A long desired wish....
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I've wanted a violin since I was 17 years old and a friend let me play out a tune or two on hers. I was enchanted with it, in love with the resonant tones. For years I would ask at thrift stores and pawn shops and pick up the thrifty nickel paper for used violins at a very affordable price. Whenever I found one, I didn't usually have the money. Once we saw one for only $20, and when I called the old man said he'd sold it already.

There is a girl who plays her violin in front of the grocery store regularly. I don't think she does it for pay, she does it because she likes to and maybe others will like to hear it. Maybe it's advertising. Her dad makes violins and buys other violins and refurbishes them. We got to talking one day at the store, and I confessed my long love affair with violins. Imagine my surprise to hear that I could get a newly improved model for as little as $100!!! Whee!!!!

My tax return came in today. I have my violin, at last. :-) And I'm a little afraid to play it, to shatter the veil of dreams and give birth to the reality. I will play it every day.

I really don't feel like going to work today. Yesterday my hips hurt, and I was stiff and limping for several hours, even after taking painkillers. They must have helped a little though...after that the stiffness went away and the pain dimmed down some. Then it flared back up to the point where I just wanted to go up in the break room and cry for a while, but no: we were swamped with customers. It's all the pivoting, stopping, starting, twisting, squatting, lifting, that does it. The faster it all has to be done, the more it hurts. There were only two of us, Sierra and I; we needed a third person desperately, especially since I was slower due to my hips, and her to her pregnancy. Then some fool needed to feed 50 people but called with less than an hour to spare, at the rushed hour, and wanted 20 breasts and 10 thighs!!!! Egads! They wouldn't all fit in one fryer load, the hot case was empty from cooking chicken (when we cook chicken, we have only one fryer, so we can't cook anything else. A batch of chicken -8 each breasts, thighs, legs, and wings- takes 15 minutes to cook) and there were *also* two orders for 12 pieces. So: 20 breasts, 10 thighs, plus 6 each breasts, thighs, legs, and wings. 54 pieces in all, and all within about an hour's time. The case just got emptier and emptier....meanwhile, other people saw the chicken cooking and wanted some, and we had to tell them it was all pre-ordered. Then they got pissy. One man all but yelled at us. There was so much chicken ordered that we had to bread more (we bread it ourselves) to fill the orders. Breading a box of chicken takes at least 15-20 minutes, and she had to do that while I waited on the ranting customers and reduced the doughnuts. A checker came back and helped us. At any rate, it was sort of hellish. I don't want it again tonight.

Today: Birthday shopping. Make a cake for my oldest son. It will be an ice cream cake, chocolate with mint chip ice cream. And, the library book sale, before work.

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Is it this hard for everyone? For normal people, do the bills and chores and deadlines and pressure of daily life lay this heavy on them? Do they constantly feel as I do, that they're at the very ends of their ropes? One problem solved only gives rise to another, it seems. One bill paid off gives birth to a different one. Every hour seems claimed and possessed by a task or some urgent matter. There is no time to think without the world intruding on me, I hate it.

I figured out how to effectively handle the conflicts with my (night) manager. Note: she is not my boss, or even my manager, only the assistant manager, who has a power trip going on. Anyway, I stopped talking to her. At all. It works amazingly well!!! Nearly all of her intimidation was verbal. When I stopped talking, she tried to get me to talk a few times (angrily hissing) but after that she stopped trying, and I've been so much happier! :-D It's not even a matter of my being upset with her anymore. I'm a lot calmer in my own headspace. I've also come to the realization that while 95% of her intimidation was verbal, 95% of my verbal communication with her was of an approval seeking or conciliatory nature. No wonder I felt bullied! And see, I was kind of my own fault in a way, wasn't it? At least to some extent?

I know she's peeved, but she's more or less avoiding me, and as it turned out, verbal communication wasn't actually even necessary. I don't think I'm going to resume speaking to me until I have come up with an adequate way to defend myself from her.
-----------------So that's handled...for now...-------------------------------
Another girl, who is deficient in comparison with me in terms of seniority on the job, experience, speed, quality work, work ethic, intelligence, * and* she is younger than me, insists on treatign me in a bossy way. It irritates me. If I confront her on an issue, she immediately backs down: "Oh, I didn't mean it that way, I just..." and makes it out as though I was overreacting. I may not be a gem, but I do conciously try to improve on my job peformance every single day. This girl is lazy. In fact, several of us,, including our well respected and loved manager, think she's a pothead and comes to work stoned. (Gee, thanks, doper, enjoy your buzz and just float along while we do your work!) It's all OK though. The big bosses seem to have their eye on her. She didn't get a raise, everyone else did. Hmmmm....

Getting a buzz on your off time at night is oen thing. Coming to work stoned or trying to function that way is something entirely different.
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Anyway, my hips feel shot, I'm exhausted, I'm going to bed. Yes, before 9 P.M.!
(Like anyone cares).....

Ok, I made an appointment with the voc-rehab people. Please, please please, people, take me seriously. Don't tell me that I'm doing fine where I am and don't need voc rehab....

OK, let's get one thing straight from the start here: rejection is never nice. It never feels good. That having been said, I think it hurts more to be rejected by a guy than it does to be turned away by a girl.
Here's why:

• Women tend to be fickle. We all know that.
• They also tend to be emotional and to want love.
• Therefore, it may be that their heart hasn't connected yet. That's bearable, isn't it?
• Also, if they turn down a fling, woemn do have more at stake: possible pregnancy, their 'reputation' and even physical harm.
• When a woman turns down a guy, she's turning down the possibility of bearing his child. You have to feel pretty secure to want to do that.
• With a guy, bedding a lot of girls is proof he's a stud (among his peers, at least).
• He doesn't have to worry about getting pregnant, and he isn't as likely to be raped by a girl.
• With guys, they are hardwired for sex and lots of it.
• That's not to say that they don't feel love, they do....but they can easily enjoy it without the love.
• Besides, some guys will screw just about anything that has a hole. Old ladies get raped. They get off on *pictures* for godssake.
• So, I mean, if a guy doesn't want you, at all, something is seriously wrong with you.

Of course, it could also be that the males are evolving to be more conscientious. I suppose that's possible.
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I went to the store this evening, and I was in a good mood. Scattered, but Ok. I saw some people I know, and as always, it took me several seconds (him) and a tad longer (her) to recognize them. Actually, I wouldn't have noticed her without him. He's easier to tell apart from the general populace. Nothign personal at all, I'm just that way. I often walk right past people I know without even seeign them. When they say hello, alarms go off...I feel confused...who the hell is this? They look like they know and like me. Who are they?? So anyway, I see these people, and he's very, very friendly and extraverted. He smiles hugely, showing his gums and lots of teeth, his glasses flash...and he asks if I saw his picture in the paper. I have just processed who it is, context and all that, and then it takes me a moment to process what he just said. Paper...picture? Whose picture? His and hers! :-D Paper? Paper? :scratching head: Local paper! :-D Oh. I don't buy the paper. That's why I haven't seen it. Hmmm. I will look. Nonono!! The *free* paper, don't you get it? :-D Oh! yes, I get it. I didn't look at it yet. OK, I will look. :smiles:

Meanwhile, she looks very pissed, stares at my shirt and gives me a very dirty look, and if I can read a look, it's intense. It has to be. :Me, looks at shirt, looks back at her: My shirt is plain blue, comfortably snug so I know where it is. Nice blue, I like it. What's wrong? She says to him, "That's OK dear, don't bother her with it. She hasn't seen it.", in a very snippy, snotty voice. I say good bye to he and he waves bye in a rather naive but friendly fashion. Nice guy. Why's she such a bitch?

And I have absolutely NO idea what I did wrong. This kind of thing happens to me all the time. I try to tell myself that I don't care, and I don't....much.... But it niggles at me, anyway. Maybe someone told them something bad about me? :shrug: I just have no idea at all. Is it because I don't care much about people except when they're right in front of me, for the most part? I am friendly when they're there.....and isn't that what matters? :stumped:

*Bitterness* (Tim, don't worry about this)
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Oh, this song says it so well...R.E.M. I can't always find words for what I want to say....but that says just about all of it, in one song. Heh. :-/

I drink down the bitterness of it as though it were some sort of evil tasting medicine.

Do you realize at all...that since all that, I don't take the word "friend" seriously anymore. I hear that word and it touches that nerve of bitterness...the cynic awakens and sneers....and I know that I'll never trust a "friend" in the same way as before. The word has lost any pleasant meaning for me, I almost hate it. Can I blame you for this, I don't know. Does that matter, not really.

I've never said this before, but I'll say it now and not again: if there had been one chance of my being "normal", if I had ever had the will for it, if there were a motivator, if there were an example, an interpreter, you were it, man. And it's gone. Fuck normality!!! Normalcy with all its two edged swords (both edges cut me) can go and take a flying leap.

The song is still playing...it couldn't be more real to me...