Make Meaning. Be present.

Live love.

Shit shit shitty shit.

I feel shitty. In more ways then one. My head is all stuffed up, I feel like vomiting, I have a massive headache, and my heart hurts. Thus I feel like shit! Its funny because yesterday I had to remove one of my residents from Bingo for using this word. She simply refused to stop saying shit. She got louder and louder when I politely instructed her that the others around her didn't share the same appreciation for this lovely word. She rebuked, "thats shit, they can all go to hell if they don't like it! They can't tell me what to do! Shit, shit, shitty, SHIT!" Well that is how I feel today. Physically and emotionally, like shit, and that is simply the best word to describe it.

I miss my dogs. Whoa is me. I miss my old life. Whoa is me. I miss everything so much my heart aches! When will it stop, I wonder. Whoa is me. I remember feeling like this when my high school sweetheart decided he didn't love me anymore either. I felt crazy, and thinking when will it stop hurting? Eventually it did. But that was because I found Mr. M. So lately, I have managed to conclude that I should move on and date. I have been throwing myself into dating, commanding myself to get over Mr. M and my old life. This is your life now. Don't be pathetic. Don't be that girl again. Your older now. Your better than this. This too shall pass. I reply this manta in my head probably about a million times a day, and wonder when I'll start to believe it.

And let me just add, I absolutely despise dating! I think it is horrible and pointless. I'm not really the dating type. I am not the normal 23 year old. I don't like to go to clubs and party all the time, so dating is like torture to me! I wish I could just skip all the awkward getting to know you part and speed right through to the days when we can lounge on the couch unshowered and not talk, yet still know what the other is thinking. I like those times better. Not all of this, I need to get drunk to hang out with you stuff. Inevitably, with all that has been going on in my life I have turned to my faith and questioned. Why again? Didn't I already go through this once? Didn't I learn my lesson the first time? Am I really suppose to sleep with another person? (This question in particular makes me very angry as I hold sex very high on my list of deal breakers in a relationship. Yet in the same token I am not a hussy, and I have only slept with the people I thought I was going to marry. My biggest fear is that one day I will have my wedding announcement in the newspaper and one of my old lovers will look at it and say oh I fucked her. *Note- this really happened to one of my friends!) Nevertheless, I wonder what am I suppose to get out of this whole situation besides the fact that someone whom I once loved hates me, and refuses to talk to me. I have even stooped so low as to do the plea bargaining with God thing. If you do this for me, I'll do this for you. In conclusion, I have discovered that either God isn't the plea bargaining type or he doesn't really exist.

I don't know what to believe right now. In the words of Gloria Estefan, "I just wanna be happy."

Why should you care?

One of my favorite words in the English language is the word, catharsis. The moment I heard it in one of the art history classes I had to take for college I immediately scribbled it down in my notebook (as I do quite often) and promised to later look up the meaning of it. It was just one of those words I seemed to identify with; without even knowing the true meaning of it.

Catharsis, as defined by Encyclopedia Britannica means; a purging or purification of emotions through art. The term is derived from the Greek katharsis("purgation," "cleansing"), a medical term used by Aristotle as a metaphor to describe the effects of dramatic tragedy on the spectator: by arousing vicarious pity and terror, tragedy directs the spectator's own anxieties outward and, through sympathetic identification with the tragic protagonist, purges them.

I am the tragic protagonist, and thanks to the advice of many friends, psychic advisors, and mainly my sister I have come to start this blog, in hopes that my feelings of hopelessness and despair will lead to some sort of awakening. Maybe this will help me to realize that the random thoughts and patterns in my life, really are not so random after all.

Anyways I decided that my first entry should tell all of you a little about me, before I dig down into the deep stuff. I could give you the condensed version, but then I thought, why the hell not go all out. If anyone reads it, they read it, if not who the hell cares. I at least know I have one faithful follower... ahem, my beautiful poetic older sister.

Okay here we go. A little about me, and all of the supporting characters in my life.

I am from a historic New England town, it is essentially picture perfect. I can walk to the water from my house. I have two sisters, one who is 4 years older than me. She is the smartest person I have ever meet, and although I may not have seen it coming, over the years she really has become my best friend. I should preface this fact by saying that I am one of those individuals who firmly believe that you don't pick your family, you pick your friends. However, even if she wasn't my sister I would still think she is totally completely awesome. Honestly, growing up she was everything I wanted to be. She was popular, pretty, and not to mention she had huge boobs, which I always envied. But besides that she just seemed to have something I lacked; she was just so much smarter than me; and she still is. Our relationship through the years has evolved into something I never thought was possible, and I am so grateful for that. A little over a year and a half ago she had a baby boy, and I never thought it was possible to love a child that is not my own as much as I love this little guy. Right now he is probably the one true source of happiness I have. Not to mention I can't help but smile when he gives me that big toothy grin and reaches up to me and says Momo, in his deep little baby voice. I love him. Period.

I am the middle child, and I have a sister who is 3 years younger than me. She has Down Syndrome. Most people when they hear this have the usual response of, "oh I am so sorry to hear that," and I usually say "don't be sorry, she is perfect, and I wouldn't have it any other way." She is pure love and devotion, except for when she is playing Nintendo and can't seem to get Mario to keep from dying. Regardless, I would not be the person I am today without her. I can remember the whole third year of my life was spent in the hospital room with my mother and sister as she battled through spinal meningitis and open heart surgery. All of the needles poking out of her head and arms, the ivs and heart monitors, all attached to this tiny person. My sister. I didn't care then that she had Down Syndrome, and I don't care now. I still say I wouldn't have it any other way.

My mother is complicated, and I can only describe her as loving and crazy. I don't really know her, and I doubt I every really will. I mean I live with her now, and always have but I don't know the real woman behind that tough Brooklyn, NY exterior. She always has her makeup on before I even wake up, and is always dressed to the nines. Even though I am 23 now, she will ask me where I am going and who I am going with, and if I have any makeup on. "Your going out like that," she will say if I forget to put on eyeliner or mascara. She is complicated. I have come to realize after years and years of trying I will never understand her. But I still don't give up.

My father is religious, and an engineer. That is really all I know about him. He is also approaching his mid fifties and in the best shape of his life. I use to hate him growing up, but now I just feel sorry for him. I love both of my parents, but these are two people that there is just now helping out. They will live the rest of their years the same way they have lived the ones ever since I can remember. Not talking to each other, and not happy. They are everything I fear my marriage will be.

I have only begun to scratch the surface of what my family is like, and now for the condensed version of me. I am a lost spiritually confused 23 year old women. I received my bachelors degree in English a couple of years back from a local state school, and as you can probably tell, I have forgotten much of what I learned. My senior year of college I took a class that really opened my eyes and love of literature. Till this point I didn't even know why I had chosen this degree. I loved linguistics, but I wasn't smart enough to do anything with that. I loved mid-evil literature, and yet again, what could I do with that. However, it was my contemporary spiritual literature class that opened my eyes. I just seemed to connect instantly with the readings, in particular the works of author Sue Monk Kidd, and her piece on the feminine divine. I really connected to her writings, I felt like someone else understood what I was going though. I mean I was raised a Italian Roman Catholic, but I hardly ever attended church, except for Christmas eve and Easter, but I still wanted to know more. I wondered why my life was the way it was, was there really a God, and if so who was he/she all about. I never told anyone about this curiosity for fear they would all think I was nuts. I mean I'm 23 years old, shouldn't I be out at a club getting drunk and high, and not wondering about the meaning of life? Nevertheless, as the class went on I continued to secretly look forward to it every Thursday night. I would sit quietly and I listen to what everyone else has to say, speaking and reading their writings in such poetic proses it made me weak in the knees and lightheaded at times. In this class I feel in love with literature and the English language. As time went on we had to create a research topic, and mine was on the Sue Monk Kidd's journey into the feminine divine. I emerged myself in her literature, and though all the hustle and bustle around me I felt that taking this class was not just a coincidence, but it was meant to be. I promised myself from that moment on I would practice yoga, and pray, and go on retreats. and write about my faith. But then life got in the way, and I can remember turning in my paper to my teacher and her specifically looking me in the eye and saying, " I really hope you don't intend on making a career out of writing." It stung, and my eyes started to fill with tears. I fought them back. Why did I have such a visceral response to her statement, I mean I didn't want to be a writer anyways. Or did I? At that moment I thought of my older sister, and secretly cursed her for having read so many books! I too could have poetic prose, but instead I had shit.

So to make a long story even longer, I graduated I moved across country with my wanna be rock star boyfriend, lets just call him Mr.M (for protection of the innocent), whom I had been dating long distance, in Los Angeles, for two years. We moved to Austin, TX. My mother disowned me. I got a dog named Mia, my puppy soul mate as I like to call her. At the time we lived with his band mates, some white trash guys from Louisiana, and a rich overindulged son of a Los Angeles movie score writer. I became YoKo Ono and eventually Mr.M , Mia and I moved to St. Louis, MO, to be near his best friend, and we got another dog, Riley, and Mr.M joined a new band. This time he joined a Christian metal band, even though he was a stubborn pot smoking drunk and depressed atheists. I thought things would be different until one day at one of our favorite restaurants as we were sipping margaritas when he turned to me and said, I don't think I want to marry you; ever. This man I had moved half way across the country for, missed the birth of my nephew, stopped talking to my mother, and changed jobs at least three times for didn't love me? Fast forward almost a year a half later, and multiple attempts to get back with Mr. M, and get my dogs back-all of which had failed, I am back home, living with my parents, and working as a certified nursing assistant. I am alone and lonely, although I am surrounded by my family. It is the transitional moments, going from one activity to another that get me. That is when I realize what my life has become. Two tupperware boxes full of clothes, in my mothers house, wiping peoples asses for minimum wage.

But everything isn't really all that bad. I can not even imagine having not watched my nephew grow up, and being with my sisters. I love my job. The people I care for are like my own grandparents. They give are always giving me tidbits of wisdom and little words of advice, and telling how I look like Angelina Jolie; I mean come on whats not to love. I discovered my true passion for nursing, thanks in part to Mr. M's mother and sister, and I am going back to school to eventually become a nurse. However, at my job I have seen so much death. I have never seen someone die until getting this job. I have never watched people suffer like I have here. Many of them asking God countless times for help. Does anyone really listen or even care. Or are we just alone in the world. I got a tattoo during one of my depressed moments that says walk by faith, but I don't even know if I believe in God anymore. All I know is that it is in those transitional moments that I feel empty, and I want to know why!

When in my car, driving to school, I use to love to listen to country music. Now it just makes me sad. So I now listen to NPR. And that was where I heard about local author, Dani Shapiro, and her book Devoted, about a women searching for the meaning of faith, and how it pertains to her life. The next day I immediately went to the bookstore and bought every book of hers they had. I began reading and couldn't put them down. I must admit I have now grown to be a little obsessed with her. She too feels the way I feel! It made me realize I have now come full circle. Again questioning, life, God, and what the hell am I doing back at my crazy mothers house in my mid twenties. I guess I will just have to find out.