maybe

maybe there's a light --finally-- at the end of this tunnel.  last night i turned in my final assignment for my statistics class.  right now i'm sitting at a 82.88%, pulled up from a 78.3% three weeks ago.  there's still last week's grades and group project scores not entered, so i'm not out of the woods yet. but at least the oppressive stress and resulting physical depression are lifting.

ps. thost group projects?  yeah, did both of them myself.  turns out this most recent one last week is because, of all my group members, i was the only one left. everyone else had dropped out.

what's in a name

i was kinda tempted the other day to change this blog's name to "confessions of a raving bitch," but that's already taken, sadly.

i'm having one of those "knock shit over left and right all over the damn house" days.  right after yesterday discovering that i've been working on the wrong chapter all week for my statistics class, so i've done absolutely FUCKINGZERO work that i actually should have been doing.  and, of course, since it takes me all seven days of the week to barely squeak by with my homework, classwork, and tests by the skin of my teeth anyway, realizing that i have three days to do all that was too much. i almost submitted drop-out forms right there.

i'm so tired of feeling like such a failure of life itself. pretty much from the day morning sickness hit when i was pregnant with Little Owl, i've been falling short left and right. she's 18 mos now; that's a lot of falling short.

when my financial aid check finally came in, i bought a juicer and a whole ton of dr. schultze's products to begin the huge detox project i've been needing. by day 2, i felt a little better. today's day 3, and the radioactive cloud that was fogging up my brain is gone. numbers aren't twisting themselves around to look like other numbers as often (which is how i screwed myself into doing totally wrong homework in the first place), letters sometimes actually make sense when i read them, i have some energy to go out and run an errand or two, and yesterday i haven't needed (like desperately needed) a nap despite waking up three hours earlier than usual.

and last night i listened to my holosync soundtrack for the first time in over two years, fell asleep with absolutely no trouble, and actually relaxed a bit. my school nightmare isn't crippling like it was last night. it's still overwhelming and i don't feel confident that i'll be able to do anything at all, but at least i don't want to curl up into a ball, cry my eyeballs out, and completely give up. how come no one ever told me that trying to get my damn degree was going to make me feel like worthless shit every damn day?

i never even re-enrolled because i wanted to. i did it because i was tired of being the stupid, pointless member of the family. i did it because i was tired of, "you're so smart, why didn't you ever do anything with it?" i did it so i could get a stupidass piece of paper to show that i'm something. and because not having any degree at all meant that i was trapped forever in the most menial, meaningless, lowest-paying and rewardless jobs for the rest of my life, which was just another way of saying that i am without merit or worth without a degree, and i was tired of it.

but seriously, fucking seriously, all i want to do is finish my fucking novels and publish them. and there's no time left over after taking care of: homework, Little Owl, the house, and getting just enough sleep to keep me running. and believe me, i trim sleep around the edges so much every so often i realize that i've whittled it to nothing and need a few days of dear-God-please-i'm-just-human, curl-up-and-wish-the-ground-would-swallow-me-up sleep. then it's back to scrambling desperately trying to only fall a little short.

no time for living.

the one about hiroshima

yeah, that was me about a week and a half ago.

this class is killing me.

i called it my "emotional hiroshima." of course, this pic was perfect because --if you're so inclined-- you can see the clown face right in the mushroom cloud itself.

such absurdity in the face of something we take so seriously. that's probably how i should be looking at it. my life won't end if i fail this class.  sure, i'll most likely be kicked out of school because of my crappy GPA, which means i'll be stuck with student loans and nothing to show for it, still amounting to nothing but a high school diploma in a family with nothing but multi-degree holders. hell, my baby sister's in her Master's program right now. and sure, it'll do a number on my self-image because let's face it, it's not like i'm really all that confident right now or feeling like i amount to anything worth counting. so far, i'm everything my parents drilled into me was beneath me. so maybe i'm pinning way too much on this class and my successful completing of it.

on the other hand, maybe i'm not?

mushroom cloud. bozo's face. sure, there might be nuclear winter, but at least the cloud's laughing, right?

[insert clever title here]

looking back on my entries the last few months...i was hit by a mack truck, wasn't i? march was bad, april was worse, may kicked me in the teeth, and here it is june and it's just like in the cartoons where i'm wobbly on my feet and dizzy with little tweeting birds flying around my head. 

finals were last night.  oi vey, don't ask me about finals. 

the job is going really well. i was in So.Cal last week for training, and for all intents and purposes it was a fantastic success. now all that material that's been piling up in my room that i've been ignoring is getting sorted, and i get to start cramming for State exams now. oh fun. 

i remember being little and going to the beach with my bio-family in So.Cal. there was this one summer when i decided i was going to be daring, and swim out past where i could see the bottom. out where the big kids were. and i did. and it was a blast! it was kinda like swimming in the most ginormous swimming pool in the world. 

then this wave came and hammered me all the way down to the sand, and i didn't know which way was up, and the current dragged me tumbling and floundering along the bottom. i hit my head on a rock, and cut my hand on a jagged shell. i tumbled along the bottom forever, it seemed. i ran out of breath, and oh gods, i can remember the panic as i realized i was still under water and couldn't breathe. my body fought for air, and i was flailing for anything to hold onto. i tumbled over and over, and there was no sense of direction. water shot up my nose and down my throat. i was breathing, but it wasn't really working. belatedly i realized i'd sucked down a mouthful of seawater. 

finally i bobbed to the surface. i remember this rattling breath that sounded like when you turn a water bottle upside down and give it a good squeeze...then let go and let the air back in, and you get that sucking, burbling, bubbling glug-glug sound. that's kinda how it was. then i was sinking back down and coughing and barfing up salt water, and it was pouring out of my mouth and nose, and eyeballs and ears it seemed, too. and just as i was in the middle of my first painful rasp of fresh air, another wave pounded down upon me, straight down on my head, and my face slammed back into the sandy bottom and i saw blood in the water, and i tumbled over and over, and over and over. 

it finally fizzled out, dragging me as if i were a dented tin can tied with twine to a stray dog's tail, to shallower waters. i stood up, blood down my face and dripping into the water, lungs stinging and throbbing, coughing water up my nose, head pounding, dizzy, and tears streaming from my eyes. no one came at me and said, "oh god, are you all right?" or anything. i don't think anyone saw. i dragged myself out of the water, went to get my towel, and didn't go back into the sea for about sixteen years. 

that's kind of how it felt these last couple of months. dragged along the bottom, tumbling, can't get a breath. now i'm back in shallow(er) waters, reeling, coughing up sea water. all i want is to find my towel, lie down in the warm sun, and dry off. maybe make a sand castle, or go roller skating on the board walk. 

delena: college student extraordinaire

i just got back from a meeting with my academic advisor. it was so exciting! in my placement testing, i had perfect scores in the Reading and Writing portions. what i learned is that i could actually test out of the writing prerequisites for my major.

killer! i was quite proud of myself, to be honest. but to be entirely truthful, the test was so out-of-mind easy...

but what an eye-opener! faires and vendors in the College Center building, flyers everywhere offering everything imaginable: trips, tutoring, jobs, workshops, performances, The Vagina Monologues... i don't remember my last sojourn into college being so excitingly bombastic, but i'm sure it had to be.

i sent *t* a text while there:
me: omfg, school is so much fun! :)
*t*: i thought u didn't start yet
me: i didn't. i just had my academic advisory mtg. but omg! and flyers everywhere, programs, workstudy... So much awesomeness!
*t*: i didnt realize how xciting that could b
me: it is! so many groups and programs offering help, and jobs, and getting to know ppl, and just a whole new adventure! it's hella thrilling. :)

maybe it's just me. there are so many more opportunities i see here now, and it's all being offered to me! just like that! i can't wait to finally jump in feet first as a student, to really immerse myself into all this wonderful collegiate atmosphere, and to really challenge myself and see what i'm capable of.

my first goal is an A average. that'll be easy to begin and maintain, especially in the beginning. since i'm paying for my own tuition, i don't think i'll be able to take more than two classes this semester, maximum. considering it's 70$ per unit, prolly more like just one class...

*disappointed sigh* but on the bright side, i'm a college student again!

...yeah, this is definitely part of my Funk.

the finer points of a good edumacation

so exactly one week ago, i took the plunge and applied for enrollment at Portland Community College, then sweated for two days while i wondered if i had done so early enough to qualify for Spring semester. turns out i had...plenty of time.

so now, in a few hours, i'll head to the nearest campus (there are three) to take my entrance exams. i'm quite excited, actually. i changed my major from English Literature and Shakespeare to...Archetypal Psychology.

quite a bit of a turn, eh?

and, funny enough, my other two bio-sisters are both psych majors. funny, isn't it? although i wonder, given our shared upbringing, just how funny-peculiar or funny-ha-ha it is. *k* wanted to be a social worker, last i heard. and *t* wants to go into sex therapy. both very active in the helping of people overcome adversity. me, i want to study mythology and archetypes, and see how they work with our modern difficulties.

more or less what i sometimes do here at iGoddess...only i'll have a Ph.D. after my name. which means really smart people who really only matter to other smart, silly, stuffy people will acknowledge what i've done for years is "real" and "certified."

kind of silly, i know. on the other hand, it's damned interesting and i know i'll be able to help a lot of people who will be ready for what i have to bring to them. it's already become obvious that i'll only put my gifts and education to use for people of a certain caliber who are ready for it.

but first...entrance exams. tomorrow, the world!