Dream Journal 4/9/19 | Welcome to the Jungle

The family and I were driving down a busy highway, with a trailer hitched to the Jeep, and all of our stuff piled in the back.

Dream Journal 8/6/17 | Bad Neighbor

I was sitting at my kitchen table with my son, as we dug into two, large bowls of cereal. I looked up, and saw water dripping from my ceiling, in the same place we had experienced a leak the first night we moved in, three years ago.

Advertisement

Dream Journal 7/15/16 | Blood and Mold

[Dream #1]

I was in a large warehouse style store, and I was trying to pull something off of a shelf, and a ton of random stuff fell down on top of me. A bunch of people rushed over to pull me out of the pile, and when I came out, my face was covered in blood, and one of the workers started screaming that my eye was missing. I started to panic, but discovered that my eye wasn’t missing, it was actually cracked open, like it was made of glass.

Daily Prompt 6/21/2016 | Companion

[In response to The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt 6/21/2016 | Companion]

Things have been a bit strained lately with Kyle and I. We’re okay for the most part, and we’re not fighting or anything, but there are some things we need to talk about, and get out into the open, but we’ve been having a hard time talking it out. As I’ve mentioned before, Kyle has been trying to get into a class at the local community college to get his CDL, but has been having a very hard time. The class costs nearly $5,000, and we do not have the money to just drop on this class. He has tried financial aide, but they don’t offer it for this class. He has tried several different kinds of loans, through the school and several different banks and lenders, but even after trying both my mom and I as co-signers, he was turned down. For everything. He also got pre-hired by one trucking company to try and get a loan, but it was garbage, and did not help at all. And time is running out.

Daily Prompt 2/13/2016 | Never Again

The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt 2/13/2016 | Never Again

“Have you ever gone to a new place or tried a new experience and thought to yourself, “I’m never doing that again!” Tell us about it.”

I’ve made a lot of stupid choices in my life, but I will never again move to a different country, state, or city, just to please someone else, while simultaneously sacrificing everything in my life that I’ve worked so hard for. I’ve done that too many times, and I will never do it again, unless it is mutually beneficial. Does that make me selfish? No. No, it doesn’t.

When I was 16, I fell in love with a guy I met online. His name was Matt, he lived in Missouri, and he was an amazing guy. When we were seniors, we applied to several of the same schools, and ended up moving to Newfoundland, Canada together, after never meeting beforehand (although, I did fly to Missouri to spend a week with him at his family’s home before we left for Canada together). I had nothing going for me in my life, or so I thought, and chose to give up everything that I did have to be with him.

Matt had dual citizenship, and was able to get several scholarships, and paid virtually nothing for school. I qualified for one scholarship, and nothing else. I had a hard time getting any loans, and ended up going through a sketchy bank to get money. The bank ended up closing, and my money was actually taken back from the school, and I had to take out a loan through my mom to pay for the rest of my first semester. Seven years later, I still owe the school money, which I fear I’ll never be financially stable enough to pay back completely. After our first year in college ended, I was unable to stay in Canada with Matt, and was forced to return to the US, and found myself panicking to find a place to live. I felt as though returning home was not an option, and chose to live with another friend from online, and his roommate, just to get money to go back to school.

Well… that never happened. Matt and I broke up, and my friend and I started dating shortly after. I’ve written about my ex before, and how I moved from town to town, further away from any sort of life and friends that I had made for myself, to better his job, or to appease his family. I was completely isolated from everyone that I knew, and was stuck in a toxic, unwelcoming, environment. After four years, he broke up with me, after accusing me of cheating on him with our roommate. Basically, I woke up at 2am to go pee, and when I got back to the room, he was sitting up, demanding to know where I went, and who I was with. I was confused, and tried to calm him down, but he was upset. I blamed it on him being delirious from sleep (he had a history of sleep-walking), but then he got out of bed, and grilled me for nearly an hour about it. Our roommate wasn’t even home, as he worked 3rd shifts. A few days later, two days after Valentine’s Day, he broke up with me, out of the blue. I won’t go into the messy details of our screwed up relationship after that, but eventually, I was tired of being used, and moved into the basement of the apartment we shared. I started dating Kyle, and was kicked out shortly after, despite having my name on the lease, and we haven’t spoken since.

Once again, I knew no one, despite having lived in that town for nearly two years. I was able to move into a slum apartment the next day, and moved from apartment t apartment for a while, until Kyle and I moved 45 minutes away to start our lives over. We still desperately want to get out of this area, but who knows when that will happen. Our next move will be on OUR terms. Mutually.

Never let anyone control you, or manipulate you, for their own gain. Don’t let them make you feel like you don’t matter. You do matter. You are important, too. You always have a choice. Always.

Thanks for reading, friends.

Jan

Dream Journal 1/30/16

Present day.

I was out for a walk with Liam, when I saw something sticking out from a sewer drain, very Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory style. I bent to pick it up, and discovered that it was an unscratched lottery ticket. I put it in my pocket, and continued on our walk. The entire time, all I could think about was the ticket, and I kept reaching my hand into my pocket to make sure it was still there. Liam and I were walking to the store anyway, so I decided that I would scratch it once we got there.

Once we got to the store, I began stacking items on top of the stroller. I pulled out the lottery ticket, and scratched it with a quarter. I stopped and stared down at the ticket, realizing that I had scratched off several matching items, revealing a prize of $42,000,000. I looked around, thinking it was a joke, but no one was there, no one was looking. I silently walked up to the register to pay for my stuff, and handed the woman my ticket. Her eyes widened, and she scanned it, causing a loud celebratory jingle to play over the register. She started screaming and jumping up and down, and came around the counter and hugged me. The manager came out, and handed me a check for $42,000,000. Just like that.

I said goodbye to them, and rushed out of the store before anyone else could see me. I headed straight for my bank, which had conveniently teleported right next door, and deposited my check. The teller who helped me sobbed hysterically as she gave me my receipt, displaying a balance of $42,000,327. I thanked her, and ducked out the door. I was in shock. I quickly went home, put Liam down for a nap, and got online.

I paid off the rest of our lease on our horrible apartment, and proceeded up buy a large, beautiful house that Kyle and I had been dreaming out and looking at, but knew that we could never afford. I then called a moving company, paid them a large amount of money to pack up my apartment, and move everything to the new house. While they came to pack everything up, I bought a brand new truck that Kyle had been eyeing, and had it delivered to the new house.

Liam woke up, and I got a ride to our new house, which was already unpacked. I texted Kyle, who wouldn’t be off of work for several hours, and told him that he needed to meet me at the address, and that I was visiting with friends. I then got online, and bought all new furniture, decor, and other odds and ends for our new house.

Kyle got off work, came to the house, and rang the doorbell. When I opened the door, and he saw some of our furniture inside, he was shocked. I sobbed, and hugged him, and told him about everything that had happened. I then gave him a tour of the new house, including his 4-car garage, with built-in workshop, and finally, his new truck. He cried and smiled and we just hugged each other while Liam ran around the large, beautiful front yard.

We decided that we were then going to finish paying off Kyle’s mom’s mortgage, buy her a new SUV, and a new truck for Kyle’s step-father. I also deposited $50,000 into my mom’s bank account, and sent her a long email, telling her about everything. We never told Kyle’s mom about her new vehicles, and had her van towed while she was working. She called us, in a complete panic, telling us that her van had been stolen. Just then, a driver pulled up with her new SUV, and she broke down in tears, thanking us over and over again.

We then donated $25,000 to the local Humane Society, which we went into to adopt a dog. We were walking through the kennels, looking at the various dogs…

And then I woke up.

Daily Prompt 1/26/2016 | Out of Touch

The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt 1/26/2016 | Life After Blogs

“Your life without a computer: what does it look like?”

In April 2013, my ex and I separated suddenly after 4 years together. I moved into the basement, and we continued to live in peaceful co-habitation, until one day, he informed me that he was giving me two weeks to find a new place to live, pack up my stuff, and leave the apartment that we shared with our roommate. He also informed me that I could not take his old computer, which he had given to me 2 years prior when he upgraded. He didn’t want the computer, he just wanted me to suffer.

Up to that point, I had been living my life almost exclusively online. We had moved 5 times in 4 years, and I had packed up my life so many times for him, as well as his family. The last couple moves took me 4 hours away from my job, as well as the few friends that I had been able to make in the the 2 years we lived in that particular city. After moving away from the city, and settling into the small town where he grew up, I lost everything. His family made my life hell, I had a hard time finding a new job, and I had no one to talk to.

A few years later, after our break up, it all happened again. The friends that I had made no longer wanted anything to do with me, and I lost my management job a short time later. I was able to find, and move into, a small, rundown apartment, where I stayed on a month-to-month agreement (no lease). I had no electricity for the first week, and no hot water for nearly two weeks. Luckily, I was able to find a new job pretty quickly, and my now-fiance, Kyle, helped me get to and from work (I can’t drive, which had caused a lot of issue with finding work).

I never got my internet back, since I no longer had a computer. And we lived without internet, or cable, for over a year and a half. The first couple months were the hardest. I had given up my podcast, my Twitter friends, my blog, my long-distance family. It was awful. Around 4 months in, my phone broke. The one thing I had left that helped keep me in touch with the world. And it was gone.

Several months later, with Kyle’s help, I was able to get a new phone. My first smart phone. I was able to get online (wherever I could find WiFi), and reconnect with my friends.

Cut to November 2014. I was around 30 weeks pregnant, and Kyle and I had moved to a new town, leaving everything behind once again. We were finally financially stable, and decided that getting the internet would be useful, as I was about to be stuck home alone for a long time, once our son came. I had a hand-me-down computer that my friend, Brian, had given me, which I am still using, and was so ready to get back online. It had been just over a year and a half since I had logged into World of Warcraft, or put out a podcast episode, or wrote a blog post.

In early November, I returned to the world of the internet, but my joy didn’t last long. Reconnecting with old friends, as well as getting back into my old games and routines, did not go as smoothly as planned. After discovering that my computer could not handle playing World of Warcraft anymore, and that most of my friends had moved on with their lives anyway, I decided that it wasn’t worth the $15 a month subscription, just to play alone. I also decided to officially retire my podcast, as it was completely impossible to record anything with a crying baby, and horrible neighbors, making noise.

Even now, I don’t do much online. I still feel that sense of disconnection. I tweet and use Facebook, but mostly from my phone. I also watch YouTube mostly on my phone, as my son won’t let me sit at my computer for long periods of time without fussing. The only thing I really do on my computer that I can’t do on my phone is… well, this. Blogging. And other miscellaneous things, like filing my taxes. If I had a better phone, though? I probably wouldn’t need this machine at all.

So, to answer the prompt, if I didn’t have a computer, my life really wouldn’t be much different than it is now.

As long as I can keep my phone.

Thanks for reading, friends.

Jan