Venting Explosions Safely

May 21, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

When I had a bout of major depression about 10 years ago, the therapist explained to me a line that I heard on an episode of M*A*S*H, but didn’t give much thought to. Depression is anger turned inward. And I was really good at holding all of my anger, stress, and frustration inside. The key to my recovery (if I didn’t want to go on medication and I didn’t), was to vent my anger, stress, and frustration in a safe, constructive way.

It was long after this, my mother gave me a journal for the now defunct Aunt Kiki Day. That journal became my outlet and it kept my anger, frustration, and stress from building up inside and poisoning me. It was a life saver really and it’s still my go-to way of relieving that kind of tension.

But there are times when I want to vent to an actual person. Like screaming into the void, sometimes I’d rather hear the words of my frustrations rather than just see them written down. Sometimes I’d rather let people know where I’m at and what my deal is.

Sometimes I would like a little support, even if it’s just someone listening.

The problem with this is that I don’t always have someone to vent to. The people in my life don’t always have time for such bullshit. They don’t care, don’t want to listen, and I don’t blame them. They have productive lives of their own. Why take time out to listen to me?

Not to mention that it’s such an established trope that I’m self-sustaining and I don’t NEED any support (that’s a post for a different day) that they don’t really think about me needing that sort of outlet. I’m the one THEY got to when THEY need to vent.

I used to vent on the Internet. Shouting into the void. The problem with that is now with social networking it’s getting harder and harder to vent without the people I’m venting about reading it and then getting offended.

Why not talk to them directly? In a perfect world, that sort of open communication would be nice. However, the reality is that people get offended by that sort of thing. I know from experience. I get pissed at people and the shit they do. I get annoyed with people and the shit they do. I’ve talked to people about the shit they do. And the reality is…nothing changes. In the end, it’s my fault for getting pissed or getting annoyed, they don’t change a damn thing, and the whole argument isn’t productive.

Venting is what I do because I can’t change them. And sometimes (getting more frequent), I can’t vent the way I want to so I can avoid opening a whole can of worms.

Which just adds to my frustration.

It’s a vicious cycle, one that I’m having a tough time escaping, partially because it’s one that’s partially of my own creation. And making the changes I need to make on my end doesn’t completely stop it.

It’s a bitch for sure.

It’s time for me to be a bigger one if things are going to change.

Picture of a Fat Girl

May 14, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ 8 Comments

Hey, look! That’s me! I am that fat girl in the picture. When I usually post pictures on the Internet, it’s usually just a head shot because, come on, I have a gorgeous face. Upper body shots are usually designed to highlight the breasts because I paid for them and they look good in the right bra/shirt combo. I don’t try to hide the fact that I’m fat; I tell people that all the time. I just try to put up the most flattering picture I can because, hey, I’m just as narcissistic as the next person.

I know I’m fat. However, when I look in the mirror I don’t see the same fat girl everyone else sees. It’s like the opposite of those skinny girls that look in the mirror and see a bloated cow. I don’t necessarily see a super skinny chick, but I don’t see a girl as fat as I am. I see someone more voluptuous, with curves in all the right places and some of the wrong ones.

But I’m not out of touch with reality. I know that what I see and what other people see aren’t the same thing. At Casino Night last week, waiting for the elevator, I had two stereotypically beautiful women in evening wear give me a disgusted once over before turning away. I know what they were thinking. How dare a fat girl wear a short, tight, black dress?

Kiki Dress — Even at the end of the night with no shoes, I looked good.

Well, I dared and I looked good.

And that’s the thing, isn’t? I know what I think about myself, but I don’t let it cloud the reality of what society thinks about me.

I make jokes about myself. I make harsh, truthful statements about my weight, too, and it tends to upset the people who know me. That’s because they don’t see me as “fat” because “fat” is bad and they don’t think I’m bad. I’m Christin! I’m Kiki! I’m Chesh! I’m Skitz! I’m good, not bad!

Well, I am fat. It’s an accurate description of my physical state. And I get treated differently (often poorly) because of that physical trait.

Scroll back up and look at that picture. You see those hips? There’s actually not a whole lot of padding to them. I have naturally wide hips. And those shoulders? Not a lot of fat on those, either. I’m built to last, baby. The point I’m making is that I could improve the perceptions that people have about me by losing weight, except I’d never be able to lose enough. I’m not built to be a size zero. I’m not sure I’m even built to be a size 8. I could starve, exercise, nip, tuck, and suck myself as thin as possible and it still wouldn’t be enough to make me acceptable by society’s standards.

I’d also look really gross. I’d have to lose all of my body fat and most of my muscle mass to even get close and even then, my bone structure would render it all for naught.

For the most part, despite society’s best efforts to change my mind in various abusive ways, I’m good with the way I look. I can work with what I’ve got and come up with something pretty damn good looking. Do I want to lose weight? Yeah. I’ve got about 35 pounds I need to get rid of to get back down to where I was. But this weight loss is motivated by feeling better. The reduction of my ass size is just a bonus.

I’m a fat girl. I will never not be fat by society’s standards. Now you all can see exactly how I am fat. So when you read something I write and enjoy it, or retweet me on Twitter, or like a Facebook post, or buy something I’ve written or made, you’re enjoying and supporting a fat girl.

I hope you can handle that.

Some Kind of Luck

May 7, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

So, I had a week of what some might consider bizarre luck. On Sunday, I found a dead body. That Friday, I won two tickets to The Dempster Family Foundation Casino Night, an event I’ve been wanting to go to since it started in 2010. Now, I’ll tell you this. I felt like the time between that Sunday and that Friday was weeks, possibly because these two things are like polar opposites of what you want from your day (unless, of course, you’re looking for a dead body and you can’t stand the Cubs and/or casinos, but let’s not go splitting the hairs of a bald man here and focus).

When I won the tickets I couldn’t believe my luck. I don’t have that kind of luck. No one would call me a lucky person (unless it comes to avoiding dying in fiery auto crashes and in that case, I’m really quite lucky). If there’s a group of people and something good could happen to one of them, I’m not that one. So my natural reaction is disbelief followed by thinking it’s either a dream, a delusion, a joke, or I’m misinterpreting something. After I won the tickets, I told Carrie that I hoped my luck would hold through Casino Night.

But that got me thinking…what does that even mean?

Someone once told me that luck is when preparation meets opportunity. I’ll buy that in terms of good luck. Too often I’m ready, but the opportunity doesn’t present itself. And then when it does present itself, I’m not ready. At least for me, these two points converge only rarely.

But if we go by this definition, then bad luck is either not being prepared or not having an opportunity. So me finding a dead body wasn’t bad luck, like some people said. It was just unfortunate. And therefore, winning the tickets wasn’t a turn around of luck that week. It was just a spot of good luck after an unfortunate incident.

I was presented with the opportunity and I was prepared to say yes (having a little black dress at the ready didn’t hurt).

So this leads me to think about the rest of my life. Preparation is important and I know that. I do try to be prepared. I fail at that a lot, but it’s not for lack of trying. I have very little control over opportunities presenting themselves. I try to make my own opportunities, but like being prepared, I tend to fail. It kills me when I get a shot at something I’m not ready for, particularly because I know it’s not going to come around again.

And so, I am unlucky. I tend to have bad luck.

But those spots of good luck, however rare they might be, keep me working to be prepared for opportunities. Some day, I will turn my luck around.

A Dead Neighbor on Sunday

April 30, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ 2 Comments

The Universe has an interesting sense of humor. Last Sunday, just days after I finished re-reading Deadhouse: Life in a Coroner’s Office and typing up a blog post for it (it’ll be up Friday), I found a dead body.

I took my cat Maudie Moo for a walk (our “walks” involved wandering around the yard together; Maudie likes it when her people are outside). At the end of our yard is a narrow alley and on the other side is the backyard of another house. It’s fenced in with a weird sort of chain link privacy fence that makes it difficult to see into the yard. I got down to the alley and walked down it a few feet, trying to lure my cat into the sun.

There I was, standing in the alley, singing along with Paul Simon on my iPod (“50 Ways to Leave Your Lover”) when I realized there was someone laying in the neighbor’s yard. At first, I was a little embarrassed that I’d been singing along without realizing someone was there. Then I realized the person that was there probably wasn’t in any condition to hear me. He was laying on his back next to his lawn mower, one arm outstretch, his other arm curled up with his hand on his chest. A water bottle stuck out from his sweatshirt pocket. He looked like he was napping, but I knew he probably wasn’t.

I approached the fence and asked him if he was okay. No answer. I got closer and asked again. Still no answer. I got right up to the fence, peering between the weird privacy slats that blocked the view but didn’t. He wasn’t moving. It didn’t look like he was breathing. His skin had a waxy look to it.

I figured he was dead, but I ran to the house and got Dad for a second opinion. He confirmed it (Dad is uncanny with his ability to determine death without taking a pulse; 25 years as a cop helped develop that skill) and called it in. I then sat back and watched as first police officers, fire rescue, and paramedics, then the coroner, dealt with the body, my dad holding court with all of them just as he had when he was still working.

Meanwhile, I was left to explain to the neighbors (and friends of the neighbors who were on vacation, but heard the call on the police scanner) what had happened. Near as we can figure, he’d been out mowing that morning between 10 and noon. Dad saw the mower out, but didn’t see him, which he didn’t think much of at the time. I found the body sometime later, around 4:30. Dad said the mower was in a different position than when he last saw it, so he probably came back out, maybe started the mower again, maybe even mowed some, and then collapsed. He’d been laying there for at least four to six hours. Rigor was already starting to set in, so he wasn’t long for the world after he collapsed. There probably wasn’t anything that could have been done for him. Speculation is that it was most likely a heart attack, but he’d been taken to the hospital last week for his blood sugar, so maybe that was the deciding factor. I’m not sure.

Carrie felt bad that the man collapsed and died in his backyard and no one noticed for several hours, but really, I think it was a blessing. He was a quiet man, not exactly social, though very nice when he did speak. If he’d died in his house, it might have been days (or longer) before anyone found him. I think that would have been worse. And really, it was a nice day to die in the yard. A little chilly and breezy, but sunny. Not much in the way of flies, if you want to get scientific about it.

People kept asking me if I was okay since I was the one that found the body, which one hand I found odd, but on the other hand, I appreciated. It was nice of them to ask, but I couldn’t understand why they thought I’d be upset. I didn’t know the neighbor very well. And as my personal beliefs dictate, the soul or spirit of the man was long gone by the time I found his corpse. That’s all it was. A corpse. Out of the ordinary, sure, but not traumatic.

This isn’t to say I didn’t feel bad. I did. It’s a shame. But I guess I’m just one of those people that doesn’t fall apart at the sight of a dead body. I suppose, with reading all of those books about death and decomposition, it makes sense.

However, I’m not immune to those weird human thoughts when confronted with death on a back lawn. At the time I’d been sick for over a week and I was still dealing with a cough. While standing at the fence, waiting for the circus to arrive, I kept coughing and every time I did, I thought it would get the dead man’s attention. And then later, a slight case of embarrassment set in when I was recounting the story to someone because I’d realized that I’d asked a dead man if he was all right. Of course, I wasn’t certain he was dead at the time, but still I felt a little silly admitting to people that I’d tried to start a conversation with a corpse.

And honestly, I felt less awkward trying to talk to a dead man than I did trying to talk to the living neighbors.

That’s because death is more natural than my socialization skills.

Active Sleeper

April 23, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ 1 Comment

Tile mosaic in sidewalk on Broad Street, Mid-C... — Tile mosaic in sidewalk on Broad Street, Mid-City New Orleans. "Sand. For Restful Sleep". Remainder of the long gone Crescent City Bed Company factory which was formerly at this location. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I’m an active sleeper.

What does that mean?

It means that when I go to sleep there’s no guarantee that all of me goes to sleep. There’s a spot in my brain that doesn’t always sleep and it has the ability to keep my body awake without the rest of my sleeping brain knowing it. As such, I’ve done some weird things in my sleep.

I’ve always known I was a talker. My mother once came in to yell at my sister and I for talking when we should have been sleeping only to find out that we were both talking in our sleep. Mom said it sounded like we were having a conversation but when she really listened, we were talking about two completely different things.

I had a couple of sleepwalking incidents as a kid, but nothing serious. For the most part I keep my activity contained to my own bed.

That I know of.

My roommate Carrie once walked by room on her way to the bathroom and heard me calling her name. She stopped and responded. I apparently asked her about something, but she couldn’t understand it. She said yes anyway and said that I told her okay and then she heard me get back in bed. I sounded like I was right on the other side of the door. I have no memory of any of it.

I’ve woken up sitting up in bed unsure of how long I’ve been sleeping that way. I’ve woken up completely turned around in bed with my pillow and head in the open window. I’ve woken myself up screaming, yelling, gesturing, laughing, and spitting in my sleep.

I once dreamed that someone punched me in the nose and woke up to my own fist hitting me, resulting in a nosebleed.

It’s always interesting when I close my eyes.

There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason or pattern that I can discern. I’ll go through a quiet period and then one night wake up sleeping half on my bed or wake up one morning with the sheets off the bed, but the blankets intact.

It’s a little disturbing sometimes. Obviously, punching yourself in the face in your sleep is bound to be disturbing. But the freakiest thing for me (so far) has been waking up to find that I had been sleeping sitting up. I tend to wake up a little bit when I roll over or otherwise move, so to find that I’m sitting up and have no memory of moving into that position is really bizarre. When I have an active sleeping period, I wait for that particular incident to happen again.

Being an active sleeper, it makes me wonder what will happen should I ever acquire a human to sleep with full-time. I already refuse to sleep with my cats, not because I’m active sleeper, but because I’m convinced there’s no bed big enough for me and a cat and I currently sleep in a twin.

But I’m open to sleeping with someone else and I wonder how that will work out during active periods. Will they stop because I’ll subconsciously know that there’s someone in the bed with me? Or will we be able to find a bed big enough to accommodate those active periods? Or will I have to sleep on the couch?

Those are questions that I won’t be able to answer until I’m actually put in the situation, so there’s no sense in worrying about it now. I’m in no immediate danger and neither is anyone else.

Until then, I’ll go to sleep wondering how I’m going to wake up in the morning.

Playing What If

April 16, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

As should be evident if you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, I didn’t take the traditional, expected life path. Instead, I veered off into the woods, sometimes cutting my own path, sometimes following one that I found.

Naturally, walking a road like this in the midst of many friends took the paved freeway (which is in no way an insult; they did it their ways and I’m doing it mine and together we fight crime, or something), I think about what if. I wonder if my family and friends ever think about what if when it comes to my life. I have a sneaking suspicion they have more regrets about my existence than I do.

But let’s play what if for a second, shall we?

What if I went to proper college right out of high school? What if I’d gone to another state to study? Or even stayed in IL, but lived on campus. What would I have studied? What degree would I have ended up with? Would I have ended up with a degree? Would I have stayed all four years? Would I have gone for a Masters? A PhD?

What if I had gotten married? Had kids? Would I still live in town? Would my hubby and I have moved to bigger cities looking for prosperity? How many kids would I have by now? Would I be a working mom? Would even still be married? Would I be divorced? Would I be looking for husband number two? Married to husband number two? Would I have step-kids? Would my kids have half-siblings? Or would I be struggling to make it alone as a single mom, the wounds from my divorce too deep to heal?

What if I had moved out at 18? At 21? Would I be stuck in some job I hate trying to make ends meet so I don’t have to move back home? Would I be putting up with being miserable for the sake of some notion of independence? Would I be forfeiting my dreams to be considered an adult?

What if I took the freeway of life? What if I did all of the things most other people do? Would I be here now? Would I be writing? Would I be blogging? Would I be published? Would I be hustling? Would I be wondering how to make the ends meet? Would I be annoyed by a rejection letter with my name misspelled? Would I be a best-selling novelist? Or would I have never written another word because I was too busy being a grown-up?

Like the Tootsie Pop, the world may never know.

That Hustle

April 9, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

About 7 months ago, I chose to become a freelancer of sorts. I decided to earn my money through odd jobs and through selling jewelry, t-shirts, and a self-published book, all in the pursuit of allowing myself more time to write.

I think of it as being on the hustle. I’m hustling to get my money. And hustling ain’t easy.

If I think about it, I’ve been hustling most of my life. That’s how I made a lot of my money during junior high and high school. I worked in my mom’s daycare for twenty bucks a week. I worked in my cousin’s daycare for seventy-five bucks a week. I cleared junk off of lots for five bucks an hour. I saved what lunch money I didn’t spend. I collected change. I babysat. Hustling.

I don’t hustle as much when I’ve got a “real” job, aka, steady, official paycheck. But I still look for ways to make a little extra money. It’s like a habit I can’t break. Always hustling, trying to get my dime.

Like I said, the hustle isn’t always easy. I made twelve bucks in sales last month. That’s it. I scrapped up about thirty bucks doing what I call “spare change work”, which is quite literally doing little things for change. On a good day, I’d make four bucks. Not a lot, but it’s four bucks I didn’t have and four bucks I needed because I only sold a couple of things on Etsy and didn’t sell anything on eBay.

Tough luck.

Those bad months can be killers. I had two in a row, only selling fourteen dollars worth of stuff in February. That’s rough. The tax return kept me afloat during that time, but it would have been nice to get ahead, you know? That’s how I look at it. Get the money for the bills this month, I can start working on next month. The more time I have, the more likely it is that I’ll make my bills. There is no surplus. It’s all about thinking ahead and paying the bills.

I live poor on the hustle. I couldn’t do this if I had “real” bills, I know that. I’d be forced to work a job I hate to make ends meet. That idea has never appealed to me and I’ve done what I can to avoid it. This doesn’t mean I don’t like working a “real” job. I like the regular paycheck, for sure. I like having co-workers, most of the time. In fact, I’m looking for a part-time gig right now because that regular paycheck would be a nice boost and frankly, I need to get the hell out of this house a little more.

But I would still be hustling. I’d still be selling on Etsy and eBay and Spreadshirt and Amazon and Lulu and Nook. I’d still be looking for odd jobs and taking extra gigs. I’d still be trying to sell my short stories.

I can’t help it.

The hustle is in my blood.

The Music In My Head

April 2, 2012January 22, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

It’s not secret that I love music. I listen to it a lot. I use it as a buffer between me and the outside world, usually when I’m writing. I listen to it when I make dinner and when I go out with my cats, showing no shame as I sing (and sometimes dance) along with my iPod. I’ve gotten into the habit of watching music videos on YouTube before I go to sleep at night.

So it should be no surprise that I get songs stuck in my head on a regular basis.

Most of the time it makes perfect sense. For example, I’ve been on an Ok Go kick lately, so it’s no surprise that their songs are playing on a kind of loop in my head, though it’s fun to go to sleep with “End Love” playing in my brain and wake up with “A Million Ways” there instead.

Even though I love their music (obviously, or I wouldn’t be listening to so much of it), sometimes having one song stuck in my brain gets tedious. I love “Needing/Getting”, but it turns into an itch that can’t be satisfied when it’s playing on loop in my brain for six days.

That’s the thing with my brain. It’s got a mean streak.

I find most of Lady Gaga’s music, particularly from her first album, to be pretty good. However, I don’t like to listen to most of her songs because they’re earworms. They get into my brain and proceed to melt important neurons and synapses. Now, if my brain can take a song that I like and wash, rinse, repeat it for six days, imagine how tiring it is to have every song I listen to clashing against “Bad Romance” for a week and a half. Yeah, that really happened.

And do you think my brain spares me from songs I don’t like? No, don’t be silly. It’s unfortunate, but not unheard of for “We Found Love” by Rhianna or “Moves Like Jagger” to randomly pop in my head off and on for two weeks like some kind of cruel torture technique (for the record, I don’t think these songs are bad as I’m not qualified to make such judgments; I just don’t care for them).

I try to influence the songs that get stuck in the crevices of my mind, but sometimes they come to me randomly. I’ve had songs that I haven’t heard in literally years just appear in my mind. Of course, when that happens, I’m compelled to seek them out to listen to them in their entirety. “Weapon of Choice”, which I posted last Friday, is a good example of that. That just happened. I was having a bad day and suddenly, Fatboy Slim was there. Who knew?

My brain did, that’s who. Sometimes, it comes through with an appropriate musical reaction.

But usually I’m singing snippets of songs for days on end.

And that’s okay, too.

Hey, Stupidhead!

March 26, 2012January 21, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

In my early 20’s I ran around with a group of mostly guys that worked the pro wrestling indy scene in Chicago. One of the guys had a fun nickname for me. He called me Stupidhead. It was a childish thing, not meant to be insulting. It was great fun, particularly when he shouted it across crowded establishments. The odd silence that followed it was always good for a laugh.

Now, I know I’m not stupid, but I have to admit that I live up to that nickname a little more often and a little bit better than I’d like.

Mistakes happen. I don’t like to make them, but I do. However, it’s the stupid mistakes that really get to me, the ones that make me go, “Why did I do THAT?”

And sometimes it feels like I make more than my fair share.

I am my own worst enemy. Even if there are other factors at play, the blame lays on my own shoulders for not doing everything I could, everything I SHOULD, to prevent these mistakes from happening. It comes down to not following up or reading the fine print. I KNOW better.

I made two such mistakes in the same week. Talk about banging my head against a wall. Both mistakes were my fault. One was not following up and paying attention. I should have read the fine print. It was one of those things that I let go because I figured it’d be okay and that attitude got me snake bit. The other mistake was a product of not thinking. Period. I forgot to consider a big piece of important information when making a decision and as such, it could cost me in the long run.

Of the two mistakes, the first one was the most immediately costly and the one I’m working to rectify right now. The other one might actually not pan out to mean much in the end. There are other variables out of my control that will contribute to the outcome of that decision. The point is that neither are mistakes that I should have made had I been thinking and paying my due diligence.

Why am I being vague about these two mistakes? Because I’m embarrassed to have made them. Talking about them in general terms is as detailed as the burn of shame will allow.

I wonder why I do these things. I’m supposedly intelligent person, but I’ve made some dumb decisions in my life. Blatantly dumb. Now, I don’t count anything before the age of twenty-five because I’ve got the great biological defense of my brain not being fully formed yet. However, that defense doesn’t hold up now that I’m past thirty and I’ve got the advantage of not only a fully formed brain, but also experience on my side.

Part of my problem I know is laziness. I don’t want to deal with it. I don’t want to follow up or read that fine print or dig a little deeper. So I just let it ride and hope it turns out okay, which is unbelievably dumb of me as my life is a perfect example of what happens when I give the Universe a choice for things to go okay or to not okay. Unless my life is on the line, the Universe tends to prefer things go pear-shaped for me than not.

Part of my problem is forgetfulness. I used to have a great memory. Now it’s suspect at best. I forget to follow up on things. I forget key pieces of information when making decisions even if they are in some way a key reason why I’m making the decision in the first place. It’s like I get focused on an angle of a picture and it’s only until I look away and look back that I see the huge barn that’s supposed to be the focal point.

It’s a frustrating thing to be dumb in this particular way. Bad decisions made with all available information I can live with. I paid my money, I takes my chances.

Sloppy thinking that leads to glaring mistakes are a little harder for me to swallow.

I really need to stop doing that.

Words to Live By

March 19, 2012January 21, 2016 ~ Kiki Writes ~ 1 Comment

I like quotes. Real people, fictional people, doesn’t matter. I like a good, strong quote. I like a quote you can apply to your life. I’ve got my share of those. Here are a few of my favorite ones.

“Simple respect. I expect nothing more and I’ll accept nothing less.” -Margaret Houlihan, M*A*S*H

It’s the baseline for my life. I’m big on respect. I give basic level respect and I expect to get at least that in return. As I get to know you, the respect increases, but sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes I keep in on that basic “You and I are both humans and I was raised with manners” level. And sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I decide you don’t deserve my respect, and I’m not going to give it to you. Period. End of story. I won’t treat you badly or disrespect you (unless I’m forced into that position); I just won’t deal with you at all. If you’re not worth my respect, then you’re not worth my time.

Likewise, I expect basic respect and I won’t take anything less. I won’t let you disrespect me. I won’t settle for it. I won’t stand for it. I got that sort of treatment more often than I should have when I worked in retail and I tell you what, I didn’t get paid enough to pretend it wasn’t a big deal. Customers were corrected, as nicely as possible at first, of course. Because I’m working a job that YOU think is lowly doesn’t mean you get to treat me that way. You will treat me with common courtesy and basic respect. Period. It’s up to me to earn anything more.

“My guts are not here for you to love.” -Margaret Houlihan, M*A*S*H

Another line that I apply to my general existence. You don’t have to like me. I wasn’t born for you to like me. I’m here for my own purpose and I act on my own reasons and I make my own decisions and you don’t have to like any of that. I’m not here to make you happy. I’m here to live my life and do my time and make the most out of what I’ve got and do it in my own way and if that doesn’t satisfy you, Scooter, then I don’t know what to tell you. Get used to disappointment, I suppose.

“I cannot sit here waiting for you to have an epiphany. I am losing the will to live.” –Radek Zelenka, Stargate: Atlantis

I use this as a reminder because I have a tendency to do a lot of sitting and thinking and don’t always follow through on the action part. Problems are typically solved through action and granted, it’s good to attempt a solution after thinking one up, but there comes a point when you can only do so much thinking and then the doing has to start. I can’t sit around and wait for a better idea or a better option. I’ve got to run with what I’ve got and risk failure.

“Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” -Samuel Beckett

If there was every a quote for writing, this is it. If there was ever a quote for LIFE, this is it. It does me no good to go through life afraid of failing and as a perfectionist, that’s sometimes difficult for me to grasp. This quote reminds me that failure is part of life and can be the best teacher.

“The power is inside you. Nobody can give it to you. Nobody can take it away. Now go play the harp.” Michael Nesmith, The Monkees

The ultimate self-esteem boost. I don’t need anyone’s permission to be great. I don’t need anyone’s approval to be great. I can be great if I want to be and no one can stop me. In the end, I’m the only one that rules over myself. No one else.

“They can’t yank a novelist like they can a pitcher. A novelist has to go the full nine even if it kills him.” -Ernest Hemingway

A writing reminder that can also be applied to life with a little revision. I’m in it to win it, baby. I’ve to be ready to throw a complete game every time I step on the mound. (And sometimes after a particularly rough writing jag, I feel like I just threw nine innings, too.)

“Hope for the best. Expect the worst. Life’s a play. We’re all unrehearsed.” -Mel Brooks

In the end, we’re all just muddling through the best we can. Might as well make the best of it.