Roids and ru

Turning 30 has brought with it some wondrous and some most annoying things ever. The experience of the 30 has been overall more enjoyable than not, but what else it has brought on is a whole new monster that is both exasperating and distracting. Just a little over a month ago I got this wicked nasty rash on my neck. Now, I am not a fan of things touching my neck and this includes necklaces and the winter turtleneck, but not men (and hadn't had one on my neck in a while) so for a rash to break out there presents some concern as I hadn't changed any eating, washing, or any other habits for that matter. I am a scratcher. Make it bleed and the itch will stop. As a child I had no nails so anything I could stab through that mosquito bite the better. Wait, better yet, let's rug burn it so that the entire surface area around it is so raw that it burns to the touch. Now add alcohol. Great! So long as it doesn't itch anymore. I have scars across my body from picking, scratching, nicking, or whatever and I can handle it. I am still a scratcher and the one thing that I've gained over the years other than maturity to know that scratching the shit out of something only makes it more susceptible to germs and diseases is the fact that I now have nails. For this reason I am most concerned because I am unable to stop myself from scratching in my sleep. I will take that scratch down to the end of the itch. I don't do meds, so while on a trip to NYC with my ailing mother a few weeks ago, we picked up three different types of cream/ointment/sprays and none of them worked the way I needed. One night, I woke up and found myself just scratching the living shit out of my feet. Even with open flesh wounds the spray Benadryl burned only slightly, but went right back to itching. My mother awoke and suggested that I pour some gin on the problem areas. Surprisingly, the gin (poured for my homeys, my feet) worked like magic. I was able to sleep. The problem though is that I can't be pouring gin on my feet or any other itching area every time it needs the relief, so I had to break down and ask my doctor for help (after returning to Chicago a week and 1/2 later). She was stumped so she put me on Prednizone and up until two days ago, I didn't know it was indeed a steroid. I felt great! All my skin problems cleared up and my skin was the clearest and smoothest it has been on record. Every skin problem I had seemed to clear up and I even stopped sneezing (which started when I quit smoking). About two weeks ago I woke up feeling like a bus hit me. I just attributed it to the road trip. Yesterday, I had blurred vision, major bones aching, muscle tension, nausea, and heartburn. WTF? I finally called my doctor to see WTF? and she said it was the withdrawal from the steroid. Not doing meds is almost the equivalent to not doing doctors and even though I had just read the side effects for the prednizone, I called my doc to verify because I actually trust her opinion. She has now referred me to an allergist. Great, another fucking doctor. I've never been so much as asked to be allergy tested and just assumed that I was not allergic to anything until I quit smoking and turned 30. Where are the doctors like this one that care? Why do I sound like I'm living off Social Security? Happy Halloween.

No disrespect

The previous post is a thought, not an attack. It is increasingly upsetting to me that the moment I decide to become more of a vegetarian borderline vegan, my produce is threatened. Spinach is my favorite veggie. I'm sad. I love that we have food that comes from the earth that needs no processing and now it's in danger. The hippie is emerging. Next I will have to evaluate my showering. Water conservation is so important, but I am so OCD that I can not go a day without a shower or without washing my hands at least 15 xs a day. I at least wanted to start with the veggies. Come on veggies! Don't let me down.

Immigration Salmonella

Did it ever occur to you that just when all this immigration and fencing hooplah has come about, the produce is becoming contaminated? A retaliation is happening and duly so. You take away our right to illegally cross your border and we wave the responsibility of growing your produce properly. huh? huh?

It's a thought.

Lifted

From the decision made several months ago to stop a habit has grown forth a field of goodness. I had no idea that it would have this kind of effect on me and for it to be so tremendously positive. For the past 17 months I have been telling my stories (real stories of my life) to a woman who didn't know me from some other loony and she has helped me become a better person by believing in me. Above anything else, I needed a stranger to give me their honest, objective opinion about someone they will meet with, every other week, for the next year or two. She has been quite a helper. She hasn't made me do anything, she has just reinforced the feelings I had and helped me realize what I knew all along. So, in all this goo, I have found more confidence in myself. I haven't had this kind of confidence since my senior year in high school. Without sounding like an arrogant hooker, I have to say that most people I come into contact with find me a genuinely decent person. Granted, in the line of work I day job it in, I know I piss people off and sometimes it's almost unacceptable (the manner in which I piss them off), but it happens and I'm learning to be ok with that and yet, I am realizing how to still do a good job and handle the people that came to me at the wrong time. It's the main reason I could not work in the food industry. I don't hide it very well.

A few days ago I posted my first personal ad. I have answered a total of two and been denied both times so I decided that I'd post my own and turn things around. Well, I can't say for sure that I will find the man of my dreams this way, but it sure didn't hurt to have an extra large slice of ego boost courtesy of the post. I expected there to be a few more wacky dudes, but most of them were pretty genuine it seemed. A couple cock shots, and a couple that commented negatively on my annoyingly lost post. Those were deleted with no response. When I posted it I was sober and balls to the wall. If anything, I just needed to shout my best qualities out there so that I could get on with it and see what the men had to say about it. Pretty freaking positive. So positive I felt it necessary to pull my ad. I started to feel stressed out that I needed to respond to everyone so that I wouldn't be a bitch. I wanted the guys I rejected felt like I was being good to them and I tried to give a positive reason for the turn down. It's a bit uncomfortable. I don't care for that much attention because I honestly don't know how to handle it. I never have (please don't take this is as arrogant- if anything, self doubting until now). The whole idea of putting up a post, scanning the crowd to see and hear who may be a good match or interesting to chill with brings some new perspectives on life. The concept seems a bit like crabbing. Ever been in the Chesapeake Bay with your pants rolled up and throwing and pulling in crab pots and baskets? It's stinky, but it's pertinent to the story. Raw and uninhibited is something that I long to be, but still remain attached to some ever steady 50's mentality. It's an edge of normalcy on the brink of destruction. The more energetic and alive I become with the new lifestyle, the crazier I feel. The need to launch my teeth into something makes me feel almost like a vampire. The wave of desperation is so strong, but the denial makes it neutralize and still have that insane amount of energy that I didn't know existed within this 30 yr old mortal coil.

This overall feeling first happened back in March when I booked my flight to San Diego for $7.50. Never having been further west of the Mississippi than Illinois, I had only dreamt of the things I would not only fly over, but experience once I landed. It makes me cry a little to think of how happy I was those 4 days. When the plans were finalized there was this honestly organic orgasm that shot around my body for about 10 mins. Beats paying $30 for a pill of ecstasy. This buries the emotional distress my body goes through while watching award shows. Even if they are the lamest of the lame fucking award shows I am still crying and carrying on. I was in NYC recently and they had a rally for the Mets to go to the ALCS. I am walking with my mom and I just start crying. I think of how I felt with the Sox rally and then the ticker tape parade the city of Chicago gave them upon winning the World Series in 2005. 88 years it had been since their last win. So much emotion. You could feel pulse under the city for a good month. Even people that didn't really care about either the Cubs or the Sox were eager and excited to talk about the Southside Hitmen. Glory be the days for Chicago Southsiders post 2005 World Series title as Bridgeport will never be the same. Elevation. Everyone needs it and has their own way of reaching the level of intensity they wish to achieve. For the time after CA, I had to remind myself to go back to the place I felt there on that beautiful avocado farm. I bet it looks different now. The trees were pruned to promote more nutrient filled avocados. I now have new places to go and to draw from so that this nutrient filled new lifestyle can continue the bettering. word.

ROAD THOUGHTS

You might think I'm crazy, for driving all night long. You might think I'm foolish to keep the moon as my guide. You might think it's hysterical to drive with all these wheels, but all I want is peace. It is the most peaceful thing to drive through the night with the moon at my back lighting the clear highway. Every day you meet people that complain or exclaim how something is fucked up. "It's freezing!" or "You're insane!" are two in each category that comes to mind. Sure, I am technically having "affairs" (harmless? who knows. are they affairs? what else would you call them?) with two gents and most of the people that know about it have an opinion, good or bad, but try not to pass judgement on me at least. To a housewife, hearing this information could possibly make her that much more uncomfortable about her husband working long hours or traveling a lot and to her I apologize. To others I apologize, too, but not so specifically because there are so many variations and I won't apologize to all woman because I hate most in so many ways. For the ladies like myself, commitment has not been the best friend we never had, in fact, it has been quite damaging to me in a lot of ways and only recently have I wanted to open up that part of my life again. Until about 2 years ago, I used to commit to just about everything or everyone, so I thought, but I have been continuously disappointed and hurt, by my self. My therapist is constantly telling me to not be so hard on my self, but I can't help it. My sister said it just the other day, "It's hard to be a perfectionist when you can't focus". Ah, indeed. This road trip has allowed excellent family time and major self reflection pre and post vacation. I love flying, but it is restrictive to have people have to pick you up and renting cars is expensive on top of the flight, so driving is commitment able. Willingly I stayed with my sister, her husband, and their three children longer than I had anticipated and it proved useful and delightful. Child rearing is something so familiar and so not something I want to handle or watch. Luckily, my mother doesn't surround herself with friends or relatives that would constantly ask how my love life is going and (in a Long Island accent) 'why haven't cha married yet?' And to my surprise most of my friends seem to want to ask, but know well enough, if it is happening, I will most certainly talk about it. I got a super serenade on my voice mail when I came home yesterday. The day I left to go to Virginia and NYC, MC Raz left a little Rainbow Connection with he and Mr. Paul Williams. How spectacularly sweet and too thoughtful for words. Sometimes I don't know what to do with myself when it comes to that kid and his giving, his talents, his super sensitive side and his great laugh. He is my favorite person ever. He is my Kermit the Frog in the flesh not Muppet. What's even more interesting, I think of him an awful lot because he is such a force in my life, but this trip, I didn't listen to a lot of his stuff as I normally would and it was just kind of interesting that he would do that the day I drove out to Va. Ah, timing. The radio got the music bid for the trip out. I must say the top three stations consistantly through the trip were country, Rap/Hip Hop/new R&B, and the evangelist/Jesus people. That was the first Chicago to Va road trip without cigs. Turning the dial helped with the fidgety behavior. Road trips rule.

WEST HO!

Every once in a while I get these extraordinary epiphanies that make me feel incredibly small. The more I think about venturing out west, the more I feel it's just for me and not a career path move. Call me selfish, but I'm almost sick of hearing other people's stories (tornado victims, myspace heroes, joe schmoe bloggers, etc) and it's making me not want to put my shit out there even though I have two blogs and am continuing to think about stand up. I definitely want to move west and it may be sooner than April if things work out, but the more I delve in my head about the subject of "the business" in any capacity, I'd rather be around real people than people of the industries. Don't get me wrong, I love show bidness, but to immerse myself in it to do the same thing that millions of other people are doing brings hives to my neck. I can't get over the competition aspect of performing. It all becomes a test and I am a horrific test taker. I remember in elementary school my best friend Danny and I were put in the principal's office or something to take a "smart" test. Fuck if I knew what it was because I couldn't pay attention long enough to grasp the concept. Apparently, I wasn't a gifted child and I have long since accepted that, but in all honesty, the lack of competition and self confidence was never present. Something happened and I stopped feeling confident enough to grab the bull by the horns and go after the things that I want. Whatever everybody else wants to do is fine as long as we're all going and having a good time. Now it's just me. I'm fine with that because it sure does cost less, but for the most part, I am the only single of my close friends. I've been waiting for this to start happening and the circle around me just got tighter. There are several positives along with the usual negatives and I have been doing a tremendous job with not feeling like a third wheel. The benefits include, but not limited to are some free meals, good company, and a change of scenery. One of the uncomfortable aspects of this is the unintentional pity. Believe you me, I'd love to have a significant man in my life, but at this point that might be the only thing that is a major force in my ability to travel with no strings. I was just stag at a wedding two weeks ago and I have another with the same accompaniment in just about a week. I've never been asked to go a wedding with a man except a roommate situation, nor have I been asked to dance at a wedding other than by friends. Ohhhh whoa is me. This sounds so cliche, awesome. The bottom line is that these occurrences are fun, exciting, and super helpful to put happy times and super people in my head. It was helpful to visit with some of the most amazing friends in NYC a week ago. I am truly blessed (yes, it is a blessing to have wonderful friends, family, and health) to have these people in my life and though it can't always be full of visits like it was this year, it has been awesome.

NOTE: This has been sitting as a draft for a few weeks adding a few points today and it sure is apparent that I continue to have the same junk swimming in my head. Clarity is approaching, I can feel it.