Sorry for the delay in updating the blog but I've been super busy prepping Breaking Up With Brooklyn's new abode on its very own domain of which I am now the proud owner.
Seeing as I am brand spanking new to the world of WordPress and its innumerable functions, the content is not completely moved over just yet but pretty soon this blog will be re-directed to a much cooler space. As a result of this transfer, I will be editing some of the current content to downplay some of the more questionable admissions. The last thing I want is for people to be hurt by way of my words - and the truth is that although I change all names for the purposes of anonymity, there are many many identifying features that can easily be pointed back to my real identity should somebody I know stumble upon these stories. I'm not so much concerned with folks learning about my exploits as I am them learning secrets of my loved ones, current or past, without their consent. That said, get your last fixins of smut in while you still can - cause the filters are coming soon.
I'm pretty proud of myself with the shift over to WordPress. I've been playing with various themes and editing them to make them a bit more to my liking. In only a week or so I've picked up a lot of the basics with respect to editing the php files and the likes. Through the help of a great friend who is a master-of-all-things-wordpress (and then some), I'm starting to get a feel for the user interface, too. Blogger is cool and all, but the functionality is super-limited and if I'm going to take this Breaking Up With Brooklyn idea any further than where it is now I need to step into the current-times and rock out with my .. fucking filters!
Aside from all the computery stuff I'm trying to make work for me right now, I finally received the test results for my entrance exam to the Radiology program I tested for weeks ago. I PASSED!! Had I not already decided, through various research and just a general gut instinct, that RN is actually the route I'm going to take, the next steps in my admission process to the Radiology program would've been an observation and then general admission board interview. I have no doubt that I'd have done wonderfully in both. The entrance exam was my biggest hurdle. When I began taking the practice tests I was scoring in the '4' percentile for the math sections (3 being lowest and 7 highest)- and the required passing percentile was a 5. My results told me that I passed the math sections in the high 6's. I damn near harassed everyone I knew to help me with the various math problems that I just couldn't grasp - and come test day I walked into the classroom with much more confidence than I'd had only a few weeks earlier... And, it paid off. I'm so proud of myself for not only following through with the exam, but ROCKING THAT SHIT!
I have a bunch of new posts to finish and will be releasing them shortly. Lots happening this weekend:
1. I would have been going to a wedding with Daniel and his family out in PA. Knowing where he is/what he's doing fucks with my head and I wish it didn't. I wonder whether or not he'll think of me, even once, during the ceremony or any of the romanticized portions of the evening... Probably not.
2. It's FLEET WEEK! God, I love a man in uniform - especially uniforms with white pants in which you can see just every lovely curve of that male body. F-i-l-t-e-r-i-n-g N-o-w!
Til later!
Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Friday, May 28, 2010
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
60 Minutes -
I am officially registered for fall semester 2010 as a matriculated college student.
Wow. Wow. I’m so excited, and proud of myself. This is going to be a long road ahead but it’s one I am actually honored to say I’ve worked hard to get on.
I went over to the school to finalize the actions this evening and the woman who helped me with my academic advisement was kind enough to push up my available registration date so that I had a better chance of obtaining the classes that worked best with my daytime work schedule. I rushed home and completed the necessary clicking-arounds to ensure that I be officially registered for two of the six pre-requisite courses I need to complete prior to entering my nursing curriculum elsewhere. Done deal, readers. Classes start September 11, 2010.
The bus ride home was an interesting one. My iphone battery went kaput after about 30 minutes of listening to music via the Pandora application. This made it impossible for me to drown out the sound of the two valley-girl like teeny bopping, squeaky voiced, bad-make up applied girls who were sitting behind me discussing some boy who was 31 and still a virgin. I will not enjoy the commute home from school each evening if this is what it is normally like. Car, now – please. Anyway, I was able to filter their squawking out while I looked out the window and I realized that this particular bus runs a route that could easily be associated to my entire life. It’s really rather unsettling when I sit down and think about it.
The timeline I was running in my mind in fact started prior to getting on the bus at all. As I entered the campus I looked around at all the youngish faces and remembered myself in this very same place at their age. I was enrolled here right out of High School. At the time of my first semester I was dating a boy named John. I wondered whether or not the bench in which we carved our names was still around. I didn’t check –and instead I walked the halls of the institution and took note of the other handful of ‘adults’ who looked like they were students and not professors. The number was small – and for a minute or so it fucked with my head but I reminded myself that there is no time like the present and what is important is that I am HERE.
The ride home brought me past not only my High School but my Junior High and my Public School as well. We rolled by the giant High School – no students outside hanging about the way they did during my tenure. I thought about the time I’d kissed Charlie, the hottest bad-ass in the school, right on that bench that was outside my bus window. The memory brought on countless other thoughts of boys I’d kissed and girls I’d had fights with. I thought about this one time that I was waiting for the bus at the very stop we were picking up passengers from and some older kids threw a rock out the back-emergency exit flappable windows that are a NYC MTA bus feature. The rock hit me square on the bridge of my nose and cut my face open.
We rolled through Gravesend. This is where the memories are most plentiful. The small stretch of area that this particular route covers in Gravesend somehow managed to cover two previous residences, my public school, the library I did my homework in every night as a child, and a stretch of concrete that was the coolest place in the world to hang out when I was a tween. The first apartment we passed on my way back home was actually the last apartment I lived in with my mother prior to moving out on my own. I remembered the time I walked in and found strangers in the house, and the time I came home to find my niece hysterical crying over a fight my mother and sister had gotten into over their drugs. This was definitely not a good period of my life. The second apartment we passed was the one I grew up in. We had a two bedroom walk-in, with brown shaggy carpet, an eat-in kitchen and a bathroom that was as pink as pink could be. Being that we were on the ground level, we had access to the back yard as well. There were two kids standing outside my old home – and they were playing some sort of ball. I remembered how my sister and I would play stoop ball on those steps – or box ball, a Brooklyn original, in the three concrete slabs outside of our front-door. A lot happened there in the 18 years I occupied that space. There were countless drug-riddled arguments and dramatized events, robberies, assaults, and the most vivid of all the memories, overdoses.
I clearly remember coming home from school one afternoon and walking through our long narrow living room to find the paramedics working on my mother. White foam fell down the sides of her mouth as she seized. I couldn’t have been older than 6. My mother would overdose a few more times throughout her opiate run – and then she graduated to crack.
I was lucky to have family members on my street. Two houses to my right lived my great – grandmother, a woman like no woman I’ve ever met. She was the rock on which I lay my head at night and know that all was going to be alright. Across the street and a few doors down was my maternal grandmother; a woman that never really accepted me because she didn’t like my father – and because I had a father and my sister didn’t. She died some years ago – and we never did really become fast-friends before that happened. Aunts, uncles, and cousins were never sparse growing up in Gravesend – and I thank god for that!
Driving down the main Avenue on which I spent many a night hanging out on street-corners and being a little asshole was a welcomed reprieve from the memories of a gloomy home life. The hang-out scene in Brooklyn back in the early 90’s was fierce. There were literally never less than 20 kids hanging out back then. We all knew each other and we all looked out for one and other. Fights were never real – and if two guys wound up getting into a tiff over some bullshit, they’d have a chance to settle it with the insurance that no one there would let anything truly BAD happen to each other. I miss those days – eating sunflower seeds and drinking Snapple iced teas while listening to old-school hip-hop out of one of the older kid’s car radios. Us girls would hang in little cliques. We’d flirtatiously look at the boys we were crushing on – and give the other girl-cliques dirty looks if we thought there may be an overlapping of admiration. It was a great time to be a kid in Brooklyn.
Public school memories are few and far between – and the bulk of them are bad enough that I’d rather not even get into them at this point. Let’s leave it at this: I was the daughter of known drug-addicts who wore hand-me-down clothes and had a problem with my eyes that resulted in my having to wear a patch half of the time…. Yes, I was a poor dirty pirate girl up until the age of 8 or so…..
We passed the neighborhood projects. Building 15, 14, 12 – and I was reminded of Louie Alonzo – I was his first kiss in Junior High. He lived in building 6 with his parents and 3 brothers. Our torrid love affair lasted three hours until I found out he tried to kiss another girl before kissing me. Fucking Latinos are players even at twelve years old… Damn them and their sexy boriquenness.
Onward we moved - my getting closer and closer to where I now call home. We drove through the neighborhood in which I lived prior to moving in with Daniel. It has only been around 9 months or so since I’ve been gone from there but the area looks even worse than it did when I was initially becoming disgusted with it. It’s a completely different world than what it was back in the day. Fully populated by an immigrant mainland Chinese population, the area is filthy. Store signs are half falling off of their canopies – and garbage is strewn all over the streets. Empty store after empty store passed by my window – and I felt a tinge of happiness to be gone from there even considering the circumstances under which I parted. My new area, although not too far from the old, feels much more like the good old days of Brooklyn.
My bus finally took its turn onto the Avenue I currently reside - and by this time I was less engaged in the memories of yesterday – The time-line was an interesting one. It was one that brought up feelings of sadness, shame, happiness, and confusion. It also allowed me to identify the fact that my drive to move up and out of this southern-Brooklyn territory is not at all unrealistic. My entire life was just chronologically recounted on a one-hour bus ride. If that doesn’t scream sheltered I don’t know what does.
Brooklyn… I love you, baby – but this break up is going to happen whether you like it or not.
Wow. Wow. I’m so excited, and proud of myself. This is going to be a long road ahead but it’s one I am actually honored to say I’ve worked hard to get on.
I went over to the school to finalize the actions this evening and the woman who helped me with my academic advisement was kind enough to push up my available registration date so that I had a better chance of obtaining the classes that worked best with my daytime work schedule. I rushed home and completed the necessary clicking-arounds to ensure that I be officially registered for two of the six pre-requisite courses I need to complete prior to entering my nursing curriculum elsewhere. Done deal, readers. Classes start September 11, 2010.
The bus ride home was an interesting one. My iphone battery went kaput after about 30 minutes of listening to music via the Pandora application. This made it impossible for me to drown out the sound of the two valley-girl like teeny bopping, squeaky voiced, bad-make up applied girls who were sitting behind me discussing some boy who was 31 and still a virgin. I will not enjoy the commute home from school each evening if this is what it is normally like. Car, now – please. Anyway, I was able to filter their squawking out while I looked out the window and I realized that this particular bus runs a route that could easily be associated to my entire life. It’s really rather unsettling when I sit down and think about it.
The timeline I was running in my mind in fact started prior to getting on the bus at all. As I entered the campus I looked around at all the youngish faces and remembered myself in this very same place at their age. I was enrolled here right out of High School. At the time of my first semester I was dating a boy named John. I wondered whether or not the bench in which we carved our names was still around. I didn’t check –and instead I walked the halls of the institution and took note of the other handful of ‘adults’ who looked like they were students and not professors. The number was small – and for a minute or so it fucked with my head but I reminded myself that there is no time like the present and what is important is that I am HERE.
The ride home brought me past not only my High School but my Junior High and my Public School as well. We rolled by the giant High School – no students outside hanging about the way they did during my tenure. I thought about the time I’d kissed Charlie, the hottest bad-ass in the school, right on that bench that was outside my bus window. The memory brought on countless other thoughts of boys I’d kissed and girls I’d had fights with. I thought about this one time that I was waiting for the bus at the very stop we were picking up passengers from and some older kids threw a rock out the back-emergency exit flappable windows that are a NYC MTA bus feature. The rock hit me square on the bridge of my nose and cut my face open.
We rolled through Gravesend. This is where the memories are most plentiful. The small stretch of area that this particular route covers in Gravesend somehow managed to cover two previous residences, my public school, the library I did my homework in every night as a child, and a stretch of concrete that was the coolest place in the world to hang out when I was a tween. The first apartment we passed on my way back home was actually the last apartment I lived in with my mother prior to moving out on my own. I remembered the time I walked in and found strangers in the house, and the time I came home to find my niece hysterical crying over a fight my mother and sister had gotten into over their drugs. This was definitely not a good period of my life. The second apartment we passed was the one I grew up in. We had a two bedroom walk-in, with brown shaggy carpet, an eat-in kitchen and a bathroom that was as pink as pink could be. Being that we were on the ground level, we had access to the back yard as well. There were two kids standing outside my old home – and they were playing some sort of ball. I remembered how my sister and I would play stoop ball on those steps – or box ball, a Brooklyn original, in the three concrete slabs outside of our front-door. A lot happened there in the 18 years I occupied that space. There were countless drug-riddled arguments and dramatized events, robberies, assaults, and the most vivid of all the memories, overdoses.
I clearly remember coming home from school one afternoon and walking through our long narrow living room to find the paramedics working on my mother. White foam fell down the sides of her mouth as she seized. I couldn’t have been older than 6. My mother would overdose a few more times throughout her opiate run – and then she graduated to crack.
I was lucky to have family members on my street. Two houses to my right lived my great – grandmother, a woman like no woman I’ve ever met. She was the rock on which I lay my head at night and know that all was going to be alright. Across the street and a few doors down was my maternal grandmother; a woman that never really accepted me because she didn’t like my father – and because I had a father and my sister didn’t. She died some years ago – and we never did really become fast-friends before that happened. Aunts, uncles, and cousins were never sparse growing up in Gravesend – and I thank god for that!
Driving down the main Avenue on which I spent many a night hanging out on street-corners and being a little asshole was a welcomed reprieve from the memories of a gloomy home life. The hang-out scene in Brooklyn back in the early 90’s was fierce. There were literally never less than 20 kids hanging out back then. We all knew each other and we all looked out for one and other. Fights were never real – and if two guys wound up getting into a tiff over some bullshit, they’d have a chance to settle it with the insurance that no one there would let anything truly BAD happen to each other. I miss those days – eating sunflower seeds and drinking Snapple iced teas while listening to old-school hip-hop out of one of the older kid’s car radios. Us girls would hang in little cliques. We’d flirtatiously look at the boys we were crushing on – and give the other girl-cliques dirty looks if we thought there may be an overlapping of admiration. It was a great time to be a kid in Brooklyn.
Public school memories are few and far between – and the bulk of them are bad enough that I’d rather not even get into them at this point. Let’s leave it at this: I was the daughter of known drug-addicts who wore hand-me-down clothes and had a problem with my eyes that resulted in my having to wear a patch half of the time…. Yes, I was a poor dirty pirate girl up until the age of 8 or so…..
We passed the neighborhood projects. Building 15, 14, 12 – and I was reminded of Louie Alonzo – I was his first kiss in Junior High. He lived in building 6 with his parents and 3 brothers. Our torrid love affair lasted three hours until I found out he tried to kiss another girl before kissing me. Fucking Latinos are players even at twelve years old… Damn them and their sexy boriquenness.
Onward we moved - my getting closer and closer to where I now call home. We drove through the neighborhood in which I lived prior to moving in with Daniel. It has only been around 9 months or so since I’ve been gone from there but the area looks even worse than it did when I was initially becoming disgusted with it. It’s a completely different world than what it was back in the day. Fully populated by an immigrant mainland Chinese population, the area is filthy. Store signs are half falling off of their canopies – and garbage is strewn all over the streets. Empty store after empty store passed by my window – and I felt a tinge of happiness to be gone from there even considering the circumstances under which I parted. My new area, although not too far from the old, feels much more like the good old days of Brooklyn.
My bus finally took its turn onto the Avenue I currently reside - and by this time I was less engaged in the memories of yesterday – The time-line was an interesting one. It was one that brought up feelings of sadness, shame, happiness, and confusion. It also allowed me to identify the fact that my drive to move up and out of this southern-Brooklyn territory is not at all unrealistic. My entire life was just chronologically recounted on a one-hour bus ride. If that doesn’t scream sheltered I don’t know what does.
Brooklyn… I love you, baby – but this break up is going to happen whether you like it or not.
Temptation is a bitch
Have you ever rode the train and noticed someone looking your way just a minute too long? What thoughts does this invoke in you?
For me it's usually one of two things: do I have some toilet paper sticking out of my pants or some other weird thing on my body? Or, is this person having sexual thoughts about me? The latter is only true of male commuters.
I've been told by a number of folks that the train is a huge breeding ground for sexual fantasy. I can see that. It's totally an uninterrupted vantage point of bodies gyrating in sync with the cars bounces and thrusts. Muscles move and curves accentuate. The train can be a pretty hot place if you allow it to be, in your mind. Or in reality if you're ballsy enough... It's fun, try it ;) -
Tonight I am riding the car to school for academic advisement and registration. Yay This is so exciting.
Exciting, too, is the man that is sitting across from me, unable to take his eyes off of my nude calves as they travel down into my chunky red heels. Summer in the city -
I see him watching me - and whenever I look over his way, his eye slightly wanders in an attempt to hide what he's doing. I move my calves, cross my legs and the likes. I want him to keep looking.
He does.
Does he know what I am doing? Mind-fuking him? Slowly and carefully with each soft movement I make, I am dancing with what I imagine to be his erect penis underneath that Brooklyn Industries messenger bag on his lap. Keep looking, baby... Keep looking.
A few seats away I see the largest pair of mens feet ever.
I am out of control today - And, a taste was all it took.
There may be something to this sexual addiction shit after all....
Fuck!
For me it's usually one of two things: do I have some toilet paper sticking out of my pants or some other weird thing on my body? Or, is this person having sexual thoughts about me? The latter is only true of male commuters.
I've been told by a number of folks that the train is a huge breeding ground for sexual fantasy. I can see that. It's totally an uninterrupted vantage point of bodies gyrating in sync with the cars bounces and thrusts. Muscles move and curves accentuate. The train can be a pretty hot place if you allow it to be, in your mind. Or in reality if you're ballsy enough... It's fun, try it ;) -
Tonight I am riding the car to school for academic advisement and registration. Yay This is so exciting.
Exciting, too, is the man that is sitting across from me, unable to take his eyes off of my nude calves as they travel down into my chunky red heels. Summer in the city -
I see him watching me - and whenever I look over his way, his eye slightly wanders in an attempt to hide what he's doing. I move my calves, cross my legs and the likes. I want him to keep looking.
He does.
Does he know what I am doing? Mind-fuking him? Slowly and carefully with each soft movement I make, I am dancing with what I imagine to be his erect penis underneath that Brooklyn Industries messenger bag on his lap. Keep looking, baby... Keep looking.
A few seats away I see the largest pair of mens feet ever.
I am out of control today - And, a taste was all it took.
There may be something to this sexual addiction shit after all....
Fuck!
Monday, May 24, 2010
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Fuck you, Daniel ---- and a little more, too!
I’ve been having a bit of a ‘block’ with respect to writing this week. I don’t know why – my thoughts run rampant on a daily basis and I’ve got so much shit trickling through my mind that I can’t even keep track of it. Sometimes I envision the scene in Hackers when the mainframe is attacked and they’re showing all the rambling lines of code – and every now and then a number or a letter becomes illuminated. I suppose the same could be true of the DiVinci Code movie. It’s a constant borage of thoughts floating through the cerebral fluid that is Kitty G.
I’ve had a lot of shit plaguing me this week – There’s the thoughts of Daniel and his would be Match.com meetups that are consistently making me sick. I know I need to not worry about this but it’s really a lot easier said than done. I think one of the major things that is fucking with me is that in his new profile, the section that asks whether or not you want kids is answered with a “definitely”.
Really, Daniel? ‘Definitely’ - ?
Cause, like, a month before our breakup you came to me on some “I never fully committed to having children, Kitty” and these remarks are what sparked one of the angriest arguments we’ve ever had. Now, all of a sudden, you’re ‘definitely’ into the idea of having children? Fuck you! – I told you from the very beginning that I wanted kids more than almost anything. My friends are having children left and right – and above all that, it’s not like I have an abundance of time left in which I can dick around. My biological clock IS ticking like Marisa Tomei’s and I’m not going to pass up the opportunity to perform one of life’s greatest miracles. Shit, even as I type this one of my friends is in the Labor & Delivery ward of a hospital in Staten Island preparing to give birth to her first child. FUCK! What the fuck, Daniel!?
The interesting thing about his “definitely” answer is that in the “describe your perfect match” section, under the ‘wants kids’, he notates that he’d be OK dating women who either “definitely, or someday, or maybe’ want children. – Do you even know what the fuck you want, Daniel? How can you absolutely want children - yet you’ll consider dating someone who may, or may not, mirror your desires? Get your ass to therapy and stop fucking with people’s emotions you heartless fuck.
I think I am slowly entering my anger phase. I wish it would be quicker and that the anger would be fiercer – but, I have to remind myself that I’ve made great strides in allowing myself to feel and that acknowledging my pain is A-OK. That said, I acknowledge that this all still hurts a hell of a lot. And I acknowledge that if I see Daniel with one of his fucking match.com dates in the Bay Ridge area, I will have to hold back on a preposterous scale in order not to spit in both of their entitled faces.
Phew -- Breathe, Kitty. BREATHE!
So – second to all that stuff, I am sort of bugging out on the whole school tip. I took the entrance exam last week and am waiting on the results. 10-14 business days is the expected wait time. It’s like a fucking gestation period… What will be birthed out of the result? I don’t know. I went ahead and did a bunch of additional research on the radiological field and job availability. Turns out that via the opening of tons of programs which suddenly offer this training, the market is completely over-flooded with candidates looking for jobs – and, well, we all know the current state of the economy. There are hardly any jobs, anywhere – even in the land of opportunity that is NYC. With this in mind, I am starting to doubt my next moves. I realize this could be my fear manifesting itself like I said it would – and I’m keeping a watchful eye on all of that. It cannot be denied, however, that facts are facts and if there are 1000 folks looking for work and only 100 jobs, my fears are very real and should be considered on a grand scale. I am looking at managing loan payments for a better portion of the rest of my working career. Do I go ahead and complete this program only to come out – unable to find work – and responsible to pay these notes? It’s a valid concern.
As a back up option to the Radiological program, I have revisited the idea of Nursing. I originally planned to try to get into a nursing program back when Daniel and I were living together. His mother is a hospital bigwig down in Florida and when Daniel and I were planning what I thought was the rest of our lives, Nursing seemed a very smart career choice for a number of reasons. Just because he is no longer a part of the future plan doesn’t mean that I should forget that there is a lot of success and, more importantly, merit in the nursing industry. I’m a caring person – and my bedside manner is amazing (just ask the trannys :P) – so, I’m sure this would be a smart career choice. The fact that all of my thoughts are centered around medicine in some respect is a bit calming. At least I know I’m not barking up the wrong tree completely.
In order to move forward and get into one of the two full time nursing programs offered in the evenings in NYC, I need to complete various pre-requisite courses on the Liberal Arts and Basic Sciences. I did the preliminary research and it looks like there are around 6 classes I’ll need to complete by June 2011. I think it’s certainly possible and I’m looking forward to this as a serious back-up consideration if the Radiological stuff doesn’t seem like the best way to go.
So, yeah – this is just a random spewing of the thoughts that are going through my mind today. I wanted to throw something out there in terms of a posting and I just didn’t know where to go with it. Sorry if it’s a bit of a ramble. I know I tend to do that on occasion. It’s the Brooklyn in me!
Speaking of Brooklyn – Tour De Brooklyn is June 6th – it’s 18 miles and it starts in Williamsburg and ends in Williamsburg with a stop off at Redhook Park. God, I never thought I’d be considering doing a bike tour that takes me to RedHook. Brooklyn sure has changed, huh? I know a bunch of you readers are Brooklynites. I see your locations on my stat-finder software ;) (big brother is always watching, motherfuckers!!) – so I am just throwing this little tidbit out there as an FYI.
I’ve had a lot of shit plaguing me this week – There’s the thoughts of Daniel and his would be Match.com meetups that are consistently making me sick. I know I need to not worry about this but it’s really a lot easier said than done. I think one of the major things that is fucking with me is that in his new profile, the section that asks whether or not you want kids is answered with a “definitely”.
Really, Daniel? ‘Definitely’ - ?
Cause, like, a month before our breakup you came to me on some “I never fully committed to having children, Kitty” and these remarks are what sparked one of the angriest arguments we’ve ever had. Now, all of a sudden, you’re ‘definitely’ into the idea of having children? Fuck you! – I told you from the very beginning that I wanted kids more than almost anything. My friends are having children left and right – and above all that, it’s not like I have an abundance of time left in which I can dick around. My biological clock IS ticking like Marisa Tomei’s and I’m not going to pass up the opportunity to perform one of life’s greatest miracles. Shit, even as I type this one of my friends is in the Labor & Delivery ward of a hospital in Staten Island preparing to give birth to her first child. FUCK! What the fuck, Daniel!?
The interesting thing about his “definitely” answer is that in the “describe your perfect match” section, under the ‘wants kids’, he notates that he’d be OK dating women who either “definitely, or someday, or maybe’ want children. – Do you even know what the fuck you want, Daniel? How can you absolutely want children - yet you’ll consider dating someone who may, or may not, mirror your desires? Get your ass to therapy and stop fucking with people’s emotions you heartless fuck.
I think I am slowly entering my anger phase. I wish it would be quicker and that the anger would be fiercer – but, I have to remind myself that I’ve made great strides in allowing myself to feel and that acknowledging my pain is A-OK. That said, I acknowledge that this all still hurts a hell of a lot. And I acknowledge that if I see Daniel with one of his fucking match.com dates in the Bay Ridge area, I will have to hold back on a preposterous scale in order not to spit in both of their entitled faces.
Phew -- Breathe, Kitty. BREATHE!
So – second to all that stuff, I am sort of bugging out on the whole school tip. I took the entrance exam last week and am waiting on the results. 10-14 business days is the expected wait time. It’s like a fucking gestation period… What will be birthed out of the result? I don’t know. I went ahead and did a bunch of additional research on the radiological field and job availability. Turns out that via the opening of tons of programs which suddenly offer this training, the market is completely over-flooded with candidates looking for jobs – and, well, we all know the current state of the economy. There are hardly any jobs, anywhere – even in the land of opportunity that is NYC. With this in mind, I am starting to doubt my next moves. I realize this could be my fear manifesting itself like I said it would – and I’m keeping a watchful eye on all of that. It cannot be denied, however, that facts are facts and if there are 1000 folks looking for work and only 100 jobs, my fears are very real and should be considered on a grand scale. I am looking at managing loan payments for a better portion of the rest of my working career. Do I go ahead and complete this program only to come out – unable to find work – and responsible to pay these notes? It’s a valid concern.
As a back up option to the Radiological program, I have revisited the idea of Nursing. I originally planned to try to get into a nursing program back when Daniel and I were living together. His mother is a hospital bigwig down in Florida and when Daniel and I were planning what I thought was the rest of our lives, Nursing seemed a very smart career choice for a number of reasons. Just because he is no longer a part of the future plan doesn’t mean that I should forget that there is a lot of success and, more importantly, merit in the nursing industry. I’m a caring person – and my bedside manner is amazing (just ask the trannys :P) – so, I’m sure this would be a smart career choice. The fact that all of my thoughts are centered around medicine in some respect is a bit calming. At least I know I’m not barking up the wrong tree completely.
In order to move forward and get into one of the two full time nursing programs offered in the evenings in NYC, I need to complete various pre-requisite courses on the Liberal Arts and Basic Sciences. I did the preliminary research and it looks like there are around 6 classes I’ll need to complete by June 2011. I think it’s certainly possible and I’m looking forward to this as a serious back-up consideration if the Radiological stuff doesn’t seem like the best way to go.
So, yeah – this is just a random spewing of the thoughts that are going through my mind today. I wanted to throw something out there in terms of a posting and I just didn’t know where to go with it. Sorry if it’s a bit of a ramble. I know I tend to do that on occasion. It’s the Brooklyn in me!
Speaking of Brooklyn – Tour De Brooklyn is June 6th – it’s 18 miles and it starts in Williamsburg and ends in Williamsburg with a stop off at Redhook Park. God, I never thought I’d be considering doing a bike tour that takes me to RedHook. Brooklyn sure has changed, huh? I know a bunch of you readers are Brooklynites. I see your locations on my stat-finder software ;) (big brother is always watching, motherfuckers!!) – so I am just throwing this little tidbit out there as an FYI.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Sunday, May 2, 2010
The Invisible Woman
About two months before my and Daniel's actual break-up, we decided to sit down and make a winter project out of watching Alan Ball's wildly awesome HBO series, Six Feet Under. I have seen the series from start to finish two or three times. Daniel, however, stopped watching right around the last season because he thought it got too campy and novella-ish. I think it is without question the smartest and most interesting series ever to grace the tube.
I was flicking through the channels one night and saw a mini Six Feet Under marathon. I was so excited I could've jumped up and down right there. I eased into the marathon and before I knew it I was once again completely engrossed in the lives of the Fisher family. There is always an over-abundance of tears that comes along with watching Six Feet Under. The identification process I go through in nearly every episode often makes me feel as if the show is speaking directly to me. This was true not only the first two times I watched the series but especially so during this winter project.
The random episodes on cable picked up somewhere around where Lisa goes missing. If you're a fan of the show, I don't need to remind you of the particulars as it seems they have a way of sticking to your ribcage the way day old oatmeal sticks to a dry dish. If you're not a fan of the series or you're just generally unfamiliar with it, I cannot stress enough what you are missing. This production will have you on the edge of your seat - not through suspense, but through sheer pain. We, as human beings, cannot look away in the face of tragic events. Think of the rubbernecking phenomenon - The Fisher family of California experiences accident after accident after accident but they do so in the same manner as us. The characters depicted on this show are all someone we know in reality. I, after watching it numerous times, am still undecided as to who I relate with the most. There are so many attributes of each of their scripted characters that I find in myself on any given day. There are sluts, liars, manic depressives, over-bearing under-trusting matriarchs, soul-searchers, and art lovers. There are episodes that delve deep into drug use, sex as a coping mechanism, prostitution, love, loss, pain, fear, abandonment, abuse, etc. I could go on and on. The interesting thing is that with that huge laundry list I just threw out at you comes only five-Fishers. There are very important peripheral characters as well, but the cast is not as vast as you would expect it to be for a show that covers every fucked up thing about humanity I can think of. I cannot say enough good stuff about Six Feet Under.
I had an idea a while back that was prompted one evening when Daniel and I were camped out in front of the T.V. somewhere around the second season of SFU. It was actually probably more of an epiphany than an idea but either way it has haunted me since and I need to put it out into the universe. There were some things happening on the screen and the dialogue was, in the Six Feet fashion, strong and riddled with guilt and pain. The conversation was directly related to loss and how we, as human beings, deal with it on varying degrees. I peered over at Daniel while the characters delivered their lines and looked for a hint of recognition or at least an indication of cognizance as it related to the subject matter at hand. There was nothing from him - He might as well have been looking at a blank screen. It was at this very moment that I realized our winter project was actually a primer.
The ultimate demise of my relationship was being narrated by the Fishers.
I acknowledged this to myself and somewhere in that split second the reason for my flowing tears switched from identifying with a television show to recognizing just what was happening in my living room. I didn't mention anything to Daniel at that point but I did throw out this idea to him later on and once after our actual break-up. I told him that I was going to document our relationship and my life as it relates to episodes of Six Feet Under, and that's exactly what I intend to do.
I'd like to start with The Invisible Woman; Emily Previn.
Tonight while I was washing my single dish, single pot, and single glass after I had a dinner of Turkey Franks and Vegetarian Beans (I had a craving!), I couldn't help but realize that I am quickly falling back into 'alone' Kitty. My days are repetitive and structured. Monday through Friday, I am up at 6:15am to the scent of the timed coffee which finished brewing only a moment earlier. I use the bathroom, greet the cat with some good-morning nuzzles and prepare his breakfast, and turn on the television to NY1. I have my coffee while I apply my make-up for the day. During make-up time, I obsess over what I will wear to work. I pack my lunch at about 7:15 and no later than 7:25 I am out the door and onto the Manhattan bound train. I'm at my desk from 8:30AM to 4:30PM. Most of this time is spent fucking around on the Internet, writing entries for this blog and various other publications for whom I am a contributing editor, and generally slacking off. By 6pm at the latest, I am back home. I change, greet the kitten, and prepare my dinner. Today was no different than everything I just described except instead of watching television or playing on the Internet after I had dinner, I studied and did practice tests for my exam this coming Friday. As I washed my dish(es) this evening, I couldn't get the thought of Emily Previn out of my head. She was dead a full week before anyone noticed she was gone and it was only via a horrific scent that her management company notified the authorities.
Ruth Fisher has some what of a mental breakdown in this episode because she is faced with the idea of being Emily and dying alone. She considers the fact that she, too, may be invisible. And, tonight - I sort of felt the same way.
When I came in from work this evening, on the steps leading up to my new apartment was a big yellow envelope with Daniel's handwriting on it. He sent whatever mail hadn't made its way to my new apartment via the USPS Forwarding order I completed weeks ago. I opened the envelope and thought that maybe there would be a small note from him wishing me well or something. With the exception of a letter from my old college, the envelope was filled with complete junk mail. There was a Val-Pak in the envelope and I wasn't sure whether to be surprised that he included that or to smile because he may have sent it knowing that whenever I got Val-Pak when he and I lived together, I got a little excited. What?! I like to save a buck!
Am I so invisible, like Emily, that Daniel couldn't even bother to include a note as a means of good fortune? In all seriousness, I don't believe I am like Emily. I have friends and if they didn't notice I was missing then the Internet would. The frequency with which I use Social Media
is a little ridiculous. But, I do feel like my life is sort of similar to hers in that I have my dinner alone most nights. It's lonely, and it's sad. I don't enjoy being single Kitty as much as I do Kitty who gets to take care of her man.
The Invisible Woman episode also finds Brenda joining her Shiatsu client Melissa as she turns a trick for a dude who is into exhibitionism. Exhibitionism: there's a topic for a later date!
I was flicking through the channels one night and saw a mini Six Feet Under marathon. I was so excited I could've jumped up and down right there. I eased into the marathon and before I knew it I was once again completely engrossed in the lives of the Fisher family. There is always an over-abundance of tears that comes along with watching Six Feet Under. The identification process I go through in nearly every episode often makes me feel as if the show is speaking directly to me. This was true not only the first two times I watched the series but especially so during this winter project.
The random episodes on cable picked up somewhere around where Lisa goes missing. If you're a fan of the show, I don't need to remind you of the particulars as it seems they have a way of sticking to your ribcage the way day old oatmeal sticks to a dry dish. If you're not a fan of the series or you're just generally unfamiliar with it, I cannot stress enough what you are missing. This production will have you on the edge of your seat - not through suspense, but through sheer pain. We, as human beings, cannot look away in the face of tragic events. Think of the rubbernecking phenomenon - The Fisher family of California experiences accident after accident after accident but they do so in the same manner as us. The characters depicted on this show are all someone we know in reality. I, after watching it numerous times, am still undecided as to who I relate with the most. There are so many attributes of each of their scripted characters that I find in myself on any given day. There are sluts, liars, manic depressives, over-bearing under-trusting matriarchs, soul-searchers, and art lovers. There are episodes that delve deep into drug use, sex as a coping mechanism, prostitution, love, loss, pain, fear, abandonment, abuse, etc. I could go on and on. The interesting thing is that with that huge laundry list I just threw out at you comes only five-Fishers. There are very important peripheral characters as well, but the cast is not as vast as you would expect it to be for a show that covers every fucked up thing about humanity I can think of. I cannot say enough good stuff about Six Feet Under.
I had an idea a while back that was prompted one evening when Daniel and I were camped out in front of the T.V. somewhere around the second season of SFU. It was actually probably more of an epiphany than an idea but either way it has haunted me since and I need to put it out into the universe. There were some things happening on the screen and the dialogue was, in the Six Feet fashion, strong and riddled with guilt and pain. The conversation was directly related to loss and how we, as human beings, deal with it on varying degrees. I peered over at Daniel while the characters delivered their lines and looked for a hint of recognition or at least an indication of cognizance as it related to the subject matter at hand. There was nothing from him - He might as well have been looking at a blank screen. It was at this very moment that I realized our winter project was actually a primer.
The ultimate demise of my relationship was being narrated by the Fishers.
I acknowledged this to myself and somewhere in that split second the reason for my flowing tears switched from identifying with a television show to recognizing just what was happening in my living room. I didn't mention anything to Daniel at that point but I did throw out this idea to him later on and once after our actual break-up. I told him that I was going to document our relationship and my life as it relates to episodes of Six Feet Under, and that's exactly what I intend to do.
I'd like to start with The Invisible Woman; Emily Previn.
Tonight while I was washing my single dish, single pot, and single glass after I had a dinner of Turkey Franks and Vegetarian Beans (I had a craving!), I couldn't help but realize that I am quickly falling back into 'alone' Kitty. My days are repetitive and structured. Monday through Friday, I am up at 6:15am to the scent of the timed coffee which finished brewing only a moment earlier. I use the bathroom, greet the cat with some good-morning nuzzles and prepare his breakfast, and turn on the television to NY1. I have my coffee while I apply my make-up for the day. During make-up time, I obsess over what I will wear to work. I pack my lunch at about 7:15 and no later than 7:25 I am out the door and onto the Manhattan bound train. I'm at my desk from 8:30AM to 4:30PM. Most of this time is spent fucking around on the Internet, writing entries for this blog and various other publications for whom I am a contributing editor, and generally slacking off. By 6pm at the latest, I am back home. I change, greet the kitten, and prepare my dinner. Today was no different than everything I just described except instead of watching television or playing on the Internet after I had dinner, I studied and did practice tests for my exam this coming Friday. As I washed my dish(es) this evening, I couldn't get the thought of Emily Previn out of my head. She was dead a full week before anyone noticed she was gone and it was only via a horrific scent that her management company notified the authorities.
Ruth Fisher has some what of a mental breakdown in this episode because she is faced with the idea of being Emily and dying alone. She considers the fact that she, too, may be invisible. And, tonight - I sort of felt the same way.
When I came in from work this evening, on the steps leading up to my new apartment was a big yellow envelope with Daniel's handwriting on it. He sent whatever mail hadn't made its way to my new apartment via the USPS Forwarding order I completed weeks ago. I opened the envelope and thought that maybe there would be a small note from him wishing me well or something. With the exception of a letter from my old college, the envelope was filled with complete junk mail. There was a Val-Pak in the envelope and I wasn't sure whether to be surprised that he included that or to smile because he may have sent it knowing that whenever I got Val-Pak when he and I lived together, I got a little excited. What?! I like to save a buck!
Am I so invisible, like Emily, that Daniel couldn't even bother to include a note as a means of good fortune? In all seriousness, I don't believe I am like Emily. I have friends and if they didn't notice I was missing then the Internet would. The frequency with which I use Social Media
is a little ridiculous. But, I do feel like my life is sort of similar to hers in that I have my dinner alone most nights. It's lonely, and it's sad. I don't enjoy being single Kitty as much as I do Kitty who gets to take care of her man.
The Invisible Woman episode also finds Brenda joining her Shiatsu client Melissa as she turns a trick for a dude who is into exhibitionism. Exhibitionism: there's a topic for a later date!
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
A break from your regularly scheduled drama..
As part of my effort to get the hell outta dodge, I am working toward getting myself into a Radiological Therapy program that is set to begin in September 2010. I briefly mentioned this in one of my intro posts, but I thought I should elaborate. I realize this blog is becoming a ranting space for things that happened with Daniel. It's going to happen, as I need to work out all the kinks and get the pain of the break up out of my system. I also want to be sure to keep my eye on the prize which is, as we know, saying goodbye to Brooklyn -
I take my entrance exam on May 7th. That's 9 days away. If all goes well and I get into this program, I will be putting myself in every possible form of debt via student loans galore. The ultimate plan includes quitting my full time job and paying the rent and bills via loaned money at what I imagine will be an outrageous percentage rate. I am probably just communicating my fears. The truth is, I haven't shopped the loans just yet. I did, however, speak with the financial aid liaison at the school and he advised that they've only got one private lender willing to work with their students. Considering I have absolutely no idea what I am doing with respect to student loans, shopping them and/or any of that other fun stuff, hearing that there may be only one available option has created a bit of hysteria on my end.
There are a lot of fears involved with this decision. You have to understand something about me in order to really get the gist of what I am trying to say here. I have been working in a "professional" capacity since I'm a teenager. For those of you who are unfamiliar with a Co-Operative Education system to sum it up as easily as possible, it's a program that allows you to alternate weeks attending work and school. At sixteen years old, I was working in the corporate offices of American Express's Catalog Order division in the World Financial Center. The pay was minuscule but I felt like a big girl in my business suits and Zodiac shoes. More importantly, though, was that in addition to the small salary I earned, the work time counted toward High School credit toward graduation.
Even prior to my alternating weeks at work for chump change, I earned my keep doing whatever I could. My mother, during one of her better lengths of life, had the galley-portion of a charter fishing boat in the Sheepshead Bay area fall into her lap. She basically owned this small business and kept it stocked with various edibles. The keep wasn't much but it paid the bills. I would often work shifts for her and earn a $30.00 shift pay plus whatever tips I could ring in. I was a hustler before Jay Z made it famous.
In summary, I have been gainfully employed for the better part of the last eighteen years of my life. I don't know what it is to not be employed and earn a paycheck every week. I have no idea what it is to just trust that everything is going to be OK. The only point of reference I have to ensure that things are going to be OK is to make sure they are!. And, if all goes well with the entrance exam on May 7th and the 4 hour admissions interview to follow that, come August 2010 I will be handing in my resignation and entrusting in the universe (and a shit load of loans) to take care of me.
Holy fuck. I am terrified!
At the end of the two year program I am eligible to sit for the exam that will render me a certified Radiological Therapist. According to everything I have read the market is going to boom approximately 26% between now and 2016 as a result of baby-boomers getting older and sicker. Makes sense. Graduation will be August 2012 at which time I will be bordering thirty-four years old. I feel like I'm starting from scratch, but I suppose anything that is started is started from nothing.
Keeping the goal of leaving the city in mind, I figure Medicine is an excellent industry to enter. The fact of the matter is that people will always get sick and barring a major advancement in Cancer Care, or an outright cure, care will always be a necessity.
One of my favorite places happens to be South Florida. It has nothing to do with Daniel coming from there; that just happened to be a nice coincidence. Florida's scale of pay has always been substantially less than that of NYC and this is something I need to take into consideration for a number of reasons. There is some strange driving force that constantly tells me I need to be there. I really can't identify what it is but I have an irking feeling inside and have had this feeling for quite some time now. With what may turn out to be close to $70,000 in student loans accrued in the next two years of my life, I am wondering how I will afford to not only relocate - but live in an area where the rate of pay is undoubtedly less than the norm. This is just one of the many fears that are entering my mind at this point and I realize that these apprehensions are going to grow stronger by the day. I hope I have the strength to push through this and not succumb to the fear that has held me back from moving forward in this life to date.
I really need to do this!
I take my entrance exam on May 7th. That's 9 days away. If all goes well and I get into this program, I will be putting myself in every possible form of debt via student loans galore. The ultimate plan includes quitting my full time job and paying the rent and bills via loaned money at what I imagine will be an outrageous percentage rate. I am probably just communicating my fears. The truth is, I haven't shopped the loans just yet. I did, however, speak with the financial aid liaison at the school and he advised that they've only got one private lender willing to work with their students. Considering I have absolutely no idea what I am doing with respect to student loans, shopping them and/or any of that other fun stuff, hearing that there may be only one available option has created a bit of hysteria on my end.
There are a lot of fears involved with this decision. You have to understand something about me in order to really get the gist of what I am trying to say here. I have been working in a "professional" capacity since I'm a teenager. For those of you who are unfamiliar with a Co-Operative Education system to sum it up as easily as possible, it's a program that allows you to alternate weeks attending work and school. At sixteen years old, I was working in the corporate offices of American Express's Catalog Order division in the World Financial Center. The pay was minuscule but I felt like a big girl in my business suits and Zodiac shoes. More importantly, though, was that in addition to the small salary I earned, the work time counted toward High School credit toward graduation.
Even prior to my alternating weeks at work for chump change, I earned my keep doing whatever I could. My mother, during one of her better lengths of life, had the galley-portion of a charter fishing boat in the Sheepshead Bay area fall into her lap. She basically owned this small business and kept it stocked with various edibles. The keep wasn't much but it paid the bills. I would often work shifts for her and earn a $30.00 shift pay plus whatever tips I could ring in. I was a hustler before Jay Z made it famous.
In summary, I have been gainfully employed for the better part of the last eighteen years of my life. I don't know what it is to not be employed and earn a paycheck every week. I have no idea what it is to just trust that everything is going to be OK. The only point of reference I have to ensure that things are going to be OK is to make sure they are!. And, if all goes well with the entrance exam on May 7th and the 4 hour admissions interview to follow that, come August 2010 I will be handing in my resignation and entrusting in the universe (and a shit load of loans) to take care of me.
Holy fuck. I am terrified!
At the end of the two year program I am eligible to sit for the exam that will render me a certified Radiological Therapist. According to everything I have read the market is going to boom approximately 26% between now and 2016 as a result of baby-boomers getting older and sicker. Makes sense. Graduation will be August 2012 at which time I will be bordering thirty-four years old. I feel like I'm starting from scratch, but I suppose anything that is started is started from nothing.
Keeping the goal of leaving the city in mind, I figure Medicine is an excellent industry to enter. The fact of the matter is that people will always get sick and barring a major advancement in Cancer Care, or an outright cure, care will always be a necessity.
One of my favorite places happens to be South Florida. It has nothing to do with Daniel coming from there; that just happened to be a nice coincidence. Florida's scale of pay has always been substantially less than that of NYC and this is something I need to take into consideration for a number of reasons. There is some strange driving force that constantly tells me I need to be there. I really can't identify what it is but I have an irking feeling inside and have had this feeling for quite some time now. With what may turn out to be close to $70,000 in student loans accrued in the next two years of my life, I am wondering how I will afford to not only relocate - but live in an area where the rate of pay is undoubtedly less than the norm. This is just one of the many fears that are entering my mind at this point and I realize that these apprehensions are going to grow stronger by the day. I hope I have the strength to push through this and not succumb to the fear that has held me back from moving forward in this life to date.
I really need to do this!
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