On the feather-soft wings of a late Spring morn, I stuggle with waking.

With that said, I'm danged tired! Woke up an hour and a half early--in this case around 3:30 in the morning. It was so hot and stuffy in the bedroom that I couldn't get back to sleep, then, as I nodded off--finally, Flamey decided to walk over my face...and lick it too. Cat slobber in the wee hours of the morning..lovely.

The birds are twittering, the rooster across the street is crowing, the sky is going from black to a very pale cobalt blue...and I'm trying desperately to keep my eyes open. Wish it wasn't Tuesday. The start of another work week for me. To make matters worse, and every lady will understand this, I'm getting my "friend" again...just had it three weeks ago....intervals getting shorter lately. Unlike some women, I can't wait for MP. Ah well, such is life....well, my life anyway.

I'm dreading giving my notice today...really, I am. But I just can't do this crap anymore. My job is making me miserable...I try really hard not to let it get me down, but it's just not working anymore. I give 110% to this company, whenever I can, and like many big companies, they don't care and what I do each day just doesn't matter. I literally---I do mean, literally do the job of 2 people every day, for the salary of 1/2 a person...and this is not living. There is no future in this, I'm just getting older faster. I decided that if I'm going to be poor, I might as well be poor working near home, than driving 30 to 40 minutes away down the interstate to do it. I know now that I'll probably never have a good job...the chances of that happening are about the same as me winning a big lottery (a real one, not those fake e-mail one's from overseas). I am sooo--tired of looking for that great job...or any decent paying job, that I don't even feel like surfing the job listings on the net anymore. I'm nearly--not yet, but almost--at the "why bother trying?" stage.

I live life so much on the financial edge, that suicide really isn't that far off from my mind sometimes...and what makes that worse, is that it doesn't bother me as much as it used to. Honestly, if I didn't have the cats, or a decent place to live, I'd have nothing much to live for. I can't pay my car insurance, don't know where the money's coming from to pay the electric bill next week....I can't stand much more of this...this has been going on for months...years, even--what with mom's medical expenses and all. I'm just so damned tired--emotionally and physically--it's not hardly worth it, anymore.

If I had a good job, it would give me hope...an actual future...I have no future, I have no life. This blog is stupid, I'm stupid, my life is stupid....(sigh). I don't blame anyone for not liking me. I deserve to be alone. I'm a loser.

Later in the day (after work):

I was rather depressed this morning. Still am, but not as much. I'm not saying above, that I"m contemplating suicide, by the way. What I meant was, my life has gotten to the point where even contemplating that act...well, let's just say that the thought doesn't nearly distress me as much as it used to--and I'm not sure if this makes sense at all--but the fact that these macabre thoughts don't bother me much....bothers me. But no, I'm not planning to hang myself from the rafters just yet---that would be the simplest and easiest solution to all this worry and pain, and I'm afraid I'm just too used to doing things the hard way. I'm rather hard-headed, the fact that I've had several concussions in my life and am still walking around (don't ask) is testimony to that. I still feel like a major loser, but I guess there's not much I can do about that, either, right now. I really don't belong anywhere, anymore...maybe I never did....except when I was a teen/young adult, meandering through my hills--but that was only less than ten years of my life.

It's hard being around people talking in a group. Sometimes I'm accepted in, and sometimes--too often in my life--I'm shunted aside, or worse, ignored altogether, like I'm not even there. Why is it, that I can give a speech that people actually listen to, in front of dozens, even hundreds of people, and I can't talk to people one-on-one or a small group without feeling like a fish out of water most of the time? I've made a total fool of myself onstage in front of a live audience and not felt at all foolish--or at worst, was okay with it after a bit. But everytime--every single time-- I talk to someone on a personal level--I feel like a total idiot. I keep saying to myself, "shut up, you moron!" But I don't always seem to listen. I mean, on a professional and /or educational level, as long as I have a definate purpose to my conversation, I can talk to virtually anyone and be comfortable--you know, feature article interviews or customer service, stuff like that. But switch gears to casual conversation--it's not that I'm shy, mind---it just that I talk too much. I wind up saying more than I ever originally intended to say...and sometimes I reveal personal stuff...I HATE that. I keep saying inside my head..."Close your mouth, idiot!" But my mouth doesn't listen to head often enough, it seems. Damn.

I do hear some interesting conversation at work. As a writer, I habitually listen in to stuff, never know where an idea will come from--once based an entire ten-minuute play on one 5 minute real life conversation. For instance, one girl told the tragic tale of how she lost her grandmother and several cousins in a fire. It seems the house they lived in was prone to neighborhood vandalism--broken windows all the time. So the grandmother put chicken wire up to the windows. One night, the kerosene heater tipped over, and no one noticed. A fire broke out and the family all burned to death because they couldn't escape through the windows. Another person told how her brother and his friends were walking down the railroad tracks, and one of the boys decided not to wait for the train to pass and ran across anyway....there wasn't much left of the boy and the brother has been in therapy ever since. On the lighter side, some male co-workers were trying to decide what TV show had the best theme song--up for grabs was Starsky and Hutch, Giligan's Island, and the Theme from MASH...and one odd-man-out with a bid for Barney Miller. Worst: hands down, it was the theme from the A-Team. Another young guy was complaining about finding a decent place for drum practice--if his thrumming fingers on the table were anything to go by, he isn't half bad--apparently though, it's considered poor form to practice one's drums on one's back porch at 10pm at night---especially in a trailer park, or so one of his workmates informed him. The conversation then turned to the national economy--the majority saying it stinks, the minority saying it's better than ever--wonder who's really correct, if anyone? Then while discussing Hurricane Katrina, Florida somehow entered the picture. The conversation got round to the launching of the new space plane (the XL38 or something of the sort). One fellow said he had a relative living near the launch pad. Said relation was supposedly there that day John Glenn tested the new space plane---and exited the plane only a minute after a malfunction sign went off, and the darn thing blew up into smithereens--and nearly melted the launch pad in the process. When asked "How'd you like it?" by the relative, Mr. Glenn allegedly replied, "Never again!" Our (millions of) tax dollars hard at work, yep. And in the "news to me, but not surprising" line of conversation: One co-worker explained that the Marines had rigged the underground passenger train tunnel that runs under the mountains near Burlington, VT (to the Canadian border)that it is wired with explosives...(so that if we're attacked, we can't get to Canada???) He went on to explain that if we are bombed, to travel east-west, as the bombing (in the northeastern U.S.) will happen north-south. Always reassuring to know that.

And once again, I step onto my soapbox:

Personally, I think we're more in danger from North Korea, or from obsessively extreme capitalism/conservatism, than from the Middle East, but what do I know? We were stupid to ever get involved there. Back in the 50's, this all started. We put the Ayatollah into power, we put Saddam into power...now radical Iran is becoming a controlling force in Iraq, once again upsetting the delicate balance of power in the Middle East and parts of North Africa...when's it all gonna' end? Look where all this devious--and not so devious---manipulation has gotten us...and it the meantime, America has become one of the most violent, racist, ultra-conservative..need I really go on? We do such good things, then we turn around and do horrible things. We give billions in aid to foreign countries, but virtually starve our own people (if people aren't hungry here, why are food pantries running out of food all the time?) and force millions to be without proper medical care or affordable public transportation, or decent affordable housing? I agree that we need to be gloally active, but we need, even more so, to start taking care of our own a little better..before our govt. finds itself one day, with another Russian or French type of revolution on it's hands....and least I've been saying that since the mid-1980's...thank goodness I've been wrong so far. (I don't really want to be anymore right about that, then I was about the Iraq War three plus years ago...I was vindicated in my statements about Iraq..I don't want to be vindicated about civil war...but as long as our govt. and big business keeps taking...and taking..and taking from the poor to lower middle classes...something's going to break...someday, people are going to wake up and smell the stench of greed wafting over their heads from the direction of Washington D.C., and say, "No more!" And then...it's not going to be pretty. I honestly hope, that in this, I am very, very wrong...I'm just afraid that the ultimate truth.. history itself, will prove me right.

There, all done. Packing away the soapbox for this evening. Sorry if I bored you. Just a little venting...venting is good, as long as you don't actually hurt anyone..(I haven't, have I? If any of my posts ever deeply hurt somebody's feelings, I'd feel really awful.)

I mentioned the Boston Tea Party in another post...wouldn't it be a hoot, if a bunch of us mean ol' liberals got together, dressed like Iraqis and poured barrels of oil out on the White House lawn? That would be a great (Okay, and expensive) political statement, don't you think, ha-ha? Of course, the paranoid nsa nazi's would have us all sent to a foreign prison where they could torture us at will, but hey--the look on Bush's face would be ever so worth it, yuk-yuk! The man is a horrendously shallow overgrown child--and what a temper-tantrum he'd throw! People would see him for what he really is, maybe. (I'm too polite to say what). I'm joking, of course, but maybe I'll write a humorus short story around it....just for fun...leaving out real names, naturally. Or maybe make it into another Dr. Who short story....a parallel U.S., hmmm.

Anyway, storms in the area, so I'm cutting this short. The cats were a little scared...they don't like loud noises, some of them--especially when I'm not around to reassure them. I'm tired and sad and not feeling so hot, physically, so it's early to bed for me, probably.