Uncle Harold Died

A few weeks ago I got a text from my mother that my great-Uncle Harold had died.

I was quite surprised, seeing as the last time I saw him he seemed totally fine. I've kind of always thought he was a turd & a half, but still...dying sucks.

My mind immediately went back to the last time I saw him, which was a little over a month ago at a family reunion. We didn't speak, of course. That's par for the course for us. We spoke a little bit back in March when we were all dealing with my grandfather dying. But that isn't the norm. I'm not one to hold a grudge generally, especially if the slight wasn't directed at me, but he really screwed my dad over. Back in 1999-2000, my dad was the music minister at the church he grew up in (still attended by my grandparents & other assorted relatives). But Uncle Harold had my father, who was his nephew, removed from the position. I'm not sure of the reason, other than he was trying to get control of the church. And guess what: he ran that church right into the ground. It's now one of those black churches with four different names in the title like Father of Grace Deliverance Tabernacle or some shit.

Ahem. As I was saying, I don't generally hold a grudge but that really pissed me off. You just don't do that to family. At least not to close family. But after that whenever I'm around him I keep my distance. But unfortunately at the last family reunion in June I couldn't avoid him due to the circumstances. I had taken a leak & as I was exiting the stall, Uncle Harold was coming in. We didn't speak. I saw him sit down on the toilet. I washed my hands super quickly & ran out of the bathroom. And that was the last memory I would ever have of my beloved Uncle Harold.

That is until my mom texted me back & told me it was actually my great-Uncle Harold on her side of the family. False alarm!

Doctor Time

I think I'm going to make an appointment to see the doctor while I still have insurance (my mom can retire in February, plus I'm getting old). I'm not necessarily sick, but something just feels off. Well, more off than usual.

Aside from my usual anxiety & depression crap, I'm just exhausted all the time. At this point I'm struggling to get my homework done because just thinking about starting it wears me out & I then I find myself taking a 5 hour nap. I'm getting it done, but I'm stressed out the whole time because I dicked around all week because I was napping or watching TV because I was stressed out.

My room is a mess right now because I start thinking about how I need to clean it & then I start to worry about where I'm going to put it. Then I get tired & just give up. There are two piles of books on either side of my bed. They've been there for weeks & I have no idea what to do with them.

Riveting stuff.

Kill me.

I have no energy to read much for pleasure. It takes too much effort. Even watching TV or getting on the internet takes too much energy.

I had been worried I was overwhelmingly lazy, but my counselor doesn't think it's that. He suggested that I might as well get it figured out while I still have insurance, in case it's something more serious than we think.

And just so everyone knows, if I start thinking about exercising that almost does me in. I've had a yoga mat for almost a month that I haven't even unrolled. I don't think it's my diet either, because I eat quite a bit of fruits, veggies, & grains.

I'm not really concerned. Just pissed off more than anything.

Birthday Story 3: The Time I Threw Up

The birthday I think I'm the most proud of at this point in my life involves vomit. Of course.

It was my 23rd birthday. I had planned to visit some friends from college in Ohio (there seems to be an absurd amount of people from Ohio where I went to college) & figured I'd go during my birthday because then I had a better chance of having fun. We'll see about that...

For my actual birthday, I was celebrating with Robyn & Neil. At the time, they were living together in an apartment connected to Robyn's dad's apartment. However, Robyn was essentially living with his girlfriend (the same girlfriend he visited me with last summer) so I basically just stayed with Neil. Anyway.

The 3 of us, Robyn's girlfriend, & his dad (who is awesome) went to some Mexican restaurant. It just happened to be margarita night. Because THAT'S always a good idea. Robyn's dad bought us some pitchers, but they tasted kind of funny. All of us thought so. That didn't prevent me from drinking 3 glasses of some of the jankiest margaritas ever, though.

So after dinner we went to see "Bruno" (I know...). By this point, I'm feeling like warmed-over shit. We get in the theater & I excuse myself to go to the bathroom. I don't puke. I don't pee. I'm just...in there. Then I go back to the theater. Then back to the bathroom where I don't do anything. This continues for the first part of the movie. By about the halfway point, I gave up & just stayed in the bathroom, where I proceeded to fall asleep sitting on the floor in the stall while leaning against the wall. At least I think that's how I fell asleep. I'm going to tell myself to remember it that way because the thought of me falling asleep on a public bathroom floor any other way is too frightening.

I had been gone so long that Robyn eventually came to get me. He forced me up, told me I wasn't that drunk (he was wrong) & I saw the end of the movie. I was not impressed.

We finally got back to the apartment where I went to sit on the bed. After a few minutes I got that feeling. You know the one (well, you do unless you're Aubree) after you've drank too much & you know exactly what the outcome is going to be. So I hurried as fast as I could to the bathroom. And I puked. A few times.

I tell you what though, I felt awesome afterwards. I laid on the bed & listened to Neil, Robyn, & Sarah talk for a bit. Then I wasn't even drunk anymore & I had so much energy! That is until I got a call from Alexa who was wishing me a happy birthday & also to tell me her cat of 16 years had died.

Also, a few days later I went back with some other people to see "Bruno" while I was sober. I liked it better when I was borderline comatose & not actually in the theater.

Birthday Story 2

For my 21st birthday, I was in Rocky Mount for the summer. As I've mentioned before, I began drinking when I was 20 so it didn't really matter to me much; besides, I didn't have any friends in Rocky Mount so I had no expectations. Plus! My birthday was on a Sunday in the south, which meant that most places were going to be dry (no alcohol served, because God only cares what you do on Sunday).

My dad had already moved to Toccoa for his job, so my mom & I went to their church. At that point, I still had a smidge of a relationship with some of the youth/young adults at the church so I asked some of them what they were doing after church as far as lunch. I told them it was my birthday & I would like to go somewhere. Well, they would only go to lunch at Golden Corral (a buffet). I decided that wasn't going to be my birthday lunch so my mom & I went to Chili's. It was as good as Chili's is going to be. Especially without alcohol.

We went back to the house & my mom started nagging me to try to hang out with ANYONE I could find, just so I wouldn't be alone. I tried another guy at the church, but he didn't want to do anything so I said, "Fuck it" & went to the damn mall by myself. When I got there, I bought myself some clothes for a present (I had already gotten stuff from my parents & grandma). Then I went to Blockbuster (ha! Old school) to rent something but couldn't find anything. Drat!

So then I went to my grandma's house & watched Disney Channel.

Happy 21st to me!

Birthday Story 1

It's my birthday week, so every day this week I'm going to post a story about some past birthday extravaganza or whatever. Since I don't have much time today I'm going to write a short piece about my one & only surprise party.

When I was 15, I was well aware of the fact that I didn't have many friends (I had literally 1 friend). As my 16th birthday approached, I told my mother that I wanted a surprise party. She said ok. Well, that was easy.

The day after my birthday was a Wednesday which meant I had youth group at church. As my dad & I were heading there (my mom was already conveniently there) my dad took a wrong turn "accidently". I thought it was really stupid, but I sometimes think my dad is stupid so it wasn't THAT big of a stretch. We finally got to the church & my 1 friend Cooper was there. He kept talking to me & talking to me & trying to distract me but I hate being late so I pushed by him into the youth room. That was when I saw my mom, my youth leader, & about 5 other youth group members just...in there.

I ruined the surprise.

.....surprise......

On top of that, my mother didn't tell anyone in advance so hardly anyone had shown up, nor did I get any presents. At least she tried.

But hey, it's better than how my ACTUAL birthday had been the day before. I had gone to driver's ed, then gone to Raleigh for a terrible counseling session, followed by Olive Garden where I almost immediately had an allergic reaction to something & my father had to literally carry me out of the restaurant because I couldn't walk.

The Furry

Do you guys know what furries are?

These are furries.

Ever since I heard of furries, I've been completely fascinated by them. My first experience with them was while watching "The Shining" when things are going batshit crazy near the end & there are some furries getting/giving head in a room or whatever. Next came an early episode of "CSI" where there was a furry convention. That episode was very enjoyable for me.

To me, furries were like God's little joke. Kind of like kids with red hair & Ross Perot.

Well, my last year in college at Toccoa I got a text from Caitlin asking me if I had seen the kid walking around campus with a tail. She was confused as to what was going on, but I immediately got ridiculously excited.

Could...could there be a real live furry at my conservative Christian college? Was it possible for me to receive a blessing of such magnitude?

Shortly afterward, Alexa texted me about the furry. Yes. I was that lucky. There really was a furry there. The campus was so small that it was now only a matter of time before I crossed paths with him.

The first time I saw him, it was from a distance. I did an actual double-take. Sure enough, there was a guy walking around in an ill-fitting shirt, jeans, ugly sandals, & a tail tied to his waist (I remember the entire outfit because it was so bizarre). After that, I saw him everywhere. Cafeteria? He was there. The dorm? He was there. Chapel? You best believe he was there with that tail blowing carelessly in the breeze behind him.

Word got out that he view this whole furry shtick as his "ministry." He felt that by dressing as one of them it would make it easier to infiltrate their ranks & tell them about Jesus. Because you know, there was such a huge furry population in Toccoa, Georgia. If he wanted to dress like an STD or an inbreed, I could understand that because those are actual epidemics there. Furries? Not so much.

Eventually, the administration told him he couldn't wear his tail to class; he got by this rule by tucking his tail into his jeans. He also continued to not shower, as his friends were also wont to do. Because you know, it takes a lot of time out of your busy schedule of playing video games, Dungeons & Dragons, & planning your next cosplay to shower.

I believe our dear furry friend was only a student at TFC for one year. After that, I graduated but I heard he didn't come back the next year. I wonder what Skidmark would have thought about him...

That Time I Almost Got Kicked Out Of College

I've alluded to this post a few times, & now it's time for y'all to experience the wonder.

Are you ready?

It was literally a day before Spring Break my second year at Toccoa. I was driving down the main road with Ij (short for Italian Job, a name Alexa gave him because he looks Italian but he isn't) when he got a call from his hysterical girlfriend, LL. Apparently, she had been called to meet with one of the deans of the school because someone had read LL's Xanga in which she wrote about a get-together at The Mayor of Creepsville's house where there was some alcohol consumed; that person then printed off a copy of the post & gave it to the dean. Since we attended a school that rewarded this kind of behavior. Drinking was a big no-no regardless of age or whether or not you lived on campus. The most common form of punishment for such a heinous activity was a crap-ton of gratis (which, as I have mentioned before, is like community service around campus), suspension, or expulsion. So obviously, LL being really upset was understandable. I felt really bad for her.

That is until about 2 hours later when I got a text from Christian, who was currently the SGA president: the dean wanted to speak to me. Shit. I still had about an hour left of my shift (back in the day when I was a host at Applebee's & thought working lunch was good), & that entire time I almost had an anxiety attack. I had no idea whether I was going to be forced to testify LL or anyone else, or whether I had been thrown under the bus as well. Either way, I hurried over to the school after work to go ahead & get it over with...

Now, the dean is a reasonably nice person. He has a very... calming demeanor. I sat down & he told me how he had already spoken to LL about her Xanga post, & then went into reading quotes from it. This was when I learned that LL included all of the names of the people who had been at the party (of which I was included). Now, I can understand why she would think it was ok to put our names. I mean, it was 2008 & homeslice was still writing on Xanga. Nobody had been reading that shit for years. But seriously?! You're going to post on a public forum that anyone can read that you had been drinking & include the names of everyone there? Idiot.

The kicker? I didn't even drink that time. I wasn't even going to go because it was at The Mayor of Creepsville's house (THAT'S going to be a fun post...) but I had gotten in a fight with my dad (who I was living with at the time since he was working in the same town I went to college) & left to hang out with Ij. I stayed maybe an hour & smoked one cigarette. And all of this crap was happening to me.

Sometimes I make really bad choices.

I explained all of this to the dean, who didn't seem mad at all. I didn't like that. I need the other person to react one way or the other so I can react. I obviously don't do well making my own choices. He was just really quiet. And that's when I started talking...running my mouth about how I thought I had a drinking problem because I would physically feel pain if I didn't drink. How it ran on both sides of my family. How I could just drink & drink & be drunk but not stop or get sick.

Jesus.

That was when the entire mood of the meeting changed. Now he wanted to fix me. Well, at least I didn't think I would get kicked out anymore! So there was that. He decided to have weekly accountability meetings with me to make sure I was overcoming my plight as a potential alcoholic. I thought that wouldn't be so bad. But then the mood changed to one slightly more ominous. This was when the dean wanted me to tell him who Ij was (only his first name was in the Xanga post). I didn't want to do it. I really didn't want to be a snake. But I knew I had no choice because it would potentially get me in more trouble, plus the fact that I knew he probably already knew. So I told him.

He talked to Ij later that day, as well as the other 3 guys involved (The Mayor of Creepsville, a ginger kid that may not have any functioning brain cells, & the guy who died earlier this year). They set up a meeting for all of us to get together after Spring Break, & basically all that ended up being was the dean & another dean telling us why we were wrong for drinking & The Mayor of Creepsville trying to debate them. While everyone got involved for the most part, I kept my mouth shut.

I was surprised, but none of us got suspended, expelled, or at the very least gratis. It was just really odd how it all worked out, especially when we were basically completely screwed. In fact, there was a group of people who got busted for drinking around the same time & they all got a lot of gratis & weren't allowed to play on their respective sports teams for the rest of the year. I know they may have been held to a higher standard, but I was really involved on SGA & the dean did mention that I may need to be removed if my behavior didn't change. But that was that.

In the end, I distanced myself from that group. LL left school at the end of that semester. I continued to keep my distance from The Mayor of Creepsville. I also avoided the dead guy because he was an ass. The ginger? We never really hung out much anyway. Ij ended up getting kicked out the next year because of alcohol (& because The Mayor of Creepsville sucks).

I ended up going about a month without drinking, until this horrible night when Ij & LL had sex in my dad's bed. I also continued going to the accountability meetings until I realized that all the dean wanted was to use me as a narc since he knew that while I didn't hang out with people much, I knew a lot of what was happening with people. So I quit going.

And Spring Break? It was decent fun in Daytona until I kind of realized that one of the only reasons I was invited was because I had a car. Assholes.

Motivation Stimulation

As I sit on my bed, I think about how badly I need to get my homework done. Why am I not doing it? Why am I procrastinating?

The answer is...I just don't know. I don't consider myself a lazy person. I just lack a lot of motivation. Once I start something I'm pretty good, but getting me to start it takes a lot of pushing. The fact that I've been in school almost non-stop since kindergarten is another factor. Baby just needs a break.

But I will get it done. I need to read about 100 pages by tomorrow (pfft. You know I be skimming that bitch) so I can do a discussion board post. Then I have to write a critique by Sunday that does not exceed 4 pages. This routine is going to be my life until August 19. There will also be a personal counseling model I have to write, but I've done a bazillion of those (so you know I be taking my old stuff & punching it up).

But on the plus side, I found out I only have a year left of graduate school. Word.