Light and Darkness

Shawn Day

To my little brother who turns thirty years old on this day, I wish you the happiest of thirtieth birthdays. I send these vibes because I know you don't read this journal.

My brother is the youngest of we, three children. Growing up he was my antagonist as I was his. Don't know if it was because I was oldest and he was youngest; I was a girl and he was a boy; or because he was spoiled and I was....well, jealous. We had some really awful fights including one that involved a knife, another sitting on a chest pummeling the other, and yet another involving a chair. Whatever the reason, we didn't like each other most of the time.

As adults, we still have our strenuous moments with each other; but we have greater compassion for the other's lives and predicaments. And no matter what, my siblings are people I absolutely love and adore. Never will I deny that.

Shawn has been through quite a bit in his thirty years. He survived leukemia as a child and goes through daily pain from the after effects of the medications and treatments from it. He's not an angel when it comes to the substances. Admittedly, he has a substance abuse problem but has fought his way back from some of the harder stuff. He's had a divorce. Lost his best friend Ryan in a horribly tragic car accident which Shawn witnessed his last breath. And his closest friend (even tighter than the bonds between Ryan and him) died in February...talking about our father.

Yes, my brother has led a colorful life...alot of it his doing. He reminds me of my father in many ways, some good and some not friendly. He's my brother and I do love him. He is no innocent passerby of this world. He lives his life with gusto. No regrets. He knows life holds no guarantees. He knows fatality comes at the end of it. And he does not skulk away from it. He has a determination, if not a courage, that anyone would be jealous. Sometimes gives him a narcissistic way about himself, but as the annual birthday rolls around no one can say that he hasn't earned each year afforded him.

To my bro....I salute you on this day. If I were one who indulges in the mary-jew-wanna, I would raise my doobie in honor of your thirty years. I love you, butt head.

Joy to Your World

Dearest family, friends, loved ones, and strangers:

I am sending my hopes that each of you are happy at the end of this year and flowing into the next. You deserve love, happiness, prosperity, laughter, and peace. With each moment of this holiday season and the rest of your lives, take a breath, enjoy the second, and then immerse yourselves wholly.

We are the gifts in each others' lives so treat yourselves royally. Learn from each person you encounter daily. Teach in return. Then we will be heavily laden with gifts that last us our lifetimes.

Truely, I am happy to know those of you I speak with regularly. I am so grateful for the means thru which we have become friends. Each of you have given me so much over these last years, even though I have not shown as much. And for those of you I have yet to meet, I look forward to our introductions.

God bless all of you. God has given us the means to control our own universes. Don't sit back and wait for your blessings and gifts to pass you by. God resides in us and everything that surrounds us. Engage the world. Take chances. Live dreams. Make mistakes. By giving your all and not shying away from living, you claim what belongs to you.....and that's God moving you.

Happy Christmas.

With love,
Nae

Good Girl or Bad Girl

Without going into more detail about my dad and his wife, let me just say that I was completely taken aback with what recently happened.

My sister told me that Sheila had given each of us (Jenn, Shawn, and myself) some money for Christmas.I hadn't heard from her since my father's death so I was a bit shocked and I expected something like a $25 check. Seriously. It didn't matter. I wasn't expecting anything. When I received it this week, it was more than $25.

I have a problem now. Do I pay bills with it or do I buy it on something that every time I use it, I think of my father? When given money as a gift, I usually buy gifts for other people with it during the holidays. Or I buy groceries. Or I pay some bills. Here sits in my bag an amount that can get me a pretty nice gift like a digital SLR (or at least pay a good portion of the amount).

So, what do I do? The responsible thing? Or the superfluous, selfish thing?

...

I am so very glad that this year is almost over. What a crap fest this year turned out to be! I believe that nothing is truly bad if you learn some great lesson from the experience of it. What can I learn from the death of my father, the loss of the love of my life, and being consistently poor? Self-reliance? Endurance? Eh. Ask me when I'm seventy and retrospection and introspection collide and I get to be labeled wise.

Question

Am I that ugly? Seriously, I want to know.

Thirteen Days

This year is almost over. Fucking aye!

Never have I wanted to say goodbye to a year as much as I do for this year.

2007...what do you have in store for me, baby?

You're Never Too Old for Mom's Embarrassment

Disclaimer folks: This WILL be an entry of the TMI kind. It will get ugly graphic but that's how my day has gone. Ok, I start where all good stories start, a simple fact that makes for humorous recall. I am on my period, which is really no big thing. Really, no one needs to know about my hoo-hah business.

Since I was ten, I've been having the ol' curse. I started young and perhaps being an early developer is probably one of the reasons for such woe in my life when it comes to my period. Almost instantly, my periods became irregular. It went from every month starting on the 22nd and lasting for exactly five days to longer months between flows. I hadn't even missed my period when I was pregnant with Emma because I was used to having a period every couple of months. (Incidentally, Em's conception was textbook.) By the time Em was a toddler, I was having two periods a year. Two. If you know anything about a woman's menstrual cycle, two periods indicate serious problems and can be cause for concern for uterine cancer. Combine that with a cervical cancer scare and you get a woman who just hates her reproductive organs.

Ok....fast forward through all the medical tests and medications to the last couple of years. I think I owe this to the weird pagan practices of witchcraft; but when I got my cats, I started having a period every month. Every fucking month I had three female cats going into estrus. Besides it being annoying as hell with all the loud wailing, it did something. Power of suggestion or whatever, the witchy power of those damn cats got my blood flowing, which leads me to my current problems. I bleed for what seems an eternity. Last month, my period lasted almost the entire month; and it's not the first time. Things may be wrong with me.

So, let's get to the last week of events. Last week, my period started again. Slow start until two days ago. And yesterday....let's just not speak of it. Let's just say that I'm like a freaking magician's assistant in that sword box trick that goes terribly, terribly wrong.

Today, I was the only manager at work and it was hell. Being on my period complicates any situation because it's an intrusion on the normal flow of things. But being on such a heavy flow makes any day unbearably complicated. I got to the theater at nearly 9 am. Within ten minutes of being there, I bled through a super absorbent tampon, two super maxipads, and my panties. I called my mother to come and help me; to bring me things. And before she got there:

• I got a call from the next manager scheduled to arrive and she called out because she was sick.
• I fell and hit my right knee hard trying to move a theatrical standee. I limped the rest of the day.
• Every person and their babysitter's boyfriend called for my IMMEDIATE attention. Each time I replied that I would be there to take care of the need, another call would come over the radio asking for me.
• I was hungry and stuck in a building because I'm the only manager with only popcorn to eat. I hate popcorn.
• I had overdue projects including a e-newsletter.
• I was so lightheaded and dizzy from my period that I almost passed out several times including on the stairs because of my period.

Thank God, my mom arrived. Now....I thought I couldn't get embarrassed by my mother anymore. I thought menstrual cycles didn't embarrass me anymore. I'm thirty-fucking-four years old. I've had a baby. I've shown my cootchie to so many people during the labor and delivery of Emma, that I could probably sit nude, legs astride a chair for a figure drawing class. I've talked about twiddlng my own twat on this damn site.....but when my 5'2" Filipina walked into my workplace carrying a Walmart bag full of super long maxi pads, pads with wings, AND PANTIES?

I was looking for a dark corner to hide.

It's not that I'm embarrassed of the bag full of feminine goodies. No, I walked over to her gracefully to fetch them. Before I could finishing crossing the lobby, my mother had reached into the bag and started pulling items out to show me.

I was in the lobby. With customers. And staff.

Yeah, I'm a thirty-four year old manager at a company that makes multi-millions yearly....and my mommy embarrassed me at work with feminine hygiene products.

 

Slippery Slope

In a depression...I think. I spend most of my free time sleeping. Quite sad. Whether it's the holidays (which I cringe each time they come around), the headaches, or the back pain, sleeping is a nice escape. Unfortunately,  sleeping makes me feel worse. Vicious trap.

I'm waiting for my raise. Finally, after months and months of not receiving my evaluation, I received it. A raise of $1.25 more an hour which seems quite a bit. Here is the bitchy bit.....the new managers that were just promoted a couple of months ago are going to be making only fifty cents less than me; and I've been told that my raise isn't a guaranteed amount. I may get less. Merry Christmas, Nae.

A raise is a raise, isn't it. I'm going to be grateful. Every bit counts when you have disconnect notices in the mail.

Eh....

Headache.

I am more depressed than I should be.

Wanted to write more but the futility of getting it out is overcoming me. Ending this fucking entry.

Missing Family

I'm a bit late in the news game, folks. When I went onto my MySpace account, I found a bulletin about the Kim family that are missing from the San Francisco area. Please repost a note on your site for everyone to be on the lookout for this family of four and/or their silver SAAB. I know their family want them found but any leads or sightings would be a second to that miracle.

From the website dedicated to the search of the Kims:

The San Francisco Police Department is seeking information regarding a missing San Francisco family of four. On Friday, November 17, 2006, James Kim, his wife, Kati Kim, and their children, Penelope Kim and Sabine Kim left on a road trip to Seattle, Washington. The family was expected to return to San Francisco on Monday, November 27th, 2006. When both James Kim and Kati Kim did not show up for their appointments on Tuesday, November 28th, it caused their co-workers to be worried for their safety. The Kim's are known to always keep in touch daily either by phone or e-mail with their friends and co-workers. The last known whereabouts of the Kim family was in Roseburg, Oregon on Saturday afternoon, November 25, 2006, they were known to be heading to Gold Beach, Oregon for an overnight stay there. They were driving a 2005 silver Saab station wagon with California personalized plates of "DOE SF".