purgatory

Yeah, that's me, floating here in nothingness.  A relationship adrift at sea with very little hope of salvation---I wish I could jsut move on.  I wish he would jsut get another job.  I wish for any reason to end it., and I realize that the reasons are all around me.  ANy hot nurse up here at Emory,, may have already happened.  But there are other reasons too, that don

time to say goodbye

Yesterday was your birthday.,  You are 32----right in the middlle of a busy, full life.  Your wife wished you a happy birthday on facebook, and it almost tore me up.  to see her write, happy birthday to my hubby, I love  you more and more as the years roll by.  You are an great husband and an excellent father. and I know he is on at least the one hand, an excellent father.  You are a special person---something about you, your spirit rises above the rest---it was calling me as you stood and looked at me from a distance down the hall.  Your eyes kept calling me.  And then you took off your scrub hat and I saw your big, round shiny shaved dome---and combine that with your mega-watt million watt smile---and that happy, amazinglaugh---and the way you listen to people and talk so easily and with such charm---kind of like my dad in the way you connect with everyone.  And you belong to Amber, and you love all those kids. 

I cannot take care of you anymore.  You are not my man---Amber needs to do all that I do now---and she does, and more.  She is food for your soul, too, apparently, something in her makes you keep coming back and coming back.   Did I have that power with my own husband---in spite of all the women he loved in the thirty years, he kept coming back to me.  yet I don't believe it was ever for me---it was for the kids, for the family.  As it was for me----the family unit, the be all and the end all.  

But for Otis, Amber is a big draw... God How i love this man----I love him.  It's ridiculous and I hate that bitch because she got that good man.  I torture myself thinking about what they must be doing at any given point in time---what are they doing now?   Where are they eating?  i  can picture him laughing across the table with her----he is really so easy to get along with.  It just kills me.  It eats me up to think about it.  I try to put it down in my mind---but it comes back to the surface.

I know that someday this will all pass and I will look back at it with hardly a memory---  I pray we'll be all right and watch us where we go-===in times where we don't know. let this be our prayer.  when we lose our way, lead us to a place, guide us with your grace, to a place where we'll be safe.   

Oh Otis, why did you pull me into your life?  I was happy befoer you.  And I haven't known any happiness since December, only torture and pain.  Sadness. Self loathing.  Everyone is happy in this relationship except for me.  For your birthday I want to give you your freedom--go now with your family and your wife and PLEASE, I BET YOU, SET ME FREE.  For your birthday, give me my freedom, set me free, please. As the tears fall down my face and drip off my chin and soak my shirt =-==set me free from your soul.  Set me free.  May God forgive me for every sin, for every failure to overcome temptation.  Yes the hell we live is the hell we create for ourselves on this earth----

What are you diong today?  What have you done all week?  I miss you so, and you don't even know how much, or what you have done to me.  You should not enter into a relationship like this with a woman like me---so desperate to love someone. So desperate tpo love.  And me, here with my sentimental husband, who can barely tell a story now without getting all choked up.  Did Imiss somewhere something with him.  Am I forgetting how he has treated me, how he will again. Is anyone perfect?  Oh Lord the pain of lving on this earth is sometimes beyond  my capacity to endure it.  It really is.

anger management

All I have to do to remind myself of my situation is to  remember when Otis looked at my face when we met there in the ER.  Yeah.....it's all good, he said.  And with that I think my face must have looked like the sky right before a tornado hits---boiling with impending fury and rage ----I don't want to hurt you .....he said, as if he cared -----oh you son of a bitch.  the worst thing you could EVER say to me---first of all, PLEASE!  The way he used me, as his "bailer-outer", and called me up at work and said "she CUT me!"  and how he was going to leave her ass====and all of the stuff that he just helped himself to when we would go shopping.  Oh spare me ===spare me from feeling sorry for me---dont EVER feel sorry for me.  DOn't worry about hurting me man----i can take care of my own fucking self.  worry about your fucking fat bitch wife===worry about your bad twins, worry about your baby, worry about yourself, but don't worry about hurting me sonofabitch.  Its tooooo fucking late for that asshole!

And I get so jealous thinking about him and her.  Making love to her.  I bet after their big blow out they made some mad good love ----i know they did.  I just know they did. I hate that they have kids together, that they are tied together like that.  I get so jealous thinking about him walking down to the corner and picking up Jaythanand the twins from school.  Seeing his happy face and his shaved head and his big, manly self.  and ?Amber getting to love ont hat, and that black skin for her onl,y  I want to fucking kill that goddam fucking bitch.  I hate her .  I can never go back to the days where I take him for groceries---because I know she will be eating that food---I would resent every penny I spent if I knew that she enjoyed any of it, in any way----I just can't do it anymore.  Amber can take of her kids, andher man.  I can't do it anymore

happy endings, new beginnings - amber bradley

The despair that I feel right now is about like the despair that I have felt in these past many posts---except for today we have here what I call the new reality.  Because now I know---i know---i know.  Saturday morning I took Otis to Kroger and I bought him abuot a hundred dollars worth of groceries, because he said they weren't due for more food stamps until Sept. 8th, Thursday, and there wasn't much food on the shelves.  To be totally fair, he NEVER asked me for any of this on this day.  But i said, well, what are you going to have for labor day?  Nothing! he said.  I don't have any money.  Well, lets' go by Kroger or Walm art and get something to make, i said.  I can't tell you what it does for me to imagine all those kids, esp the little twins, and Jaythan, with their shiny brown happy eyes, enjoying all the food that Otis would grill for them---seeing them gathered around the table while he made them burgers and hot dogs.  So we started planning on what we would buy---baloney (balogna) he said.  I love baloney.  I haven't had any in so long.  Baloney?  I'm thinking?  for real?  Baloney is cheap,so have at it.  Then I said, how about one of those big things of ground beef, and some more hot dogs, and some more beans.  Well, we hit up Kroger.  We got baloney, bread, hot dogs and hamburger buns, about ten pounds of ground beef, two packs of Ball Parks, buy one get one free, because he said nathan's were too salty, beans, honey buns and oreos, and baby formula for the baby, becasue they were almost out, and Amber was diluting the formula to make it stretch.  Also. a couple of containers of strained peas, and blueberries and apples, Imodium because Otis had the shits, from giving himself too much of the laxative, the moscato wine with the naked man on the bottle, Yuengling beer, and a pack of cigarettes.

We stopped at Burger King and I bought him two ciabatta breakfast sandwiches, one of which he gave his dad when he dropped his new pair of shorts that I got him, over to his dads.  I took him back to East Point and dropped him off a couple blocks from home, toting all the bags.  And I felt happy to know that he would have a good weekend, grilling and the kids would have something to eat, with their daddy.

Saturday night I went to work and it is always a little quiet and a little lonesome without him there, but I like it too, because then I can sleep if we don't have any cases.  If he's there and we don't have any cases, he comes and gets me and wants me to hang with him.  Saturday morning I get a call from him and he is profoundly upset.  He said he had been out walking since three in the morning.  Amber apparently got drunk (on the beer I had bought?) and for some reason went in search of his phone, which she found in Jaythans room.  She apparently found blank picture spaces on it where I had attempted to send him some pics, and maybe one of the shoes which I had bought that he liked.  I don't know about that becasuse it's hard for me to get the story straight from him when he is upset.  He said, she cut me with a knife, man!  I'm like, What?"  She CUT you.  Yeah, man.  And then she apparently tried to hit him with a candle, one that I bought for him.  So I guess he jumped up and ran out the house.  I was very upset, worried about him and I was driving home, went past Old National Hwy, and at Flat shoals I think, I'm just gonna go by his daddy's house and see if he is there.  Sure enough, there he was sitting in the garage with his daddy and his auntie, sitting there in the Roca denims I bought him, his True Religion boots and a wife beater shirt.  And how I love him in that.  He saw me go by and I cont. to drive but he ran down the driveway to meet me.  He was looking really nervous, told me that Amber had JUST been by to borrow money from his dad for gas?????? (Why was she there?  what the fuck, I don't understand anything??????????  He said she just left out of here.  Well I was so worried about you, I said!  LEt me see your cut.  It was nothing.  NOthing.  Barely a scratch on the skin.  what the fuck!!!!  Okay. well man, you were talking to me and then we got cut off----hell, I thought she stabbed you in the back and killed yoU!  I'm alright baby, he said.  Okay, well, I'm gonna have to let you go, I said.  Too much drama here for me.  He shook his head.  Yes.  I said.  But I didn't really mean it.  I'll go then, I said, and I pulled out, went dfown to the corner, turned around and drove past again, and I felt kind of pissed, the way he leaves me hanging like that, thinking he was cut up and maybe dead

So then I go to Walmart on Old National cuz I wanted to buy MY family something for Labor Day to grill and eat!  And he calls me.  I'm hungry, he says.  Where are you.  I'm at Walmart.  Oh, probably already in Union city already, he says.  No.  I'm right here on Old National.  What do you want, I can get you something.  Get me one of those pizzas we were looking at the other day---what kind?  Pepperoni and ground beef.   I picked him out a big meat trio pizza because there wasn't any just pepperoni and ground beef, three chocolate milks, two dr peppers and some club crackers.  I picked out my own stuff and paid, ---drove it back to his dad's house on Springdale.  HE came out to the end of the driveway and I handed over the goods.  Be careful, I said.  I drove away and I felt like I had at least fed my man==that he wouldn't go hungry.

Well, later that day I get a call from him from his sister Tam's house.  They were both on the line, and both saying that Amber had spent the night and all that day calling everyone in the family ten times and more, wanting to talk to everyone, and they were all like, why should we talk to you now, you never talk to us any other times.  so no one was spilling anything.  Also, one of Amber's friends had gotten on somehow under my FB page and said they saw all kinds of pictures of Otis on there, and while I do have one whole album dedicated solely to pictures of him, that album is visible only to me, and always has been visible only to me.  The other album is a pictorial tour of the OR and all of my friends, male and female, and there are four pics of Otis on there.  I was scared shitless and shaking though--scared about everything.  Scared that Otis was gonna get major busted by his wife, that she would have lots of dirt on him, that she would make my life hell, and etc etc.

But I looked back at my FB profile and saw that everything was secured and private as I thought, so we parted ways again.  He called me one more time from his mama's, saying he was going to go down to child support services and find out what he was going to have to pay because he kept saying, I'm done, I'm done.  I'm done with her ass.  And honestly, this time, I thought he really meant it.  I knew that this would actually be no good for me, because then Otis would have to find another Boo to put him up, because he literally had no where to go,---he just didn't want to go stay with his mama.  We found out last week that Tammy was no longer an option, --the big fat girl who told him her door would always be open to him, had found herself a fiance.  I also figured out something this morning too, as I was driving and thinking---Otis picks big fat lonely women for a reason---they're the ones who will do ANYTHING FOR a man, to keep him, to love him, ANYTHING.  I was one of those---big fat girls.
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Yesterday I read my horoscope and it was the most chilling one I have ever gotten---it shook me to my core---I knew something bad was going to happen after I read it.  I will retrieve the paper and write it down in its entirety as it was written---but basically it said your tendency to be overly generous is going to blow up in your face---I knew the whole situation was going to fall apart--I knew I was screwed.  Don't really believe in those things--but I believed in that one. 

Aries:  September 5th, 2011---A tendency to go overboard as a generous benefactor might not pan out.
toooo fucking ironic

Well, I went to bed and I was really expecting him to call me from work---so looking forward to talking things out---see what happened, what his next move would be.  And I realized that for me, him breaking up with Amber would actually be a bad thing, because like I said, he would then be on the make for another bailer outer (that's what he called me, once).  But the dreamer in me, I don't know, thought we could continue on for awhile---hell, I know we couldn't, maybe I thought it would be easier to break it off. 

But he did not call---I had that phone on vibrate next to my arm,, between my boobs, constantly in contact with my body so I could feel it vibrate and answer.  But 11 pm came and went, 11:30 , 12:00---i knew by eleven thirty he wasn't calling, and I felt puzzled, because I felt sure i would get a call and I would be able to commiserate some more with this sorry state of affairs.

But next morning I dragged my weary self out of bed---went downstairs after my shower and fired up facebook.  What do I fucking see first thing---Amber Bradley's post.  "I love Happy Endings, and new Beginnings."  I knew right then and there that the two of them had kissed and made up, and more than likely he had called her from his work phone, because she wouldn't know what work cell he had been given, so it was him who had to call her.  He couldn't stand it, he couldn't take it.  He can't stand not being with her, or the kids, or all of them. Or maybe he had nowhere to go, but back home.

I found my last twenty in my purse, because he had asked me, or did I offer it (my God I made it so easy for him to use me---pitiful fat old woman) because he needed money to get to the bus and to the child support office---I decided I wasn't going to answer the phone at first, because I knew we had to arrange to meet to hand off the money---but then I decided I would answer it and tell him he could go up to Level K and find it under the tool box on the Ranger.  Where he had left the honey buns and the oreos---which I also brought.  But then he called me, and he said, I'm down here in the ER---so I decided I was going to give him his honey buns and his (my) money, and  end it.

So I met hiim, ===I handed him the bag of honey buns and oreos, --I think my face said everything---yeah, he said, everything is good----yeah, I know you two are back together I said.  And that;s what i want for you, i said.  I was already choking up, becaues I was so frustrated with his weak ass====jacking me around, playing with my feelings, sucking me, and his whole family into his drama with that fucking bitch===I don't want to hurt you, he said.  Oh MOTHER FUCKER!!!  "The worst goddam thing that son of a bitch could EVER say to me.  dont give me your pity, don't feel sorry for me, don't need your pity-=---go back to your fucking wife.  I don't need your pity.  Give me a hug, he said.  Oh fuck you.  Thats what that bastard said to me the last time he MADE THE TIME TO STAY, but it was for the money, as usual.  And it was the most insulting shit hug I ever got.  Like you would hug your old aunt who pees on herself.    Oh nono nonononon ==fuck, you and your hug and i don't want to hurt you.  Stick that up your ass mother fucker.  I put out my arm and said NO.  No.  Then I said, Don't call me, don't call me at night.  He seemed surprised and sad.  Oh.  Okay, he said.  I looked about me wildly for the exit out of the fucking ER,l because it's like a rat's maze of doors down there.  Here, he said, right here.  He pressed the button to open the automatic door and I went out, but I was lost.  I turned around and watched him slowly walk away, and of course he never looked back.  And i idly wondered, where he got the really nice, oversized umbrella that he was carrying.

used, manipulated, taken for a ride,

Well this morning we had a fire drill at work and we were all herding downstairs past the cafeteria, and who did I see when I passed but Otis!  God, just to see his fine face like shocked me and hit me in my heart---honestly, he is so good looking to me---withthat shaved head and those amazing eyes.  I don't know what it is---but for some reason, I was also instantly pissed.  Because for some other reason, I was always under the impression that he was in a fucking hurry to leave the building to catch the bus to get home to the bitch.  He never can stay around to see me---but I bet he is sitting around down there chatting up the nurses---the smart ones who don't try to buy his fucking love--pitiful old fools like me, old white fucking sugar mama.  I am ashamed to admit how much money I spent on him this month--and for wht?  for nothing?  Barely a kiss---nothing.  If I try to tell him some little story or some little thing, he either interrupts me or is reading an evil text from Amber, and worrying about getting home to HER!  god how foolish can one woman be?  I mean, I am getting nothing out of this relationship!  NOTHINGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG.  but poorer, more in debt.  God is watching my foolishness and I am hell bound, hellbound, I am telling you.  Hell BOUND! 

We stopped by his mama's house yesterday, because that's where he has to sockaway all his treasures---it doesn't lookgood to Amber when he comes home with five bags of clothes and a Fossil watch.  He has to hide all his shit--otherwise, God knows what shemight do to it if she went on a rampage, his wife I mean.  His mama said, I'm mad at you.  I said, Why?  She said, because you never called me---I said, well, you know I never know if I am interrupting or you're watching TV or anything.....She says, That doesn't matter!  Call me!  then she said, listen, call me sometime.  I need to ask you something.  When can you call me?  I said, how about tomorrow?  I know his mama is gonna hit me up for money.  She was admiring the true religion boots that he was wearing.  I would wear something like that!  she said, in the winter.  Oh yes, I would--I lke to wear different stuff like that.  she was admiring his sunglasses, which I bought, and said, I would wear these too!  Oh my god, the hints were dropping like bombs.  She siad, Oh my God, I love your bracelet you are wearing.  It was a multi-colored stone stretch bracelet which was cheap.  I liked it because I could literally wear it with any outfit, which is what she said.  Do you want it?  You can have it, I said.  ANd she did not  hesitate.  Oh yes.  I love it.  I took it from my wrist and she put it on hers.  there was NO, no, really , I wouldn't dream of it.  None of that, give and take before one party says,NO, I want to give it to you.  What there was was, Yes, I want it.  SO I'm going to call her today and I know she is gonna hit me up for money===and I hope it's not a lot, but I'm gonna give it to her, because I'm gonna play this game out with thiese people,and know one thing, god is watching this shit.  Fifty bucks is my limit.  Fifty bucks. 

Theother day when I was picking him up from his dad's house, out comes his half sister Cheryl.  Supposedly a minister of her own church--how one achieves this status I don't know.  But out she comes---sslithering up to me like a predator, like a snake.  I just want to ask you one thing, she says,.  I would like you to make a one time donation to my church.  I said, well, I can't rigtht now, cuz right now I'm basically supporting HIM and your mother and sometimes to his daddy---She took out an envelope with her church name on it and wrote $100 dollars.  I wanted to puke right on that manipulative, user bitch.  Because one thing Iknow, that money wsn't go to her damn church.  It was gonna go in her pocket, for nails, clothes, a new hat, food, anything but the church cause.  She was at Otis' dad's house solely for th epurpose of borrowing money from Otis senior )not her real father, by the way).  Well he didn't have any money for her either. 
Yesterday, also, Otis dad was gonna lend Otis a hundred dollars so he could make his rent, because Amber shorted their land lord last month and didn't give him all the rent money

Okay, it is now September 6th and I'm just gonna continue this from up there, even though, as of this morning, I know that Otis and I will never be the same, and that I will never go back to what I did for him, or them.  But anyway, so Otis' dad was gonna give HIM a hundred, but then he instantly needed twenty bucks of it back==so then Otis needed another twenty to make the rent.  These people just seem to make the rounds with each other, driving around, if any of them have gas money, looking to bum ten or twenty bucks off each other.  And I see that they readily give it up, if they have it, BUT the undertanding is that it will be paid back---otherwise there won't be no next time!

It just makes me almost laugh at this process they have of bumming money, borrowing a five or a ten---
Anyway, what do you know.  I called Otis mama, just like I said I would, because I keep my word, we do in my world.  In my family.  To be fair.  In my family.  So me and Miss Pat talk a while.  We talk about Amber.  I just hate how she do him, she said.  He works all night , then he has to go home and clean everything, and she takes off and he has to stay with the twins.  And those twins, that one that looks like her, she's bad.  They're bad.  I said, you really think they're bad--because I saw those twins and they were sweet little girls, ---I don't care what his mom said, four year olds can't really be that bad, and they weren't.  they were well behaved.  They minded.  "I know they are!"  she said.  Specially that one that looks like her.  I love her but I don't like how she do him.  So there I had it then.  She said it==I love her, which means, I still respect her as his wife, or I respect her as a black woman---whatever.  Or maybe she just said it so I wouldn't think she would betray a daughter in law, in case I ever ended up as one.  Then Miss Pat said, well, I was afraid you were mad at me about Otis' clothes.  I'm like what?  she said, you know, how he had those nice shirts all balled up.  I wanted to hang them up, like you said.  But he said they would be okay. 

A tiny part of me hoped and hoped and hoped against hope that this was what she really wanted to talk to me about.  Oh God how I hoped that Miss Pat just wanted to talk about his shirts and not wanting to hit me up for money.  Oh, I said.  Those are Otis' shirts.  Once I give them to him, he can do whatever he wants to do with them.  I'm not mad at all.  I was sittng on the toilet, taking a crap actually, and I really hoped me and Miss Pat were having a lady chat.  but then as I was edging toward maybe goodbye, she said,Listen Lori.  I have something to ask you, but it's just between us, okay.  So I knew it was coming.  I need to borrow some money.  I need to get a car tag for my car and some some some blah blah fixed blah blah, (actually Otis had said something about this too,so it sounded like a familiar story).  I listened.  Well, how much do you need?  I asked.  Two hundred dollars she said.  Two hundred dollars!  I felt my heart sink into despair because I knew I wasgoing to go over my fifty dollar limit, and I was watching all my money go to people who don't love me but use me---opportunists, every last one.  I hated myself for being weak, and for being such an easy target,  (Jordan would never be this foolish),and for still hoping that maybe he might love me if I gave him mama money which I barely had for myself.

Well, I can't give you two hundred right now I said.  I've given Otis as much as I had, and I had to pull out most of it to cover some of my own stuff.  Well, how much can you give me, she said?  I think I can get you a hundred, I said, while crying somewhere deep in my soul at the absurdity of this situation.  How did I ever get into this, with these people?  

She was a little disappointed.  Well, alright then.  As long as you can maybe get the rest of that to me by December,  Her birthday was in January, so maybe there was some truth to the car tag story.  But I still felt to myself, the nerve, telling me to get the rest of it to her by December.  And Lori, I can't really repay you until at least February. that's okay, i said, because I knew i would never be repaid.  I didn't even ponder on that thought.  I hung up. feeling so utterly taken, so used, so unloved for anythjing except the money that I really didn't have, which made it worse, because I knew I was taking away from MY family, my bills, my needs.  My debt.

I had told her I would bring it by that day, after work.  And as usual, I was compelled, according to my upbringing, to do what I said.  I was also anxious to please her, my faux mother=in=law, so that maybe Otis wopuld be pleased.  And maybe I could do something for her that that bitch Amber couldn't. It gave me some sense of power over her---sick,but it did.  So after work I went to the credit union, drew out a hundred, (which by the way was money that was supposed to go to Otis for his birthday).  Then because I still wanted to look good in her eyes, I went to Chick a loes and got her fifteen lemon pepper wings, and THEN to the grocery story and picked out three grapefruit, the red kind, because that's what she said she would REALLY like to have, the last time I saw her.  Which at that time I had brought her two dozen bottles of water, raw chicken breasts and thighs (she preferred wings, I found out) nutty bars, and a twenty, which otis tried to grab, but didn't get. 

So then I drove over to the apartments and called her.  Well I swear I thought I had called into the twilight zone. Miss Pat?  It's Lori.  Oh, she said.  I'm surprised she didn't say Who?  Uh---well, uh, I brought your money, I said.  I thought you wanted it today..... Oh uh, yeah, honey.....I mean, well, I can bring it by another day, I said.  I got the most distinct feeling that she didn't want me to come up!  I can come down in my chair, she said.  Well, no, I don't want you to have to do that, i said. 
Well, alright, you can come on up then, she said, but she wasn't to excited about that prospect.  I'm thinking, what the fuck is going on here.  She called me up this very day, asking for money, here I am with it, and I'm getting this vague, weird conversation.  I was like blown out of the water, my mind was all confused.  It was like talking to two different people!  One who was so eager to talk to me, who was insulted I didn't call her every week, and this lady, who didn't really want me to come up to the apartment.  It was fucking weird.  So Imade my way through the electronic gate, some guy coming out let me come in.  I made my way to her apartment.  I knocked on her door.  It took her awhile to answer it.  She opened it.  I almost thought she was going to bar the door.  Well come on in baby and give me a hug.  I kind of walked past her and said, I brought you some wings, and some grapefruit, since you said you liked it.  I don't know how good they are since they're not really in season yet.  "Oh how sweet, she said.  I love grapefruit!  How did you know?  You told me, I said.  I took a brief glance around the small living area, saw no one , but got such a definite feeling that someone was in there, in the bedroom maybe?  A lover?  Man , I don't know how, she can barely walk,and when she does its bent over, she pees on ehrself worse than I do, and she wears dentures.  BUt still, we all need some loving, I guess.  She did not ask me in, to sit down, to talk, so I walked back to the door and gave her a hug.  Either she had someone there, or she was fixing to go and had no time to be polite.  So I gave her the bank envelope with the money, bent down to give her a hug, and she watched me til I got on the elevator, then closed her door.  I walked back to my car and sat there and ate all fifteen teriyaki wings that I saved for myself.  Too damn bad if she would have preferred them over Lemon pepper, or breasts. or legs or whatever the fuck---no matter what I got, she would always be wanting, or happier with the thing I didn't get.  I felt profoundly depressed---Otis mama didn't give a damn about knowing me or talking to me.   Hell,she didn't even particularly give a damn about getting the money that day---because I know in their world, if you get it, you get it, if you don't, you don't.  but somehow, they survive,any way they can.

late in the day in "august, thunder rumbling in the distance

Joe and I have been literally been sitting here in this family room all day, since about ten am.  We probably have spoken five minutes worth of conversation with each other.  When we drove home from West Palm Beach on Friday, we maybe had ten minutes worth of conversation.  What does this mean?  That we are so comfortable with each other that we don't really need to talk?  That we just don't have much to say to each other after 30 years?  Sometimes I fear it's because I am a very poor conversationalist---I do, but I don't think so.  Jordan and I talked almost the whole time when I was in the car with her, and last night at work, I carried on a four hour conversation with a girl I barely know.  I am atually very good at prompting people to talk, and very good at give and take in a conversation, not dominating it too much, except with my sisters maybe----I think they think I am a butt-er  in-er , but they are the only two people besides Rhonda who really listen to me, and let me talk.  I fear that we just don't have much to say to each other, Joe and I.  We just don't.  We just watched a movie, Life as we know it, with Katherine Heigl, ===it got bad reviews, but I thought it was sweet, myself .  But there was one scene, where Heigl is fighting with JOsh Duhamel, god he is so fine, ==and Heigl's doctor boyfriend said, If my wife and I had fought like that, we would still be married.  And to me, that is the truth----it shows you still care enough to fight, to figure it out, to communicate.  And friday night, I was sitting st the front desk, and Otis was clear downthe hall way, talking on the phone with Amber.  Only he was talking so loud, I could hear him from the front desk.  <Like his daddy, his voice gets higher when he gets frustrated.  Well, I sidled down the hallway, and I was listening.  He was passionately yelling into the phone,m sometimes taking it away from his face, gesturing wildly in frustration.  He said, that is not my gotdam fault I lost my job at St. Joes.  That was your fault . And .....what ever happened to for richer for poorer, for better for worse, till death DO YOU PART?  this man wants to stay married to this woman.  He loves her for some goddam reason that I don't gget, but that bitch knows how to play him like a fiddle. She's been threatening divorce and hitting him up for alimony AND child support.  Well he hung up with her and we were discussing it, andf all of a sudden he was afraid he hadn't disconnected his cell phone and he was freakng worried she heard us.  He dialed her back, but apparently she hadn't heard anything, he must have disconnected.  It bothers me so much to know and to realize that he cares  so much =-==that he tells me, fuck her, I'm fixing to move on for REAL, and yet, he is instantly worried about beingn caughtk, found out, busted, and losing HER.  ANd I keep thinking, what the fuck?  What the fuck I am doing here.?  This still is the rare  black man who just cares passionately about his woman and he wants to stay married to her  And it pisses me off that he keeps coming back to me to use me for all the little shit he needs at Walmart.  It hurts me.  It hurts me bad.

another day another dollar another day in purgatory

WEll, sittinghere at work.  Dr. Owings doing a thyroidectomy on a big fat black woman.  he said to me, cuz I think he is racist, not enough to eat for this one.  There ought to be some kind of government program available so this lady can get something to eat---of course all that said matter of fact straight sarcasm---cuz she weighed about 350 pounds.  She had a transverse healing abdominal wound that was still a little red and raw, mostly healed but still red and raw at the incision line.  I'm just setting the mood in here---we get no music because Dr. Owings can't tolerate music. He is an excellent surgeon. They say he was hell on wheels when he was young.

Jordan is home temporarily---between life phases.  We moved her home from Macon and all her stuff is filling up the dining room and the computer room.  As if the house wasn't cluttered enough---now I just can't thnk, clean or function---I'll let it all go til we pack her up and take her down to West Palm Beach.  Just when I get used to her being home---away she flies again like a little bird.  I worry so much about my daughter, about her future happiness.  What did she say to me yesterday while we wereeating our Thai chicken chopped salads at Panera.  Why is Becki so upset that Brianna is leaving?  I said, Because then she has to be all alone with Barry.  Jordan was upset.  Well Barry isn't very nice to her, she doesn't like Barry that much, ---you don't get it.  She says, you and Becki and Rhonda (Rhonda?_--how did she know Rhonda wasn't happy)  I don't think you like Dad.  I don't likeRhonda encouraging you, I don't like Facebook, you all encourage each other on Facebook!  Oh how little that girl knows---she simplifies the situation too much---Hey I said, I try to back Dad up when you and Tom get too rough on him.  No. You don't likeDad .  Its not very nice.

If I had been thinking quicker I would have explained things better.  I wouldhave said, You know, I love Dad. but I don't like him.  You see how he treats me.  You knowwhy the other day I didn't text him back when he  txted me about picking up lunch stuff for tom.  ?  You know why?  Because he texted me a picture of a carton of broken egg shells that fell out of the garbage can when he pulled it out from under the sink.  The caption was "GOOD JOB".  Now what the fuck?  WHo the fuck does that?  Was that necessary to do that?  Whatkind of unhappy son of a bitch takes the time to send that picture with that caption to his wife, while she is hard at work---in the space of time it took him to text that he could have cleaned that shitup and just gone on with his business, live and let live.  It was his damn fault for being in one of his goddam hurries.

That sonof abitch didn't deserve a t ext back from me..  If y ou're gonna treat me like shit,then you get treated like shit.  I wanted to tell her, want to tell her---you know what.  Why are you blaming me and Becki and Rhonda, esp me and Becki.  We're the GOOD GUYS!  We are the ones who have sacrificed everything, our happiness, love, peace of mind, to give  YOU, our children, a father, some semblance of a family---that's what YOU wanted Jordan.   You didn't want us to be divorced.  So we didn't get divorced.  I did it all for you, Jordan, for you, becaue I think Tom would have understood it, but YOU, you wanted to live an illusion---YOU--we are NOT the bad guys.  We do not text our husbands with nasty, mean picture messages, we do NOT give our spouses the silent treatment, make them feel guilty for laughing and enjoying life, yell at them, verbally abuse them, mentally assault them with put downs and harangues---no.,  We are not the goddam bad guys---good god almighty we fucking gave it all up for you guys---lived in hell for thirty plus years so YOU COULD HAVE A GODDAM FATHER!   THATS what I wanted to say to her---and I still might, because if she treats Chrislike that, he isn't gonna likeher.  Hemight love her, but he is gonna hateher too.  And I can't bear to think of someone hating my daughter--but she is like Joe---she watches him, she loves him, she hates him, and I know she is gonna be just like him.  Something IN her, is gonna imitate him, and she can both help and not help it.  I worry.

OL called me three times yesterday even tho heknows Jordan is with me.  He didn't call me at all last week, but something is up this week.  He called me twice yesterday and then once at night and we spoke briefly,and  he seemed so up, it was weird.  He said, I can't wait til I see you on Friday I have some things to tell you.  It freaked me out.  BUt they seemed like good things.  Maybe he got his drivers license, or ID>  Maybe Amber got a job.  I don't know.  But I am rather freaked.  and he said he wou ld maybe stay and see me in the morning,but he has said that to me fifteen times so far nd never stayed.  so this morning I knew w0ould be no diffrent, but he called me at 7:15 and I didn't hear the call cuz I had the sound settings messed up.  something is up. but don't know what.  Not overly concerned.  Just curious.  Don't care as much as I used to.  Hungry.  Where is my break relief?