Life on The Short Bus.

[theflamingfeminist]

Funny how things work out the way you want it to. Even the way you don’t. I’m going in circles, I know. Our paths take us in very odd places sometimes. I’m on the verge of what I hope is is my next step elsewhere, we’ll see after tomorrow. I’m tired of the negativity. I want change. So we’ll see what tomorrow brings...

Also funny to realize who wants your respect and who you want respect from, yes? I’m realizing how much we do actually appreciate that, and when you get someone’s respect, WOW. It’s amazing. My former coworker was waiting for my opinion on some things and I was surprised. Then again, I respect his opinion - so being that close to gain it on both sides. Made me feel needed.

[theflamingfeminist]

Positives:

1. Getting to be with Jason on last day for him

2. Working out both professional growth and actually feeling like I’m maturely growing up in even the smallest things (and feeling them with the snap of a finger)

3. Getting to taste dads fish in the air fryer!

[theflamingfeminist]

Positives:

- positive interactions with family

- productive work day (jblm)

- it is only 10 min walk! And I get a ride back to the welcome center from coworker.

[theflamingfeminist]

Positives:

1. Made it in one piece to gram pam and papa’s

2. Productive day at work and tasks were accomplished!

3. Minimal mistakes were made.

[theflamingfeminist]

- got my pass done thru the chaos

- has a good interview

- despite the chaos it ended up working out well.

[theflamingfeminist]

- the wedding went perfectly.

- the drive home was fast!

- this week seems to be falling into place

[theflamingfeminist]

How quickly we take something for granted. I’m amidst an 800 acre fire that’s now 50% contained (that’s a positive - it’s been 20 for almost a week!), and the second biggest fire in Washington state. I’m four miles away from it. We made the decision to evacuate for a night this week due to being so close to the evac map and so unsure if we’d end up getting that knock on the door at 3a in the morning to grab and go. It’s so different looking at a perspective that you might not look back at a place again. So what’s important to you? What’s the items you don’t want perished that you have 5 minutes to grab for?

That’s a hard bloody question. Hat night? Grabbed only what we needed to survive and fled. I didn’t get to think about what I wanted to keep “alive” if I was never coming back. Didn’t get a chance to, really. So I started thinking about it. I wrote down a TON of things. And then started going through the list - because really, was half of those things truly important to me? And why? Could I explain to myself or to anyone else as to why/what? I’m still deciphering. I have so much crap that I don’t need right now it’s ridiculous. It’s all so replaceable. We don’t think about that until it’s almost too late. So might be going through my stuff again. Don’t need it, do i?

Still battling the fire, like I said. But we’re back in the apartment, smoke all around us from ours, Oregon’s, and probably Cali’s too. Waiting waiting waiting. Just ever so lingering.

[theflamingfeminist]

shitshow in the sun

this weekend was supposed to be the get away before all the stress came flooding at me in a few weeks. friday was a shitshow before I even got to go home. I can’t even talk about it, that’s how severe it was at work. so naturally, I broke down before I left work, had a few panic attacks, and then thought about it while I was on my “weekend vacation”. oh, and had to go on a severity call for the incident. if that wasn’t severe enough, i’m still not done with all of this because I go in tomorrow [for normal work] unsure if I still even have my job. i’m so close to even going fuck it and move down to oregon. nothing is really left for me. I keep trying so hard to keep my life together and I swear the things I want most in life get torn away from me. oh, but I can’t just say fuck it and move down, not just in a blink of an eye. i’m going into the hospital in a few weeks. a week from tomorrow, to be exact. I have to wait to see what the verdict is with my brain after that. what, the 17th? and it’s not just I get an answer and be done with it. it’s a ‘so this is what we’re going to do with you’ sort of answer. ‘yes surgery this is the sort we’re going to do’ or something else. i’ve been trying not to think about this, because boy am I nervous after this happens. idk what happens after that. how that works. how fast surgery goes. we’re also in the midst of a pandemic. my life is a big disaster right now and I have no idea how to run it. six more work days. then i’m there.

[theflamingfeminist]

biggest news in my life,

I stepped down this past monday. it wasn’t their decision, it was mine. yes, they offered it for me - because if I had stayed as my position, next week I most likely would have gotten fired. this was my ‘redemption’ of being able to stay. one of the worst days it feels like. it’s that feeling of failure. that feeling of I didn’t make it. here is my chance of getting to learn the job without the responsibilities and understand it without all the bigger stress surrounding it. I haven’t not been a leader in a loooong time... 

i’ve been a mess all week. i’m so glad I had the day off right after monday [day this all happened] because this just would’ve been a terrible day at work. but, this is for the greater good. lol. I sound so fake after saying that - greater good. it’s better off for me. really, it is. I really am getting to learn all of my job better and it sounds like I get to be the ‘guest advisor’ which is technically still the leader position - more supervisor - so i’m not going down to full associate, and i’ll stay and keep my keys and see what he’ll do from there. I haven’t seen him since monday and jason hasn’t seen him since tuesday - but since they last talked that’s what/where it was going to. now without the immediate stress and responsibilities, I get to work on myself. which, when’s the last time i’ve done that?? years. I did fine on wednesday, which was only korey and I, but on friday it semi hit me that josef was coming back about the time I’m stepping down and I figured out i’m not really being in the shift I truly love - freight. granted he has his reasons and I have to accept it and it’s NOTHING PERSONAL - one of the BIGGEST things I have to work on, and coached myself that he needed me later because he needed freight actually done so i’d be scheduled at night to get it done [looks like i’m 10-6 a lot of the time] until I noticed i’m slowly being replaced by josef. I lost it yesterday [saturday]. again, this confidence thing = i’m completely at a -2. I need to work on myself. i’m not being replaced. he’s got a plan and it is not a bash against me. it just feels like it at the moment. in the back of my head I instantly went back to ...didn’t he tell me he wouldn’t be on the floor? why is he getting my shift?...  it doesn’t matter. it’s not relevant to me. I didn’t realize how much this all effected ME in my head. but it does. apparently a lot.

oh and apparently ben knows too. he didn’t say squat to me - but he went up to jason yesterday. because I trust korey and jason [yes I told korey on wednesday] enough, we can only assume philippe told him. already asking jason questions. I didn’t get demoted, dumbass. just stepped down. and then I got to learn - yes, korey officially is taking my position. which honestly? i’m kind of happy and relieved. I hope he doesn’t fail for himself, because I want him to succeed. it’s a cutthroat place here in this retail business, but I don’t want him to get fired either. I want him to be able to flourish. he’s not happy in the position he’s in - he’s BORED out of his MIND. he needs something to do. so this’ll be a great place to be able to go. jason thinks I can get back up in this position in three months... idk what he’s thinking about where korey would go - whether that means korey transfers or else I do - but there’s options for both of us - korey goes closer to his place [kent] or me go down to oregon - lol at the moment can’t really go anywhere else considering I cannot drive.

I know the more I think about it I know this is the right thing to have happen - i’m going into the hospital in less than a month for another EEG to figure out where my seizures REALLY are, and perhaps go into surgery. there’s a reason for all this.

it’s just letting go of pride now, being able to stay steady at work, and take it okay. I am ENOUGH. you fake it until you make it. and you keep slaying the dragons.

[the-memedaddy]

meirl

[lgbtculture]

I want my gay rights now! - Marsha P. Johnson (NYC Pride Parade, 1973)

[theflamingfeminist]

letting something go is one of the hardest things for me. my empathy side, and the side of me who feels like I can either fix it, or else either i’m in the wrong, Idk which one, always keeps me from completely opening my hands and saying GOODBYE. i’m playing songs right now so I can’t get frozen stuck in my head for a week, as much as I like that song. I dated my best friend of 8 years [and no, we weren’t best friends through those eight years,] for six months. and then I realized I wasn’t feeling it. yeah, that sounds harsh. yeah, that seems so fake. but really? I can’t do that to someone if that isn’t real, right? that’s not fair to them. I realized he was more my best friend than ever my “soulmate”. i’m allowed to feel that way. i’m allowed to make that choice. there’s NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT. and i’m working on accepting that factor, and continuing to walk away with that.

I never wrote about how much he hurt me - because I know I hurt him. I didn’t do it intentionally - he is dealing with his first breakup; and he dealt/is dealing with it the way he wants to. when I told him, he came back through work and talked to our assistant manager and said I was a manipulative manager and used work and treated him differently than the other associates. I could just hear his parents talking through him. four factors with that: 1. he called me what my emotionally abusive ex was. that’s far over the line and that’s far, far too gone. 2. just that morning he was trying to tell me that he’d go to a different store to make our “friendship” work. 3. I could just HEAR his parents talking through him. the ones he was just “itching” to break away. and “independently no longer listening to. guess I was the black sheep bitchy bad guy who influenced him too much after all. 4. great when you hear from the manager who spreads rumors later on about that he called me my manipulative ex. because that means even after this shit he talked even more. at work. where we weren’t supposed to have ANYONE know. cool. well, he wanted me to talk to him like an associate, treat him like the rest. here’s to that. then he got furloughed. damn. I keep thinking I miss him... he never ONCE texted me he was sorry. never. well he’s about to come back soon, and thank GOD he’s no longer going to be my assistant - he’ll be the other half like he aaaaalways wanted. 

just every time I keep thinking I miss him get that angry streak where I go no no NO girl you are NOT reaching out because of everything there. you’re not in the wrong. it is NOT up to you to put your hand out. you are OKAY. it is ALRIGHT to walk away. completely. and to LET GO. but that’s the thing. I have to actually let go and with all the emotions. it’s one thing to ignore all this whilst he’s been away from work... it’s fully another to see him face to face for however many times ago and no longer feel emotions [including the negative ones] and be okay with that.  I get into this “is this okay?” “did I do the right thing?” “do I need to fix something here?” and then start overanalyzing it over and over again.... and need to STOP - because i’m in the okay, and don’t need to do jackshit. not my problem. it’s over. I just need to LET. IT. GOOOOOOO.

aaaand maybe get frozen out of my head.

[theflamingfeminist]

day whatever

aaaand the smash of a new riot hit. covid-19. I can’t even wrap my mind around it still. i’ve finally got the concept of wearing a mask on now.. which sucks ASS. it’s been almost six months since i’ve seen my mother, which sucks [I mean yes, my brother, his fiancee, and my sister, but there’s nothing like not seeing your mother], and knowing it got pushed back and now one can’t. 

i’m on day four of vacation, that I didn’t request of, ha, but needed to have due to hours being cut, and it kinda sucks. I waited to not do anything creative, and my creativity mind just kinda sucked itself through the window if you ask me, during this week. I don’t know if it’s just my attitude getting to me or the fact that I finally am being hit how much this pandemic is hitting us. it’s that great unknown not knowing what’ll happen beyond today and tomorrow - it’s like a movie. a movie for once you cannot predict the end to or know what is coming. and that’s scary.

[theflamingfeminist]

[yconic]

She's not alone.

[theflamingfeminist]

parent trap

sometimes you can’t tell if it’s better to be brutally honest or if it’s better to just shut up and be quiet. I said wha ti wanted to say which was me hurting and me actually being brutally honest and it hurts. life’s not nice.  but what really sucked about it? my mother got super defensive and started acting like me - she does that any time she disagrees with me, and it’s super frustrating to have that happen and her not even notice it. how do you tell that to a person and them take that okay?! now if she had said that to me, I would have had to take it all in without questioning any of it, and that would have been that. that’s what’s so frustrating! I honestly was saying it hurt this weekend about that I couldn’t come over down south because ohh it’s about dad and mom [you know, I normally would have understood that - but what really sucked? I knew they had already planned to hang out with carlee and conner by friday.. and it was like really? no bryn, but yes to them?] so I voiced that. to which she got super defensive. she sounded like me on a younger age! dude, i’m not talking about every fucking time you get to see conner, that’s not the point, i’m just saying that I wanted to see you, you said no, the reason was because you wanted more time with dad, and then you spent it with conner/carlee. i’m allowed to feel emotions there, right? apparently I cannot express it.

because she threw a fit. all I wanted to do was talk. so I went into the guilt mode and started full on crying, and she went into full on shut down and just was saying i’m sorry cuz that’s what she thought I wanted to hear and etc etc. NO I want my mother I want a normal person talking back to me like it used to be. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I am so glad that she gets to go and do all these things like an archeologist class and if she wants to, walk the dogs at the humane society and find knitting classes and so forth because in reality? i’m so fucking stuck in my stupid corner of washington state and not close to any of my family [while one is turning herself into a monster for whatever reason] and I can’t just walk over and get a hug and say hey can we sit and enjoy each other’s company? because I. can’t. move. I don’t have that freedom. and it fucking sucks. because boy do I wish I did. no instead i’m the one who fucking has a mental disorder and has to take drugs I wish I didn’t need and can’t drive because of it now and now I just fucking sound like a fucking pity party. I just wanted that conversation to go so differently. she texted me 45 minutes later stating that she couldn't talk anymore and that she couldn’t think of anything when she was like that [which wasn’t the point and i’m not going to point those out!] and she’d be more aware of my feelings in later instances. really - it was just this weekend that hurt. I don’t care if she saw my siblings every day. I just wanted to come so badly and am actually kinda depressed and wanted to be around family to help that and didn't get to. #pityparty no instead bryn has to wait until april, an entire month from now and still no definite dates because mom has shit going on and bryn has to wait until her class is done. is that too selfish?

I didn’t even get to talk to her about everything I wanted to. so was it worth it? I went into tears every 15 minutes for a good hour and then i’ve been in a guilt trap since. that’s not what being honest is supposed to be. so why do I feel like that? you’re supposed to feel relieved. or something along those lines. now i’ve lost contact from her and she won’t talk to dad, cuz woo-hoo he tried when I went out with nala and I knew he’d go ask. i’m not wanting him to side with me but I want to know she’s okay. obviously she isn’t so therefor it’s making me feel like it’s worse. 

[theflamingfeminist]