Jitters

I have this really uncomfortable feeling right now... like I can't unwind.

I slept at my friend's house last night. Let's call her Kimberly. So Kimberly and I have been sort of like each other's significant other lately, considering we don't have boyfriends to plug into that void. It's really nice though. I go over, we roll as fast as possible, promise not to eat, smoke, talk for hours about our issues until we realise that we are fucking hungry and then we eat bagels with cream cheese and strawberry jam and cry the next morning.

I just wrote and rewrote a couple of things. I just don't know where to start to drain this tension out of my body and spirit. I am sorry if this is boring for you, this is sort of a selfish post in its probable incoherence. 

I have music on right now, and it is supposed to be calming, but I think I need quiet. And I think I need to laugh. 

Everything is just so serious right now. This morning I went to my old university to sell my teacher a used book, and the money I got from that is the only money I will have for a week. This is bad news. I never thought that things would get this drastic. Luckily I have enough groceries for the next couple of days, and parents whom will probably loan me a bit of money until I get back on my feet.

I am starting to feel worn down by all of my decisions. I have been telling myself that everything I have decided to do in the last few months have been growing experiences and character-building changes. I started university in Music and now have decided to change programs to Journalism, starting in September. And right before I started university I quit my stable job at the department store for a higher-paying part-time sales job where I travel to different stores. After the first week of school, I realised I was sick of traveling 3 hours a day and moved from the suburbs to Montreal, where I would spend 40 minutes a day traveling instead. In order to move out, I got a student loan of 5000$, which I thought would last me a year. Fat chance. With the cost of rent and school and vegetables, it is finished in half that time. To help pay for the groceries I got a second part time job at a restaurant, which went bankrupt a month after I started. At that restaurant I met Australia Boy, a rocker-stoner-chill chef who ended up showing me to the apartment he lived in with Tara, and they were looking for roommate number 3. So I filled the slot, and my instant-crush on Australia Boy materialised into a full-fledged crush by spending time together on the couch jamming and smoking weed together. When the restaurant went bankrupt, Australia Boy lost a lot of money, and so our growing relationship with each other was severed when he moved in with his girlfriend. Right before he left, I wrote him a semi-love note telling him I liked him and that I thought it would be a mistake for him to move in with a girl he barely liked... and he wrote back, saying; "Give me a second. We're going to start a band. Xx." After not hearing from him for about 3 weeks, my mary-j habit escalated. I don't blame him, but his own smoking habits and his leaving were definately part of the catalyst. So I sat there at home, smoking, watching 5 full seasons of Six Feet Under, a show about Death, and eating a lot of mac and cheese. When Australia Boy finally called me, it was because his girlfriend had left for Columbia for 6 weeks. I figured this was going to be the point where we would start something, thinking he had/would find a decent job and apartment and leave her. That turned into me being his mistress, something I never would have sunk so low to do before. I couldn't believe I lowered my values and morals because I thought sleeping with someone would propel them forward, towards me. Completely insane and completely cliché. I will never be the other woman again. And so things finally ended with him on Christmas Eve, when he didn't want to cook in the kitchen of his girlfriend's apartment with me because her roommates would see us. He suggested I go back to my place and cook alone. And so that's what I did. I spent Christmas Eve alone. I also spent New Year's Eve alone, broke, while all my friends went out, lying on my bed totally stoned out of my mind, until my parents called me at 11:00 and decided to come pick my sorry ass up. And that is when I called Andrew, and he told me I might consider a change of scenery- Nova Scotia.

Since I knew I was quitting school (for now) in November, I have been looking for jobs. I have been extremely unsuccessful. So far, I have a couple of things up in the air, but nothing is solid, nothing is gauranteed. I still need to go on interviews for all these potential jobs. I don't know if it is the recession, if it is me, if it is a sign to pack it up and move, either to Nova Scotia or back Home. And part of me hates the idea of going home. Of defeat. Not being able to support myself. Losing all the independance and networks I have made. I feel like moving out was such a good thing in terms of experiencing new things, living in the City, just growing up. But I feel like I am fooling myself now. I am not keeping up. And I am trying so hard. And I have no idea what will happen to me if I go from living like a "grown-up" to living with my family in the suburbs again, trapped in a small town with no car and a train schedule that rules my life. Part of me thinks I will hibernate and die of depression. The other part of me really misses my family. But I think seeing them every day will just make things go back to the way they were before, where you take everything and everyone for granted and get pissed about all the small things and can't stand your family. So I don't think I will move back. But will I still have the choice in a few weeks?

But being at home in the suburbs, where I am as I write this, always makes me feel uneasy. I get this weird pang in my gut, a mixture of emotions that I cannot define, though I have tried much. And normally I am ruled by my emotions. But this is indescribable, the only words that come to mind are nostalgia, guilt, missing, cages... ect ect ect. It is like two parts of me are fighting each other, the Independant Woman and the Little Girl. And the Independant Woman is being put to the test in more ways than she can count, with this incoming poverty and fucked-up, confused romance feelings for Andrew, with making decisions, because it feels like all the ones I have made have led me down the wrong path. I didn't picture myself as a broke, stoner, dropout, struggler. The Little Girl is crying for her mom and dad.

So what do I do now? How will I get myself out of this mess? 

I think this feeling of unease is Truth. I am usually very good at denial. But this Truth about all the things that could so easily come crashing down on me is already weighing me down, and the worst part is, I am not alone. I have a family who will take my back, but I just keep trying. Is this perseverence valiant, or pathetic?

I'll soon find out.

xx

Anne