It's amazing how many different emotions I've been through in the last few weeks. Anxiety, fear, elation, rage, disappointment, excitement, uncertainty, desire, love, determination, and about a hundred others. I suppose this is true of anyone, really. But the amplification levels of my particular emotions have been high. That's just a result of the kinds of life-altering things I've had to deal with so far this year. At times, it's felt as though I've been experiencing all possible emotions at once, and they gel together into a single blob that rests inside my heart, inflating it to multiple sizes of itself. This is one of those times.
It's been put to me that I have several problems with my life as it stands now, and this is something I don't hesitate to admit to anyone who'll listen, including myself. It is because of these problems that I do feel lucky to have so many people who understand what having problems means, and are willing to lend a hand to sort out at least some of the minor ones, as I would for them. The larger problems, of course, still rest solely on my shoulders, as they rightly should. To that end, I'm okay with having problems now, because I am working tirelessly to fix them. Previously, I was not, and this was the reason for my aformentioned rut, and the resulting depression and stagnation that was my life, thus making the problems bigger still.
Consequently, and with regard to my past actions and situations, I have been misconstrued time and time again by people around my life as being something I am not. A layabout, a charity case, a whiner, a supplicant or an abuser of privilege and more. If there is one thing that irks me, it is being labelled as something I'm not. While such descriptions as listed here may be assumed or inferred by mere observation, they are certainly not true in actual reality, and I believe most people who really know me would agree that such descriptors would not apply to me. Because of my choices, I've made my bed to lie in, but the bed is not who I am, and I can choose to leave the room if I want.
In any case, misconstruction has happened to me once again this very night, and with someone that I care very deeply about. My already heavy heart is made further still by the realization that I have been made to end things for at least a while, and there hasn't been enough time yet for me to even get to the bedroom door, let alone leave the room, thus proving that I can be all the things I say I can ultimately be.
Soggy Pretzels
Let's Get Fiscal
Due to a snafu at work, we didn't get our paychecks today. Of all the ridiculous times for someone to fuck up the payroll, it had to be the day before long Easter weekend. I was down to my last few dollars and was counting on getting some grocery shopping done before tomorrow. As it was I was just able to get the bare essentials until I get my check cashed Saturday. I am assured that it will be on my desk tomorrow.
Speaking of money, I'm going to a financial advisor on Wednesday morning to see what advice I can get to aid my ailing finances. It seems that the expected yet belated events that I foretold to myself happened this morning, so I will need to get my ducks in a row sooner rather than later.
For the moment, I have a weekend of Easter activites planned for myself and Drew, including an Easter egg hunt on Saturday afternoon. I just have to keep all this anxiety about the future at bay until then, until I can begin to do something more productive about it on Tuesday.
The Pressure Is On
Today, Drew and I went to her new school, Green Acres, to register. The theme song for the old TV show has been going through my head all day. In any case, she starts school tomorrow so that is a good thing.
The not so good news is that their kindergarten only runs Wednesdays and Fridays and alternate Mondays. So I still have most of the rest of the time from now until the middle of June to contend with in terms of getting her in day care or finding someone to watch her while I'm at work. To say nothing of the summertime when school is out. Trying not to get ahead of myself, but I'm being told I'm not eligible for a lot of things right now, with regard to subsidies and so so forth.
In the meantime, She will be bussed to school from in front of my building and dropped off at just after three, which means until I can arrange to have someone pick her up and mind her for two hours until I get off work, I have to be there to meet her at home... so that means another missed two hours of work.
Work is already pressuring me to return to a 40-hour schedule. They are going to have to accept the fact that I will not be working extra hours again, ever. This whole situation with scheduling changes and me not knowing when the busy days are going to be and not knowing if I'm going to have to work late until a day before is not conducive to my single parent status. I'm going to have to tell them flat out that I'm not doing it. On the plus side, they've hired a new person who seems to be willing to do weird hours, and she has some skills, so maybe there is a system that we can work out with the three of us. I'm trying to put my own personal feelings about this crappy job to the side for the sake of getting through this next awkward patch of time.
It's like a race now, to see how quickly I can get settled down -- all my concerns about housing and money and all those long term things are more important now, and and the learning curve for me is low. I'm having to do all these things that I should have done years ago, and it's hard, and I'm not satisfied with how not quickly it's being arranged... but I have to remind myself it's only been six days.
Simply Magic
I have been in action mode since a day before I left, over a week ago, and I don't feel that I've slowed down once. It's been a constant agenda of running around, phone calls, and traveling just to get things in order. But I'm so glad to be back in terra cognita, my hometown, my stomping grounds, that I feel I have the strength to do whatever is needed of me to get things sorted out for my daughter and me.
I've got an appointment to get her into a school tomorrow morning, in Senior Kindergarten. Really, I think she is ready for grade one, because she is already reading at a second grade level, and has pretty good math skills. But I think she would benefit from going to kindergarten and grade one first so she can develop some social skills first, since up to this point she hasn't had much interaction with the rest of the world. Also, I can speak from personal experience that being skipped ahead a grade at too early a point can have weird consequences within the school populace. I'm sure some of you nerds reading this can relate.
She spent the night having a sleep over at her cousin Owen's place, and the reunion between the two former playmates was simply magic. I regret not having a camera to capture the moment. We picked Owen up at daycare with Drew in tow, and Owen literally exploded out of the sand box and ran over to Drew and hugged her like crazy. Then, like a polite little man, he went around to all of his friends introducing her around: "David, meet Drew!".
Still a lot of work and settling in to do, and a lot of financial snafus to work out on my end of things, but we are moving forward, and I've told her lately that I'm "working hard to make things better for us." I think she understands.
