Once per decade I go through an major upheaval in my life. Like it or not. In New Age terms, it's like I draw the Tower card every ten years or so. (Must not digress into how much I love Tarot cards as an intuitive tool.)
Anyway, this is my life:
I. Starting off early on the decade thing
1969 - born
1970 - adopted
II. This one is more of a cascade than a waterfall, but still
1977 - moved from southern California to central Massachusetts
1978 - Legendary Blizzard of '78 to which all other Blizzards are compared forever, welcome to Massachusetts
1980 - Grandparents died. Note that I'd really only know them for about two years.
III. Accelerated Pace
1987 - 88 - transition into and back out of college
1989 - pregnant - had Lizzie
1990 - married, moved an hour away from my parents
IV. Downhill Slide
2000 - husband goes to jail. Gets 9-12. This is a looong story, filled with "Holy crap, what?" And I am just not up for telling it right now.
2001 - Single parenting two kids while on SSI disability. Father-in-law and his ex-wife start making demands & try to have Social services take my kids. Buh-bye.
V. Here and Now
2008 - house fire, 5 months of motel life, falling behind on all bills
2009 - can't even get the rest of the repair work done, TYVM, Liberty Mutual.
2010 - Sean decides it's time to file for divorce without bothering to discuss it with me. Mortgage Company decides it's bored with trying to work out a modification, & auctions off my house.
That was last Thursday. So that's where I am.
Note that I didn't add in all the other crap that I've been through. Just the massive decade crap. Between III & IV Justin was born, and had to have an operation for an inguinal hernia. We bought a house, and found out it had lead paint when both kids tested positive for lead poisoning. We had to de-lead the house, which involved staying in a motel over Thanksgiving. This was about a month after Sean got out of the hospital for pneumonia. He almost died from that. The CDC guys went to visit him and everything.
Between IV and V, my "best" friend decided to dump me because my life is "too complicated" for her to deal with. Nice. Then my mom died and my dad went crazy. He moved to Cambodia where my sister lives and married some way younger woman who wanted to move to America. When he finally recovered from that and got an annulment, he moved back to his apartment in Marlboro, where I grew up. But then he met someone else (nice lady), who decided that they needed to move to Florida.
Anyway, my point, and I do actually have one, is this. What do other secular people do when they have huge shit like this going down all the time? I mean, I have social issues already, so being a part of a church community wouldn't have worked out for me. But I also don't have any friends or relatives or their extended families who live anywhere near me. So I'm pretty much support-network-free. I don't have the slightest idea where to go from here, other than to take more Ativan and cry at my therapist.
Maybe I should get a Phoenix tattoo. Yes, that was random. No, it's not likely b/c I have a million allergies and also needle fear.
You know, I just realized that I'm still in mid-decade crash. Since this post, the water department has threatened to turn off my water, and my car failed inspection a million different ways and died a spectacular death. I bought a "needs work" replacement car the other day for $450. Had a mechanic take a quick look at it, and I don't think it's repairable for a reasonable cost (the guy warned me it might not be). But I'm bringing it in this week to be sure. At least I can get to the grocery store and the laundromat now. But I'm probably looking at another cheap-o car in the very near future. Again, at least I can drive to where one is. This one had the virtue of being within walking distance of my house.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I also found out that social security is going to penalize me on my SSI for all the money my partners and I made selling Poser content at the Content Paradise store. They don't care whether the money was paid to my account or Midge's. They don't care who actually earned and received the money. They just care that eFrontier/Smith Micro reported it against my SSN. Great. So getting extra money toward another car isn't happening that way.
And this part isn't about me, but my friend's dog died, and it's really bothering me. She's an online friend, whom I've never met in person, although I've talked to her on the phone. And I've never met her dog. But the dog was her baby, and she loved her a lot. A whole lot. So I'm pretty sad for her.
Also, another online/phone friend just had a baby, and then her husband was laid off work. So it's going around everywhere. It's like a big fat giant Hurley curse. (Don't get me started on the end of Lost. Just don't.)
But you know, not once have I wished I had a god to appeal to. What the hell good would that do? I could use some more people to help me think my way out of things, but no vengeful gods, thanks.