a new girl

that girl is on my mind.

no, not my ex-roommate. for once. :-T

but that other girl at my other job. . . .

yesterday, she came to work looking amazing in a black dress. the top half of the dress was black with white polka-dots and was rather demure-looking, and the bottom half was all black and hugged her lower body in the right places and ended at just before her knees. she wore some black kitten heels to match, and overall she just looked great.

i kind of had it in my head that she was dressed that way just for me. up until then, i had never seen her dressed up at work. at that job, there is a somewhat strict dress code: we all have to dress business casual, at minimum, and be all in black. until yesterday, i had only seen her in black leggings or tapered-leg pants, or what-not. so to see her all dolled up was a pleasant surprise.

it could be my imagination. but she seemed to want my attention as much, if not more, than usual. and i have to admit that i went out of my way to be around her. she is rather affectionate with some of her friends at work, and that is starting to include me. and yet even now, i am blushing at the memories of her grabbing my arm a few times and bringing it to her chest. i feel like i now know the exact weight and feel of her breast just from those brushes against my arm alone. she also has very beautiful, intelligent eyes. i ended up getting so instantaneously caught up in them whenever our eyes met, and i could swear that, at those times, she could totally read how much i like her.

sheesh. i swear i'm no different than a horny guy who can't keep his hormones under control.

but i don't know if all of it is just in my head. maybe it is. i just don't want to get my hopes up. i like her -- and i like her a lot already. and i am definitely attracted to her. but at the same time, she is a young thing, and who knows with the younger, post-generation y kids these days. i'm glad that, more and more, the idea of sexual fluidity is being a little more openly embraced by those younger generations. but does that mean this chick is only out for some experimentation?

who knows.

there was an interesting moment yesterday, though, as she left for the day. my shift hadn't ended, so i was still at the front area, where i could look out through these large windows into the front parking lot. i knew her shift was ending and had kind of hoped she would whisk through the front so i could say goodbye. but she ended up stealing out a side door and into a car that was waiting for her in the front. i couldn't help myself; i watched her get in the car and the car start to drive away. suddenly, her head turned toward the window and she saw me. she saw me looking at her. she started smiling broadly and continued to look at me as the car she was in pulled away.

so yeah. . . . maybe she knows. . . .

:-T

despite it all, though, i know i'm not ready for any sort of intimacy with any other person. my therapist and i have talked about that a few times recently and are in agreement on that.

but i still can't wait to go back to work at the second job. . . .

:)

i don't make much money there. i think i get about nine bucks an hour for about twenty hours of work per week. it is a much-needed supplement to my income, for sure, though. a lot of people who know me are surprised by how long i've lasted juggling two jobs, which, on most days, require me to work 10 or 11 hours per day, with less than an hour separating the two gigs. it does get tough, physically, i have to say. but that bunch of people i work with at the second job are so amazing. yes, especially that one girl . . . . but the rest of them, too. i get the energy i need when i'm around others who exude that much energy and enthusiasm, and those are what help to perk me up by the time i get there in the evenings or weekends to help me get through my shift, however long it is. and for sure, now that i have even more of an incentive to come in to work there, i don't see myself giving up this second job for a long while to come . . . .

still in hiberanation mode

wow.

that's all i can really say: wow.

i don't know if it's my anti-anxiety meds at work, but i haven't been feeling much of anything lately. no extreme emotions anyway. no extreme happiness, no extreme sadness, no extreme anger. nothing that i can't handle, anyway, although there are times when it gets pretty dicey.

my former roommate and her unit have moved up into the suite where i work. this is going to make for a very interesting situation.

especially since she and one of her other teammates have gotten their own offices.

now, she and that other teammate don't outrank me. in fact, i think i might outrank them, even though we both occupy the same position, if only because i have been in the position a little bit longer. i have another co-worker who i've been working with in the same suite who has the same position but has occupied it for far much longer than me, my former roommate, and her cohort combined. and yet she and i still are in our cubicles while the other two chicks have their own private offices.

this only happened yesterday. and it created quite a stir between me and my co-worker rather instantaneously.

i'm curious to see how the situation all gets resolved. what i find quite interesting is that, beyond all my control, there are more and more reasons being thrown at me, one after another, to sort of justify and enhance the current estrangement that i've been experiencing between me and my ex-roommate. just when i start getting a little soft-hearted and feeling nostalgic for our old relationship, something just happens to resurrect those feelings of, "oh that's right! you are a not-very-good-person for me." and then i can continue to go back to where i need to be in order to continue trying to rehabilitate myself.

it's just crazy for me to just kind of be all alone in this. i have my therapist, yes. but other than she, no one else knows just how much of a fucking basket case i really am. people see me, think i'm oh-so-funny, oh-so-charming, oh-so-smart, oh-so-light-hearted. and i am all those things. but i'm an absolute basket case, too. i have nothing inside me that is strong enough to keep myself grounded and here and where i need to be. i have all these feelings of anxiety that can get to be so troublesome to get a handle on. and yet no one really sees that. and it just . . . boggles my mind.

on to another note:

i've met this other girl; she's my co-worker at my second job.

i like her.

and she has been unbelievably flirty with me. each day, she gets a little bolder.

i still need to keep my distance because . . . well, she's kind of young. and i don't want to start causing work-place rumors to fly; all the co-workers at my other job are fairly tight-knit, and nothing really escapes their notice or knowledge. for instance, her flirting with me kind of got the attention of at least one other person yesterday.

still, she's really cute. beautiful eyes. great skin. and a nice decolletage.

but . . . she's off-limits.

:-T

all's good

things are good.

no, really. they are.

i am taking things much better than i had anticipated. the process and anticipation themselves were what made the going difficult. but now that all is said and done, i feel so much better.

the big break-up of the household between me and my now-former roommate actually just happened. it was supposed to happen a couple of months ago, but we thought we could just make it work through the end of our lease. however, this last month of our lease has been tough. i worked to create the necessary distance that i would need in order to be okay with the break. and now that all is said and done and we have parted ways, i am actually pretty fine.

it took so long and so much out of me. but it's so great to be able to know just how fine i am with the whole ordeal over. i don't think i could've gotten to this point without my therapist. she absolutely rocks.

now that my former roommate is no longer the center of my universe, though, it's hard to get back to the swing of things. i am so used to orienting my world around others that, now that i'm on my own again, i barely know what to do with myself. but i am slowly trying to remember old hobbies that i enjoy -- reading comic books, minor arts and crafts projects, reading. even writing on this ol' blog.

most of all, however, i have been throwing myself into work. i no longer really need to work a second job, but because i enjoy the co-workers at my second gig, i feel no dire urge to quit any time soon. the long work-days and work-week are really starting to take a toll on me; i look like a zombie, and whenever my mom gets a good look at me, she starts wanting to shove food down my throat. but the tiredness is a good tiredness. the toll all the physicality takes on my body is a good distraction to the troublesome nagging thoughts that sometimes flits through my mind when i least expect it; it brings me back to the present instead of allowing me to continue to worry and fret about things beyond my control.

the whole bar exam thing is something i occasionally think about. but my therapist has encouraged me to not tackle all my troubles and woes at once and to just concentrate on getting my life and perspective all back into order. one of the main things i need to assess is if i really want to take it again and if i ever really wanted to take it at all. but that's all going to come later, for now, even though i started this blog to vent about my frustrations regarding the bar, at this time, i don't need to be thinking about stuff like that at all.

in the meantime, where does this leave me? i feel like i am in a state of hibernation. my body is going through the motions, needing to do what it needs to survive and to distract itself. but in the meantime, i am holding myself back, holding myself in, for the sake of getting myself better. as it is with most good therapy sessions, the longer i've been with my therapist, the more deeply entrenched i find that some of my bad habits, vulnerabilities, insecurities are in holding me down. at the same time, though, i feel that the one quality that my roommate has always criticized me for -- my idealism -- really is so uniquely me that it is now bubbling forth again. i always submerged my idealism, when i found out how strongly she looked down on it. but you know, there are certain things i believe in and trust in that are not jaded. and it really does feel good to not only know how strongly that idealism is felt in me but also to be able to express it freely. i seriously underestimated how much of my personality got suppressed just from being around her for so long and so often. . . .

so i'm finally on the right road that i need to be on. it feels scary and tenuous. but i'm glad to be here, now that the time has come. here's to a more favorable journey, from here on out, and this time, i am glad to be riding solo, armed with only faith and quietude, from this point forward.