As I take one day at a time, over and over again, I create mixed tapes in my head to her. I have been singing many of these songs to her long before I even knew who she was.
There was a point in time that I thought every song on this list was ridiculous, I couldn’t understand a few lines here or there. The lines that sound like exaggeration feel all too real now.
Here are the 90s pop songs playing on my radio. A few may drift from that decade and genre but they fit there to me.
This is just a darling way to bounce back from all of those emotions:
This might be the sound track to my life. I remember the moment and action that go with a few of these lines. When I just wanted her to know who I was – I started writing and never stopped.
Let me tell you about middle school dances… life was never pleasant for me but I don’t talk about that.
That’s god with a lowercase g, the concept.
We are going to continue down R&B lane for a moment so forgive me for that. I have been singing the next two songs a lot but I go got the John Michael Montgomery version as it is much easier for me to achieve. Well, I only sing it when I am alone, no one would want to hear all that.
All-4-One was one of my first CDs after Tragic Kingdom and Pieces of You, which I had received as Christmas gifts that year. My older cousin traded me a very scratched up All-4-One CD for who knows what, surely I got ripped off but that is where I first heard these two songs. That same year, a country artist covered them so I would hear the same songs in a country version on the radio with my grandparents – it was a confusing time and I didn’t understand why. (The reason was $$)
I realize that this 90s mix is quite cheesy but who could expect anything else. This is about the sentiment which is lightly scattered all over the place. Without further ado:
Oh how I loved this song as a teenager with no one to directed it to.
There are a few pop songs that I thought were so ridiculous that I couldn’t even listen to them. They fell into the Aqua – Barbie Girl category in my mind. When they grace my 90s station these days, I will admit, I listen to them and my thoughts drift – once again, the odd lyrics suddenly make a little sense. Brace yourself for bubblegum pop.
One more and I will climb out of this rabbit hole.
So I guess if I could say anything to her – it would be all of that. Another song that I have caught myself listening to when it comes on is one that I felt was the most over played song of my life:
I’ll wrap this up and get back to reality. For the next and final song in this series, it will be hard to believe that I had not heard it before a few years ago after she used ‘Round here’ in a very impactful text message. It seems as though it has been around for over 30 years so I may have just over looked it but when it comes on these days – I stop – I listen and I try my hardest to come up with a plan that will work.
It’s painful being a little lesbian. It is amplified when I start worrying about his feelings and needs. It’s then that I get embarrassed – not that I am a complete asshole – because I concern myself with his well-being too. Quite frankly it pissing me off in a weird way – like why can’t I just hate him? It’s weird.
Today, my dog had to go to the vet. She got preseribed pain medicine and how she can barely walk. Her age is showing and it hurts to be alone right now, I will come back to a place that has helped me many times before and talk about the music.
Today, songs that Jimmy Buffett has covered when my dad mentioned that he had covered some Grateful Dead songs that had surprised him.
My father was a big Jimmy Buffet fan, growing up, I can’t say I knew much music that was not Jimmy Buffet from him or 90s country from my grandparents, well then and older. My grandmother loved Eddie Arnold. When I knew one of his songs, I had no idea why.
My dad explained that Jimmy Buffett’s version is skewed about his daughter at least in the first verse.
Through coincidence, I now own an album that has Eddie Arnold’s version on it – It would be lying if I said I don’t have a set of records with some songs I play that tear me apart. I realize, it’s really not true but I wish we had records.
I believe Patsy Cline’s version may be the original – either way, I have now pulled at my own heart strings so I will continue to post those random add songs from my record collection that I play to loud and feel too hard to.
Today, I met Jenn’s mom for the first time. We were taking the boys some clothes and food and then got stuck hanging out with her – which is awful for me to say. I should and am ashamed of myself. I am going to set some goals to try to get over this hurdle in my ‘personality’ and I am supposed to schedule a follow up visit with my “Coach” person at the mental health place so I will even talk to her about this. I had plenty of time to think about it because I was stuck driving in silence for hours.
A few days ago, Maddison asked if I would go with her to CC to take the boys their clothes and I agreed for some stupid reason. At the time I didn’t work but at the last minute, Lisa, my arch work enemy, had Internet issues and could not work. I offered to pick up the first half of her shift, because I was driving to CC after which is about 3 hours away.
Everything was broken at work. I took 16 calls before everything completely stopped working and it sounded like I was talking on VoIP on dial up or something. I absolutely detested cell phones when they first came out because most calls sounded like that. I don’t want a delay, static or packet loss on my phone calls. I spoke to 16 people telling me they couldn’t hear me and asking me if they should call back as I repeated, “Don’t call back – the phones are broken, send an email!” The only emails that I actually got were to say the phones didn’t work. I was able to gather enough information to get it reported just to argue with the networking guy telling me “Everything looked good over there.” Until my boss eventually woke up (literally – this was all happening around 8 am) and got someone to actually help. Eventually my phone stopped working and then they fixed the issue except I could never get back online so I ended up leaving for the day 2 hours after I came in and I spent at least 15 minutes trying to reconnect so most of that was in the first hour and a half. Let it be known that I do not function well before 10 – ever.
They tried to get me to come in the office around that time but I explained that driving 30 minutes to work for an hour and 30 minutes to drive home 30 minutes and then to CC and back for 6+ hours did not sound fund at all. Eventually 3 other co workers got online and helped so I could leave. I work from home now so leave just meant – turning off the damn computer and phone.
Maddison had a delay, so she got here about 2 pm. From what I understood, we were going there, spending about 2 hours there and coming home. That is home by 10 easily. If I could be home by 10 it sounded fine to me. I try to sleep on the way and I think she bitches about that so then I try not to sleep as I am trying to sleep, it was all very complicated. We get there and I have to carry groceries in, which I was pretty clear on that I was not there to do any labor but it’s very hard for me to stand around while other people work. Then Jenn’s mom wanted us to go to her storage unit and get things. I don’t know why – maybe Maddison has the keys. So then we were stuck doing that. I have no time to go to my own storage, yet here I am standing around one nearly 300 miles away. There I stand my ground and I am lazy and spend my time messaging the lady or at least playing pokemon.
I had asked Maddison if we could stop by the beach on our way out but I wasn’t trying to make an hour ordeal about it. I didn’t realize we were going to have to go so far for the water either, last time it was right in the middle of towns next to all the restaurants, this time they took me all the way across the bridge to go to port a and I was already over it. I wanted to take pictures and it was already dark. I don’t really want to walk in the ocean after dark, thank you. I did anyway and just risked it because no one cared about what I wanted, clearly. It was about 9 around this time and I had started to make things less than fun since I had expected to be home by 10. I kept making it clear that I was wanting to go home and that I didn’t want to be driving past midnight, but somehow I was not in on her mind games and the Jenn’s mom asked if we could go through downtown to take the scenic route – though it was clear I wanted to leave – so Maddison asked me expecting me to say ‘No.’ Of course I didn’t say no – I just got more frickin irritated because I wanted to go home and I had to go to the bathroom and now we are driving down some street to see something in the dark in the town that she lives in. I just didn’t understand – NOR do I understand why Maddion was making me say “No.” She was the one driving. It was her car and her trip. She is the one that used to live with them. She is the one that knew Jenn for 8 years, I was just there for support because I hate when my friends are brutally murdered – not that it has happened before but I do hate it – and I do hate that I can’t handle acting nice for that long. I am sure many people can act nice even when they felt like I did – but I could not and people don’t like that.
So once we drive around randomly, we went back to her house and she helped Jenn’s mom fill out some sort of application. There would have been another but the website was offline for hours. At this point, I was doing everything I could to try to stay calm because it feels like they are just trying to take longer.
We finally left around 10 but I went to the passenger seat, so she drove and then started bitching about it so I made her pull over to get gas. She said it was because I didn’t bring weed but really I just wanted to be home. I didn’t appreciate her keeping me out so late. I don’t even find it very safe to be driving on the high way after midnight – the worst new stories have articles of wrecks that happen hate at night. She will say that is stupid and insane but I am sure I know someone that would at least agree that could be right.
I don’t think I really understood emotional manipulation before I met her. She will say its all me, but everyone I know will back me up and reassure me that there is nothing wrong with me, even if I let her get to me – including that mental health “Coach” I mentioned. Her name is Sarah, she’s pretty cool. I actually met her at a drag show before I ever met her professionally. She’s actually met Maddison because she has been a patient there but as expected, she has not been consistent with her mental health appointments and I have not missed one since the fight (1/18). Well that is not true. I did not know that I had one of them, so I missed one – but that is all and no one was too mad at me. No we talk on the phone and it’s super fun. I actually haven’t talked to Sarah since Covid – I am sure that can count as missed appt #2 but they have just been closed or whatever – I am not sure.
So when I drive – Maddison is so mad that I am speeding. She keeps yelling that I never drive my car this way – well, I am usually not in my car 3 hours away – 3 hours behind schedule and I remind her that my car can’t even do 100 – and I am not even sure why I was going so fast, except, its a new car and it’s easy to go fast on the high way. I usually use that much pressure to barely reach 80, while going downhill. So she keeps screaming at me about ruining everything and tells me that if I don’t want to drive that I can get out of the car and figure out how I am getting home. This wasn’t even 11 year. When I was down there, I wondered what I would do if she threaten to leave me. She bounces between being a nice normal person and being an evil vindictive person and it’s just so confusing. My mom used to be like that. It has really given me perspective as to what my father had to go through in life and his was way way worse because he did stay because they were his kids and even though she eventually left, he never gave up on her.. well not until we were grown and actually after that. It was June 30, 2016 to be exact. That was the second time I took my mom to the hospital for a psych eval. The next day is the second time the basically forced me to come get her. However, the second time I refused to take her back to his house because I knew that if my mom went back to my dad’s house – someone would end up dead and the other would end up in prison, so I did what I had to do and I paid for the plane ticket that she wanted and sent her to Georgia.
I feel like we all kind of gave up on her that day. My brother excluded, he had passed that judgement long ago. He didn’t have the attitude my dad did when she tried to hit him. He watched it his whole life and knew that she deserved what she got. At the same time, he never hit her. From what I know, my mom tried to punch my brother once. He can recite the story like it was yesterday. Chy was there; she was just a baby. My mom called the police on my brother saying he beat her up over this.
She swung to punch him (which is the most uncoordinated drunk punch you can imagine) and my brother, who was about 25 at the time and actively in marshal arts training, moved out of the way and redirected her energy so she continued into that punch and ended up on the ground. From what I know – she was so drunk, she may not even know how she ended up on the ground but the cops show up after she calls.
Since there is a baby in the house, they ask her if she has somewhere else to sleep. My brother runs down to the neighbors A frame house in the rain and ask if she can stay there, because they had supplied her with the alcohol. They agreed but by the time he returned to the house, she was already getting cuffed. I believe the next lines of the store is that she smarted off to a cop, but I don’t really know what was said. I lived a pretty normal life back then.
My mother is someone that was failed by the system. There is so much about police reform, that is a night that they needed to look into deeper. Starting in 1990, that county should have countless records of my mom abusing my dad but when I called for help in 2016 – no one had any records, no one could help. I called crisis hotlines. I took her to the hospital twice trying to get her help but no one would help. They would shoot her full of adivan, test her, say she is fine. AND then send her home without any medicine or direction. She was seeing the mental health people in her county – its just ridiculous, so I had to just chance it. As it turns out – she has spent plenty of time in jail and repeated the same patterns with the guy she moved in with. He is her next door neighbor from when she was in grade school. She met up with him on facebook and that’s how that happened. For a while, we felt we took advantage of him by sending her but she had her own income through back child support and all. It took a while but I know that we were just protecting ourselves.
I have completely lost track of my terrible night. When I noticed it was almost 11 I told her that I had to pull over to text the lady. She didn’t question it because she knows that I won’t miss that text. So I go to the bathroom and just start crying because I really wonder if she is going to leave me there. I just opened up to M and said some stuff that was on my mind. I cried a lot in that bathroom stall at that random gas station. Even left without buying something because I didn’t have my wallet. Turns out, crying girls can use the restroom with no questions asked and you just get a “Have a good night” from the clerk. Maybe they don’t make you buy something anymore but I thought that was a pretty big deal.
Maddison starts to switch between insane bitch to “Do you feel better now?” I don’t know if she meant because I texted M or something else but I was my charming self and told her I no longer had to shit and I think she may have been on the phone with someone. She continued to complain about my driving. I continued to drive too fast. I told her that I had to work at 8 AM, by 1 AM I am fucking tired. She didn’t seem to understand but I don’t know that she has had a full-time job since I met her.
The end of the story is that somehow I made it home. I left at 2:06 PM and got home at 12:44 AM. It would have been nicer if I didn’t work from 8:00 AM to 10:00 AM before following through with this stupid idea. What gets me is that I was there because she needed help driving and asked if I could go. I said, yeah that shouldn’t be a problem in text which is what I am held to but I specifically asked how long we would be there because I didn’t want to be out all night and I thought home by 10 was reasonable.
In my mind, she knew that i would never agree to a 10 hour and 45 minute trip so instead she acted like we would be back in 8 hours and then makes me feel crazy when I start to get irritated when I start to notice there is no way in hell we will be home near 10 and then we don’t even leave by 10. No one there cared at all – and NONE of them work a full time job. Fuck.
Should I mention, I barely ate at all.
So, I messaged the lady a lot because.. she said I could and I kinda really wanted to talk. Damn I hope that kind of things is okay. Turns out I seem to be more fearful that I let myself believe.
• byadmin • InCountry, Music • Comments Off on Trust me friend a hundred years goes faster than you think
The other day when I was driving in the car and flipping through radio stations, I came across “Don’t Blink” right when it started. I listed to the whole song and cried quietly the entire time. Having an 88 year old grandmother during a pandemic has caused me a great deal of fear and stress. I have only seen her once – and that was mainly because I was needed for her mental health reasons – it is really hard for her to stay alone.
I have been trying to concentrate on taking my medicine daily. Once I went to work from home in mid March, my entire routine was thrown off. I no longer got ready for work – I just rolled out of bed. When I started to panic about her working with him again and being quarantined with him and just everything with him and nothing with me – I started to get really worried, jealous – I don’t even know what but I seem to be back to my ‘loving – I don’t care about any of the details as long as she is living the life that she wants to’ self.
Basically, why I mentioned this song, “Don’t Blink” is because it made me cry when I was driving. I rarely listen to an entire new song – things really have to grow on me, but it was reminding me of what I already knew. We had already been discussing how my niece, who was 1 when we met, is a whole ass kid at this point with a 5 year old little brother. It only added to the perspective.
When I found out that there was a cave less than 100 miles away that people got married in, first I joked to the original poster that I was going to get married in her cave and then I ran off to my love to tell her all about it. She responded perfectly, and I like to think that she knows exactly what I am shyly hinting at. Next month will be 7 years since I met her and though I know that it is insane by today’s standards, I really do want to ask her to marry me. I don’t think that either of us really live by anyone’s standards and you can say that we dance to the beat of a different drum, but I sure wish that I could pull off meeting her in the exact spot that we met 7 years ago – I would walk there all dressed up – hopefully she would show up unsuspecting, but I am.. predictable to say the least. I have never even thought about proposing to anyone before. I grew up knowing that marriage was not for me and it would never happen so don’t glorify it.
My mom left when I was 2 – that is many years of watching my father struggle and hearing that you can’t depend on anyone but yourself. He was broken and couldn’t even consider dating or trying again. With that said, I grew up with a very young father that had little to no money. By at least 5 years old, I knew that no one had any extra money to give me for any reason – so don’t even think about asking.
In high school, my friends started fantasizing about their weddings, telling me all about where they were going to get married and what they were going to wear. These were all teenage girls that had no serious boyfriends but they knew that they were getting married one day and no better day than 14 years old to start planning it. At the time, I was realizing that not only was I poor but I was also gay – now I would never have money for a wedding nor was it even legal. I knew what a civil union was, this was the late 90s – but I also knew that I would never have any support from anyone.
So basically, I stopped thinking about it. I was actually already in love with this lady once it started becoming legal.
Well – there were a few states long ago. I remember hearing about Virginia on the radio when I was in the car as a kid, but that may have been the start of civil unions. When I saw that Colorado had legalized gay marriage, which it an awful phrase but it gets my point across – I texted her immediately. She told me something like ‘they know whats up in CO.’
At this point gay marriage and marijuana was legal in CO, I don’t think that many could disagree with whatever her statement was. Now it is still legal, even after Trump has ripped apart the nation, so I better jump on it. I can’t say that I don’t think of how I would ask her to marry me way more often that I would expect and it scares the shit out of me every time, but I think that is how it is supposed to go and we should probably go somewhere amazing to do it – not the side of the road but sometimes you have to work with what is possible. The dang Alanis Morisette concert was the day before that day so I thought it was guaranteed that I would spend it with her but those plans got jumbled to say the least.
Oh yes, and last night I had this dream that was replaying a moment from the past where I reached down to grab her hands and she interlaced her fingers in both my hands and – well – I must say, it’s what my dreams are made of.
When I was driving home from work – to continue working from home, this song came on the radio and it reminded me about something.
There was about 5 years of my life that I did think I was just too cool for love.. feelings and just about everything. It was back when I was working diligently to built my army of platonic supports and enact every defense mechanism that I knew how to use.
Then I met her, my world instantly changed. I had shoes that I thought were stupid now. I don’t think that she ever even saw me wear them but I can’t say I wore them in a serious manner after that. I hit that brick wall and my armor must not have been glued well because it all just came crumbling off. I looked at her with a shy smile and it wasn’t long before – I thought – she knew that she was all that I could think about.
I’m not really sure when that change really happened for her – but somewhere in there, I no longer cared at all. If people wanted to laugh, they could. If people wanted to have opinions that differed from mine, that was fine, but I didn’t want to hear about it.
So I think that I used to be – a lot less secure with myself and much more guarded. Somewhere on my journey in making sure that she knew exactly how I felt, I completely lost track of any defenses. For several years my best defense has been, “I am in love with someone,” but once it failed – I had to come up with a better one. Actually, I didn’t – I just avoid people all together now. So basically – this song came on, it was the version without Justin Bieber but since he is my boy ‘twin’ I guess he can spice up the video with some cheese.
I’m not even sure why, but I agreed to stay with the kids while she went up to see her new girl again. This time I didn’t freak out like I usually do, until she got home. The only thing that I can imagine is that I must have had a dream between 5:30 AM when my alarm accidentally went of and when she got home at 6:11 because when the Alexa went off and said she was home, it woke me up. I felt like I have been up for hours. When she walked in the door I asked her to bring me a drink. I proceeded to cry hysterically and I didn’t even know why. I was panicking and crying, telling her that I thought she was going to come home and hold me. I explained that I thought that I was going to wake up in her arms and that she promised me she would be home in time to get her kids to school.
I left because my brother had sent me some strange messages. I got home and he was having his own breakdown. He kept getting really mad at me and yelling at me like she does. He said I didn’t care and I didn’t understand when I asked him if he would put the meth pipe away. He continued to rant about how he could die at any minute and I needed to get a pen and paper to write some things down. I couldn’t find one fast enough for him so he started telling me the same story that he has told me since it happened, nearly 2 years ago.
The only thing that was different this time, is that the girl that essentially sexually assaulted him as he slept in her bed, asked him what he was doing there after she did it. She clearly thought he was someone else, that had been drinking. I remember how mortified I was when someone accused me of saying in appropriate things to her at work and they were just words and she completely made the thing up. With him, something physically actally happened. I feel like she is gaslighting him making him feel like he did something wrong and it is tearing him up to the point where he will live in my house rent free as I am struggling mentally, emotionally and financially and smoke meth in my house without hiding it. I never saw this coming.
I tried to talk to my psychiatrist about all of the problems that I am having. I explained my excessive and uncontrollable anger. I told him about depressed I have been. I told him about my excessive spending and increased sex drive. He said it was all situational and anyone would have the problems that I am having right now. It felt like when my ex, T, would tell me that I am not autistic and that I was just dealt a really hard hand in life. I don’t know how I feel about that. I can’t change the family I was born into or the problems that they have but I keep doing my best to try to be strong and face everything head on.
What happened this morning must be part of having PTSD. I have been trying to do some research, because it was a very strange occurrence. At the time, I was quite sure that I had been laying there in bed awake since 5:30 when the alarm had gone off. After I was with my brother and he was breaking down, I got away by saying I needed to go pick up my medication and get some tacos for us to eat. As I was walking into the gas station, I remembered being startled awake by the Alexa. If I was startled awake then there is no way that I was not sleeping at that point. It all seems so blurry even though it was only this morning. Maddison kept asking me why I was crying and I couldn’t even tell her why. I have tried to explain to her that I would have the same issues with Teal when she would stay out with her friends late after working at Salt Grass. I would cause the biggest scenes and I was completely un-medicated then.
Today when I accidently googled 512, I came across this song.
I felt like I needed a little Lamb of God on my site. I couldn’t tell you what the hell they are saying but I am sure it’s good.
When I was younger, I used to go to every Kittie show possible. I must have seen them 10 to 20 times. I ran a website called KittieIzGod.com based off the name of their first demo tape. It was called Sex Iz Hell. I realize that doesn’t really translate but I was like 15 years old.
There used to be a good Sweeny Todd version of Somewhat Damaged on YouTube but I couldn’t find it today. This will have to do.
