Call the Feds; I'm off my meds!!!

I just wrote a long self-indulgent rant here, but I decided to delete it.

I've been off my meds for 4-5 days because I hardly have any pills left, and I am trying to stretch them out, but it obviously isn't working for me, because I'm an absolute nutter now. I have depression, folks. I take meds for it. Well, I e-mailed my doctor today, and he's gonna give me some samples of my meds, as well as prescriptions for them. Apparently, they have now gone generic and should actually be affordable for me without insurance. Yay!

I went to the cherry blossom festival yesterday. I'm too tired to post pictures from it now. You'll have to wait. I wore my Kamaji t-shirt to the festival. :) The trees were breathtaking. Many of them were just budding, though. I wanna go back this coming Saturday to see them blooming fully.

Alex's grave has a cherry tree by it. I wonder if it's blossoming now. I wish I could go to it. I haven't been back to Stockholm since the summer of 2005. I really, truly wish to go back this summer, but I don't see how I can, financially. I also wanna go visit my friend in Chicago. I really, really want to go to Chicago SOON!!!

Still haven't gotten my financial aid package. I'm really worried that I won't get the funds to be able to go to school. It's really stressing me out. I haven't heard JACK SHIT from Hunter AT ALL. Ugh.

I'm gonna have some soy ice cream now: cookies and cream! :)

han är så gay!!!

update on the boy: mr. exmo hasn't dated a girl for six years. yeah, so mr. exmo is pretty much all about boys nowadays. that's okay. i just wanna be his friend. he's such a cool guy! anyway, i feel like a freshman in college again: a silly girl crushing on gay boys. yeah, i feel let down, but i'm quickly getting over it. he's such a nice boy. i'd be depressed if we couldn't be friends. i dunno if he wants to be friends outside of work. i'll lay off and let him do the work on that; he already knows i truly want to be his friend. so, now i am hoping that i can meet a boy who isn't far away, isn't mildly autistic, and isn't gay. is that too much to ask? no, i found it in alex. i know it's possible; it's just hard to find. alex was a very cool straight boy. they do exist. they seem to be an endangered species, but they are not extinct. :) i have to keep the faith that there is a straight or bi boy out there for me.

i'm not gonna see the firefighter anymore. he's flaked on me one too many times. he calls and wants to make a date. then i respond and don't hear back from him. this has happened several times. the last time he called me and left a message (which was on monday), i didn't respond. i don't feel as hormonal at this point anyway. for a few months there, i was a total hornball, but it has died down somewhat. i hope to be able to abstain until i find someone to date.

other news: i called the ob-gyn office about the $3,000 medical bill. they said they normally allow 3 months to pay it off. i told them i could not do that. they are gonna call me tomorrow and maybe give me 6 months to pay it off. i still cannot do that. i will tell them that. i will pay off what i can every month (which won't be much). this may ruin my spotless credit score. what else can i do?

more news: i have now finished two of the modern african novels i've been rereading. i will begin another one in the morning. hmmm...maybe i'll try "god's bits of wood". reading two buchi emecheta books in a row has made me unable to deal with another intense novel about mothers going through hell, at least for the time being. yeah, reading good books is good for my brain. :) i can appreciate these books more than i could 10 years ago when i took the modern african literature course.

last news: i am hungry, and i am gonna make some bowtie pasta with marinara sauce, capers, olives and parmesan. yeah, i have lapsed on the vegan thing. my consumption of dairy and eggs is very minimal, but it exists. and you know what? it makes me NO less committed to animals than if i were a textbook strict vegan.

the exmo

the boy at work is actually from utah, not las vegas (which is where he lived before moving here). he didn't wanna tell me at first because many people think utah and then think mormon and then think ewww. i admit the word "mormon" makes me think ewww, specifically ewww about the whole "mark of cain" shit. i told him i knew utah was more than just a haven for mormons. boy then told me he was raised mormon. i didn't know what to say. i had wondered that earlier, because he told me he'd gone to university in utah and had four sisters. boy told me he's no longer mormon, which i had already surmised from every experience i've had with him. i decided to google boy tonight for fun. i found out that he was a missionary in japan when he was 19-21. he had told me before that he'd lived in japan and spoke japanese, but i didn't ask him what he had been doing there, and he didn't tell me. i had told him i spoke swedish and had lived in sweden, but didn't tell him why and he didn't ask. both stories are hard for us to tell, i think. i was just about to tell him yesterday how i was racking my brain trying to think of a birthday present to get for my mother-in-law, but then i realized he'd ask if i was married, and i would have to explain all about alex. i think that boy and i both have lots of complicated shit in our pasts that is not easy to talk about. i think maybe it's hard for him to get to know people, and i think maybe he's kinda scared at the pace with which we've been getting to know each other, as well as the depth of our friend chemistry. he's a really complex person with many different facets to him, and i don't meet many people like that. he and i share being so multifaceted. anyway, i just cannot for the life of me figure out what his sexual orientation is. but...maybe he can't figure out mine, either. there are some really effeminate things about him, but i think there are also some butch aspects to me. maybe he's like me, with an orientation that doesn't really fit into any box. yeah, for all of my talk about BOYS, i have it in me to be attracted to girls and people who've changed genders or have a gender identity totally outside of that dichotomy. i'm just mostly into boys who were born boys...and it has somewhat to do with the fact that i love ample phalli. nice, cute, sweet boy-boys with substantial meat = what i want. anyway, i want so much to get to know him better. i wish we would hang out outside of work. he hasn't asked me to, though, and i don't wanna ask him to. i'm afraid that i'm feeling the really tight friend chemistry and awesome rapport more than he is. i want him to ask me to hang out outside of work. there's just something deep down about both of us that i feel is the same; something deep-down-similar between us that i feel is there with all of my closest friends and felt with alex. we'll see how things turn out. i really hope i will be his friend after this temp assignment is over in several weeks. anyway, he's quite handsome. yeah, that's right. he's very tall (6'4") but very thin. he told me it's because he had surgery at 5 weeks old that took out part of his small intestine and as a result, he has a crazy metabolism and cannot absorb vitamin b12 or iron. he has medium-dark brown hair and his skin is like, a darker shade of light. like, the strong southwestern sun has left permanent pinks and bronzes and summer freckles on him. he has really great coloring, actually. i think his eyes are blue-green. his eyebrows and eyelashes are very dark. his voice is medium-deep and slightly husky. he is quite stylish in an indie-boy type of way. it's really cute. he loves indie rock, but also loves music from many other genres and time periods. and, he LOVES radiohead and LOVES thom yorke's album, as do i (i listen to that album over and over and over and over and over again). his other job is as a manager at a restaurant. he's very intelligent and down-to-earth and funny and warm and real. i really like talking to him. anyway, i've done a bit of research on ex-mormons, and a nickname for an ex-mormon is "exmo", hence the title of this post. no, exmo is not another swedish word. :)

Jag tycker om honom

hi

i have a crush.

this is boring news to the blog community, but it's not boring to me. this is mainly a blog about how a girl who lost her partner to sudden death is trying to rebuild her heart and life. such a girl as i would feel that crushes are a big deal. yeah, i officially have a crush on "boy at work". jesus. boy and i could talk forever about things, but we can't...we have to do our work!!! and, i still have not established boy's sexual orientation. boy mentioned that boy had a crush on a girl who came out to him as a lesbian. so, i think that boy might like girls. but my gaydar goes off around boy! and boy is so hard to figure out! many things are at play here. boy and i are temporarily colleagues (we're both temps), boy has TWO FULL-TIME JOBS, boy has other shit going on on top of his two full-time jobs, etc.....and this bitch here has already learned not to mix with colleagues on a romantic level. eek. okay. i have crush on boy. we could be best friends, which is the main ingredient of a lasting love relationship. i know it. alex and i could talk forever and ever and ever and were best fucking friends in the universe, and that was our basis. i could talk to boy at work about any fucking thing. the spark is in my heart. who knows. maybe boy at work is an example that god is giving me that there is another boy out there for me. maybe boy and i can be more to each other after we stop being colleagues in a few weeks. maybe boy is gay and we will become best friends. maybe boy was simply in my life to remind me of what best boy friends feel like. cuz i haven't been in living contact with a best boy friend since alex died. not that boy can be compared to alex. however, the closeness i naturally and immediately feel to boy at work reminds me a lot of how i was with alex. anyway, someday, i will have my boy. boy at work has a complicated history, like i do. :) more later.

love of my life #3

i want to tell you about the third love of my life. i have yet to meet him. i dunno where or when, though i hope so much that it's soon! i don't know who it is. i've had two loves before. they're both my soulmates. i can't be with either one now, for different reasons. so, i must wait for #3 to show up. the first love of my life often takes over my dreams at night. i have a lot of unfinished business with him. the second love of my life died. i don't have unfinished business with him. he does not haunt my dreams. his spirit is with me all the time. i'm at peace with him.

i've been getting out and about more lately, partly because i'm employed at the mo', partly for my own mental health (volunteering and doing political stuff makes my mental health better), and partly because that next volunteer event or radical passover seder or night out might be when i meet him. and maybe i'll meet him at grad school. i dunno. i just want god to be good to me and let me not be one of the ones who spend the rest of their lives alone. i'd rather die now and be with alex in nangijala if that's gonna be the case. i can't go for decades and decades alone. i'd rather just go now.

i guess my impatience is partly fear: fear that i will always be alone. i'm afraid that i will never find another person to love and share my life with. i pray and pray that god will give me a gift since i have already been through so much hardship and have gotten through it without it killing me. i want god to give me someone who i can be very close to who also won't die on me. i want a life partner with whom i'll create a family. i've worked so long and hard on myself, and i know i will be a very loving partner. god, will you please allow me to be one of the people who have a wonderful, loving, lasting partnership?

health is wealth

i barely smoke anymore. i usually only do it if i am drinking, and you will be happy to hear that i drink a lot less now than i did when i worked at that job i had. i still drink several times a week, but i'm betting that will go way down once i become a student again. i won't be able to study if i'm high, so the alcohol consumption will go way down. i remember at oberlin, i would drink on fridays at "TGIF', and once in a while at parties, but that was it. i am gonna be a total nerd at grad school. study and work, study and work, study and work. anyway, the anti-depressant i'm taking is what's making it so easy not to smoke. i forget to smoke. that's what happens. it doesn't usually even cross my mind unless i'm drinking.

i am addicted to salads. i love eating them. i love to eat the greenie-greens and then i love to have kidney beans, olives, tomatoes, cucumbers, mushrooms, carrots and beets in my salads, too. i want to be healthy, no matter what i weigh. i mean, i want my insides to be healthy, and they ARE pretty damn healthy...probably healthier than a lot of skinny folks' insides. my outsides are not so healthy. my knees hurt when i go up and down stairs and my feet continue to give me problems here and there. i sweat too much. i have acne. i have too many facial orifice exretions. i think the acne and excretions and (partly) the sweat are due to living in a toxic environment. new york city is toxic. i want to try to counter that as much as possible by ingesting really healthy things. the healthy foods also help my mental state. i have had knee and foot problems for eons, but i think they are exascerbated by my weight. it probably also exascerbates the sweating, but i feel like i never sweated this much until i moved to nyc.

i got a medical bill for $3,000 in the mail the other day, and am freaking out about it. i can't pay $3,000. i can pay it very slowly in small increments. if the medical office does not accept installment payments, then i might as well consider my perfect credit to go in the gutter. yeah, i have managed to keep my credit perfect all of this time i've been broke. i'm in more debt now than ever before. I just try to tell myself that I will pay as much as I can on it each month, and deal with the problem more after I graduate.

there's a new temp to take over the other empty position here in the department i work at in the music venue. he is really cute and cool, and i can't tell what his sexual orientation is. i really, truly can't, and i would not ever ask him. he's from las vegas. he's 3 years younger than i am. he's waiting to hear if he got into grad school to become a psychotherapist. he moved here like, 6 months after i did. yeah. cute boy, no chance. my friend and her brother-in-law are playing at a venue downtown tonight; it's the brother-in-law who is waaaay attached (he owns a condo with his girlfriend), but with whom i share waaaay chemistry. i wanna see him, and then i don't. i am also so tired from the week and have cramps. i think i'll just go home. my dad went to the doctor (the cute one with whom i have mad chemistry) and the doctor asked my dad like, 40 questions about me and how i am doing, and my dad told him everything, and the doctor said he could give me samples of my anti-depressants when i run out of my supply. i have been meaning to e-mail him since then. maybe i will do that this weekend.

rag, slag and shag

i am on the rag. i have cramps. i was supposed to meet up with the firefighter, but i guess that will have to wait until aunt flo leaves. i see the firefighter once every few weeks or so. i am done slagging around with different guys; i've just settled on shagging the firefighter until "love of my life #3" comes. oh, you want to know about the firefighter? i think he's about two years older than i am. he is very handsome. he's mixed, too: half italian and half puerto rican. he's really tall and big and strong like you would imagine a firefighter being. yes, his "firehose" is very big, too. don't pretend like you weren't wondering about that; i know you were! i have no emotional connection to him whatsoever. i barely know him, or anything about him. it's almost totally physical. he's nice, respectful, really handsome, sexually compatible with me, and that's it. yeah, i wish it were different, but this is all i have now.

Financial Aid

so, maybe i will go to columbia after all. i don't wanna say no to columbia just because hunter may or may not give me enough financial aid. hunter says i probably won't get a yes or no from them about admission until mid or late april, and then how long until i get my financial aid package? maybe grad school financial aid packages will be like undergrad ones for me. the undergrad public schools i got into gave me shitty financial aid packages; i wouldn't have been able to attend those schools at all. the expensive undergrad private schools i got into gave me almost full rides. maybe columbia will give me really good financial aid as well. maybe it will end up that it will be cheaper to go to columbia after all, due to their footing part of the bill. or, if not cheaper, they may give me enough financial aid that i will actually be able to go there. if they give me enough, i will probably say yes to them instead of opting out on the hope that i will get into hunter, let alone get enough financial aid from them.

anyway, hunter is pissing me off right now. should that surprise me? it's cuny!!! i used to work at cuny and saw the degree of incompetency amonst the adminstrative staff there. no, i am sure the professors at the hunter school of social work are great and the academic program itself is great. but as for everything else i'll have to deal with as a cuny student, i dunno. as a whole institution, columbia is way better. so if i end up accepting columbia's invitation, there's nothing to feel bad about. it will be a higher-quality experience overall.

columbia invited me to an accepted students of color social gathering on thursday evening. i'm going to attend it. if i go to school at columbia, i want to live in harlem. i have wanted to live in harlem anyway, and now it would be the most convenient place to live if i were going to school up there. plus, i want to continue living around "my peeps" and i want to live around the community i will be an advocate for. plus, i have family history in harlem. my godparents both lived there and worked there (my godmother was a politician and civil rights activist up there) and my mother worked for her up there in the '60s. i remember my godmother's picture on my wall in my room all throughout college, telling me i could make it through. there were several times that looking at her picture saved me from giving up or going absolutely mad. what if i lived and went to social work school in her home turf? i would make her so proud.

maybe things will actually work out for me with school and housing. i pray. i've had enough hardship in my life. god threw me a bone with being accepted to columbia and by giving me this temp job for the next 1 1/2 - 2 months. i hope god throws me another bone by opening the door for me to actually go to school and have a place to live close to it. maybe my godmother will pull some strings up there for me, to help this all work out for me. maybe alex will help her pull the strings. if i lived close to school, i could have a cat. i could come home often and care for the furry little one. that would be too good to be true: going to school for what i want to go for, living near school in a meaningful place, having an animal friend of my own...maybe i would even find a partner. then i would have nothing to complain about. life would be very good.

yesterday i volunteered at an event that my animal shelter put on to raise money for finishing the new shelter location. we had a fancy breakfast for dogs and their humans, and then we sold daffodils out on the street. i got to take home 5 bunches of daffodils. they are bright yellow and are in a vase on my kitchen counter. they are this big, bright bouquet of life in my dark little lair. yeah, i need to do major spring cleaning this weekend, fer sher!!! you know you need to clean when fresh, beautiful flowers clash horribly with the rest of your apartment. i will miss the low rent i pay, but i won't miss not really having my own living space (i live amongst my friend's belongings) or living way the fuck out in queens, or not having anywhere to hang out in the neighborhood, or not having any friends nearby. i finally discovered that there is ONE good restaurant in my neighborhood: a mexican restaurant by the subway terminal. it's really good food! it's amazing to finally have a place in this godforsaken neighborhood that i want to go to! i guess i will be living here through june or july or whenever my friend moves back.