restless

“I just can’t stand bein’ alone…
gonna have to change that someday.
there’s a restless feelin’ in my bones and I know
that at times, it just won’t go away…”
-alison krauss & union station

earlier I read duchess’ blog — these people I know only through the 100 hour board, I read their blogs sometimes because novel concept mentions them frequently, and links to them — and a few days ago she brought up a lot of the same feelings I’ve had lately. and novel made a comment that said the magic word…restless. I feel lonely and restless. I just want to go somewhere, anywhere, to have something different. probably that’s part of why I bought the car; not because I want to drive far, but because it’s a change. it sets one day apart from another.

I watched groundhog day tonight. I suppose that should sort of inspire me, that if I’m having to live through days that are all the same, I ought to be improving myself. acquiring new skills. becoming the person I want to be. well, of course — that’s what life is, whether every day is exciting or blah. but it feels like I can’t change. like I need outside change before I can have inside change. I’ve never understood this part of my thinking process — even when I know an idea is irrational, like the idea that I need outside change before inside, I still believe it. listen to this: “mika, there’s plenty of proof that you can change the way you are without changing the way everything else is.” logic. and yet here’s my mental response: “but, mika, you can’t. other people can. maybe you could in the past. but right now, it ain’t gonna work.”

there’s also the overarching problem. I don’t believe in my pirate captain. or in my cowboy, or my prince, or even my best friend. it’s too much to expect, and I won’t lower my expectations. so, at least temporarily, I’ve accepted my seemingly inevitable fate as miss mika forever. never mrs. somebody. at work the question has been brought up a lot recently, “are you going to be staying around here for a while?” the implication is that I might get married

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sorry for the cutoff. twenty minutes later I wrapped up the entry and clicked “publish post,” at which point I got a message about an internal error. I tried going back but the rest of the blog had been lost somewhere in cyberspace, and I have no desire to try rewriting it. wasn’t really interesting, anyway, just rambling more about marriage and blah blah blah blah blah my water? the only interesting thing was an update about my new car, and the surrounding drama. the truth is that there is no surrounding drama. my dad hasn’t said anything about the car, except to tell my mom we needed to call our insurance company to get it covered, and my mom offered to go pick up my old car from antioch tomorrow. perhaps they’re going to let me learn from this “mistake,” if it turns out to be such. hmm. we’ll see.

crime and punishment

I bought it. the parents are not happy. well, my mom is the only one home right now. “I wish you had talked to us about this first,” she said. “the engine in your old car has just been fixed. we know it’s good.” I reminded her that she said I was welcome to sell that car. “yeah, well, I thought you would discuss it first,” was her reply.

yeah, well…I wish they had discussed my car with me first, too. remember that one time, when the car died, and it cost a lot of money to fix? I’m more than happy to concede that having the car fixed means it can be sold, which is good. but the whole not asking me thing. it just doesn’t sit well with me. I’ve had some long talks with mick sr recently, and I absolutely am not letting him “replace” my parents in any way, nor is he trying to undermine their authority, but I think I ought to be able to make big decisions when I feel the need to. or maybe even when I simply want to. of course some of them will be mistakes. I need to make mistakes, though. I wouldn’t learn enough if I did everything right. (I know because I used to do everything right, and it got boring.) anyhow, whether for better or worse, I wanted this to be a choice I made all on my own. so maybe I don’t know all there is to know about cars. but…maybe neither does my dad. maybe I paid close attention last time he and I were shopping for a car, and tried to follow that example this time. maybe it isn’t the end of the world that I went out and did something without having my hand held, or the decision made for me.

the problem in all of this is that if I say I was trying to be independent and more grownup, my parents will turn it around to tell me that I acted like an immature teenager. but I don’t think I did. well, alright, I purposely did not seek their counsel on this car thing, but maybe right now in my life that was something I needed to do. to be just mika, making a choice, and having the experience of being right or wrong about it. it seems like there’s nothing else to experience lately, except work…which doesn’t count for a whole lot, in the grand scheme of things.

this morning before work I checked my email, and there was a note from ryan informing me that he’s joined the blog world. I don’t know why yet, but after reading his blog entry I had a smile on my face, and though not much went right today, I feel happier. like things will eventually go right. (the “discussion” later tonight may be a huge setback in that timetable, but we’ll see.)

I got a call from aubrey yesterday — she’ll be living in sacramento for part of the summer! selling alarm systems, of course. (of course.) it will be her and about 20 guys. hopefully she brings a cowboy or two along. interestingly enough, they’ll be here in mid-june, right about when jarom comes home. support for mika. very helpful.

my headaches have started up again. since saturday. don’t know why.

in the other room I can hear my brother asking my mom something…the question isn’t important, it’s her tone when she answers. exponential irritation. definitely from the car. man oh man. can they take the car away, I wonder? it’s in my name; I paid for it; they’ll have to drive me around in the meantime. would punishment even work? what is there to take away from me? and do I deserve punishment? what exactly is my crime — making a (somewhat impulsive) choice?

when mick jr told me the other day about the company going downhill very, very quickly, I didn’t feel as upset as maybe I should have. it seems to open more possibilities. this job is what keeps me in fairfield. nothing else. I could go anywhere. of course that would mean paying rent, or finding someone to mooch off of, plus buying food, or finding someone to mooch off of. but it could be done. where do you think I should go?

aha…my dad is getting up from his nap now. this is the absolute worst time to tell him about the car, yet guess what my mom is doing. telling him about the car. fabulous.

jinxed

gabriel...so healthy, once...

yesterday I ran out for lunch about 1. grabbed some mcdonald’s and had just backed out of my parking spot when the oil light came on. I live in fear of that light, especially since I haven’t put oil in since mid-january (my bad). I’m trying to think fast and not panic when all of a sudden the engine turns off, and the brakes, steering wheel, and ignition lock up. holy hannah, I say out loud, this is very, very bad. turned the steering wheel a tiny bit before it froze, allowing me to be not quite in the middle of the parking lot, and put it in park. mick sr came and rescued me — brought me oil and tried to fix the problem, with minimal rebuking — but said it was beyond his power to heal, in a manner of speaking. on the drive back to the office he told me I’d need to have the car towed, and then he jinxed me.

not intentionally, of course. but jinxed nonetheless. “I hope it isn’t your timing belt,” he said.

got a call from the repair shop today. yep, it’s my timing belt. and it will cost, as a bottom estimate, $650-700 to get it fixed. my parents are going out of town tomorrow, and won’t be back until thursday night…my car will be ready tomorrow afternoon if all goes well, and thursday afternoon if all goes not well. which means though I can get my mom to drive me to work tomorrow, I’ll need to find a ride home, and possibly a ride to and from work on thursday. blah. I have no desire to spend money on this right now, but it’s not as if I have a choice, is it?

I will be so glad to get away this weekend.

so today we took pictures at work for our new marketing such-and-such. liz and daryll asked us yesterday if we’d adhere to a certain dress code for the pictures, which is fine by me. the whole thing only lasted about 15 minutes or so, and it was a nice break for everyone. except that when I finally got a chance to take my lunch, I’d had two or three bites of my delicious sandwich when someone told me, “we’re ready to meet now if you can join us in the conference room.” thinking this would be a short meeting (ha), I left my food on the table in the break room and went into the conference room. there we sat for half an hour looking at the pictures, laughing about so-and-so’s expression in this one, commenting on the lighting in that one, discussing options for a new round of pictures. what we liked and didn’t like. what kind of an image we wanted to give to the potential clients.

that took 12 minutes. then we spent 13 minutes talking about color schemes for everyone to wear the next time we do pictures. and 5 minutes when liz, daryll and soli started telling all the other people about the us attorney’s office clearance security packet we’ve been filling out (we = the people who’ve been asked to do that job). I cleared my throat. “liz, are we about done here?” suddenly she remembered we were in fact done discussing the pictures. “alright everybody, let’s meet up again in the morning, and each of you bring a color suggestions for shirts, ok? thanks!”

now, half an hour (actually, 25 minutes) talking about this topic is small fries compared to corporations that spend months researching customer preferences, marketing tactics, etc. however — those are corporations that can afford a separate commmittee for said actions. we have no more than 30 employees, and because liz and daryll “wanted our opinions,” they completely stopped all processes for half an hour. I have deadlines, y’know? I realize that the people in production are just plodding through day after day, doing whatever their manager tells them to do and enjoying the break they get when we have a meeting. but I’ve got a long list of things to do, too many things to finish before I leave this weekend. and no time to waste listening to people talk about “earthy tones” and what color khakis the guys should wear (clay or camel?). aaaaaaahhhh!!!

and no mail still. wouldn’t mind a letter from jarom. life goes on, though.

ryan seems to be having a worse day than I am, but he couldn’t point to anything bad actually happening — more like just being in a bad mood. that’s always worse to me than having things go wrong. pobreryan.