Trembling branches

I think since it's been more than a year between posts now that I can safely say my mind is not in the game. Sadly.
I've been out of graduate school for over six months and still no new job - library science is a tough field at the moment. The number of library school graduates is increasing every year, and with the economy the way it is, the jobs are actually decreasing. People who were scheduled to retire aren't retiring now that their retirement packages are worthless since the stock market tanked. New positions aren't being created because municipalities are getting less funding from both taxes and the federal government. Colleges and Universities are cutting positions and/or not adding any new ones because their finances went the same way as everybody's retirement funds - endowments that were supposed to be "secure" are decreasing as only part of them are in truly secured funds and the rest are invested in companies whose stock dropped with the rest of the economy.

Here's hoping that a new president will at least not make the problem worse. I believe Barack Obama has the potential to be the best thing that has happened to America in generations. However, as with any new president, he also has the potential to be the biggest mistake we've ever made. Everybody's worried about his "lack of experience" but I would argue that lack of experience isn't necessarily a failing here. For one thing, nobody really has the experience required to be president of this country until after they've been president for a while. No other position can really prepare a person to be the leader of what has often been called the most powerful country in the world. And for that matter, our "experienced" leaders fail us as often as not. Bush had seven years of presidential experience - real presidential experience - before the country fell apart around him.

All in all, I'm trying to be hopeful. And in the meantime, I will be looking for part-time work outside my field. Keeping the job I have, as it's the most meaningful library experience I'm going to have until I can get a "real" library job - but it's just not enough anymore. With my sister's wedding coming up, I'm going to need the money, and I'm not content with sitting around waiting for something to happen anymore. I'm bored. And bored is making me depressed, which means more and more of each day ends up spent in sleep. Which is not helpful and is not conducive to getting things done. Something needs to change.

Door is ajar

I just feel so disconnected today. Probably because I really need to clean and am magnificently unmotivated. But it's more than that. Talked to my best friend on the phone - the one person who has an unqualified talent to bring me out of a funk - and just couldn't keep my head in the conversation. What is going on with my brain lately?
It's not just today. I just feel like I can't focus, and it's been like this for months now. Since the end of the semester - though I wasn't particularly focused that last few weeks. But now, I just can't focus on anything, except for the totally unrealistic fantasy world inside the books I've been reading, which is neither healthy nor helpful.

I suppose watching The Hours isn't really helping, but I've never seen it and it was there, so I picked it up, and it has to go back to the library soon, so I was going to just watch it, but it's like it's sapping out what little energy and motivation I had to begin with.
Does Heathcliff die at the end of Wuthering Heights?
I watched it last night and that was kind of unclear. Then of course I called my mom, and she doesn't know. Of course, I shouldn't really have expected her to. She's more the "I know everything that happens in every romance novel ever written, and in most of the movies where explosives play a part, but expect me to know anything about Classic literature and I'll give you a blank stare" type. Which probably shouldn't bother me, since I haven't read Wuthering Heights, either. But lately along with the disconnectedness has come a moodiness that blames people for things they can't really help.

But now I need to go clean my kitchen so I can make chili and cake. Now that the movie's turned off, maybe I can accomplish something before I turn it back on.

Useless

I just feel like I'm floating out there, being absolutely without merit - to anyone. I'm probably just moody and PMSy, but this is WAY not my usual me - with or without the loveliness of PMS.
I try not to be needy. Mostly because needy people piss me off. But Katie posted her wedding pictures - which I took - today and I was going through labelling people in them and she messaged me saying I "don't need to do that," and that she was going to "have everyone mark themselves." And I was actually hurt. Like I just wanted to sit in my chair at my desk in the middle of the library and cry. That's not a normal reaction.
After that, I just couldn't motivate myself to do anything - anything productive in any case. I did do rounds before we closed, but just because I really didn't feel like losing my temper with my student assistants who have this talent for ignoring everything I say when I ask them to do something. Of course, then I had to send one of them around again anyway, because there were still people there, but in my circuit of the building I wasn't sure if people had left while I was elsewhere.
Of course, then when I got back to the desk, the student working was on her cell phone. ON HER PHONE. AT WORK. And this is not the first time I've told her not to talk on the phone while she's at work. What is so crucial that it can't wait until after we've closed? Furthermore, in what world is it acceptable to sit around at work and talk on your phone? And unlike previous cases, I actually sounded angry and censorious when I told her that she shouldn't be on the phone.
I'm just not dealing well with this ungrounded feeling. Like life just keeps heaping itself on my shoulders and I'm not coping fast enough and I'm going to drown in all of the stuff that I can't handle. And like everyone else is moving on and I'm just stagnating. Which is of course rediculous - which I tell myself, but mother logic isn't working today. I can't possibly be working in my field and in graduate school at the same time and still be stagnating. Can I?
It's as though I'm walking around in a fog and nothing I can do will dissipate it.

Or maybe I'll just blame it on the cold from hell that refuses to leave my body.

Life, in general.

I don't really know where to start. I've been reading this book called Hard Love, by Ellen Wittlinger, in which a seventeen year old boy, well, I guess you could say that he "enriches his life" after discovering "zines." He's been living in kind of a bubble since his parents got divorced seven years ago, and while it seems like it's entirely self-imposed, as most seventeen year olds' bubbles are, it isn't.
And he's me.
Okay, so I know he isn't actually me, and I'm not trying to say that he's actually me. I mean, he has a penis for crying out loud. But still, he's me.
He doesn't really know who he is or what he wants. He doesn't feel much (as a direct result of the aforementioned bubble), which actually isn't always like me. My sensibility comes and goes. Sometimes I feel nothing and sometimes I feel too much. His best friend - really his only friend - is trying to get involved, trying to do something with his life, and he puts it down - not because he actually thinks it's stupid, but (he doesn't discover it right away, but he really does feel it) because he doesn't know how to join. He stands on the outside looking in, not knowing how to get inside and saying - to convince himself - "well, I didn't want to be in there anyway."
That's me. I sit and I read and I write and I watch life happen and I don't know how to jump in and make it happen to ME. And then I say, "well, I didn't really want to anyway."
Life doesn't really happen the way it does in novels and movies. People don't really act that way. The scared, shy wallflower never actually gets asked to dance, the quiet girl never gets asked out by the captain of the football team OR the head of the popular group. Money doesn't grow on trees and good doesn't always prevail. I realize that it sounds trite and cliche, but there's nothing I can do about it.
I don't actually usually try to be bitter, but sometimes it just happens and I can't help it. I'm not a happy person. Get over it.
I would say that I try not to blame my parents, but really, who am I kidding. I completely blame them. It probably isn't fair, but again, that's the way it is. I was brought up in a house completely filled with apathy. Nothing mattered so long as everyone was healthy and doing their homework. It'd be nice if the house was clean once in a while, but it doesn't really matter so long as we're not having guests. You really should eat your vegetables, but nothing's going to happen if you don't. And recently, my dad - who I usually find loveable and sympathetic - who's been overweight my entire life telling me that I should lose a few pounds. I'm by no means skinny, and I'm most likely way unhealthy, but I'm also not a child and I don't live with him, and it would be nice if on those few times a year that I see him if he'd lay off the sensitive topics. Made all the more sensitive because as far as I can tell he's never had this conversation with my sister who (let's face it) has a boyfriend who's planning to eventually marry her so it doesn't really matter anymore.
I'd like to say that I'm not shallow, but today seems to be my day to tell the truth, so to be honest, I am. I'm shallow. I can't help it. I'm shallow and I want to be beautiful and sometimes I hate myself for the way that I look. I'm judgemental and sometimes I look at people and think that they're disgusting and fat and need to lose weight and then am forced to admit to myself just exactly what kind of a hypocrite I'm being. But again, I come back to apathy. I say to myself, okay, this is going to change NOW and work out for a few days, try to eat healthier, and then I have a bad day and determine that since I am seeing exactly no results and I'm majorly craving tacos or pizza or a cheeseburger from McD's, I'm going to give up. Again. And I wish for a cheap, easy way to do it with no effort. Let's face it. Most of the "beautiful people" did not get there by working for it. They got lucky with good genes and got involved when they were young. I wanted to be involved. I wanted to do all of those things that bitter judgemental high school girls make fun of, but I couldn't.
My parents didn't have time.
So yes, I blame my parents for the way I am. I quit trying to stop blaming them. And I'd like to say that I'm going to change it, but really, I'd be lying to you and to myself, and while I am by no means stopping THAT, today is my day to be honest and I'm embracing the opportunity wholeheartedly.
And now I have to go run in a circle around the library to see if there's even anybody still here.

And they're apart again

I can't believe the last time I posted was when they got back together. Now of course they're broken up again, and I'm pretty sure this time it's gonna stick. Both of them are seeing other people. And have been since about five minutes after they announced that they'd broken up, so that's...interesting.
Well, not really, seeing as she was pretty much dating her new guy even before they broke up. They just called themselves "friends." But we all knew what was going on. For as long as I've known her, she's hardly been without a boyfriend for more than a week. She sets the new one up before breaking up with the old one. Though this time he broke up with her.
I thought it was great. Okay, so maybe that makes me a bad person, but I was really kinda happy that it was her heart that would be broken this time. Turns out, it didn't so much work that way. Apparently she was "really broken up about it" and she "grieved for her relationship" for a while, but are we honestly fooling ourselves into believing that she was that upset about it? Are we really playing that game?
Well, are they, anyway. I'm not. I'm not good at that game. That pretending to believe that people feel something they don't feel when I know that they are feeling something completely different from what they're pretending to feel game and I have never worked well together.
He really was upset about it, and I'm reasonably sure he agonized over the decision to break it off for a long time before deciding that it really was best for both of them. And if not, then it really was best for him, and that was the only thing he really had to worry about. It is his responsibility ONLY to look after himself. She's a big girl. She can handle it. Especially with her little "friend" to comfort her.
I really am obnoxiously cynical. I should work on that.

Well, they're back together

Which is good. I think. I know he was hesitant because he was worried she'd break his heart again, and truthfully I'm still worried, but it's not my job to be worried, and I don't think he'd want me to be. He's just having a rough time right now, and honestly I think for now he's safe. His father is really sick. Like in the sense where he's literally dying. And you just can't break up with a guy whose father is dying, so like I said, for now, he's safe. Well, in the relationship sense anyway. Of course, the fact that his father is dying is the thing that's making him "safe" is kinda frightening.
I'm just worried about him in general.
And now there's this extra thing where I'm worried about me, too.
Josh, My Josh, who I've been, ya know, in love with since I was sixteen, has a boyfriend. In the "I'm officially coming out and declaring my romantic involvement with another man" sense of the word boyfriend. I do not have an issue with homosexuality. I really don't. My problem with this is that he's MINE. And I feel horrible. We never even dated. I guess I've just been creating this imaginary (apparently impossible) future in my head for the past six years. Of course our parents really haven't been helpful, since all four of them have made it clear that they would look on said relationship favorably, but now it's just not going to happen. And the thing that really bothers me is that I talked to him two weeks ago and he didn't say anything. I know that's a difficult conversation to have, but to let me just read about it on his website is cruel.
I had a panic attack. I know. Hugely overracted, right? It's not like I chose it, it just happened. And now I guess I just really don't know how I should feel. I still love him, mostly because I can't help it. I know that nothing is ever going to happen. Hell, I knew that before, now I just have a compelling reason why. But I just can't help it.
I'm so confused.

I think I may be falling in love. And that's not a good thing.

It's heartbreaking to watch someone you care about be heartbroken, and yet, when he bears it so admirably, it's so touching you can't help but wish it was you who had the power to do that.
Not that I want to break his heart, but I do wish I could heal it a little bit. He's so unhappy, but still asks me how I am every time I talk to him. He's one of the very few genuine people I know. He doesn't ask the question as a polite inquiry. He asks because he cares about the answer. He listens. He really wants me to be happy - something I gave up on for myself years ago - and his caring makes it feel that much more possible.
Problem: I met him because he was in love with one of my oldest friends - who is the cause of his recent heartbreak - with whom he is still in love, regardless of the fact that she broke his heart. Maybe it makes me selfish, and maybe it makes me a bad person, but every once in a while, I can't help wishing someone loved me enough to be this unhappy because of me. It hurts to watch him be so sad, to talk to him knowing that he's pretending to be happy. Sometimes I just want to sit in a corner and cry over his broken heart. Is that normal?