Dear Diary/Journal/Bob 3.0

[Rei]

I feel ill.

[Gravity Defier]

Bob,

I went to my little brother's graduation ceremony this morning; it was something.

Before I get into that, I need to get down my favorite moments of humor.

The student president gave a speech, in which he claimed (yes, made up) to have spoken with President Obama (who spoke at the ceremony of our in-state rival, ASU, located up in Phoenix) about being denied an honorary degree. The conversation was said to go like this:

Tommy (student president): President Obama, how do you feel about not being offered an honorary degree from ASU?
President Obama: Tommy, I already have one high school degree; I don't need a second.

Then, the guest speaker -Dean Kamen, the most adorable little man ever- said he came to speak here for two reasons: one, because we have good tortillas (it's tradition to throw them around the audience during the ceremony, much to the admin's disgust) and two, because he hears AZ is pretty strict about who it gives honorary degrees to (see above link) and now he has something "someone else" doesn't have.

Okay, like some humor, it may be one of those things you need to have been there for but I thought both jokes were damn funny when I heard them.


Anywho, back to the whole thing.

I actually enjoyed this ceremony much more than I enjoyed mine but I still felt this huge wave of regret, sitting there listening to how ambitious some of these people are and how...boring and not special my time was. I really don't have many moments that I will fondly look back on. A lot of the time, I was just sort of there, going through the motions. Put in that light, no wonder things have been the way they have been. Needless to say, I felt like a highly unintelligent, lazy loser. Oh self-esteem, how easily you are shaken.

But Kamen gave a very good, very subtly funny speech and the ceremony went by fast enough considering the idiotic rambling going on in the row behind me. After it was over, we met up for pictures with the family and I was a little upset that my paternal grandparents took pictures with my little brother after adamantly refusing to take any with me at my graduation.

Following the photo session, we went out for lunch and then went to see Star Trek, which went by very quickly and was thoroughly entertaining. ETA: I was enormously annoyed by the trailer for Transformers 2, thanks to one shot in particular.

Now, I am here, looking at the photos and wondering how it is I managed to look so damn goofy in the ones I'm in, not to mention flat-chested. Sports bra, maybe? Meh. I've been told I look a bit thinner overall and my shirt and pants were both a bit loose, so yay! to that.

That's enough rambling for now.

[shadow-petra]

I FINALLY have insurance on the car! It's not my own car, but whatever, I get to drive! I've been waiting so long for this moment, it's about friggin time.

On another note. Bob. I. Want. To. Eat. Like really really eat real food!

[Rei]

bob... can you make an end? make this all end?

[human.]

Dear Bob,

I find it amazing how many scholarships there are for Armenians! It always reminds me of Petra! On another note, looking for scholarships for college is really boring... Where are the ones for the half Japanese? We need financial aid, too!

Thanks for listening. =]

[Confessions]

Bob,

I've gotta go away from human contact. Be locked away in some mental institution, like in I Never Promised You a Rose Garden only with computers and diet coke. Seriously, I'm losing my mind.

I'm being controlled by my inner demons- my inner sadistic god, and the rules I make as a joking suggestion that immediately turn true for me. I am constantly limited by myself. And I don't belong so well in society, either.

And when we lose it's even more worse. I get crazy. I mumble to myself and hit myself and scream silently and after the game I cannot talk to anyone. I feel Joker crazy, insane.

I've been constantly planning my suicide note, but not keeping track in my head. I can't really do it because I want to die feeling no pain- and I have no access to sleeping pills- and because I don't want my family to suffer. And still I plan it.

I want to scream, but I can't. I want to release my anger freely, but I can't. I want to cry, but I can't, I can only wail and shut my eyes as if I was crying. I want to have superpowers and destroy everything around me. I want to kill a complete stranger with no fear of being discovered. I want my inner sinning record to go away, to open a blank page with myself and the whole world, so that nobody will remember any bad thing I did.
I want to finish this already. I want to be like the rest. I don't want to be above the rest because I can't accept compliments- I blame luck or "anyone would have done the same". I want to finally have fun and not feel insecure about that fun.
And I want everything that's bad for me. I want to do, or not do, whatever the hell I want, and live without caring for it.

I constantly write stuff that I want to write here, in my head, and then erase them. Probably because I can't continue the sentence; also sometimes for other reasons that I don't want to state.

Sayonara, Bob. I hope you have a very good f****** day. Better than mine. Because right now I am nothing but sadness.
And all because of the stupidest thing one can think about.

[Mich]

Dear Bob:

I live in an apartment complex that has three other males I know and interact with on a personal basis, two of which I consider my friends. We are all above 21 years old. So yesterday, when I realized I had forgotten all four of my ties at home, I went to each of them and asked if I could borrow one of theirs for my interview the next day (today, incidentally in about an hour).

None of them had ties. None of them have ever owned a tie. All of them scoffed at the very thought they might have needed a tie before their lives at this point.

What the heck?

Wish me luck at my interview; it's for a "server" (read: waiter) position at a slightly fancy bar/restaurant, and if I don't get it, back to Boise for the summer,

Jeff

[neo-dragon]

Dear Bob,

It's hard to force myself to grade lab reports when I didn't get a single call for an interview for any of the positions that I applied to for next year. Why do I work so hard when apparently no one thinks I'm even worth their time? You have no idea how much I was hoping that this year would be different from the last two. Now I'm seriously doubting that it will be.

[^Peter]

Hey Bob,

I just finished 24 season 7! (Don't read if you haven't watched it, Bob.)
I'm not sure if I'm satisfied or dissatisfied... On one hand, it was an exciting season, but on the other hand... ... can this finale really be considered a finale? I heard the Bones finale was disappointing, though I don't watch that... I wonder if this is the same feeling Bones fans have.

beep. beep. beep. beep. beep. beep.

[starlooker]

Trust me. The Bones fans have it much, much worse.

[Eskarina]

Dear Bob,
I want my brain let itself be talked into cooperating with my mind, or the other way around, and let me have some normal eating schedule, sleeping schedule, and all in all just a style of schedule. This is exhausting and I feel so sick.

[starlooker]

Dear Bob,

Make me clean and organized, please. And make all the paperwork go away before I drown in it or die of a thousand papercuts.

System is slightly on overload.

Although, happily, I'm in a much better mood than I was in March/April.

[Eaquae Legit]

Please also make all the emails go away.

[locke]

Bob,
my eyes are being bothersome.

[Eskarina]

Dear Bob,
Please feed my teachers to dragons-- whoops, not, that'd be cool- just make them vanish.

Sincerely not happy,
~Me

[BonitoDeMadrid]

Bob,
Please make me a multi-billionaire now so I can help out those inglorious bastards? Pretty please? This team is just bringing me down more and more.

~Sad panda

[locke]

Bob,

gah, I forgetted to check into my flights for tomorrow all day yesterday. This despite looking up my flight information for various people approximately eight times yesterday, starting with my supervisor at 10am and going all the way til 5pm when sending info to my second cousin once removed who is getting married this weekend. looked up my flight all day, thought about transit problems all day. never once occured to me to go check into the flight and get an earlier boarding pass. doh.

[Gravity Defier]

Bob,

I guess there's going to be some hearing about my case? I'll find out more on Tuesday, when I meet with my lawyer but I guess she got a 'notice of hearing' in the mail. Argh, hearing, hearing...involves the judge, right, Bob? Maybe the prosecutor, too. Oh, hell. Why they don't ever give me more information over the phone is beyond me. Naturally, I will spend up until Tuesday worrying about what is going on. Hell, I will probably worry after I know what is going on. Every time something new comes up for this, I get a knot in my stomach and I either want to cry, throw up, or both.

[locke]

Bob,

my dad is not looking good, but that's probably because he's sick. I wish he would really lose the weight, but that's not going to happen at his current job. I feel somewhat responsible because some of the stupid contrarian things I passed on to him in my health nut days are now things (unhealthy things) for him that really believes in and follows, or they just give him the excuse to not really care and try to lose the weight.

also his sleep apnea breathing machine isn't working tonight and so he won't be able to really get any sleep and since the people from the company are being unhelpful (both the st. louis branch office we're at now and the joplin branch office that is his 'home' office) nothing can be done tonight. I wonder if that makes them responsible if he winds up driving 300 miles home tomorrow to get his backup breathing machine and he falls asleep at the wheel and... bad things happen... because they refused to help him since he wasn't in his home location, despite there being a branch office less than a mile from our hotel. We shall see what happens tomorrow when a technician deigns to be available rather than just a receptionist trained to say, "I'm sorry we can't do anything for you tonight." In the event that he decides to drive home tomorrow, sleep, and then drive back up here to meet us I imagine I'll be renting a car on my credit card in order to get us around. cest la vie and all that. I was already informed that my dad made 60,000 less take home pay (not gross, net) this year than last year, and even though both he and my mom were paid today, I'm expected to pick up the rest of the bills for this weekend other than the hotel or tonight's 'expensive' $30 pizza dinner, since they have less than 100 in both of their checking accounts by now. oy. I'll get a check to pay me back, "later". this weekend is getting less and less fun, although I'm enjoying myself so far.

[Gravity Defier]

Bob,

I'm sorry to be in here again; I'm sorry to have been in here as often as I have over the past six years. I should not post this on the internet, I'll never be able to take it back once I do. There will probably be a day when I come to regret it and I know this, yet I'm posting it anyway, knowing there is a chance, albeit minor, that someone who knows me will read it. I'm an idiot, though, and if you hear this story, you'll know that about me.

I want to know who this girl grew up to be. I want to hear about the boys who broke her heart and the boys whose hearts she broke. I want to hear how she was happily disgusted by her parents when they acted like 14 year olds, flirting and calling each other 'dear' and are now in their 31st year of marriage. Her dad didn't have to go to the Middle East for a war. The house they bought has a neat yard and dinner is on the table when her dad gets off work and is done with coaching -whatever sport is in season- for the day. Her room is now a GB Packers room or a Marine memorabilia room or a SD Chargers room. Who knows, maybe her parents were kind enough to leave the walls the color she chose when she was given permission as a teenager. She has three successful brothers; the oldest did in fact graduate from high school and was thus recruited to that professional baseball team -he has beautiful, strong arms and yes, he has three gorgeous, happy daughters; the second oldest became a photographer and people couldn't be more impressed with his work, including his wife and two outgoing boys, who are welcoming their new sibling in November; the youngest, he's in the movie business and travels all over the world. They all fight at times, they're not perfect, but what they are is happy. But what of her? Did she become an architect or a teacher? Maybe she became a marine biologist or an artist. Whatever she chose, she does it well and with confidence. That's a nice story, right?

Within a year of that moment, things started to go wrong and they never stopped for longer than a year here or there. That happy little girl stopped existing as she should have been and became me, this horrible, weak, miserable, broken person.

We were in Tucson; we'd be back at home in NM a day or so later. I was four, my dad was in Japan for a year and my mom needed help or a break from the four of us. It was so hard for her with my dad gone and with my grandparents so emotionally distant from us, even then. She took it out on my oldest brother mostly; he was just a kid and didn't deserve a lot of it. So we went to Tucson. We were at my aunt and uncle's house. It was all boys and they were all too cool or something for the tag-along little girl, so I watched a movie in the guest room. I was lying on the floor and content. I've always been pretty good about being alone. He walked in at some point. He was around 13 at the time and family only through marriage. He was curious. I was uncomfortable and a little scared but it wasn't painful in the least. It was just a hand, anyway. That doesn't count right? When we got back to NM, with much embarrassment and without being able to say it directly, I told my cousin and brother what had happened. They thought it was funny and then told me I must be making it up. If that was how it was going to be taken, Mom didn't need to know. When I started wetting the bed and my parents, months later when my dad was back and we were living in CA, decided to take me to a doctor to find out what, if anything, was wrong with me, I had to have a physical exam. Maybe not had to but it happened. And I cried and cried, just when the doctor had me in the little medical gown. I was mortified when the actual exam took place.

The nightmares I had as a child, the endless nights, staying up until 3am and then running into my parents' room and into bed with them. My head was by my mom and my legs were thrown over my dad's stomach/side/back. That was the only place I could sleep. Sometimes my oldest brother would let me sleep in his room, in my My Little Ponies sleeping bag, to give my parents a break and he'd play "Lean On Me" for me. Corny? Perhaps. He was also big brotherly and told me on many mornings that if someone broke into our house at night, they'd shoot at me because my snoring sounded like something out of the military's arsenal.

But the dreams. My parents were poisoned. Someone was chasing me and eventually caught me; I could never scream for help, I was so scared. My family disappeared or flat out left me. Couldn't put my hands or feet over the edge or something might grab me. My mom hated mornings because I never wanted to wake up, from getting so little sleep.

Dad left again, this time not for Japan but the Middle East for the Gulf War. I wrote him all the time and he wrote me. But when he got back after a year there? I was scared of him, a little. He brought back pictures of oil fires and blown up cars and charred bodies. My parents fought often. I remember one Sunday rushing to sit between them in church. This was unusual because I always tried to sit away from them, so they couldn't poke and prod me when the inevitable happened and I fell asleep from boredom. I had to sit between them because I knew, the way kids know more than adults ever want to give them credit for knowing, I knew that at that point, we were keeping them together. I had to sit between them to serve as the bridge or connection between them. I held hands with both of them.

Don't get me wrong, Bob. We spent 4 years in CA and I had a lot of happy moments there but they were, quite often, dependent on me being happy alone in my room, away from people. My oldest brother had started getting in trouble -gangs, marijuana, bad performance in school, missed curfew- when my dad left for Kuwait or wherever he was. I hated seeing him and my mom fight. No, easier to retreat to my room and my Fisher Price Little People. Or, if the kids in the neighborhood were out, that was a good enough escape so long as they let me keep my thoughts to myself or didn't pick on me. See, I had annoyed this one older kid by having the nerve to exist and he grabbed me by my bangs, dragged me to the sidewalk, and slammed my forehead into the curb. I must have had 'weakling' written on my forehead even then. However, that wasn't exactly the norm in CA so I think of those days as my happiest.

Then the orders came, my dad had three choices: AZ, D.C. or Kansas. D.C. was out right away; my dad wanted somewhere on the smaller side and somewhere he would be happy to retire at. Kansas? Nah. Let's go with the tried and true AZ, where the youngest was born years before.

It was bad, Bob. The kids hated me; they teased and sometimes pushed. I had been looking forward to the first summer until I heard my parents were sending us to NM to spend time with my paternal grandparents. It was boring and miserable for all involved but time passed, we came back, school started again soon enough. What I thought was bad news was actually kind of good news: I knew no one, not a single soul from my fourth grade class made it to my fifth grade class. I made three friends that year: Kayla, Leah, and James. That could have been the turning point but wouldn't you know it, my little brother swore that he saw Dad kissing a coworker who had started hanging around the house, first at parties with lots of people and then just her and dad -and us, of course. He was wrong, he had to be wrong, right? When we went to the park with her and dad, that didn't mean anything, right, even if she was a little too close?

Then came The Letter. That stupid, stupid, heartbreaking letter. Mom was out in the garage, looking for something and discovered a letter from her to my dad. At this point, my dad had already had enough accusation from my mom and had moved into the barracks on base. He swore he was innocent. I remember hopping in the station wagon and driving out to the base. My mom cried for hours, talking to the friend of the family. Then it was dark and time to go find dad. I was sent to go get him when we saw him walking and pulled over. He looked so happy to see me. I knew he missed living with us. I got back into the car, my mom got out, they talked, I saw him start to cry and I would have cried too but my brothers were there. What would they think if they saw me cry? I held it until we got home; it was always behind closed doors for me. My oldest brother was practically out of the house and cared but it wasn't his life anymore. Second oldest brother was openly depressed, as was the little brother. Suicide attempts by the little one, hiding from the older one. Me, I let it all fester inside. My hair started falling out in clumps, like I was undergoing chemo or something. Dad moved back in that December but left us again on New Years' Eve. He was just going to watch a game with some friends, he'd be back in time for the countdown. It could be in a movie, the pathetic scene that was me in my homemade hat, my brothers, my mom, all sitting in a room only lit by a television, gloomy, watching the countdown and knowing he wasn't coming back. We lost him to her.

She called me names, too. Said I wore slutty clothes. Anyone who knows me knows I cover more skin than most girls my age; big, baggy shirts and pants in the summer. She insulted my mom in front of me and my brothers.

I made it through fifth grade but sixth grade was a mess, as would be every year after. Teasing, again. Leah moved, Kayla didn't want to be my friend anymore, James...he was still my friend sometimes but he was also getting popular and had less time for me. Seventh and eighth, repeats of sixth. Ninth, I went to school out of my neighborhood boundaries and everyone hung out together after school. I couldn't, I had to go home. Tenth grade, the best of the four, I finally found some people who were willing to put a little effort into hanging out. I was still left out of quite a bit but something was better than nothing, right? Eleventh grade...it started to fall to pieces because of stupid high school drama. I was pushed into some lockers, told it would be a good thing if I were to die. Twelfth grade. I couldn't wait to be done with high school at that point.

Dad had married her and hadn't told or invited us. I wouldn't have gone anyway but I learned about it from a stranger. Mom was struggling to support us on $4-8/hr and all sorts of assistance. Dad paid child support, probably to ease his conscience for always letting us down or choosing her over us constantly. Okay, he also paid it because the military made him and he really did want us to be taken care of financially.

Going back to 5th grade, if you'll allow me, Bob, that's when F came into my life. He was a soccer player, just like all my brothers. I didn't realize he was a boy until 8th grade when it suddenly hit me. He must have realized I was a girl about then, too, because that's when things started to change between us. Flirting and innocent little touches of the hand here and there. The thing was, he didn't want anyone to know he liked me. If we were alone, it was okay for him to tell me but anyone else? Not a chance in hell was he owning up to that. So from then until twelfth grade, I saw him for a few months here and there, when he wasn't dating someone else and I was patient. I waited for him to come back and he always did. Then he went and ruined everything. He was dating this girl, Amanda, but decided he wanted to hang out with me sometimes, too. We were playing some Mario racing game. It was January 21st, 2001. It was after 2, maybe 3AM. He should have left long before but there he was, with me, playing some stupid video game. Before I had any idea what was happening, I wasn't sitting up anymore and neither was he. "No, what are you doing, I don't want this, what is this, how do I make it stop, I'm scared." He was so much stronger than me, though...he was not only a soccer player at that time but also a baseball player and wrestler. I felt him and all I could think about was how I must have asked for it somehow and my mom would be so disappointed in me and what if I get pregnant and I don't want to live anymore. He couldn't finish what he started.

I sat in our rocking chair, waiting for everyone to wake up so I could get in the shower without waking anyone. When I did get in, I turned the water on and just sat there under the falling water and sobbed. I called my friend, asked if her mom could help me...she worked at Planned Parenthood. I got a morning after pill. For months, I wrote, I got headaches, I held razor blades in my hand but I couldn't really do it. My niece was so young, then, and I couldn't imagine what my family would say if I went through with it.

I graduated, the headaches remained, I saw a doctor about it and the symptoms all pointed to brain tumor. I was lucky, though. It was all the symptoms of it without the tumor itself. College came, I had some unplanned hospital visits and then got better. I lost weight, decided to join ROTC. I had been given an internship within a NASA sponsored program at my school. I made some friends.

My brother, who had been doing so well, was caught using heroin and has been in and out of jail since. My dad left his second wife for the third. ROTC found out about my headaches and gave me the boot. My friends thought I was weak and spit on me to show their disapproval. I came back to Pweb to talk to you, Bob. I was overwhelmed and lost and I ruined everything. I quit the internship. I nearly failed two classes and only scraped by with, first, Incompletes, then a 'D' in each class. After a few months, I got better again. I made it to graduation. Got suckered into moving back to this hellhole. Struggled to find work, landed a job I hated but was damn good at, then landed the teaching position and worked my ass off. I don't know anything about psychology but this person here would never do what they accused me of, not after what I went through.

The other boys, though...there were others. J, who harassed me and wouldn't leave me alone because he wanted to see me without my top on. He was supposed to be my friend.

M, who said he loved me but was too ashamed to let anyone know about me. I won't say any more about him; the other stuff didn't matter to me quite as much as that did, though lord knows it should probably matter a hell of a lot more.

C, who found me most beautiful in a picture of me when I was four. I was a mistake to him; he said as much. He also told me he feels sorry for anyone else who might ever love me and be with me.

Bob...I tell you this so you can in turn tell me: what's wrong with me? People leave me or use me or are ashamed of me.

Is it because I'm really not worth anything? Am I too ugly or fat or short? Talentless? Lost? Insecure? Scared of practically everything? Bitter? Untrusting? Stupid? Boring? Do I make too many excuses for myself? Take too much pity for myself? What is it, exactly, that makes me so damn terrible?

I also tell you because I'm drifting. I'm not completely alone yet but I seem to be getting there and I'm holding my breath, positive the other shoe is going to drop at any moment and the ones who are here now are going to finally realize everyone before them was right, I am crazy, I'm not worth it.

I made a lot of my own mistakes, Bob, and it's too late for me to correct those. I'm doing my best to avoid making more. Where do I go from here?

Where the f*** do I go from here?

[Eskarina]

Dear Bob,
I'm just so glad to have her, so I can talk to someone about things that keep bothering me and know she won't roll eyes at the very first sentence. I'm glad we both have schools for this year almost finished, and I do hope it simultaneously means we can hang out more than we had been so far.

It'd be nice, I miss our tearoom meetings of all those years, endless hours of talks and drawing things together and thinking about whatever artsy crossing our minds. I think I need that, I need someone to talk about fantasy literature and all the woo-woo things everybody else thinks about as nonsense.

As far as I can say, letting imagination run nuts is comforting, it makes all those stupid fears go away, substituting them with something different. Something I just know isn't real and won't be real, yet something I can at the best case dream of and at the worst just switch it off. My mind is otherwise being this strange bunny thinking up scenarios I don't like, they keep interfering, and being with her means I can tell someone, make fun of it, and make a story with it. Or something.

In the end, we end up laughing and contemplating, and not being the together nuts we may seem to be. I know she knows I'm there for her the same, she can get out *her* crazies, and it's just all fine. This hiding from the conformity of society around is stupid. But to be hiding in with her doesn't feel like it's stupid *that* hard. It makes the depression a little bit better, it makes the frustration of feeling alone a little bit dance away. Glad for that. Glad for feeling like I'm alive, really much alive, in all those hours spent with her. Days should be longer when she's around.

[starlooker]

Dear Bob,

My grandfather hasn't been doing well for the past month or so. Incompetence at his nursing home has not helped. So he's been on my mind a lot. Apparently things really went downhill today/last night. His vitals are good, but his kidneys are shutting down and I don't think they're going to want to put him through dialysis. They're giving him morphine for the pain. So, we're really just waiting at this point.

So, I'm starting to go through similar pre-grief that I went through with my grandmother.

Right now I'm very sad that if/when we have kids, they won't ever get to meet any of their great-grandparents, especially my mom's parents.

It just comes and goes. Not real often, not real intense, but often and intense enough. So.

[starlooker]

Dear Bob,

Got a call from my mom. Probably sometime in the next day or day and a half.

Pre-grief is intensifying a lot. In that strange place where it's morphing into real grief.

Lots of crying. Lots of sadness. Some guilt, too.

[starlooker]

Dear Bob,

Turns out he died a few minutes before I wrote that. Very sad today, very denial at times.

I never knew anybody else quite like him. Heck, I never knew anybody who even reminded me of him. I did, however, know an awful lot of people he would like. That's because he was the most outgoing, social, never met a stranger type of person I've ever known.

He was the thread that really bound us together. Oh, sure, my family loves each other and we'll continue to have big gatherings and sing and play cards. But something will be missing that no one will be able to replace.

Thank God for the many, many memories we all have to share and to make each other laugh.

I cried really, really hard last night. This morning just tears running down my face quietly at intervals.

Sad.

[Eaquae Legit]

*hugs Kirsten* I'm so sorry.

[Rei]

*hugs Kirsten also*

[locke]

Hugs Kirsten

I know exactly how you feel, particularly the bit about "we'll still play cards."

--

Bob,

I had all sorts of things I wanted to tell you, then I finished reading Lathe of Heaven on the plane and now I'm just all sorts of serene. My family is awesome, btw, and even though I worry and struggle every day with various things, life is pretty good. I've got more planning going on now too, so hopefully some of this directionlessness drifting I sometimes feel trapped in, well I can paddle my way out of that and get back into the strong current that pulls me forward. I've been all dilatory long enough. excuses are silly and no need to make them for myself. :-p

[Confessions]

Bob,

You know what I had for lunch today? Suicidal Lasagna. Well, I doubt the lasagna itself was, but the people it belonged to were none other than the Suicidal Seniors. I only found out after they had offered me some lasagna during lunchtime and I had some, and then I figured, what the heck? I'm not going to be afraid of it just because it belongs to them.

And guess what, Bob? Now I have food poisoning. It can only be the lasagna because the only other thing I had today was canned soup. I've been poisoned by Suicidal Lasagna. How ironic is that?

[Gravity Defier]

Bob,

Regarding this:

I guess there's going to be some hearing about my case? I'll find out more on Tuesday

We are indeed going back to the judge for a hearing (unfortunately, the soonest it can be done, for scheduling reasons, is approximately three weeks from now). The only condition of probation that was not related to me paying fees was that I have absolutely no contact with the kids I was helping, meaning the only reason my lawyer thinks I should be denied release is if I failed to uphold that condition. I have not failed in that. Not even close. But the prosecutor wants proof that I'm psychologically fit and we're petitioning that because it won't be a condition set to get me off should I wait the two years for it to end naturally. If I'll be deemed mentally healthy enough then, there should be no cause to not label me as such now. Also, because of loopholes, wording, and technicalities in AZ statutes, they can get away with treating me harsher than they would a felon with regards to first-offense set-asides. If the judge agrees at this hearing, the trouble is only halfway done. We'd then need to start a whole new process of petitions/paperwork to guarantee when/if they dismiss my charges that it isn't only in one system (courts) but all systems (courts, law enforcement, etc.), so that I don't get dinged on background checks.

This will not be taken care of in time for the position I have a shot at. *sigh*

[Yebra]

Dear Bob,

This is ridiculous, the new assistant is only a year older than me. It's almost enought to make me feel like an adult of some kind. Almost.

[locke]

Bob I've got issues. I somewhat thoughtlessly sent her a message on facebook, thinking, hey I'm visiting her old hometown maybe she's got good ideas on things to do. And then I got a cheerful reply and it all came flooding back, how much I miss her, how much I resent not being with her, how much I feel like she's the only person I've ever met that fit me exactly--I don't want anything else. I thought I was finally over it this winter, when I glanced at a picture of her she put on facebook and didn't think she was the most beautiful person I'd ever seen, a first. But that was just me being in another relationship, I can't really look at more than one woman at a time anyways. But I wasn't over it. It hurts just as much now as it did two years ago and it did three years and two months ago when I met her. Love at first sight & conversation is terrible.

and it's not fair to anyone else, for all my floundering in the dating pool, I'm really just looking for anything that will deaden the sensation that I missed my only chances, just to settle with anyone as good enough. talk about desperate.

I've seen silver turn to dross
seen the very best there ever was
and I'll tell you
it ain't worth what it cost.


otoh:
in spirit poor, in mercy rich
they hunger for your righteousness
their hearts refined in the purity
Lord let me shine for them
Lord let me sing.

[starlooker]

Dear Bob,

I go to that church. Or, well, I went to it and always meant to return but boyfriend and I got into the habit of worshipping at St. Mattress on Sunday mornings. Nonetheless, I liked it. I like the pastor and the people and when I think "I should go to chuch" that's where I think I should go.

I think I will go -- maybe not next week -- but soon.

Wake up this morning. Reading the New York Times on my cell phone. Headline, "Doctor Who Performed Abortions is Shot to Death."

Start reading the article. The doctor's name sounds vaguely familiar -- but, no, it couldn't be, could it? The doctor my supervisor once mentioned in passing?

Wichita, KS, it says. Oh. I guess it is him.

Article mentions that some people had staged protests outside his church before.

And suddenly I flash back to the first Sunday I went to that church, when I saw parked across the street a van with very graphic pictures of late term abortions and a lot of slogans saying that someone or other was a baby killer...

No. No way. Can't be.

Read down further in the article.

Oh. This Sunday morning, someone walked into the church I mean to go to with the nice young pastor and the sweet congregation that gave us coffee mugs and the kids that I would watch in the pews when I was bored during the service and gunned him down in the lobby as he was walking into the service.

Bob? What the f***?

[elfprince13]

people are FSCKED.

[Luet]

Bob,
I've been thinking about things today (due to stumbling upon an unfortunately unprotected facebook profile of a friend of a friend). I was reminded that they are the most paranoid, toxic, dysfunctional, delusional, self-righteous group of people I have ever known. I thank God every day to have escaped that.

[Eskarina]

Dear Bob,

Not ashamed one bit about that thing over back then. I just wish I wouldn't have to hide. Bad secrets, shoo away :P