Running Thoughts (2)

I just found out that I got a raise!

This will be the first real raise I've gotten since...um, lets see, June of 2002. Last year there were layoffs and no money for cost-of-living raises; while my salary did increase slightly when I changed jobs, the increase was not dramatic. (I didn't switch jobs for the money, I switched for my mental health.) In fact, my take-home went up more by changing my W-4 to "married" than it did with the pay increase in the new job.

And today, I found out I got a raise. Small, yes, but a raise nonetheless. And it is a true raise, not a mandated cost-of-living increase (although the amount isn't much more than a cost-of-living increase).

This makes me feel good about how I've been doing my job. Despite my frustrations with it, the boring stretches, and my eagerness to go back to school, I am glad to know that my work here is noticed and that I am being rewarded.

...because their po-po are real sticklers.

I've never actually been pulled over for an expired inspection.

I have been pulled over for other things and had the expired inspection noted; I have been pulled over in an area where four cops were monitoring every car that passed through the intersection and also had the expired inspection noted.

But I have never been pulled over EXPRESSLY because of my inspection being expired.

This is a pain for me. Now I have find time in the next several days to get my car inspected; then I have to find time to go down to the West Lake Hills muni court and have the damn thing dismissed. I am annoyed.

Do not drive in West Lake Hills. They will getcha.

If a tree fell on my bed in the morning, but I was asleep, would it wake me up?

Answer: no.

It's hard to be awake on a Monday morning when I feel like the weekend didn't happen. It flew by too fast.

I spent an hour Sunday at Home Depot, buying materials with which to fix my broken closet. Two sanding blocks, two self-adhesive drywall patches (4"x4"), one roll of self-adhesive drywall tape, one plastic taping knife, and a gallon bucket of joint compound.

Now I just have to empty the closet. Then I can sand, apply patches and tape, apply compound, prime, and repaint the closet. I don't know what color the old owners used—I'm assuming plain flat white, but who knows with those people. I will attempt, also, to use the joint compound to create some texturing. I do not want to have to buy spackling compound so that the patched areas match the stubbly texture of the walls. Ideally, once we have a new closet rod hung (another story altogether), no prospective buyer will be able to see the untextured part of the wall since our clothes will be hung in front of it.

I am not a handy person, usually. I have skill with some tools, but mostly from being involved in theatre. You do realize that, when you build in the theatre, it's NOT REAL, right? So my skills with tools and building are mostly restricted to constructing things that are not intended to last. I have no real, practical skills with other aspects of home improvement, like DRYWALL REPAIR.

Oy vey.

I found out last weekend one of my very good friends is moving to New York.

This friend is the reason I have other friends in Austin. He was my "catalyst friend"—introducing me to the people he knew, taking me to parties, showing me around town. I'll be honest—were it not for this friend, I would probably have not met my husband. Seriously.

So, anyway, this friend of mine is also an immensely talented graphic designer. He doesn't have his degree, and had planned to start working on it this fall at ACC. He really wanted to be doing something more with his life.

[I'm starting to look around and realize that a lot of critical people in my life are going through the same identity crisis I am. This is slightly bizarre.]

At any rate, I was proud of him for going back to school, but I knew it would keep him out of the workforce for a while. (He's been working for some friends, sort of part time.) I worried how he'd be able to get back into a good job after being out for so long.

And now he's moving to New York to take a good job that another friend of ours recommended to him. I am sad, of course, to see him go -- and so quickly, in less than three weeks! -- but I am so excited for him at the same time. What an opportunity!

And, too, there's that touch of envy. Much like with my best friend in culinary school, I wish I were moving on to the next big thing for me right now. But I am not. I have to wait. There must be a message in that. I just don't know what it is.

My best friend called me yesterday. She just started culinary school.

We graduated together and are the same age and both of us want something more from life. Her luck is that she decided what that something was in time to be in school this fall. I have to wait another year. This is frustrating.

On the one hand, I am stupidly happy for her—her voice sounds brighter than it has in months. I can tell how uplifting it is for her to be working towards this goal of hers.

But on the other hand, I am so envious. I want to be where she is, back in school, working towards that goal. I know I am not ready—not just in the practical matters, but also mentally.

I know I am ready to go back to school. But I am not ready to go back to school. There are too many mental adjustments I still need to make, sacrifices to be realized, milestones to pass, before I will actually be ready.

But still, I am envious. I want that bright note of joy in my voice. I want to know my goal is that much closer.

Today is one of those days.

We have a project that is nearing deadline, but half of the materials still haven't been provided to us. I work way too quickly and my partner on the project is still being trained, so he works somewhat too slowly. So I'm alternately doing actual work and explaining various systems to him. This makes the day drag by.

I have new comments. Bye, bye Enetation. Hello HaloScan!

This weekend, we went to San Antonio to celebrate my dad's birthday.

We had a glass of wine at the house and some snacks. We had a nice dinner, with more wine, dessert, and espresso. And we watched the second half of the Cowboys game when we got back to the house.

I could not go to sleep because my stomach was upset.

If I feel sick at night, it's because I've had too much to drink, eaten really, really rich food, eaten too much food, or all three. But I did not drink too much. I did not eat too much.

Before dinner, I had one glass of pinot and some slices of cheddar. I also had three sesame crackers. At dinner, I had pasta in a light butter sauce with mushrooms. I had a salad with oil and vinegar. I had three escargot and some warm, crusty French bread. I drank three glasses of cabernet, one espresso, and a small, creamy tiramisu.

B says I am just getting old, that my stomach won't let me eat whatever I want anymore. I agree that I cannot eat just anything anymore—for instance, prime rib with bearnaise is almost guaranteed to make me feel really gross all night. Likewise, no matter what I eat, if I have more than one glass of whiskey, I'll be violently ill. I know these things about myself.

But angel hair with a light butter sauce and mushrooms? Salad with oil and vinegar? Three glasses of wine with dinner? None of these things ever affect me negatively. I didn't even FINISH my pasta because I could tell I was getting full, and I didn't want to stuff myself. And all my self-restraint was worth NOTHING. NOTHING.

I don't want to get old if this is what it means.

Sometimes I am disturbingly emotional.

I just got choked up by the end of a Discovery Channel show on the building of the transcontintal railway. The line that got me—"Lincoln was dead, but his dream was alive. Now it was truly the United States of America."

God, I am a sap.

This is the saddest children's book ever.

My husband would probably frown at me for saying this, but the US Men's Olympic Swim Team are HOT.

I just discovered that someone found my blog searching for thom filica on Yahoo.

That's seriously weird. Yahoo, get your act together!

The decision to apply to law school, for me, was pretty agonizing. I spent several nights laying awake, terrified of the consequences of actually getting into an expensive law school, moving to a new city, and being half of a way-out-of-college grad student couple.

But I made the decision and was happy with it, and threw myself full force into all the details of LSATs and applications and personal statements.

And the personal statement started to get me. I've read (and been told, and know from good, solid intuition) that the best personal statement isn't going to be a bland commentary on why I'd make a good lawyer (or even a good law student). Rather, a good statement would emphasize my personality, play up my ability to overcome adversity, highlight my strengths, and show how I'd contribute to a diverse student body—all without expressly stating why I want to go to law school.

So as I've scribbled and typed in fits and starts, I've begun to doubt my motives. I don't know how to address any of those issues. I think I've overcome about as much adversity as any late-twenties woman from a broken home has—probably less, when you take my marvelous extended family into account. My strengths...well, I could talk about them, but they'll just repeat what's in my resume, and likely be boring. I can write, read, edit, research—oh, and I can build you a pretty decent website. Ooooooh. Special. And diversity? I'm a white woman, who went to a semi-elite small, religious liberal arts college, who's been working for the same employer for five years. There's not a lot of diversity in me, except that my career has been rather more artsy than I imagine many other "non-traditional" law students' careers have been.

My personal statement is making me doubt my gut. My gut jumped on the law school bandwagon the moment it occured to me. Everything in me cried, "Yes! This is something you can do well!" So why does my brain freeze the moment I have to actually articulate all the things about me that make law school sound so exciting???

NB: My boss just came in and we had a twenty minute conversation about how he doesn't want me to burn out in this job, so he's encouraging me to take some professional development courses. He said, "I'm always afraid people are thinking of leaving. But I guess I'd rather have someone really strong work for me for two years, than someone who's just competent for twenty." So will my eighteen months here be long enough not to cause serious animosity?

This in GQ. I like this bit:

"They were masters of disguise, capable of passing themselves off as immigrants, women, even large animals."

I do not like Vicodin. Oh, pardon me, I'm not on Vicodin, I'm on Vicoprofen—Vicodin with ibuprofen added.

I guess I didn't notice how it affected me until I came back to work. Laying on the couch or in bed at home, I just felt drowsy. Sitting up in front of my computer, trying to get work done, the situation is completely different.

I haven't even been taking much of the stuff—by the middle of the day, most of the pain is gone. Most of the pain seems to be muscle stiffness, so that makes sense: as my body warms up, and as I use my jaw, the soreness starts to ease. But today, around 3:00, I felt an ache in the jawbone and I could tell it wanted to move up the side of my head, into my ear and behind my eye, and down into my neck and shoulder. So I took another pain pill—eight hours after the first one I took today.

An hour and a half later, the pain is gone and I feel horrible. I am so lightheaded, my eyes are swimming, when I talk, my voice echoes in my ear canal, and I can't concentrate. It's taken me three times as long as it should to write this post because I keep hitting the wrong keys and having to delete and retype; I also am having trouble forming my thoughts into sentences.

I just don't understand how anyone could become addicted to this stuff! I feel so wretched, I can't imagine what taking more would do to me.

At least my sockets don't hurt. But now I have to worry about driving home.

My neighbors are screaming at each other again.

This happens sometimes. For a while, about a year ago, it was happening a lot—like, nearly every day. Tonight is the first time I've heard them screaming at each other in several months. That doesn't mean they don't still do it, they just don't do it while I'm home.

The first time I recall hearing them scream, I was upstairs in bed with B., and the wife started absolutely going bananas. I could barely hear the husband, but every now and then he'd say something loudly enough for me at least know he was still in the room. Finally, I heard her scream, "Get out! Get out!" and then I heard a door slam, and then I heard their back gate slam, and then I heard his car drive off. Then we listened to her sob, heart-wrenchingly, for several minutes. It was morning, and I remember being glad I had to get out of bed and shower for work. I couldn't have stayed in bed listening to her any longer.

Other times I've heard the yelling have also been in the morning, usually when I'm downstairs fixing breakfast. She often yells at their child, for various things that kids do that they shouldn't or that kids don't do that they should. The most disturbing part of being downstairs while she's yelling is that, when I am outside on my patio, I can still hear her yelling in her kitchen. As can the people who live across the parking lot. One morning, when I did NOT hear the yelling, I walked out to my car to leave for work and the man who lived directly across the lot from us came out of his door to ask if I was OK. I thought it was odd, and said I was fine, and wished him a nice day, and left. Only later did I realize he must have heard some yelling next door and thought it was coming from our home.

Tonight, the yelling is particularly bad. I don't like listening to people's arguments in any situation—perhaps it's a little too painful a reminder of some the fights I overheard when I was a kid—but our neighbors voices in particular really get to me. She starts to sound panicky, and a little wild, and I can hear the crying in her voice. And then I hear doors slam and the gate slam and a car drive away.

I know they live with an elderly parent—I don't know if he's her father or the husband's father. The daughter is young—maybe seven at the oldest, but I'm not a great judge of kids' ages. I worry less for the husband and wife than I do for the grandfather and the daughter. I hear the arguments and I wish I could do something or say something. The codependent child that still lives somewhere inside of me wants to make things better for that poor little girl. The angry child inside me wants to beat some sense into that mother. But most of all, I want the yelling to stop. It makes me sad.

Surprisingly, I feel pretty well recovered from the nasty extraction. The anesthesia put me right out and when I came to, it was like being really buzzed without the nausea. Good times!

I still can't feel my lower lip or most of my chin. They are tingling, though, so I know the lidocaine is wearing off. I have about half an hour before I can take another narcotic (good stuff!). At least I can feel my tongue again—that took about three hours.

And no more gauze, at least for now—not having much of any bleeding.

I really expected to be very mentally fuzzy all day today, and I planned to do nothing but sleep. I did doze off for a while, but B. woke me up to change my gauze. I may take a nap once I pop another pill. Good times!

The thing that is suckiest is that I am fairly mentally alert, but pretty much stuck being inactive. (Any kind of activity can, apparently, increase bleeding. Bleeding is bad.)

So here I am, lounging on my bed, propped up on a boyfriend pillow, watching this depressing movie. Once again, all together, now, GOOD TIMES.

I'm having two of mine (the impacted two) yanked tomorrow. I find it ironic that "wisdom" teeth today are extracted as a matter of course. I don't know anyone who has kept theirs.

I do NOT want to have mine out. I'd rather they stay nice and happy, warm and cozy, down in my gums. But my dentist, oral surgeon, husband, father, and brother all think I need them out. My mom is the only one who's ambivalent, but that's because she used to work for an oral surgeon who told her she didn't need to have hers out.

My mom and I are almost exactly alike physically—same height, shoe size, eye color, even the same small gap in the front teeth and crooked inscisor. So why are her wisdom teeth still in her head while mine are going to be brutally hacked into pieces and extracted?

Can you tell I'm not happy about this? I have too much crap to do to be out of commission for three days recuperating from oral surgery. My house is a mess, our closet is STILL broken, I need to buckle down on the LSAT study, and my personal statement needs work. But instead of taking care of some of these things this weekend, I'll be sleeping propped up on pillows, cleaning my sockets, and eating pudding.

Ooooo boy. Pudding.

I haven't posted so much here lately—I've been keeping another blog lately—"change of life" related—at divineangst.blogspot.com. I don't feel like I'm cheating, but I do feel sort of neglectful. So any of you who wonder where I've been, that's where. I suppose I could just combine the two, but for now, I want to keep my thoughts sort of compartmentalized. That will probably change later this fall. Sadly, though, right now, my thoughts are sort of focused on going to law school.

Please forgive me for any errant posting of as-yet-unfinished writing.