every problem can be solved in 30 minutes and everything goes back to normal at the end of a show. Buffy on the other hand, is simply a masterpiece in which I can engross myself. All the themes, the texts and metatexts, the gender politics, the metaphors are amazingly rich, deep, and mostly truthful feeling.
Overall, it's less calories than comfort food and more distracting to boot.
Any other stress relieving or comfort-inducing strategies that you rely on that won't make me gain 30 pounds or land me in jail?

New Year

I might have to scream if one more person tells me "Happy New Year." I am not happy. And this year might prove to be almost as horrible as last year, as I look out over a fairly likely divorce, the small possibility instead of having to committ my husband, and the prospect of selling the house I love in order to move into my parents' basement.
I am visiting relatives, and we went to their church this morning. It was a fairly uncomfortable prospect. They broke out into sharing about what they are thankful for, blessings from the last year, and I had a really hard time not crying. I am a religious person, but not of the touchy-feely variety. And on top of everything else right now, I'm aching fairly fiercely. I fought off the impulse to stand up and share my pain, to thank Jesus aloud for allowing my husband to be mentally ill- so ill he doesn't trust anyone, so ill he hurts himself physically and everyone else mentally. So ill he can't even count on me or his family for help, but he runs away from his marriage and his life. So ill he becomes a new, humorless person who can't love anyone. Who lost his easy smile, and all the jokes and intimacy. So ill he steals from me and can't think of anyone else's pain but his. Thankful that God would allow this. Allow me to be able to lose my love and my home. I'm really thankful.
That and the shaking hands. I hate people touching me- it's gross and on top of it, it's cold and flu season. But people come up to you and stick their hand in yours. Errrr. You know, you exchange more germs in a handshake than you do with sexual intercourse. And at least 10 people forced me into a handshake. One more than once. I'm not carrying any weapons, I promise!
(for those of you who are unaware, the handshake started as a custom to convince your neighbor that you were unarmed when you met.)
I wish I were home. It's easier being miserable in one's own home than abroad.
I am thankful for my dog, but she's hundreds of miles away.
Happy New Year, everyone.