Packin'

Aside from my cheesey blog title, seriously, I got my gun now! I'm super excited. My mind has changed so much since the Fall when I first decided I'd actually buy one. It's been a process trying to find something in my price range, small enough for concealed carry, and a gun I'd enjoy shooting. The gun I purchased is called the Kahr CW 9mm. I picked it up this morning, so when I got off work tonight, I came home, took it apart, and cleaned it. It took me forever and I had trouble with a few parts. The gun is really springy when you first get it, so it takes a lot of strength to pull the slide back or mess with the firing spring.


This is how the gun looks in it's case. It's the gun, the magazine, and the lock.


This is when I disassembled it to clean it. It's the spring, the barrel, the slide, and the frame.


The gun reassembled and clean :D



It has a two hundred round break in period. I'm not sure how much of that I'll do the next time we go shooting. That's a lot of rounds, but I think I plan to put at least a hundred through it. I still haven't gotten my concealed weapons permit yet. In a few weeks when I have more money I'll send my paper work. It's fine for now though. I need to get familiar with it anyway. I hope I don't experience any problems with it!

Time and Time Again

Another night I go to bed feeling unsatisfied. Honestly, I just don't get how to be anymore clear about my expectations, about my desires or my needs. I don't even know if that's it anymore. I guess I still haven't learned that you can't make people change or make feelings change. I guess what I want isn't as important as someone else's wants. I don't like saying that, and I really hope I'm wrong. I'm tired of feeling pushed away and as second best. I feel the affects on myself and in me. It's going to make me stop caring, and it's stupid. It shouldn't be this way, and it doesn't have to be this way. Why? Why do people push away those who love them?

It's been a pretty sad excuse of the past couple weeks. A lot of really crappy things are happening around me to myself and to good people. I've been trying to stick to my roll-with-the-punches attitude, but it's getting me down. I still feel afloat in all the crap, but barely. I really just want this week to be over. I want to be done with studying. I want to be home.

Please God get me through this.

Roll With The Punches

Today was pretty decent. I had an exam at 7:30am so I woke up super early to get ready, make breakfast, and get to the classroom early to review. I have no idea what to think about how I did on my exam. It's over. That's all that matters. After my exam, I made my way to the prison. It was my last day today because they're in the process of shutting the place down. It was insanely busy today. It made the day go by fast, and made me less aware of how tired I was, but I was so busy that I was making a lot of mistakes on the paper work I had to fill out. The room I worked in for the majority of the day didn't have air conditioning either so it was gross. I'm happy to be done with going out there. It's been a great experience, and I've learned a lot, but it's so far and the work is aggravating.

I plan to study more now. I have a quiz tomorrow and a cumulative final Friday. My gun is in Tallahassee. It's my mission to pick it up before I go home. It's been hard to communicate with the gun transfer place though. I'll definitely be posting about it once I get it, pictures and all.

I got an awesome surprise today too. I've been talking with an old friend from New Jersey a lot lately and on a whim he decided to mail me a package. We both really love music so he made me two cds, drew some pictures, and wrote me a letter :D I loveeeeeeeee getting mail, and I'm super excited to check out the songs. I'm going to mail a cd and something random back to him as well. I think we plan to make it a pen pal type thing. It should be fun!

Other than school stress, there's still not much of an update on my mom. She still can't find a way to work, so it's really scary wondering when she might get fired. We put our house up for sale which is a weird situation too. I feel like the house has been a financial burden to my mom for a while not, but it's weird thinking that we wouldn't own it, or I wouldn't come home to that house. My mom really needs to relocate to a city though, and hopefully she'll be able to move to gainesville soon enough to save her job. We'll see though I guess. It all depends on if the house sells which is not likely in this current housing market. My mom also found out that she does not fall into the disability eligible bracket. She official failed her driving test so she no longer has her license, but she's not blind enough for disability apparently. I can tell she, as well as all of the family, are scared. Bills don't go away just because your life is falling apart at the moment.

I really just wish the house will sell at this point. It'll be really sad to let it go, but I don't want her to lose her job or not be able to get any where basically. She needs transportation to doctors, jobs, basic needs. I keep praying, and I'm trying to be there for her. She's getting a lot of crap from her job, some family members that don't understand, agencies pushing her off to someone else. It's a lot to deal with.

I'm hoping the week off before summer classes is some what enjoyable. I'm going to be in major debt when I return to Tallahassee. I have no money right now, and going home is just a major money sucker. I'm hoping to work 30 hours a week though when I come back. We shall see. I need to de-stress though. My left eye keeps twitching and I've resorted to stress eating, a habit I thought I successfully broke when Thomas and I broke up. It's making me feel disgusting. I plan to work out as much as I can over the break as well and come back to Tallahassee ready to clear the apartment of junk food once again.

I hope I wasn't a debbie downer to anyone as they read this. My motto as of lately is 'You gotta roll with the punches'. I'm trying not to get bogged down with sadness. I'm trying to deal with what's going on, and move forward, as forward as I can get. It's all I can do.

Sorry Doesn't Cut It

I burned a CD to listen in my car for the drive home today. I put this song on here randomly, but I forgot how good it was. The appeal to me is how powerful the lyrics are and how much they mirror how I feel. Everyday I wish I could change how some things happened in the past. This song hits it on the head how I feel and what I wish I could say.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkAcgInHMU0

State of Shock
"Best I Ever Had"

Now I know I messed up bad
You were the best I ever had
I let you down in the worst way
It hurts me every single day
I'm dying to let you know

Now I'm here to say I'm sorry
And ask for a second chance
Cause when it all comes down to the end
I could sure use a friend

So many things I would take back
You were the best I ever had
I don't blame you for hating me
I didn't mean to make you leave

You and I were living like a love song
I feel so bad, I feel so bad that you're gone
Now I know you're the only one that I want
I want you back, I want you

Now I'm here to say I'm sorry
And ask for a second chance
Cause when it all comes down to the end
I could sure use a friend
Now I'm here to say I'm sorry
And ask for a second chance
All I want to do is make it up to you
Cause when it all comes down to the end
You were the best I ever had

We fell in love for a reason
Now you're leaving
And I just want you back
So many things we believed in
Now you're leaving and words won't bring you back
I'll never let go of the heart I broke

You and I were living like a love song
Now I know you're the only one that I want
I want you back, I want you

Now I'm here to say I'm sorry
And ask for a second chance
All I want to do is make it up to you
Cause when it all comes down to the end
I could sure use a friend
Now I'm here to say I'm sorry
And ask for a second chance
All I want to do is make it up to you
Cause when it all comes down to the end
You were the best I ever had

I can't believe that I threw away all our dreams
I can't believe now that you're gone how much you mean to me
I feel so bad, I feel so bad
You were the best I ever had
I can't believe that I threw away all our dreams
I can't believe now that you're gone how much you mean to me
I feel so bad, I feel so bad
You were,
You were the best I ever had

Panic At Its Finest

I'm really irritated with myself right now. I did some research real quick on some job opportunities in gainesville with a BA in psychology and almost all of the positions listed online at myflorida.com are at this one behavioral clinic. It made me feel a little better to know that there is SOMETHING out there for a bachelors degree applicant, but I know these jobs are going to be more paper work than psychology relevant. The reason I'm angry with myself is because I feel like I'm going to make a poor decision. I feel like I'm basing my life decisions on other people, on where I'll have the most support and it frustrates me. That support isn't always there.

I don't want to move to gainesville and regret it. I can't imagine any more time in Tallahassee. I'm really unhappy here, but the support I thought I had in gainesville is really unreliable. Gosh! This is stupid. I don't want to make a big decision based on something that is really unreliable. This is such a confusing time right now. It's hard to deal with the typical 'roller coaster' of emotions. I've been calm, then sad, then angry, and then scared too many times today. I'm too much of a planner to not have a clue what three months from now will look like.

I thought I could just roll with the punches. Find a cheap apartment, transfer winndixies for income, and hit the REAL job hunt hard as soon as I got situated. It's not that simple though. I don't know if I'll be able to transfer. If I did, what if they don't have hours for me? I don't want to feel alone in this. I'm not saying my family or friends aren't there for me, but that light at the end of the tunnel that made Gainesville okay in my mind just went out.

I really don't know what to do.

Denied

So....finally heard back from UCF. Not accepted. I don't know how to feel about it. I got used to the idea of taking a year off but it still makes me nervous. I don't know what I'm going to do on this year. You can't just work. You have to stay competitive. I don't want to stay in Tallahassee. I originally thought of moving to gainesville for the year. I'm really confused now. I don't know what's going to happen with my mom.

I kind of feel like maybe I wasn't supposed to go to school this year because of what's going on with my mom. I could work and help support her, but I don't put a whole lot of weight in fate.

I really don't know what to think or feel. I'm getting more sad about it than when I first read the email this morning. I have those feelings of failure again. If I'm not competitive enough now, how on earth am I going to get more competitive with the year off? I don't want to stay in Tallahassee and all of my opportunities are here.


I don't know much anymore. :(

The Scoop

Before I even get into this, I plan for this to be a REALLY long blog. I want to talk about everything that's happened the past week and I know it's going to take a lot of explanation.

So here it goes

Starting Thursday of last week:
Amanda and Robbie got here to start my birthday celebration. It was absolutely amazing having them here. I love my friends. I hadn't seen Amanda in so long, and I always like hanging out with Robbie. It's nice to get away from Chiefland with them every now and then. We went out to eat a lot, watched movies, and goofed off. Friday we saw Your Highness. It was what I expect from a movie with those actors in it. At midnight when I turned 21, we went to the store and got stuff for drinks. I had been stocking up on soda and snacks for so long it wasn't even funny. I had almost every soda imaginable but we only ended up buying rum and vodka. We didn't even open the rum though lol. I had like four drinks and that was way more than what I needed. I never drink, so everything hit me hard.

I got sick later in the night. It was nice to have Robbie there. Everyone was kind of laughing at me, which, looking back, I would have laughed too, but he was taking care of me while I cried about throwing up lol I was really emotional the whole night. I think I should take baby steps for the next time I drink more than one. For the rest of my birthday we just hung out. Got IHOP when we all finally woke up. We didn't drink again after that.

So, Sunday I got some bad news. Let me give you some back story first. My mom has had glaucoma for a while. Glaucoma is when the pressure in your eyes fluctuates a lot and it gets to be too high. I can't remember when she found out, but I know for a while she was taking eye drops for it. Her vision has been really bad lately and she had been meaning to set up another appointment to see what's up. My mom waited to tell me until after my birthday, but she found out that she is now blind in her left eye and her right eye is almost blind. The pressure in her eyes was really high again too. The specialist told her she isn't going to be able to drive anymore and that they have to report it to motor vehicle so her license is taken.

I can't imagine how my mom held it in for so many days that she was blind in one eye, and almost blind in the other. That alone is life changing. Also, my mom works in Gainesville. Do you know how little you can do living in the country without the ability to drive? This made a million questions come up. How will the mortgage get paid for? How will ANYTHING get paid for? My mom is 55. She still has SEVERAL years to live. Not driving from now on is a huge impact. I was really emotional when I found out. I was scared for my mom. I felt like she didn't have adequate support in the trauma that just occurred. Now she had all this financial burden getting in the way of her coping. She has a lot of things she has to go over with her doctor.

My mom doesn't know if she qualifies for disability. You think being blind in one eye and about to be blind in the other makes you qualify. It doesn't. You vision has to be at a specific level and my mom forgot to ask her level in the chaos of finding out. Disability, however, is not enough to pay our mortgage, let alone any other bill. It's not even like my mom can get a job close to home. NOTHING is close in Trenton. And nothing in Trenton pays what UF offers her. My mom isn't a candidate for any type of eye surgery either. They told her because her left eye is already blind, that there isn't any hope for it now. The pressure in her right eye from the glaucoma is still too high as well. She's on drops again, but because of this, they are unable to even think about performing any type of surgery on that eye. They also told her that even if the pressure was low enough for surgery, the procedure itself might stress her right eye out so badly that it could make itself go blind.

They told my mom that she'd probably be blind in both eyes by the age of 60. Can you imagine that? Five years from now, you can't see anything for the rest of your life. You lived so long taking advantage of this sense. Building your world on it, and then it's taken from you. What if my mom lived to be 90? That's another thirty years of being without vision. Some things you might not have thought of too are services for the blind. Do you know how hard it is to get a seeing eye dog? Or find an agency that can teach you braille? It's hard. And guess what? If she found the services, they'd be far away, and how does someone get to those agencies not being able to drive?

My sister and her family are not well off and haven't been for so long. They can't offer much help, maybe a ride or two. My dad is already on disability and hasn't worked as long as I can remember. He's dealing with his own illness. I'm a student with debt. We all are in no position to be able to help and it sucks so badly. My mom's best chance right now is to sell our house and move into a city. Some place she can walk to things, or a job. But the market is awful and you have to ask yourself how long will it be before she can't perform routine activities? It's really scary. There's also the selfish thoughts like will my mom see my graduation? My wedding? My kids? My niece and nephew grow up?


There's still so many questions about the whole situation. I'll blog about it as I know more. Pray hard though because this situation sucks. Why my mom? Why?




::Sigh::


UCF should be contacting me soon about whether I got offered a spot since I was on the alternate list. I don't know what I want anymore. If I get accepted, I'm obviously going to try to go, but I'm scared for the future financially now. I got really used to the idea of taking a year off. I feel like things are happening for a reason right now. Maybe I'm not meant to go to graduate school right now....


Maybe...