Well, I still miss working at the store. The new job is OK, and they treat me a whole lot better, but I don't think I'm going to be able to sink my heart into it like I did the store. I'll just be putting my time in and going home. And really, this is the way it shoudl be, I suppose, but it has no passion, no drive, no depth or color. So even though it's challenging and fairly active, I'll be bored to some degree, as I always am in any facet of life that lacks color. If they wanted me back at the store, I know inside that I'd go back at the drop of a hat...but I think that's unlikely to occur. They didn't miss me, (and at times, I can see why) and I don't think they'll be longing for my return either (heh).

(if my typing is messed up, it's because I'm typing without glasses)

So, since the work lacks passion, I'm back to getting obsessed with plants again. Today I planted:

• 1Dicentra Spectabilis
• 2 Astibles
• 1 Sempervivium
• and 6 sweet woodruff (too lazy to look up the proper name

I still have rhubarb, gladioli, and strawberry plants left to take of ASAP, and it's high time to start planting starts of tomatoes. Oh! and onion sets. I think I bought about 200 of them, and have no space at all prepared for them yet (not too bright, huh?).

Perhaps what I'd really like is to pursue a degree in botany or horticulture. Plants are almost as calming as goats, but unlike goats, you can make a decent living from a botanty/horticultural related field.

I planted 4 apple trees (malus)for the espalier tunnel/arch, and while I was purchasing them, some hippie/mountain woman type of female shopper walked up and started in commenting about my apple trees. I told her what I was doing with them, and she took a step back and said rather critically, "Oh, well you don't care about the apples, then." I replied that the trees would fruit just fine, in fact, remarkably well for the space used and size of the trees. Then she started telling me, very authoritatively, about pollinaters, that I shoudl make sure my apples woudl pollinate one another or I would not get any fruit. Hello, bitch, but do I look like I was born yesterday? How often does a total newbie undertake making an espaliered arch of trees?? And who in the hell do you think you are? I told her that the four I had shoudl be sufficient, but they were merely the beginnimg of the project, which will incorporate 8-12 trees total. (more superflous preaching about pollinaters) Finally I just told her, rather shortly, "Besides, I live in town. There are lots of apple trees there, and I'm sure there will be plenty of pollinaters even if I didn't have any. She looked doubtful and wished me good luck and walked away. ::irk!!!::

Wait:

em·pa·thy (?m'p?-th?)
1:Identification with and understanding of another's situation, feelings, and motives.
2:The attribution of one's own feelings to an object.

sym·pa·thy (s?m'p?-th?)

1. a: relationship or an affinity between people or things in which whatever affects one correspondingly affects the other.

b:Mutual understanding or affection arising from this relationship or affinity.

2. a:The act or power of sharing the feelings of another.

b:feeling or an expression of pity or sorrow for the distress of another; compassion or commiseration. Often used in the plural.

3.Harmonious agreement; accord: He is in sympathy with their beliefs.

4.A feeling of loyalty; allegiance. Often used in the plural: His sympathies lie with his family.

5.Physiology. A relation between parts or organs by which a disease or disorder in one induces an effect in the other.
=======================================================

Sympathy is what I feel at times, not empathy. The two seem like almost the same thing, but they're not.

Nah, I don't lack empathy, I'm just highly selective. With someone I care about, seeing them hurt will freak me out (although most of the time, I'm able to handle the situation and then fall apart later) whereas with other people, it's not that I'm happy they're hurt or that I don't care, but I either intellectualize the event (thinking about physiological details) or feel uncomfortable (a girl having cramps or a guy crying because he's in serous pain). So I think that I could be a decent phlebotomist. The question is, is that all I want to be? And the answer, of course, is no, but it'll have to do for now.

These grunt jobs are all about memorization of routine and minimal applied thought. Thinking too hard gets you in trouble. So although they're nice to me, the pay is a little better (debatable, since I might have gotten a raise by summer, had I stayed at the store), the benefits are good, etc etc, I think that ultimately, it isn't a position which I'll be happy maintaining for a long time. Stair step, yes. Resting place, no.

I still feel sad about not working at the store. I had seen enough to know that none of us mean anything, but having it hit home and happen to you is quite a blow, and I apparently had a lot of emotional investment in the place. The whole discrimination issue still gets my goat, it was wrong in every sense of the word, but I don't have the heart to fight it. What irks me the most is that my Asperger's syndrome was not the reason I couldn't work in the bakery, and I knew it. It was an excuse. The real reason was plain and simple, self interest; I would have felt better if they'd just come out and said so instead of making a personal slight out of it.

It's so crazy, because the biggest issue that I did have with that bakery was the amount of lifting. It killed my hips, but I was willing to do it because I loved the work. So it's ironic that the two full time bakery workers have both had foot injuries (which would interfere with lifting things quickly and moving around rapidly).

No, the real reason was that I was becoming too much of a pain, too much of a threat. I wouldn't shut up about things like sanitation and customer service and safety. Those issues couldn't be countered easily, so they just ran me off instead. I wonder how many other workers will have to leave, how long it'll go on, before the underlying problems become apparent, and if, even then, they'll actually be dealt with.

Anyhoo, it was a blessing in disguise. I needed to do something else with my life, but I felt like it'd be disloyal to leave. Now I can look around for that new direction, whatever it is. If I lived closer to Spokane, I'd go apply at White's boots.

I've decided that I don't ever want to grow old (as in, old enough to lose my independence). I don't care if people love and visit me or not. I don't ever, ever want to live in an old folk's home (spare me the pretty sounding labels, it is what it is). I thought old folks physically attacked the nurses because they were senile. Heck, has anyone considered that maybe they're just really pissed off about being where they're at? I mean, is that a possibility? Most of them seem to have broken hearts and broken spirits, like they've stoppped caring, stopped seeing, stopped thinking. Put me down like an old dog that you love, but *don't* abandon me in some antiseptic hellhole, even a nice one. I don't want to ever see a mental hospital...I'm sure that I would have nightnmares for years fearing that some moron would send me to one for my "disease".

Um, yeah, OK. So, as you can see, the job isn't exactly a perfect fit for me. I'm going to have to try to make it work though, because I am frankly too stressed to look for anything else. I guess I'll try to go ahead and take the phlebotomy classes in the summer. Wait- do they need to be empathetic, too? Is empathy something that I can fake or role play if I script it? People are constantly telling me that I seem nice or "sweet" (that's a laugh), etc, so I think that I must not look as cold as I feel. I'm nice to the goats when I do stuff (tattooing, disbudding, etc)to them, so maybe I could translate that to people.

See, this is what I'm talking about. I try and I try to find a place where I fit like a puzzle piece, and instead, I don't fit anywhere. I have to pretend that I fit when I'm actually more of a chameleon, and it sucks. I'm tired of having to pretend, or having to try hard not to flap or stim or makes strange sounds. Deal with it! You people do all sorts of stuff that makes absolutely no sense to me, like asking me how I am and then walking away before I can answer, or wearing really uncomfortable clothing, or caring more about what a person looks like than who they really are, or intimidating people who haven't even done anything wrong yet, and I have to deal with it even though it drives me crazy, even when it's actually hurting or confusing me. Most of the stuff I do is just strange, it doesn't hurt anyone.

I'm going to spend my whole life looking for a place where I can just relax and be what I am, and it isn't going to happen. Cripes.

Back to the old folks again, I sort of wonder about the whole empathy thing. I wonder if normal people actually care, or if they are just awfully good at pretending that they care? If they truly care, how can they endure it? Because I, being autistic and supposedly lacking in empathy and theory of mind, am driven to distraction by things that I observe (in the way of treatment of other people). If they are so superior in their empathy, then how in the hell can they stand it? It seems that if I'm bothered by it, their own reaction would be even more, but that isn't at all what I see. This makes absolutely no sense at all to me.

I got a new Elton John CD (Empty Sky) and am enjoying it. It really doesn't take a whole lot to make me happy.... :-)

My new job starts on Monday, which leaves me only 2 days off work before the stress begins again. I'm hoping to make the strawberry bed(s) tomorrow, including amending the soil, and then make any seed/bulb/plant orders. Hmmm. I also want to make an arched "tunnel" of apple trees in the front yard, but when I think about it, I should probably start buying the place first. Even if I get the trees cheaply, for example, $20 each, if I get 10 of them (which would be half the length of the tunnel planned, but the more I think about it, I don't want the entire length anyway) that'd be $240 for the trees alone, not counting metal rebar supports to train the trees up, or the boulders to protect the trees closest to the street from the encroachment of careless winter snowplows, or other associated expenses. Not counting the rocks, it'll be at least a $300 investment. Also, it is best to plant the trees in the fall, not spring. I think I will wait and order the trees with tax refund money and have them shipped in the fall. I do need to order the strawberry plants though.

I still want to paint before I start working again, but the sad truth is that there just isn't a whole lot of passion or drive in my soul lately. When I do paint/draw, people end up wrecking the half completed works anyway, so really, why waste my time?! Oh, that's just an excuse. I should quit whining and just knuckle down and do it.

sigh.....I still miss my old workplace....pathetic....

We're having a debate on a forum about eugenics and prospective gay fetuses. Frankly, I don't see what the big deal is. Maybe it's because I'm strange and non-standard issue anyway, but I think it'd be kind of neat to have a gay kid (OK, so flame away). I certainly wouldn't opt to abort or to have some sort of a "cure" administered in utero. Normal people with their ideals of a 100% normal world scare teh livign bejeezuz out of me.....Seems to me that one day, they're going to obliterate all the rest of us through one means or another.

To the end of the line, start to finish, I am still a Hill. No one can take that from me; it's written in my genes. No amount of degradation or homelessness or poverty can erase it; it will still be there. It is my birthright, oldest child of two oldest children, and I won't be robbed of it. I'm not talking about money, it's about identity and familial pride. It's easy to forget in this wilderness settled by a handful of immigrant families, by people who probably weren't all that bright before they started inbreeding.

What is a Hill?

We are eccentric and idiosyncratic, and for the most part, make no apologies for it.
We are, as a rule, intelligent.
We actually enjoy listening to classical music, and in fact this is probably the type that comes to our minds first if we hear the word "music".
We play chess, read books, collect things, and enjoy outdoor activities aside from team sports.
We frequently have bad knees, sinus problems, allergies, and few close friends.
We are concerned with education, status, and having a respectable job and position.
We like fine things: not necessarily brand new things, but good things. Actually, for a family that tends towards valuing good things, we're fairly frugal. We have a word for new, unnecessary, cheaply produced items: "crapola".
We appreciate culture, although the family could fairly be labeled "WASPy".
And then there's the Hill family humor...I'm not going to try to explain this.

Someday, I'll live near my family again. Until then, I'll maintain my identity. Which really, when you're a clannish Hill, is sort of uncomfortable, away from the fold.

Something I am noticing lately is that not only does my ability for coherent, intelligible speech fade away under stress and pressure, but the intake also becomes impaired. Usually a little bit of it gets through, in single word soundbites. (reference the post from Nov 13th on this page).

Examples from today: I went to the autism specialist who has been evaluating my tyhird son for a possible autism spectrum disorder. Preliminary findings are PDD-NOS, with possible Asperger's, pending I.Q. test. I relayed the recent happenings at my former workplace (yesterday was my last day) to him. I told him that essentially, I had a meltdown due to my manager nitpicking me, and also that even though I had been told that I would work in the bakery and would be trained for it, this hadn't happened, and the reason I had been given was because of my hyperfocusing,(which from my point of view, is pretty much necessary in doing any kind of fine detail work, particularly artistic detail work.) (At times like this, I really wish that I had become a surgeon, where the hyperfocusing would be a tremendous asset. Nobody in their right mind would complain that a surgeon paid too much attention to their task at hand.) a component of the Asperger's syndrome. I also told him that once I had calmed down from the meltdown, I realized that I'd made a mistake, and I begged them to let me stay, or to place me in a different position, or whatever, but it was to no avail. Having put in my 2 weeks notice, I had to go, period. I didn't feel that the whole thing was entirely kosher, particularly the part where a disablity was used as an excuse not to promote me where it'd be promised, or to move me if necessary.

Here is what I remember from what he said:

"Possible lawsuit

wrongful termination

hostile work environment (if he only knew!!!! I didn't tell him a tenth of it!)

People at job service building would be the ones to talk to

Idaho favors employers over employees

Everybody has their niche; what can be a liability in one place can be a huge strength in another.

If they hadn't told me that they were going to train me for an area, and then reneged on it, it would be a different story.

I'm sorry you were treated that way."


There was considerably more meat to the conversation than that, but for the most part, I remember only single words and key phrases.

And I hate to say this, but I think that I probably do this all the time, and especially when I'm upset. Certainly people get nasty to me, but I think it's also quite possible that my brain highlights primarily the most upsetting, disturbing things in BIG RED LETTERS and that at times, it's 95% of what I remember, just the highlighted stuff (which of course is generally highlighted because it set my alarm bells ringing). In other words, the positive stuff, the things that could be potentially nourishing to my soul or useful in terms of context or balancing out the negatives, go in one ear and out the other, and almost the only stuff I retain is often of an insulting, painful, traumatic, or otherwise freaky nature. It isn't that I do this intentionally, it just happens that way. It probably isn't all that surprising that I'm frequently depressed. :-/

If only I could stockpile *nice* memories and replay them over and over again. For some reason though, I have to ration out the nice memories that I do have. If I play them more than a few times, they fade in strength or I find it harder to remember them...no, that isn't exactly right. It's like they lose their clarity and strength, sort of like a can a pop goes stale after you open it. The bad memories, on the other hand, gain power and strength with each repetition, unless they're tied to a breakdown, in which I typically remember almost nothing at all except for a foggy gray haze and nothingness, like a living death that you gradually came out of.

The thing is, I don't think people realize...when they say something really mean to me, I don't just hear it once. I hear it hundreds or even thousands of times, cutting me down, making me hate them, and each time it's almost as fresh and brightly sharp as the first time.....when really, maybe they were just having a bad day and didn't mean it much.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Or maybe I just give them too much credit. I need to stop hashing all this over, because I am getting seriously enraged. I hate losing my temper, it's disgraceful...and every time I make a snide, sarcastic little comment, any satisfaction or relief I may feel at the time is offset by the shame and self-loathing I'll experience later on (couldn't pass up the opportunity to say that nasty little thing, could you? No, you couldn't just keep your mouth shut and maintain your dignity. You had to return the favor and get them back. Are you happy yet? You're just as bad as they are...yadayadayada).
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
A few years ago, there was a guy that I really and truly loved. I mean I loved him like there was no tomorrow. I can only hope that someday, I'll be able to feel that sort of intensity again, and hopefully for someone who can return it (because if it's one sided again, I don't think I could make it), but if I don't, I feel somewhat grateful (if sad) that I was able to experience that intensity and degree of color once. Anyway, I sort of knew he didn't feel the same way, and that was OK, but I did think he was my friend, and that was enough. Except, he wasn't my friend. We talked about everything under the sun, we spent hours visiting, playing games, doing stuff together, talking about our hopes and dreams, but as he said later, he wasn't a friend...just an aquaintance. If he had come across as a friend, he didn't mean it that way. He was just trying to be nice. I don't have any words to describe how much that hurt. I think he should have just put a bullet in my head. It would have been kinder.

And now, I sort of feel that way again. I don't trust people like I used to. They're all just full of shit, trying to be nice, pretending they're my friends, so they can go home and pat themselves on the backs for their own benevolence. I thought I meant something, I thought I mattered...even if it was only a little bit. And I don't...not a speck.

Color me disillusioned.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

I haven't given my bosses enough credit. They don't hate me, I just felt that way. If they're ignorant of the things that go on in the deli, it's because they've got the whole rest of the store to worry about, and they're trusting the managers of our section to ensure that things go as they should. Moreover, the bosses are inherently nice, decent people. In other words, the managers I've been speaking of are screwing them over behind their backs. It isn't the store itself that's the problem. There is a manager who's supposed to oversee the deli managers, but he's got so much else to worry about that he doesn't want to hear or think about the deli.

Our department might bring in a lot of money, but it's seperated from the rest of the store by that counter. I think the absolute best thing that could happen to the deli in terms of layout would be the move the displays that are blocking off the end of the deli. Having an open pathway, where they'd never be 100% certain that someone (i.e., a boss) wasn't entering or standing beyond their range of vision there, would make a lot of difference.

It would also help if they'd develop the habit of coming in the store at random, unexpected times dressed in ordinary clothes. I don't know ho wmany times I've coem in on my days off or at night, walked by the deli, and noticed crowds of customers standing there being ingnored (or waited on by only one person while two others were chatting happily in the back), or no chicken cooked or cooking or even being thought about, at 5:00-6:00 PM (our best hours in terms of selling chicken) or workers just goofing off or standing around "because there's nothing else to do". (I'm sorry, but you can *always* find something to do).

One of the curses of having AS is that my minds obsesses and broods over things (usually upsetting or disturbing things) that normal people apparently can think about for a short time and then either choose not to think about any longer or simply stop thinking about spontaneously. My mind doesn't work that way. It chews over stuff as relentlessly as a cow regurgitating its cud or a kid gnawing on the same old wad of gum all day long. Except, sometimes the same thing will bother me for days or weeks on end and I just cannot get rid of it unless I resolve it or it gets replaced with something else more absorbing or disturbing.

People often tell me that I think too much. I don't know what they're talking about. I think constantly, ravenously. My brain never stops, and it's always hungry unless I'm seriously exhausted or drugged (as after a birth). I don't know what they mean. Aren't they thinking all the time, too? This is hard for me to conceive of. I mean, if I just sat here and wrote about absolutely everything that came to my mind, I'd be here all day long, all the time. one of the reasons I value my sleep is that it allows me a rest and often I can think about things other than what I've been obsessing about (yeah, I think in my sleep, too, but it's less oppressive then). In fact, a lot of the purpose of having this site is it's function as an outlet, an overflow valve.

So, the end result of all this is that if something is bothering me deeply, it's going to drive me absolutely crazy until I get it resolved or settled somewhat.
Depression drives me to the edge of suicide.
Little niggling remarks by other people replay themselves over and over again like a harrassing message on a broken answering mnachine that I can't unplug.
Fears and worries grow and snowball out of all proportion and then I have anxiety/panic attacks.
I generally take a low risk policy towards social interactions, knowing that I can't afford to invest too much; if I let them hurt me, the costs will be too high, and I'll be paying it while they just shrug me off and forget about me.
Other people get a little blue, I get so depressed that I fall apart and can't function.
Little things, little stresses, worry me until I'm just a nervous wreck, expecting something disastrous to occur at every turn.

And I have go to find a way to deal with this, to be able to calm down. I know what I need, but it isn't going to happen for me. The goats- they help, but I can't have them here. Gardening helps. Exercise helps. I need to start finding things that help and cultivating them.

Another thing that would be good is to develop a routine/structure for my homelife. Routine and order is very comforting.

Damn, I'm gonna miss that job. Oh yeah, I got the job at the hospital. I decided against taking the CNA classes, it was just too much added stress at this time. Starting the new job is going to be about all I can handle for a few months. I think I'll go ahead and take the phlebotomy classes in the summer though, if I can.

So I went to the mandatory CNA class meeting (mandatory if you want to take the classes, that is). I'm undecided.

For:

• Being a CNA would be a great stepping stone into other medical/nursing areas, such as an LPN, RN, or nurse practitioner or possibly (yeah right) a doctor.
• It pays well and there will always be a demand and a serious need for CNAs.
• For the right person, it could be a very fulfilling, rewarding job.
• I'd get to work in a hospital. I love hospitals.
• There's the distinct possibility of specializing in developmental disabilities or autism spectrum disorders, especially with the increased awareness and improved detection or those of us who would have flown under the radar before.
• working as a CNA could settle, once and for all, the question of whether or not I belong in the medical field.

Problems:

• You're not allowed to miss a single day of class except under the most extreme circumstances. Hospitalization of family members is not among those reasons. If Charlie ends up in the hospital again with breathing problems, I'd flunk the class. I couldn't go on a vacation unless I did it before the class or afterwards.
• The classes are 9-5, Monday-Friday. That's a lot more time per week than I'd thought. No offense, folks, but I honestly thought that CNA classes entailed basic adult diaper changing and care techniques and first aid/CPR (which I already took before)and that was about it. This is a little more involved than I had guessed.
• What this means is that I either won't be able to work or my work hours would be severely curtailed. The only thing I can think of that would work is if I stayed at the store and worked as a cashier from 6-10 PM and then 8 hour days on Saturday and Sunday. If I did that, I'd miss only four hour (36 hours per week compared to the 40 I do now), but honestly, I don't think they're going to let me be a cashier.
• Lastly, I'm having serious doubts as to whether I have the correct temperament necessary to be a CNA. It isn't that I never care for people, because I do, but I am selective, and then when I do care about people, I get too deeply attached. I have this fear (which, in thinking about the problems I've been having at my soon to be former job, isn't all that unfounded)that people would be mean/rude/violent to me and I'd get really stressed out. If I can't hack working at a store, I don't know if I'd be able to take care of old men who pinch me and irrational women with Alzheimers who slap me for no good reason, simply because they're deranged.

One ray of hope: They are also having a phlebotomy class this summer, and I do think that I would be better suited to being a phlebotomist than a CNA. There is less prolonged personal interaction, and my fine motor skills (which have served me well in art, cake decorating, and artificial insemination) would come in handy there. I am gentle, I don't like to hurt people, but blood doesn't bother me. There aren't as many job opening for phlebotomists, but I have a hunch that I'd be better off doing that instead.

My job interview at the hospital (kitchen) is tomorrow. I should be apprehensive/anticipatory, but as it is, I'm just depressed and dispirited. I don't even have a written reference to bring with me, and god only knows what kind of reference they got over the phone, if they even called. Dammit, I know I wasn't perfect, but I wasn't that bad. The things that other people did to me- threatening to hit me, calling me names, telling me I shouldn't have a baby because I have Asperger's (I had it anyway, and he seems just fine), forcing me to work when I was in a lot of pain; I never did these things to anyone else, and I'm sure that the people who did them have, by and large, left with high recommendations, or are still at the place, still getting away with it because they're beyond reproach. Alright, so now I'm obsessing over the whole fairness/unfairness thing, and it isn't getting me anywhere but upset. I'll stop.

I hate it. It seems that no matter where I go, there just isn't going to be any place in the world for me where I'll really belong or fit in or be wanted. I'm so tired of it. I'm tired of hoping people will like me.

Shit. What a whiny pity party. At this rate, I might as well dig out the Hank Williams and Dwight Yoakum. ::disgust::

Today's song: sorry seems to be the hardest word

I'm sitting here trying to think of something else to write about, something other than

• work
• my love life
• autism/asperger's syndrome and all the different ways it can fuck up your life
• or just the generalized frustrations of my everyday life

and I'm drawing a blank.

Now I'm listening to Elton's "Blue Eyes". I love this song...I love it so much....because the sound of it reminds me of someone. Ha, ha. ;-) Noone will guess. ::smirk::

Well, I don't think they care at all that I'm leaving. Workers like me are a commodity, disposable. It hurts my feelings, becaue I feel like I've put a lot of myself into this store, like I've tried my very hardest to improve my performance and to look for ways that things could be streamlined or made simpler or more efficient. I've come in when I was so sick I could hardly function. I came in when I had a newborn baby that was nursing. The baby went to the daycare and I pumped my milk. That seems kind of wrogn to me, but I had to keep my job, or none of us, including the baby, would have had a place to live. And now, seeing that they don't care about me at all, I wish I could go back in time and hold that tiny baby and find something else to do. Geez....I'm going to start crying again and my eyes have been foggy for days now as as it is. I'm such a dork....who else cries like this about their job? Anyway, back to the topic here....I worked when my hips were killing me and I could hardly walk (please note here that the assistant manager went out of her way to order me to do things that would entail me walking all the way to the other side of the deli, to within a foot or two of where she was standing, even though she knew I was in serious pain and she was *right* there), I've filled in for other people when they quit or got sick or just flaked out, I even had an abortion because in part, I was terrified that they would fire me or ask me to leave if they knew I was pregnant (I didn't know at the time that pregnant women could work back there, and at the time, my hips were already causing serious pain, so I couldn't fathom what it would be like with the added strain of carrying a baby. What I did know is that they wouldn't cut me any slack.) And the day after the abortion, I was right there, broken up, barely holding it together, because I really did want that baby. I actually got vigorously questioned as to why I hadn't been there on the day of the event itself. (No, I didn't tell the manager who asked, but it seriously freaked me out and upset me.) Every day after that, I had to look at hundreds of sweet little newborn babies and just grieve and hold it together.

I've worked holidays so that other people could enjoy theirs, weekends, whenever they needed me, I'd work if I possibly could. I mean, I have consistently gone the extra mile, and given this place all I had to give, and they don't care if I stay or go. I mean nothing.

So, something happened at work. I'm not going to go into detail, because nobody would care anyway. What I will say is that it's been a cumulative thing and that the deli/bakery is just seething with hostility that goes more or less unspoken most of the time. When I read that and look at it, I think, "wow, that doesn't sound like a very good place for an aspie to stumble around in", and it's not. I'm just not good at this stuff. I like things out in the open, direct, up front, honest, and as ethical as practically possible, plus I don't have the fine tuned social skills that would be the grease to lubricate so many squeaking, grating wheels and gears. I've tried, I have....and it's been torturing me. I get no appreciation for my work, there are just these weird vibes of suspicion ,uch of the time, and it's massively uncomfortable. I just don't want to be anxious for hours on end anymore. I'm too stressed already, and I can't take it.

Anyway, very unexpectedly, this event happened, and I just broke. And I'm sitting here now thinking, because I remeber when I was a little snotty several months ago, and I caused another girl to cry (it was not intentional, but yeah, I was definitely meaner than I needed to be). I almost got fired for that, because she was crying over it. Both my managers have brought me to tears in the past month or so, unnecessarily, I didn't deserve it (OK, so that's subjective and debatable), neither of them got talked to about it, and they sure as hell weren't even sorry. They're never sorry for anything, no matter what they do. The big bosses apologize, but not these gals. I guess they think they're so perfect that they're always right. I think it takes a lot for a person to apologize. I always meant to tell the girl I hurt that I was sorry, but I never worked up the nerve to. And now I feel bad about that, even though she isn't there any more. Anyway, I've said it before: if you want me to hate you, humiliate me in public, and crying in public is one of the most embarrassing things on earth for me.

So I just cried and cried, and I wanted to walk out right there. It took all my self control not to...I just couldn't bear the thought of going back to that deli....and I had alreayd been a little burned out before all this anyway, and so with a heavy heart, I put in my two weeks notice.

And I don't know why I did this (except that maybe I was tired of being treated like shit and having to put up with the constant cavalier treatment back there), because I love that store. The whole next day, my heart was sinking (even thoguh I was still pissed off, upset, and hurt), because I am attached to the place.

Oh, you know what, just fuck it.... I give so much of myself to this place, and they don't even care. They don't even see it. Why am I crying about this? They don't deserve me if they can't treat me in a halfway decent manner and at least listen to what their own empoyees have to say once in a while. Forget it...just forget it.

Dang....I hate change.