I Want The Jim To My Pam

I'm trying very hard to be upbeat and shiny, and it's been working for a while, I've even fooled myself a bit. But that's a difficult thing to maintain when you're not 100% sure you made the right decision. My life is so completely different from how it was, even two months ago, and I think that would be overwhelming for anyone. I wonder how other people fared in situations like mine, because I'm not the kind of person who thinks that nobody understands how I feel. I feel like I tried to ignore the fact that I should be upset, and was so proud of myself for not being affected, that I ignored the obvious...which is, holy shit, I'm pretty fucking sad right now.

I'm so tempted to pack everything and move somewhere completely foreign to me...New York being the object of desire right now. Los Angeles is too familiar, and the problems I've been having in the past month and a half are too similar to the problems I had before I met C and moved away. One of the things that always makes me happy, which is roaming around the city and getting lost and experiencing new things, is proving difficult because, although I've been gone for over three years, Los Angeles is like the home I grew up in - the one where you could walk around with your eyes closed and not bump into anything because it's just that familiar.

There's a certain kind of person who's afraid of being alone for the rest of their life at 26...and although I think I'll laugh at myself someday for thinking that, it's hard to get out of my head. The fact is, I have never been as happy in my life as I was when I was happy with C...and it's scary that I now have to top that in order for leaving to have been worth it.

Dear You

One thing that depresses me more then it should is shopping for a greeting card. I pretty much loath holidays that require purchasing a card for someone. If I know the person I'm buying the card for well, I'll pick out something silly; like a Spanish or religious card, or I'll buy a child's birthday card with a picture of Barbie on it...but I always make it a point to write something somewhat meaningful, preferably funny (years of sarcasm has made it very hard for me to be sentimental) in the card. I find it a huge waste of money when I receive a card that has some generic poem or some trite message, which the sender then signs, stamps, and sticks in the mailbox. I've saved very few cards that I've received in my life, but all the ones I've saved say something special from the sender.

Today I overheard my mom call my brother to remind him to send my grandmother a Mother's Day card, then I heard her say "all I want is a card"...fuck. So, full of dread, I stopped by Walgreen's this afternoon. First of all, I've never in my life found a card with a preprinted message that even comes close to describing how I feel about the person I'm purchasing the card for. After each card I picked up, read, and stuffed back into it's (wrong) slot, I became more and more panicky. I wandered away from the Mother's Day section to see if I could find something whimsical, but then I realized that my 96 year old grandma probably wouldn't see the humor in a Quinceañera card, and after all my mother's done for me in the past month, she deserved more then a "God Cares" card.

By this time I had inadvertently read all the card section labels, which never fail to depress the living hell out of me. Why? Because when I see sections with titles like "I Still Believe In Us", "Lets Fix This Together" and "Cope/Serious Illness" I can't help but think that there's going to be a time in my life that I'm going to actually be looking for a card in that section. It didn't help that the world's worst music was being piped into the store particularly loudly, namely "She's Like The Wind" which never fails to remind me of Patrick Swayze's once successful career which is now just a faded memory for him. God, I'm a wreck aren't I?

Since I wasn't able to find a card that fit my mother, and the one I made up in my head was a little harsh:
Dear Mom,
Since you've been on Lexapro you've been the mother I always wished you would be when I would cry myself to sleep at night as a child. I'm very nervous about the day when you decide to stop taking it.
Love,
Georgia

as was the one I made up for my grandma:
Dear Grandma,
I really love you, but when I hang out with you it makes me depressed because you're SO FUCKING OLD!, and it makes me think that if I were that old I'd probably kill myself and then it makes me wonder if you ever think about that and then I feel like a horrible person.
xo,
Georgia

So I gave up and just picked out two of the most generic cards I could find, to which I'll sign my name and stuff in an envelope, thus fulfilling my duties as someones child. But if you think I'm not going to worry that one of my cousins got my grandma the same card that I did, then you don't know me very well.

Does This Come With A Happy Ending?

I got a job, one that I really like, but I can't really describe it because I'm still not exactly sure what it is that I do. I can say that I work for a really awesome/neurotic/Jewish psychologist who facilitates psychological testing on his patients in order to testify as an expert witness in court on their behalf, among other things. Basically I'm his assistant and help him with organizational stuff, I think. It'll be good experience for me as I'll most likely be taking a lot of expert witness testimony once I'm a court reporter. I'll be working around twenty hours a week, but I get paid pretty well so it should work out. The office is about a minute's drive from my house, but I'm looking for a bicycle...although riding here would still only take me about five minutes. I have the perfect bike for me in my head (70's-80's Schwinn or something similar, small frame, at least 3 speeds, a basket) but it's hard to find.

I have to stop this entry short so that I can leave the room...my mom is watching Fox, or more specifically, Bill O'Reilly...kill me now.