Argh!

Hmm, how to start.

I take pictures.
I sometimes luck into a good shot, by taking a large number of pictures.
I, like most people, like getting credit for doing something good.

So when people take that away from me by taking the pictures that I have made available for their viewing, and put those on their own sites... I feel deeply betrayed.

I know they only mean to show their friends something cool, or display pictures of themselves looking good, or at a cool event...

But something in me just flares up when it happens. I described it to a friend as a "burning firey 'I will follow you and punch you until you give me credit' kind of hate." Very big issue for me.


Let me put it this way. The picture is mine, don't steal it. How easy that is to understand!

*grumble*

Alison: gets this feeling that the best is yet to come.

I don't know, I just have this idea in my head that God is saying "Stick around, you ain't seen nothing yet."

And believe me, I've seen cool things. There's just this amazing sort of build-up going on in Manhattan, and I know I'm not the only one feeling it.

Alison: feels a sense of belonging.

I had the most wonderful talk with some dear friends yesterday. Basically, I have been struggling with a feeling of complete detachment from my surroundings. Not a new feeling for me, really. One that has followed me from childhood, actually.

Okay, to start with... I've been talking lately with some people about the idea that the devil feeds lies into your life all along, and then various situations enforce those lies, and in your head you say "See? I really am __________." Insert whatever lie you have believed about yourself.

Then there are the seed moments, stupid little snippets of life that no one else would notice, but ones that rocked you to your core. Hurtful things said, hurtful things done, that help you to define yourself as something.

I define myself as not belonging. Yes, people might be friends with me, but I very rarely feel like I fit in with them. Even with some of my closest friends, I will sometimes look up and think "Who are these people, and why do they want to be close to me?" Because that's how thoroughly deceived I am. I truly intimately believe that I do not fit in, and will never fit in. I'm too weird, or too quirky, or say dumb things, or know too much, or don't know the things everyone else knows, or am not pretty enough.

I can trace all this back to Second Grade. The all school skating parties at the local skate rink were the biggest deal ever, especially who had skated at the couples skate. It was huge for us back then. For some reason, I had missed the latest skating party, so I was way out of the loop. That day at lunch, I sat down at the girl's table. One of the girls had kind of an item going with a boy one grade above us, and so I turned to her really excitedly, and asked who had skated together at the couples skate. She turned to me and gave me such a scathing look, and with a bitch tone in her voice, said "Why would YOU want to know?"

The message that little 7-year-old Alison got from that was "It doesn't matter that you're here, you just don't belong." And I believed it.



So the struggle now is to redefine myself as someone beyond that lie.

Something Heavenly

I know that most Christian rock music sounds alike, and this is no different, but sometimes it's good to hear.

Whatever You're Doing (Something Heavenly) by Sanctus Real.

It's time for healing, time to move on
It's time to fix what's been broken too long
Time make right what has been wrong
It's time to find my way to where I belong
There's a wave that's crashing over me
All I can do is surrender

(Chorus)
Whatever you're doing inside of me
It feels like chaos somehow there's peace
It's hard to surrender to what I can't see
but I'm giving in to something heavenly

Time for a milestone
Time to begin again
Reevaluate who I really am
Am I doing everything to follow your will
or just climbing aimlessly over these hills
So show me what it is you want from me
I give everything, I surrender...
To...

(Chorus)

Time to face up
Clean this old house
Time to breathe in and let everything out
That I've wanted to say for so many years
Time to to release all my held back tears

Whatever you're doing inside of me
It feels like chaos but I believe
You're up to something bigger than me
Larger than life something heavenly

Whatever you're doing inside of me
It feels like chaos but now I can see
This something bigger than me
Larger than life something heavenly
Something heavenly

It's time to face up
Clean this old house
Time breathe in and let everything out...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZayut9i45M

Bump

This is a post to let you know that I'm alive.

I've started writing blog posts so many times over the last 3 weeks, and haven't finished one. Haven't been happy with them. Failed topics: Love, How odd I am, The Future. I'll probably write more about those some other time, I've got thoughts on them all.

Here is your pseudo-philosophical thought for the night:

All of the rest of your life is a near-death experience.

Fuck.

You know what irritates me the most right at this very moment? People asking me, "So what is the plan now?" I DON'T FUCKING KNOW. It has been, eh, 25 hours now that I was told that I was no longer employed, so of course I have everything worked out already. But thanks for the suggestions on places that I should apply, I really want to hear your input right now. While you're at it, do you want to tell me your opinions on everything else in my life? That would be great. Thanks.

Keep your suggestions to yourself, and I won't have to use bad words. Deal?



Plans as of now... None. I've got nothing. Absolute blank on what I should do job wise. And right now I don't want to be thinking of a plan. Just give me a few days to breathe, and we'll take it from there. If I want advice and suggestions:

I. WILL. ASK. FOR. THEM.

"We've decided to let you go."

So... Life has changed.

Yesterday morning, my boss called and said that she wanted to meet with me before I started working yesterday evening. Fair enough. But then people asked me how things had been going at work, and that started me on being paranoid. So I called her back, asked what it was about. She said it was about the fact that I had wanted to talk to her about working less hours. Again, fair enough. So I show up to work an hour early to meet with my international buddy and have dinner, and one of the girls there looks at me weird and says, "Are you working tonight? I thought Becca said she was taking your shift?" Uh... Not that I knew of. So, I popped in to the office to ask my boss about it. She's just covering the start of my shift in case our talk runs long. Suspicious, but still believable. After dinner, I stop in to the office to chat with the boss. Well, apparently, I wasn't picking up on barista-ing as quickly as they would have liked. And when I was stressed out a few weeks back, and mentioned that I'd like to work fewer hours, and perhaps not the Saturday night close, that apparently sealed my fate. See, she had hired someone to work 25-30 hours, and to fill that Saturday shift. Which would have been nice to know. And apparently the proper response to struggling at work is to ask for more work so I have more experience to get better. She said I'm a very nice girl, who is good with customers, and that with time she thinks that I could have gotten up to speed. But there is the level they thought I would be at by now, and then there is the level where I am.

So, I am currently unemployed. I honestly feel like I failed, but also that I wasn't given the chance to succeed. So... doubly screwed. I would have appreciated knowing the fact that there were specific reasons I was hired, things I had to fulfill. I was under the impression I was hired for who I was, not when I could work. Granted, they expressed that speed was a big deal for them from the start, but I felt I was just getting the hang of it, which is why this is so out of the blue. I feel like the point right after a break up when you think just how much you passed up just to be in that relationship. And now I am just irritated.


This job felt like such a God-send, such a way to really get connected to the community. I don't know what I'll do with the rest of my summer. Maybe look for another job, although I'm a bit discouraged as of now... And the job hunt was difficult even at the beginning of the summer, I don't know how well I'll fare halfway done already. Now I've got more time to focus on other things, and less to stress about. Which is nice. And the fact that it really was just a summer job, not a career. I'll be fine, I'm just not cut out for a highspeed coffeshop career.