...

It's 3 a.m. and I cannot sleep. I find myself mostly fine all day, excited, hopeful at the opportunities which surely await me, one day, soon, which will once again alleviate my stresses and find me going to sleep peacefully.

But when my head hits the pillow, and darkness comes over my computer as it too attempts to sleep, I just start sobbing. Quietly, if Lief is home, loudly if he is not, for sobbing silently has less a purging effect than just letting it all loose. And then I fear the couple upstairs will hear me, and I stifle myself once again.

I have genuinely not ever felt more alone. I could rattle off fifteen reasons for this, but it would hardly elucidate the situation any more than simply saying that I feel really, truly alone. I have, in the past, felt that the Universe has ceased to be present, and even then, felt less alone than now, for there was hope. Hope which is scarily absent. Instead of my usual get-out-of-this-mindset-mindset, which is that things always get better, I've realised a bone-deep truth, and that is that things always get worse again, too. Thoughts of offing myself are less and less what they've always been, which is, impossible, but comforting. Instead, it feels like something to sincerely work out a plan for. A contingency. Because, truly, I haven't got it in me to weather another swipe like this, like it seems to be, on all levels. I've no lover, no prospect of a lover, and most definitely, no prospect of anyone who wishes to keep me as their confidante and lover for the rest of our lives, have children with me, grow old. My friendships are in varying degrees of disarray, and with Andy being the only person I've allowed to see me vulnerable for some time, I'm ill equipped to even try and discuss anything with anyone. I feel that in person, with people I care for, I come off distant and cold. I feel I've worn out my welcome, and that it is best for everyone if I just don't try and reach out.

And there is the matter of my lack of job, the again ruinous state of my finances, which so precariously relied on the job I was quite easily terminated from, without warning. A job I loved, a job I really, really needed. In the dark, when I try to sleep, it's this fact that causes the sobbing more than any other. I wrote letters to my former manager and one of the owners. Neither has been met with any reply. I find this so rude, and hurtful.

I just can't do this anymore. I'm just hoping having written this, I can maybe fall asleep. I've got to get up in five hours to go to my parents' to work off a small sum advanced to me to pay bills, where I'll face guilt trips and badgering instead of support and love.

Killing Two Birds With One Blog

The goal of late has been to write one blog a week, and make one piece of art per month. Well, I've made two pieces of art this past week, and this blog is three days late. Ah well. I am very happy with both, which is a giant milestone since there has not been a whit of creative energy in me for the past six months, maybe more. Worse, these are pieces fulfilling obligations to lovely, patient people; i.e. they were paid for last...JANUARY.

Housewife, Sans House or Husband

As my brownies-from-a-mix were baking (sub olive oil for vegetable oil, add peppermint bark chips) just an hour ago, a thought occured to me:

Perhaps I am not meant to have a career per se. Perhaps all this beating my head against the wall, all this existential ennui is just silliness, like women in the middle of the last century getting Home Ec degrees at Brown to pass time until they got a husband. Maybe I'm just biding my time until marriage.

Of course, this is complete rubbish. Well, except for the minutiae which are not. Facts:

I am an incredible cook.
I keep a clean home.
I am organised, and detail oriented.
I am terrific with children.

In short, I could quite excel at being a housewife.

That is, were it not for a persistent gnawing at my gut for change, for personal control, and the fact that I know ennui, existential or no, would not fully abate, then I could quite excel at being a housewife.

What I could be, though, is a woman who works from home in the sort of job that would not need to be relied upon wholly for stability, or to do something in which I was relatively autonomous. Carpentry, I think, could fulfill this need, both as personal fulfillment, as well as providing finances to the home.

I think a lot about marriage. I just got out of a serious relationship, or at least a relationship which seemed more serious than any I'd been in previously, and most definitely one I'd wanted to turn toward marriage, and thus am currently in no position to be handing over that level of commitment to anyone. And yet, when I am out and about, I'm looking at people no longer as potential playmates, but as partners. Given my lifestyle, there is a dearth of options.

A friend joked last week, "You're going to have to spend a lot more time at Target Field."