This is very long, but I really need to get this out, and I've never been able to talk about my problems out loud.

When I wrote my last entry I had just gotten done serving a volunteer shift in the baseball park concession stand since it was our team's week.  It was supposed to be a lot of fun, and it wasn't super-hard, but it was frustrating.  Very much so.  I found anything three items or above were above my memory power, and the math was too hard.  I passed it off when I could and just did the serving, but there were some annoyed people, especially the guy who wanted my to figure up his 10 or so items!  

Then there were the slow times.  Autumn's scout mate Jamie and her mom were there.  the mom looks like she is really nice, and she was wearing a rock concert tee with hr soccer mom ensemble (I live in the small town with the huge amount of soccer moms and the upwardly mobile smattered in very generously with those of us who are just scraping by--one mom is a secretary or assistant to a plastic surgeon and makes the big bucks!  How crazy is that?), so I thought she's be cool.  But every time I tried to talk to her, she said, "I have no idea what you just said," "What are you talking about?" or something that either said she couldn't pay attention for two seconds or that I was completely off the wall, which I sometimes am.  It can be very hard to follow my train of thought, which you know from just reading here.  One time she gave me the big hint by saying her oder daughter was 18.  A lot of the other moms around here, no matter where, look down on me because I am young and they don't feel like we should be on the same playing field.  The other mom, very pregnant with her third (at least) child seemed very well-to-do and tried her best to pretend I wasn't there.  Fantastic.  Good times.  I couldn't wait to get away from them, but at the same time, I enjoyed the chance to give back and maybe get a bit of exercise.  If I was just going after food, I think it would have been better.  That and if I brought Autumn, but that would have left Ben alone with the little Farrahsaurus.  She could play with Jamie and be someone for me to talk to, and we really need to bond right now.

The housing thing.  I put it on the back burner in my mind because it was putting too much on me stresswise, so I thought I would just let go and wait for Ben.  With the new car, I also figured we couldn't afford to move anyway.  I see the transfers going from the meager savings account (we would use it to buy a house with) going into checking every month or more often.  He's even thinking of taking a job 30 miles away in New Albany as a manager at Aldi's, which is a sort of low-brow Save-A-Lot-esque type of grocery chain, even hough I told him it would be a mistake.  He said it would be good being close ot college, but he is off for the summer and only takes a course or two per semester now  because that's what he can handle.  I think he would be losing money after factoring in gas, which I can see going up to $5 per gallon in the near future because they have us by the throat and they know it.  He's still turning it over in his mind, though.  His current situation has a flow of uncertain employees who come and go on a regualr basis, uncertainty about when he can get a new employee at that point, and the stupid protestors outside 24/7 in their hut taking pictures of patrons, harrassing the workers, and breaking the law.  It's very hard on him and I'm sorry, but I don't think the alternative's any better.  Today he called and said they are lowering teh amount they reimburse him for gas mileage on the twice-weekly trips to Indianapolis for banking and to the Clarksville Sam's Club for supplies.  Groceries are getting high, so he decided to buy a chunk of frozen stuff for us at bulk price, which helped cut the weekly grocery bill in half.  We're doing what we can and yet we're effectively drowning.  I would get a job if the girls would be okay, but he has to work these double shifts like twice this week with little to no advanced notice, and I would get fired for that.  My parents, also 30 miles away are to busy readying my sister for college and deserve their own life without having to raise my kids, and my in-laws both work.  My father-in-law goes to school now for nursing and is in poor health, so running after the squirts would be out of the question.  And a sitter would take more than I could make around here.  We're just stuck until I can get them both in school so I can work during the day or something.

The housing thing would be fine on the back burner, but yesterday there was a knock at the door.  Our bastard landlord coming over a day early for the rent check.  $300 more from the savings account...  He wanted me to let Autumn play with his kids and talk to both of us.  He had that fuck-ass worried/paranoid look on his face he always gets when he's screwing us over.  I changed out of my pjs (it was early evening and the day had been cold, leaving me seeking comfort in warm places). dressed the Farrah (she's potty training and prefers to do so in the nude), had Autumn put stockings on under her dress to keep warm, and out we went.  He told us that he had to know within a week's time whether we wanted to renew, that rent was going up from $500 a month to $550.  We make $2,000 a month, so it was already a quarter of our income.  He kept pushing for an on-the-spot answer, still saying we had a week to tell him and Ben said we'd have to discuss it every time, because it is a big decision.  He wants to have time to line someone else up.  Bastard.  Then came the lecture about the time he told us things weren't up to his standards.  This is a guy who okays furniture but says that having things boxed up, even in a closet, rots the floor, that a plant in the house, even a single leaf touching the ground, will rot the floor.  He pushes the smoke detector issue like crazy even though we regualrly check it.  He once told me to make sure to clean the lint trap on our personal dryer, which I finally told him I knew about.  Volunteer firefighter t oabout five houses makes him some sort of big-shot.  He told us in the beginning he was desperate for the rent money and then built the biggest, most extravagant, no expense spared house in the middle of the woods with a long, crazy drive-way and a pond he had them dig.  the kids have a cmoputer for each of the two older of the three kids and a large clubhouse/ treehouse, all on land he bought from Ben's parents, renting out his previous home.  We are going down the drain because of his excess and he acts like he's a pauper.  I really don't get that.  But then he starts telling us that he  needs to know if there are rodents in our home (excuse me?), any health or safety dangers to the kids, etc., saying he wouldn't let us live there in filth but that we are good people he likes and that we pay everything on time (should a bill be late, he gets notification), but he has to do what he has to do.  I couldn't look at him because of the brimming hatred, so I watched Farrah.  I wished I could pass out and then maybe he would leave us alone and stop acting like he owned us, even though he fucking does.  He went in with Ben to check the smoke detectors, and they talked for half an hour. The outlook was bad, since the girls had made some messes and I had a lot of things out of place in my pursuit to reorganize.  Like I said, he showed up out of the blue.

Meanwhile I am out watching my kids and his, as his wife is sitting in the van or against it, depending on where I am, with their stupid, ugly baby.  She only appears when they directly talk to her or if I say one word to the kids, like telling the boy, who's almost 4, to be careful on the swing set, since it's on level ground and almost tipped over several times.  then she yelled at him to come to her but he didn't, and when I looked up, she hid again.  It must be great to be embarrassed by such a loose cannon husband.  He drags her with him for moral support when he ants to bitch at us, warranted or not.  That means it becomes a family affair.  The kids tell Autumn how their parenst want her to come over for a milkshake.  the parents always invite my girls over to play.  Over my dead body, although I always give a tentative okay and quickly fill my mental schedule, not that I need to.  The kids disgust me, he look-alike spawn of their father.  The mother actually married with him and procreated three times.  It literally makes me sick, and when they talk to me...  Autumn hates him too.  She has mentioned wanting to kill him, wanting to win a crossbow once so she could shoot him in the chest with it because she sees him for who she really is, afraid that he will throw us out.  She once told the daughter I hated her dad, to which the daughter non-chalantly said "That's okay."  We firgure she hears that a lot.  

This time her fear is right, because we have a month to move.  Ben didn't tell me until later and I still don't know details thankfully (usually he tells me something, tells Ben, and calls me to make sure I know he told Ben), but I saw the empty glass of straight rum (he always cuts it with soda), the look of defeat and uncertainty.  I looked around, unsure of what to do, our perfect evening and plans of watching Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade dashed.  Then Farrah opened a jar of honey and poured it on the living room floor.  Earlier in the day she took the bottles of seafood sauce and tartar sauce while I was microwaving fishsticks and rubbed them all over her body and on the couch, which is still slick.  It was the last straw, and I did the unthinkable.  I hit my child, my baby, even though I hate the whole notion of spanking.  I don't know what came over me.  Then Ben came in, and I told him what I did, and he looked at me with such fear, such disbelief.  He asked if I needed help to stop, if I would ever do it agin.  I couldn't speak.  He took the girls next door to his parents without telling me, saying they were going outside for a bit to give me some time to cool down.  But he took her sippy cup of milk.  I took nine Advil, hoping it would be enough to off myself after all that had happened..  He eventually came back alone.  I figured the girls were in the car, ready to be spirited away for the night, maybe forever.  We got into it, and I literally was so upset I could not think of anything to say about how I felt or what I thought we should do.  He saw the bottle as I contemplated taking more and asked if i'd taken too many and I said not that much.  Did I need to go to the hospital?  No.  Then it turned to I was too proud to get better, that I didn't want to get better, that I had stopped the medicine and needed to go back to the doctor or just get a new one.  He also said how scared of me Autumn is, that he tried to hush her up but she told his parents a lot of things.  I never want to see or speak to them again, and I mean it.  The way they'll look at me, judge me in their minds, already knowing I have mental issues, which he says will be fine.  He doesn't like my parents and says little to them, but it would be such a big deal for me to return the favor.

He later told me he didn't know if the girls could stay with us because we may not be able to take care of them anymore.  If I left (it came to the point of discussing whether we should split up, which would be too hard on either of us, but he was afraid for the girls)  he would probably lose them anyway.  I told him he can't have Autumn, which legally there isn't much for him to do, since he never adopted her.  I didn't tell him why.  If anything, I would want her to go to my parents, because that's where she would be happiest.  Then he spilled it.  He said it would be okay to have hard times, to have a new house,but he didn't want to be without me because i would be too hard.  About this time I as making my way past our yard and halfway through the landlord's yard, pills in my pocket for when I got up the courage.  I would eventually take 10 more, bringing the grand total to 19, almost 1/5 of the bottle of 100.  He was holding onto me so I couldn't keep going.  I didn't know where I was headed, but I didn't really care.  I just wanted to die.  The overpass on the highway and a pond seemed good final destinations.  I ended up being overcome by emotion, faling to the ground, halfway almost passed out, halfway just comforted by the tall, seedy grass.  The coyotes howld somewhere far off and it was beginning to sprinkle.  He told me we couldn't talk there because it wasn't our land.  Like we freaking have anywhere that belongs to us at this point.  The new house needs to be picked, septic, electricity, and a driveway need to be put in.  There seems to be no hope, but I guess I should start packing.  We went back in the house, he was done crying about me trying to die and not being ready to let me go.  I guess I'm not ready yet, but sometimes I just can't take it.  as he says, there are a lot of times when I'm just me, but then others I am someone else.  I hope he knows that scares me too, even though he can't explain why I can't talk to him about it.  I can't talk to anyone.  I tried knocking myself out by hitting my head on the corner of the fridge and have the bump to show for it.  He will never understand, but i think he got an idea once I told him about the schizophrenics in my family, how they are medicated and still try to kill themselves, the angels talk to one, only one has a job, and mental hospitalization is a recurrent thing.  If that's where I am headed, there is no future.  They just sit there and watch TV in their own weirdo world while everyone makes fun of them.  The one without a job has been known to live with hi probably retarded mother.  Then it came down to whether or not I thought our bonding time of watching TV was special to me anymore, which it is, but there should be more to our life.  Things went bak and forth until i finally fell asleep after telling him what he did wrong and he apologized.  I told him I would pretend none of this happened, but he wouldn't let me, and now it is impossible.  We'll be okay in time, but it's so bad right now, and the ouse stress is just grinding it all in.

Eventually I did tell him that I will never be better.  At this point, a lot of hings don't seem real.  I fill my time and a notebook with ideas fo a summer camp a friend and I would like to start together someday, but I'm pretty sure it's just a fantasy at this point.  I have two little girls to take care of.  So I may try to help feed ideas to the currently existing summer camp we used to work at.  I wish I was still there, that I had a plan.  No one takes me seriously, no one likes me here, and it's same everywhere else because I just can't fit in.  The world is a small and lonely place for me even when the net can be cast so far.  I feel so alone.  I can barely eat, only because I make myself.  I feel so sick and have been crying off and on all day.

This is what I get for cheating on LJ, I guess.  this weird guy on goodreads.com was sort of nice to chat with, as in he was different and affluent, and well-travelled, which we all aspire to be.  He cited beautiful women as an interest (which he just changed to pussy cats), and most friends were female on his buddy list.  He sent some really funny jokes my way and had lived many lives.  

Then the messages got darker, about how his wife and he were like brother and sister, and how he'd had these affairs, even crossing the ocean from Ireland or Scotland or wherever he lives to be with the other woman for a week in a hotel.  He'd be telling me to delete all correspondences after reading, and he'd be doing the same.  How covert.  That raised some flags.  I like to think I earn all that trust Ben gives me when he isn't around.  I took a week to think it over, and this came.  Happy reading.  More after the message.

Rebecca

I guess after 7 days you have decided not to reply to my rather personal response.
Not having kept a copy, I don't recall the content in detail, but remember the general drift, so I hope you didn't take offence.
I trust you and the family are well.
Take care
Bill

PS: If you decide to remove me from your list, I shall not take offence 


Way to be an ass and get your feelings all hurt, guy.  Not like I went and told his wife.  If they really had that "arrangement," I don't think he'd be so antsy.  Whatever.  Glad it's over, even though I was on good behavior.

Then there was the louisvillemojo.com which is like a local myspace.  That was okay.  I only knew one person offline, but the first two days got me 238 profile views and about 25 comments, mostly "hey, sexy," "you're hot," "wanna chat?" and the like.  They'd take it down a notch but come up fast.  Then there would be a lag on my side and a similar message to the above.  God, it's like I'll never outlive that tease reputation, whether I'm trying to be one or not!  I used to love that way of life, btw.

Next up, to get into the big pond to look for old friends and acquaintances, I swallowed my pride and went over to myspace, aka the devil.  I found a lot of people I used to know from school, which is what I really wanted.  I'm friends w/my brother on there, old pals of mine I'd lost contact with, old schoolmates, Melody, Ben, and his cousin Dave.  So far there isn't too much on the spamfront except single moms working form home, so it's not so bad.  And I love tweaking my page.  I'll stay around.  Here's my info.  

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=349887143

Now, the big question:  Will I stay here?  Of course!  I love this place, and myspace is more for just coordinating, and this is for baring my very soul.  That and I could never journal this stuff in front of my brother and classmates.  So I'll just have to tease them with pics.

I ultimately realized upon further examination and weighing of evidence that I, in all likelihood, did not miscarry and was just five days late a month after being three days late, and I'm just an extremely heavy bleeder.  Being a depressive hyponchondriac off my medication for awhile and therefore being on the edge of suicide for a few days until I could get my long-awaited renewal to kick in probably figured in there as well.  I am appalled and very sorry to involve you all.  Things are back to normal now.  Still, i took some time away to deal with what happened, and I did a little work on my alt journal to feel like all this has meant something.

I didn't tell you about teh party at Ben's work.  It was so wild and crazy for me.  I had ten drinks (a personal record by far), so I got a teensy bit sick, was on the hotel room floor numerous times, where I may or may not have passed out as I wondered whether we were dying of alcohol poisoning.  A loving drunk, up until that point, I made merry at the table, and tried to get frisky at the tale with Ben's leg.  Oops.  And I baely had a hangover the next morning, which if it was a hangover, was my first.  Yay for wild youthful indiscretion.  We hung out with his cousin Dave, as well as a former co-worker and his wife (our dopplegangers for all purposes), and I got to swim and explore and write.  These trips are always a bit like a honeymoon, even when we cannot be together the whole time.  Another one is coming up in May, and I can't wait.

Christmas went well.  The girls got what they wanted.  They even got a swingset from Santa, which my mom and brother delivered to Ben's office ouut back for safekeeping.  Heavy such-and-such.  At least the girls were pleased, although it's still in our living room.  New Year's was goos as well.  Nothing to write home about there.

My friend Melody called on Christmas, in tears, bless her heart.  He did it to her again.  She stayed with his family for three days and he wouldn't go to her grandmother's brunch.  Then he sent a text message: "I miss you sexy" or soemthing like that just to make her want to come back.  She knows this is bad but she can't pull herself away.  One of her freinds said it's too much drama and abandoned her, but I know this s how it really is and how hard it must be on her.  I will stand by her even if I am standing alone, because I want the same from her.  It just kills me to see her so full of potential and yet backed in a corner of Hell because she can't bring herself to leave yet.  I love my friend, and I wish that would be enough to make her happy and strong.  But it never will be.  We rarely ahng out and I'm bad about talking on the phone, so I'm not the greatest option either as far asa shoulder to cry on.  That and I never have been one, so situations of others' distress just makes me kind of freak out in a silent useless way.  Maybe I should have had more girl friends instead of guys and just been more social period.