Month: April 2003
Wake Up Call
Friends stick it through. You might not agree with them, you might have things materialize that you don’t agree with, you may move away from them (or vice versa) but they stick it through and show up over and over in your life (unless you push them out or abuse things). My early morning wakeup call reminded me of that.
I was woken up by my father while I was in the midst of some dream I can’t remember and ws told that Leah Kennett was here. Now I am groggy, I am sporting bed head and I am in boxer shorts but I hop out of bed and get dressed and then hop downstairs to see an old friend and shoot the breeze for a while.
It was good to talk to someone and get my mind off things, surely I would have woken up in the crapper – I had already done so too many times the past few weeks thinking about thing sin general. Leah’s mostly the same as she was when I used to hang out with her — except she was getting over minor surgery on the inside of her thigh and that felt like a positive to be honest — first time she could comprehend some of the shit I had been going through for the past few years. We just talked from one subject to the other, wheeling and dealing. I didn’t touch the subject of her boyfriend much because I honestly don’t know shit about the guy.
2 hours later she hobbled to her car and drove off to a destination unknown to this writer. Just the same, I’ll see her when I see her again, because I know I will down the road.
I don’t think I mentioned the blackout on Friday Night while a storm front rumbled through the area. It was quite a change of pace here to have no electricity and I found it pleasant to be honest. Candles were lit everything was pitch black for as far as I could see besides the cars passing on the highway behind my house. Of course Dad soon found annoyance in me being a conversationalist… Ho hum, better luck next time. 45 Minutes was all the blackout lasted and I really wish it stayed around much longer — it was quite surreal being thrown back life without the internet, without TV, etc.
*Sigh*
This is the end, beautiful friend
This is the end, my only friend
The end –
Of our elaborate plans
The end –
Of everything that stands
The end –
No safety nor surprise
The end –
I’ll never look into your eyes again
Can you picture what will be,
So limitless and free?
Desperately in need
Of some stranger’s hand
In a desperate land?
—
This is the end my beautiful friend
This is the end my only friend
It hurts so much to set you free
But you’ll never follow me
The end –
Of laughter and soft lies
The end –
Of nights we tried to die
This is the End
— Taken from The End by James Douglas Morrison
© 1967 The Doors Music Company
Dreaming
I’ve talked briefly with people in the past about some problems I am having when I am sleeping. Some people have trouble sleeping because of insomnia, others have trouble sleeping because of being uncomfortable, while others have problems sleeping due to heartbreak while others have problems sleeping because of nightmares.
While I can get to sleep ok (now), I’ve been having a series of dreams that have the exact same topic or the exact same outcome. They’ve been going on for a while now and it’s getting to the point where I’m afraid of why they are still showing up with me.
The dream usually has me pinned against my family – my father, brother, mother do something to upset me and the entire duration of the dream I am hurt, enraged and sad at the same time and fleeing from them or trying to avoid them or being chased by them.
I’ve been trying to figure out just why I have these dreams and it’s pretty obvious that it’s got to be because of my arrangements in this household – I’m at the lower part of the food chain and I have to bend to their will more times than not. I feel oppressed and this need to escape and yet I feel like they will chase me down or force me to be part of their little circle again and again…
No wonder I feel like a child more times than not.
Of course, my dependence on them for normal things is part of the reason I feel like that. I can do plenty of things by myself but there is one thing (getting around) that I can’t (I don’t drive) and therefore I am stuck not being able to do what I please (that and money reasons :rolleyes ) more times than not.
SO what would get me to stop having these dreams? I don’t know for sure but independence and a change of scenery would help, I would think.
Renovations and Vowel Movement
Sometimes it gets to the point where you break over the slightest things. The sameness flowing around you, the lack of variation from the norm… Or maybe even the norm makes you ill to your stomach and makes you want to toss your cookies.
I’m at that point right now.
I’ve been sick of my father the last few weeks but then again, my mom isn’t that much better than dear-old-dad. I’m tired of her habits. I’m tired of his habits. I’m tired of this house and of this room… I’m tired of this neighborhood and the suburbs in general.
I’m tired of the word “Liberal” being used like a 4 letter word in society. I’m tired of tattoos and body piercings being stuck on everything and everyone (can someone please tell the cute girls that natural skin is sexy? Please?). I’m tired of Florida, where education and infrastructure mean next to nil to the government and somehow it gets elected again and again. I’m tired of the fact I have to have social hour on the computer because my social skills are lacking with my poor-ass hearing situation offline.
I’m tired of feeling so boxed in.
Yet the answers aren’t aparent or aren’t coming into view very easily on how to deal with this mess and where to go to solve these quesitons. I don’t have the money to move, I don’t have a job. I don’t know where to look for a job that doesn’t necessitate phone skills or driving.. You can pray only so much until it gets to the point it feels like God is laughing at you and snickering while you are pleading to him.
Things were a lot better when there was someone else that I felt I shared things with. Now there’s no one to share things — emotions, thoughts, frustrations, dreams, etc — with.
I need help.
Worlds Of Wonder
I’m writing this entry through Notepad right now because I’m not able to access my web site and update it — damn Digital Zones, fix the fucking thing already! (UPDATE — 8:41 PM as I write this and they are STILL down!
UPDATE 2 — 5:57 Tuesday — FINALLY back up and running )
I’m not feeling so great right now because my chest feels like it’s exploding… Every time I make progress with moving on, I regress a few hours later because of one thing or another. Hmphf, go figure.
I didn’t update things yesterday (insert shocked expression here) because I was waiting for something – anything – online and instead of that happening, I took some allergy medicine after I started feeling very ill and was stoned/out by 10 PM. Seeing I’ve been getting up extremely early and not getting to sleep until 3 lately, it probably was a good thing that I hit the sheets a bit early.
Yesterday I spent the early part of the day sunning myself at the neighborhood pool (that’s telling you how bad the condition of my own pool/porch are) and got righteously burnt with grotesque burn lines from my tank top to prove it. Something tells me that I am going to have to start remembering to use tanning oil :p .
On the way back from the pool I started wondering about some people that were part of my past and if I should bring them up here on the site — knowing that the Search Engines will end up crawling this page and their names will be indexed and they will be able to find this page (them or their relatives ) and realize someone who they may or may not remember was speaking about them and may or may not want to hear from me in the first place.
This is sort of a collective Where Are They Now but without the glory and gifts for those who take part in the program.
Let’s start with the one who lived closest to me who disappeared when 1) she graduated and 2) her mom left her step dad who still lives down the block from me: Lisa LaCasse. Lisa and me were in the same school from 5th grade onward and the last memory that shines through it all is me being a dick and giving her a “body glove” without thinking about her having whip-lash (senior year of HS). If it makes you feel any better, Lisa, I had a neck operation last year and I went through the same hell you experienced. It’s also worth bringing up that there were plenty of rumors (ok, not so much rumors as your sister and her friends screaming it at me when I rode down the block one time) that you had a crush on me at one point or another — it was probably for the best that nothing ever materialized with that because A) I was a coward at the time and B) I was insecure and both affected how I dealt with girls I met.
Next girl who I need to bring up is someone who I admittedly had an interest in during HS at one point but things got torn apart after we moved up from 11th grade — Jen Wertenberger (which I probably spelled wrong . I haven’t seen hide nor hair of Jen since — I can’t even remember. I did see her friends at Target one time and thought she might be with them but I didn’t see her if she was. Jen was a good friend and I was a smart ass and a dick when I was hanging out with her, and the same insecure coward I talked about above.
Now, the next name on the list is one that my friends hear one time or another usually when I confess my past and I am arguing with myself whether to mention her here or not… Ok, I’ll do it: Jill Clawser. There, I said it… Someone lock me up! I was so obsessed with Jill during 10th grade and much of HS but I was so scared to step forward and so insecure to tell her how I felt… Probably for the best, of course, everything happens for a reason or so I once was told by a very wise person. Jill dropped out from HS her senior year, I saw her a few times at Spencer’s Gifts and one time at Target on a passing chance but then – nothing. I had a web page up in my Pictures section asking “Where are they now” and her aunt came across the picture — ma’am, if you find this, I was sort of terrified someone actually responded to the inquiry about Jill and I didn’t know how to tell you that I can’t hear so well so I couldn’t use the phone and call her if you got her number.
There’s someone else I was close to online that has disappeared entirely because I know her life went in a different direction than mine and was always a good bit different than mine, she was someone I needed in my life as my friend in a very trying time in my life (right after I went deaf) and I value her being there for me till this day. Tiffany O’Neal of Jackson, Mississippi. Me and Tiff used to talk on AOL and later on AOL IM for hours every morning before she went to school… I got to know her and her friends that she lived with, Jill Brown and Thomas Hood. I’m wondering what-up with all of you? Last thing I heard from Jill was that Tiffany had entered the Navy? Maybe, maybe not… I can’t be certain. It was so long ago….
Memories…. from the corner of my mind….
Of course I could post about other people in here that I used to be interested in or friends with but it’s for the best that I don’t. Besides, this feels like I have been rambling for hours even though it might have been only 10 minutes. I’m much calmer than I was when I started this thing.
I’m really getting antsy though — I want access to my web site back so I can get this update up!
Oh yeah, kiddies, I’m getting Mike’s kick ass computer system as he is getting a new machine any day/hour/minute/second now…. I’ve cleaned out most of my files/pictures/movies/applications on this system so far and am ready to just format the hard drive and re-install XP before I venture off into my new machine….
* Time entry was written
Poor Times, Bad Taste
I spent the early afternoon with Andy — went to Alan’s house in Central Clearwater to drop off one of the two Captains Beds that we have. After that we stopped off at Home Depot to pick up some things (fence, utilities) that he needed for a new gate fence that he’s constructed (so he can store his bass boat)… After that he stopped off so I could get some McDonalds before going home.
I really wish I hadn’t asked him to stop at McDonalds. Every time I go to one of their restaurants, they give me every reason in the world not to go back to them. That being said – let me call up an old rant I did (on epinions.com) about McDonalds…
If there is a fast food chain that represents the fact that too much capitalism is a bad thing, its McDonalds.
Probably in the early part of the 20th century, they had the good times and great taste that they used to preach on their commercials… But somewhere down the line, they decided to reach out and preach to suburban America and take over the landscape… Instead of food, I now identify suburban sprawl with Mickey D’s.
Enough with the politics, lets get to the food, service, etc.
McDonalds is the fast food capital of the world. Your food is prepared and then stuck under a heat lamp until you order it… Meaning it could have been sitting on the rack to be sold for hours before you reach it… Yum…
Secondly, the store being the cornerstone of Suburban America, the hospitality and the courtesy from the people working behind the counter leaves much to be desired. Teens in need of work and elderly who need another source of income make up the backbones of the McDonalds work force. This is not knocking on teenagers, students or retirees (and I apologize to anyone who interprets my comments that way), but when you need some cash, do you really want to deal with the public in a Mass-produced fast-food job to get it? No…. That is the type of attitude many face. Thankless, minimum wage jobs do not encourage courtesy.
Cleanliness of every store I have been in across the US (from New York, down the eastern seaboard to Florida, all the way across the continent to Los Angeles) leaves much to be desired and makes me wonder why McDonalds aims to be such a family orientated restaurant. I certainly would not want to bring my child to one of these places to eat food… I know kids fall in love with Ronald McDonald and the playgrounds now attached to most restraints (not to mention Toys inside Happy Meals), but I would rather hook the kid on Subway. That’s not saying Subway is much cleanlier than McDonalds, but I would rather have a child get hooked on more tastes than the bland junk at Mickey D’s.
One last point I want to make is the oil at McDonalds. I was a very common eater of McDonalds foods until 1998…. After a very weird experience eating McDonalds food, I find I cannot consume anything that was fried at a Mickey D’s restaurant without tasting — and get ready for this — the peanut oil that it was fried in. Peanut oil might be more healthy than other oils (I do not know for sure) but would you REALLY want to chow down on Chicken McNuggets that taste as though they have peanut Butter smeared on them? How about scarfing down French fries, smothered in Jiff? I did not think so… Everything I have consumed smells and tastes of this oil… That includes the shakes! Ugh!
When looking to stop for lunch, find a Subway, find a Pizza Hut, find a Steak’N’Shake… Just spend your money on capitalist institutions that still know the meaning of “courtesy” and truly represent the “Good Times, Great taste” of fast food service… Just do not waste your money, your time or your taste buds on the mass produced, mass consumed food at the franchise identified by its the Golden Arches.
I’m going to be heading out to dinner with the Family in a few minutes… I wanted to get that in before I leave…
No true entry because this old poem sums things up…
What Am I….
What am I supposed to do?
Just call her name
And get off the train –
Loneliness
Southbound
Cartoon Express
A fixture through the mess –
Her face, and my memory there of
And the desires unquenched
As the fifth Beatle
Who has never crossed Abby Road
Artfully dodging –
Responsibilities
That take place in love:
Speak
Feel
Express
Not repress
To me It’s all a fantasy
Like a child going through a toy chest
© 1997 John P. Fontana
Remains to be seen
It remains to be seen just what and where life will lead next and I feel totally tapped out right now and exhausted emotionally with how things have been going the past couple of weeks. I woke up today with plans to do things and I never was able to get myself to do them. Never strong enough to will myself to do this and that…
It also remains to be seen just when I will push myself to run this site through Dreamweaver MX instead of Front Page XP. Front Page may be a whore who you can bang for hours on end but she’s not the fine lady we’d all like….
It remains to be seen just what the world thinks of Re Elect JFK, the revamped Helene Kersey Online and of course my ramblings in this journal.
It remains to be seen when I’ll feel like the world is a better place because right now it’s hell and I’m the devil’s bitch.
