It All Comes Down To Faith

In the last few years I have had the opportunity to go through various stages of life. Single and living at home, single with roommates, single and living with family; but the recurring theme has always been single. My first romantic relationship started at the young age of 15 and continued pretty much until I was 22. After that amount of time there was obviously a lot of emotion involved and I didn't feel like I had true closure until this year. The end of that relationship was pretty tragic and shocking for me and definitely affected me adversely. My state of mind was not improved by the marriages of my best friend and sister within the same month, despite how happy I was for them.

I floundered for a couple of years, after deciding that the way I had been living previously hadn't done my marriage prospects any good, so I tried other things. Things that were basically not good for me which I eventually realized before I did something really stupid. Basically I had lost my faith in good things happening to me. It took me a while but I got to a healthier place. Everyone has their own way of dealing with grief mine was to be blunt and brash. My honesty won me some friends but it could also be very off-putting. Mostly it came from being unsure of who I was and eventually it was that self-discovery that gave me the confidence to date again.

The great thing about finally knowing who I am is that it means I am more open to meeting people and also aware of what I want in a relationship. This also means that I know if someone rejects me it is not the end of the world. It just means that I am not what they are looking for in a mate. Part of that also means that I have faith. Faith that somewhere out there is someone that I am right for, someone who will accept me for who I already am, not some unrealistic idea. What gets me through the day despite an impending sense that time is passing too quickly and that my chances become fewer the older I get, is faith. Faith and hope in a divine plan that is beyond my understanding.

Happy Thoughts

Poor Communication & Etiquette

As previously mentioned I currently pay my bills by making sandwiches for people who pay for them. In this time I have made some interesting observations concerning human behavior. First is that people are rude. Second is that demographics are astonishingly telling. I work at two separate locations and the difference in how people treat me from one location to the other is dramatically different. Both are in affluent neighborhoods but the interesting thing is that the people at Location One are pretty friendly. They know some things about me and I usually know some things about them. At Location Two I am generally treated with disdain and have had assumptions made about my intelligence because of the job I do. Yes, I work for minimum wage but that doesn't make me stupid or not worth treating with respect.

At what point did it become okay to talk on your cell phone when ordering food? It is extremely rude and if I had my way I wouldn't serve you until you were done. I had someone come in last week and stand in front of the counter while on the phone and I continued to sweep and do some cleaning until he was done. When the phone call ended he was mad and asked if I was finally ready. I replied by telling him that I am always ready, just waiting for him. The most irritating part is when their sandwich is done or nearly so and they suddenly realize that something about their sandwich is not what they wanted. Usually this is because they were paying attention to something other than me and don't realize that what they told me and what they actually want are not the same thing. Inevitably they are put out and mad at me even though they were the ones not paying attention.

So my place of employ has what can be called membership cards. On these cards you can earn points that add up to free food. These cards can also double as gift cards so I don't always know which it is. I generally assume that if they hand me money and their card that the card is to add point onto and the money is to pay for their order. I can't tell you how many times that people have been upset with me because the card was actually a gift card and I use the money they gave me instead. Is it wrong for me to assume that if you hand me money at the register that it is to pay for your purchase?

Rant over, you may now continue with your day.

It's All About Perception

On this anniversary of significance it occurred to me that it is my perception of the events of ten years ago are pretty self-centered. What I mean by that is everything about it is based on my perception. I know where I was when I heard the news and how I felt. I remember how it affected my life as an adult, but it has never really occurred to me what effect it must have had on people who were teenagers or even younger at the time. My sister mentioned that she was in 9th grade and how everyone turned on the TV's in their classrooms to watch the story as it unfolded. I watched a documentary about one of the two photojournalists who was allowed at Ground Zero and how she tracked down some of the people she spent time with in the days and weeks she spent there. Link is: Portraits from Ground Zero. I would highly recommend it.

Cheers and Jeers

• Cheers to my landlord for taking care of our flooding problem so quickly

• Jeers to the guy who lives near my parents and whom uses his riding lawn mower on a lawn that would be much better served with a manual one. What a waste.
• Cheers to an anonymous benefactor.
• Jeers to assumptions that people make about others.
• Cheers for Diet Coke and chocolate, but not mixed together, that's gross.
• Jeers to adults who still act like children, mainly throwing tantrums when they don't get their way.
• Cheers for Hulu which keeps me entertained with old TV shows.
• Jeers to minimum wage that is not sufficient to pay bills.
• Cheers for the weather getting cooler.

Hug-o-war

"I will not play at tug o' war.
I'd rather play at hug o' war,
Where everyone hugs
Instead of tugs,
Where everyone giggles
And rolls on the rug,
Where everyone kisses,
And everyone grins,
And everyone cuddles,
And everyone wins." 

Shel Silverstein

Lungs?

Tell me this roast beef doesn't look like some kind of body part, specifically lungs.