Quick things:

  1. My knee is worse than I thought. Basically am trying to stay homebound at this point to get it to heal. Spent 40 minutes in the car today (over the course of three hours) which made it much worse. As a result, no pumpkin patch visit tomorrow. I apologize to those who were coming along; I just can\’t walk around that much right now.
  2. As my knee is so fucked now, which basically means my whole left leg and back and neck are also fucked, I don\’t think I\’m coming to Pittsburgh on Wednesday. I cannot express what this means to me, so I\’m just going to leave it at that.
  3. My computer died a few hours after I made the post early Friday morning. I hate my computer, and I think it\’s time to buy a new one, but I don\’t have the kind of money for what I need. This is the second time in four months this has happened, though, even with a new hard drive and motherboard. I\’m fucked.
  4. Seriously broken computer, made worse by Will tinkering with it, and Verizon DC having had their account setup servers down ALL DAY with NO notification or explanation as to why that is, we can\’t get back online. Which means I cannot get my e-mail, my website, my distro, my store, my phone book, etc. On a crappy dialup at the moment, but essentially, everything is shot to hell.
  5. Will\’s and my relationship, upon his getting back into town, has suddenly taken a drastic nose dive, which neither of us can figure out as to why this is. As a result, it\’s like living in a war zone here, and I need a vacation, or couples therapy, or to change the locks on the doors and not let him back in (which would be illegal, as it\’s his apartment), or even better, my own place to live. But as I can only afford $200-odd a month for rent and utilities, I think I am fucked.
  6. This week has consisted of some of the best and worst days of the entire year, but fortunately, it has nothing to do with mood swings, just events. Christ.

Jennifer, I was going to reply personally to your response to my last long post, but for some reason I cannot access the page right now. I\’ll respond at more length later, but I just wanted to say that your words were golden to me. I didn\’t see it as a lecture at all, but wonderful advice which rings true to my core. I needed to read/hear that. Thank you. And I did know about the Seabiscuit connection; there was much ado made about that amongst the local CFIDS community. I haven\’t read the book or seen the movie either, but I find the author to be inspiring.

I have to disconnect and call Verizon back again now to complain some more. But a brief plea: please come visit or call me. I feel like a fucking gimp in bed and Will\’s out partying and doing his \”Dr. Will thing,\” which, in my mind, involves acting like an asshole, so, whatever. I don\’t know what I\’m feeling right now, but it appears to be a combination of anger, frustration, and feeling like I\’m rather close to loading my shit in my car and getting the hell out of here, except for the small problems of being to gimpy to carry anything, having nowhere to go and it being fucking cold outside.

What is the number one lesson radical feminism taught me? Don\’t rely on a man for the most important things in your life, namely, your money, your home, your food, and your self esteem. And yet here I am, relying on a man for my home. And that eats away at me, not being able to be independent and self-reliant. But is anyone, truly?

Fuck, I need someone to talk to about sex and poverty and class and race and music and feminism and art and self esteem and psychology, and I need to not have to pay $125 for 45 minutes of that discussion a week. I could have an IQ of 85 and I think Will wouldn\’t even notice at this point. My brain could implode and all he would do is ask me if I\’ve taken my meds and then go back to putzing around with the mess around here and tipping back another shot of bourbon. And it\’s bad bourbon, which makes it even worse.

Do I buy a new, working computer, or go visit Jamie for a few weeks (and get the hell out of town for the first time in years) over the winter holidays? Do I do one of the above, or hit the road on my own for a girl adventure, and visit Elizabeth, Kristen, Natalia, Sarah, and I guess some of the guys, too, along the way? Or do I just fruitlessly save my money and continue to feel trapped, angsty, and worthless?

If I dropped my finger on a map of the US, did enough research as to local benefits and the cost of living, and presented a proposal like the ones they do for Convergence, what do you think the chances are that I could get all the wonderful people to move there? Nil. But this place is eating me alive, financially, bodily, mentally, and soulfully.