The Weeping Willow

Monday at work, I found out a tradegy happened to one of my coworkers, who also happens to be a former manager. I really have a problem with how I found out about the information.

First, let me say that ACME has a policy where RAT employees can not use email for personal annoucements. I understand that. People do make “annoucements” through the IM system. I guess that is allowed. I usually don’t hear much unless it is an email or an annoucement. People tend not to talk to me and I am fine with that. I occasionally like a chit chat, but mostly I like to be on my own.

On Monday, I heard my manager talking to Faith, who sits across the way from me. My ears perked up when I heard, “Her fiancee was killed yesterday”. We have had a few people who have had relatives get shot, so I was wondering if it was one of them. Then about an hour later, I hear the people behind me talking. “They were going to get married this year, weren’t they?” I could not figure who they were talking about. I looked at my list of people on IM and two were offline. One recently had a heart attack, or at least, that’s the rumor since nothing was really said about that either. Finally, that afternoon, the suspense killing me, I went up to Faith and asked whose fiancee was killed. And that’s how I heard the news. And then our supervisor gets upset when “rumors” are being spread. Try getting information to everyone! I would have liked to have found out about my coworker. We got along well, and I am very sad for her.

Tuesday I got other news from a friend that I couldn’t really believe my eyes about. I am still processing that one, but I wish my friend the best. However it made me realize something.

• Sometimes you need to keep things from your parents.
• Sometimes you need to keep things from your spouse.
• Sometimes you need talk about the things you need to keep from your parents and your spouse.

Therefore, I think I am going to create a blog on my creative writing account, of which at this time no one currently knows my moniker. Hubs has access to this one, even if he doesn’t remember the web address. I’ll probably close this one down, as I haven’t posted to it much anyway. Or maybe just post an occasional work annoyance.

Don’t worry. I’ll send you an email. Or if I don’t, email me or leave a comment.

In the midst of that strange dream, posted below, I started having a problem with one of the people I work with. One of the clients, as they are called. She complained to my boss about my lack of performance in scheduling her meetings. In the email she sent, she threw in a few untruths for good measure.

The situation was that I was suppose to be helping one of her underlings with scheduling a meeting. I kept in touch with the underling, but didn’t bother her, since the request came from him. Every time I wanted to schedule the meeting, one of the four executives who had to be in the meeting were busy. When I finally got the executives squared away, the peons couldn’t meet because they were on vacation or what have you. This went on from February to about two weeks ago.

I made some mistakes, but I had the evidence to back myself up and prove I wasn’t a complete slacker. As a result, this person is getting a new assistant, and my boss wasn’t very happy with me but understood where I was coming from.

I am now working with new people. It is going much better. I still need to stop talking about getting out of this place and actually take some action though. I’m getting nowhere here.

But, honestly, I am happy to be rid of her.

I was standing in a hallway, next to a counter. A blond guy in a brown suit walks up to me and says, “I hate when they put food here.” I look questioningly at him, and I said, “What?”

“I hate when they put food here. I mean, there are the bathrooms,” he points behind me “and you know people go to the bathroom, and then come out here without washing their hands and then they touch the food.” As he is talking, I hear Neville whining, “No mowma nooo noo mowma.” I walk past the guy, away from the bathroom doors and say, “Excuse me, I have to help my mother.”

I am walking down a pink hallway. Steam is billowing out of the room. I hear the shower, and all the while, I hear the whining/whimpering of Neville. I turn into the room where there is a pink frilly shower curtain, and a pink bathtub. The only think in this room is this showy bathtub. My mom is yelling at Neville to hold still. She is scrubbing him. He is crying because the water is so hot. I confront my mother. “What are you doing?!”

She looks at me, with no remorse in her eyes, and gives me some lame excuse I can’t remember now. I take a deep breath, and I yell “GET OUT!”

When my eyes opened to face my dark bedroom, I would swear the words were still echoing off the walls. I almost got up and called my mom to yell at her. It was 2:45 a.m. for me, so about 11:45 a.m. for her. I am sure she would have loved that.

Hubs didn’t even wake up.

Honestly, I just don’t care anymore.

Well, I guess that isn’t 100% true. I do care. I care that they are watching me. I care that they think I am a slacker. I care that they might fire me.

If they do, it would probably be 95% my fault. Because I am bored with work. I sit most of the day. I can’t motivate myself to get up in the morning for this crap. Of sitting. Doing nothing.

Last week, my boss said she was going to change things. I get 300 requests a month total. Some people get 500 requests a month, per person on their desk. Geez, you think you need to make a change?

Today, I was told that I need to report my time accurately, or I will be facing termination.

Hubs asked me one time why it mattered if someone came in, started working right away and was 15 minutes late, while the person who goes out 5 times a day, smokes cigarettes for 10 minutes and can just let that time slip by. Management cares if I take 15 minutes from them. Cigarette smokers can take 50 minutes with no problem.

So, yes, I am a slacker. I have had my tardy moments. I am bored with my work. I think they are watching me, making sure I am doing what I should be. This job makes me feel so unmotivated. I guess, no matter what happens, it won’t be the end of the world.

But I don’t want to be a failure.

I have been thinking of a lot of things. I won’t go into them at the moment.

But in all this thinking, I realized that I felt stuck. Like I had no choice. It was out of my hands.

Then I realized….

I have control.

Oh, I could sit here and play the victim. This is my fault, that is my fault…I am really good at blaming myself. Or I can try to do what others want or expect of me. But, I have to think of me sometimes. 

Are people going to be hurt by my choices? Maybe.

Am I going to have regret? Maybe.

But will my choices make me happy? Maybe.

I can’t see the future. But I am in control of the now. I want to see where that takes me.

“I think writing about unhappiness is probably the source of my popularity, if I have any-after all, most people are unhappy, don’t you think?”Philip Larkin
English poet, 1922-1985

I blame the PMS. It’s about that time again, and always about that time, the feelings of unhappiness really seem to set in. Various thoughts go through my mind. I feel caged. I want to do something. I hate my job. Where is my life going? I want to be a mother. Each month, these feelings get worse and worse, and each month they last longer.

Right now, I wish I could sit by some water, hugging my knees into my chest. I imagine the moon’s steady stream of light bouncing off the glass surface, the fullness of moon. To sit, and be able to just be alone with my thoughts. It doesn’t matter that it’s daylight, and I am tied to my cubicle. This is where I wish I could be.

I feel like I should do something wild and crazy. I feel like I should do something just for me. I want to be free. Free of responsiblity. Free of the various things that chain me to my life. I want to hit the road and drive. These feelings come to me every so often. I remember even having them as a teenager, the feeling of running away.

But here I stay. Chained, but not broken.

I thought of closing up this blog so that only people can view it by invitation. Sometimes I want to say more than I feel like I can say.

It’s a consideration.

After my last post, things have really improved with Hubs. In a way, it probably wasn’t fair of me to dump all my emotions on a public forum, but it had to be said. I realize it also isn’t fair, because he really can’t tell his side. (Well, I guess he could leave a comment.) On New Year’s Eve, we went out to dinner, and I told him I was closing down my other blog, and he asked if I still write to this one. I told him, I haven’t for a while, since it has been a few weeks. I am not sure if he has been by to read all this or not. But, things are better. I think the biggest help is that he has been regular with his hormone shot, and I haven’t even had to remind him about it. Overall, things have felt better, more loving. Part of me still wonders how long it will last.

I know it isn’t always easy for Hubs, also. I sometimes feel like although I don’t want a lot of material possessions, that I might be an emotionally high maintenence person. I want to feel loved. I want to be kissed by him. I want hugs. Not all the time, but brief displays of affection throughout the day are nice. I also want the physcialness of the relationship. He has been a lot more sensitive to this. He has been more consistent with his hormone shot as well, which I think has helped a lot. I feel like we our on the road to repair, and I am trying to keep an eye on things to make sure we don’t go to that place again.

Thanks to all of you. I really appreicate you all for your friendship, love and support.

Sunday night, Hubs had a blow up about a stupid thing, which lead to hurt feelings on my part. He left the room, I ignored him. He made the bed to make amends, as I had washed the sheets earlier in the day and they had not be put on the bed again. Probably also, because he knew I was upset and didn’t want to be in the same room as me. (And I won’t even go into what the fight was about, it was that stupid.)

Monday I started talking about the issues I have been having. I still had some emotional residue from the night before. The feeling unloved, the stupid fight, the lack of affection, the lack of intimacy, the lack of having any sex at all for weeks at a time. As we talked, I could see that familiar look of fear in his eyes. Fear of things changing. Fear that I will leave. Fear that he won’t be able to figure out what to do to make things right.

And we talked about things. Me doing most of the talking, him doing a lot of listening. He promised to be better about taking his medication. He explained his fears of not wanting to make a promise he couldn’t keep, because of the hormone injection not working. I told him he should see a doctor, but he is doesn’t feel it is necessary. Most because of his inconsistency.

And even though, to me at least, things don’t feel all better, they feel somewhat better. I am still not sure if our life goals are the same. I also don’t know how long this will last. Only time can tell if things will be any different.

Sometimes I regret that Hubs has the address to this blog, because sometimes it would be nice just to vent, and get it out of my system. But, I talked to Hubs a few days ago, and so he is aware of the issues at hand, but I still want to vent, because I am not done talking about it. But, if I keep talking to him about it, I will seem like a nag. Still, this is kind of ripping me apart. Anyway, I don’t think he even looks here anymore, because I don’t post very often, so it might just be the two of you who read this still. And I probably will still leave some details out.

I feel like the last few years (like 5 years maybe) now, Hubs and I have been going in this emotional circle. It is to the point where I believe him when he says that he loves me, but I don’t really believe that he is in love with me. I have told him this. I don’t think he sees the difference. To me, love is where you have a special place in your heart for someone. It is where parents, friends, cousins, siblings, children are. Being in love with someone is the passion. I don’t see Hubs having passion for me anymore. That drive we use to have where we would want to do almost everything together. Just being with each other. The touching, the intimacy, the drive. I don’t really think I can explain it so much as I feel it. And lately, I haven’t been feeling it.

Hubs takes a hormone shot, because he has had testicular cancer. Well, he is suppose to take this shot all the time. And sometimes it is a struggle to get him to do it. So, in my head, I automatically think that I am not worth him taking the time to take his shot. I know that this is some of where the intimacy plays. However, I kind of feel like asking him for intimacy has become a chore to him. Touching me has nothing to do with the shot. So I feel like I am left pursuing him. And I am getting tired of it. I want to be worth pursuing. Why can’t we pursue each other? I want to feel love, not feel like, oh, I am kissing you know because you asked me to. The lack of intimacy is taking its toll.

I feel like we are in a stalemate. I feel like we are roommates, with occasional benefits. I even think back to when this all happened. Some of you might think that it happened with Angel’s death, but I think it goes back even further, to an old job I had that made me really depressed. A job where maybe I leaned on him a little too much. But isn’t being partners having someone to lean on. I know he got frustrated at my frustration, but I don’t know if we ever really recovered from that. Because I can think back, and the problems were already happening then. But the thing is, I think Hubs is perfectly happy, and doesn’t see that I am not happy.

The worst part is that I feel myself detaching. I have hinted at separation to him. I have been thinking of separation. Throwing myself out of my comfort zone, and move on. Or I could just sit for another 40 years doing the same thing, day in and day out in a lackluster marriage. I kind of think he just wants me around because I am comfortable, like an old shoe, not because of any passion he has for me. I don’t want to be an old shoe. I want to be worth it.

I wish I could run away.