Lost days

Sorry, I lost a few days.  I fell into the black hole, you know, the pit filled with quicksand, and stayed stuck.  My doctor called me in to go over my lab tests and started in on me about the extra protein in my blood.  Really.  I told her, "Look, I really don't care about protein in my blood.  Right now I'm half-way between I-don't-give-a-shit and kill-me-now."  She put me in the hospital.

I have six black-and-blues from donating blood to those nasty little vials--one of them is as big as a plum and has turned a sickly yellow-green.  But someone finally figured out I needed to be off the Seroquel.  Like all meds, it doesn't work for everyone.

And like all meds, in order for them to work, you have to take them.  That was the mistake I made in Boston.  I thought I was fine and decided I didn't need medication anymore.

And I loved Boston.  I loved the cobblestone streets and the autumn leaves so intensely painted they looked fake, dressed in colors like salmon pink and day-glow orange.  I loved the way I could walk from my apartment to little shops that sold spices or books or vegetables stacked in little piles.

But I lost it.  Both ways.  I lost my temper and my self-control.  Then I lost my job, my home, and the place I loved to live. 

Oh, well.  I've decided to stop beating myself about the head and ears over that one.  I'm trying to love my new home in the desert.  I'm trying to do better, trying to think before I shoot my mouth off.

I have some good things here:  Family.  A hovering, too-motherly, but loving sister.  A bit-too-stuffy brother-in-law who saved me from living in a cardboard box.  A poorly paid, but fun job with great perks.  And, of course, men.  Men to talk to, men to spend time with, think about, dream about, and maybe one day, fall in love with. 

Just not today.

Today I am still unraveling.  I am unwinding, looking for my core.
Like a torn sweater with a loose piece of yarn that tempts you to pull on it.
Of course, we all know what happens when we try that little trick.   We wind up with a pile of spaghetti.  Like my brain.

But I've stopped whining about that, too.
I have a second chance.  And I'm trying not to blow this one.

Rachel

Facing My Public

This is probably a crazy thing to do, but I'm not exactly known for having a whole lot of common sense at times, and I suspect all the little neurons floating around in my brain aren't always connecting.  I suppose if I would have used what little brain power I have, I wouldn't have ended up in Arizona to begin with.

But there it is, I'm here, working at this rinky-dink hotel, and already so much has happened that someone is writing a book about me and my sister and her husband and their best friend and some life-changing events that have already taken place in all our lives.  It beats the heck about of boredom, I suppose, but on the other hand, I could have been killed.  And I'm barely past thirty.  Well, okay, a little bit more than barely past thirty.

At any rate--and you may be able to relate to this--I had to quit my job in Boston because I told off my boss in a rather loud, ugly, and vulgar way.  Something you've thought about doing, too, right?  Yeah.  It really felt good.  He was an insenstive jerk, arrogant, and took credit for every good, profitable idea I devised for increasing sales at our hotel.

I did learn that being right isn't always the best course of action--pointing it out, I mean.  Especially in front of the boss's boss.  I made the oaf look like a fool, which he is, but then...yeah.  I didn't have much choice but to turn in my resignation.  And of course, in this economy, it was not such a hot idea.

Instead of calling my shrink, I went on a binge--a drinking one, not a shoe-buying one.  (I drink when I'm depressed, but I tend to buy shoes when I'm hyper.)  That also wasn't such a hot idea--the binge, I mean--as I ended up feeling like crap.  I blamed my half-Irish temper.  But the truth is that I just lost control.  Me.  Myself.  I did it to myself.

At any rate, that's when my sister called.  She's six years older and acts like my mother, and manipulated me into visiting her in Arizona at the hotel they recently had become partners in.  I'd never been to Arizona, didn't really want to go to some dumpy little town that was filled iwth spider and snakes, but as I said, she threw the old guilt trip at me and I bought it.  Besides, since I was out of a job, I'd soon be out of an apartment, out of food, and well...you get the idea.

I was here, in Arizona, two days when things started happening.

I think I probably need to tell you something.  I have some issues.  I have a spider phobia.  I have a fear of getting emotionally involved.  The latter problem, I have pretty good reasons for that one.  I also have this odd attraction to danger...or maybe it has an odd attraction to me.  And I have some brain problems, too, some mood disorder problems I'll talk about later.  All totaled it makes for an interesting story, I'm told. That's why there's this woman who's going to be writing about it.

If you want to follow along, great. Maybe we can both learn something.  Or not.

Rachel