Nothing Ever Changes

It's never fair. I'm not super happy right now, I rarely get what I want. Yes, a new phone is nice, but I did ask for an mp3 player. I don't come home because I can't deal with my brother. Either he decides to be pissy over something I've barely done, or I get angry with him. It's not healthy, and it's not right. I don't like coming home, not just because of the trip, but I never feel respected. I was the one with the remote, I had the choice of what to watch on tv. When we were younger I never said anything. I'm tired of acquiescing. I have the right to watch what I want to on my own or with other people. I should be respected. I am not respected by my eldest brother. I don't know what I feel right now, but I'm tired of crying. I'm tired of being depressed and feeling like no one respects me.

Yes, I understand you're going to work in an hour. So what if I'll be able to watch TV for the rest of the day, I wasn't planning on it, I was planning on getting out. I was planning on having fun and being happy. This day can turn around, but right now it sucks. I don't say anything because I knew he wouldn't understand. I wasn't talking about today or now. I was talking about before. Things change but they mostly stay the same. Yes, I do think about you. I put myself is places or not in places because I want to stay happy and because it's for you.

You make things too fucking difficult. You're too much of a wild card. I try one thing you take it the wrong way. But seriously. It's fucking television. I don't have cable, I don't spend my time watching TV or playing video games. I don't because I don't have it. Coming home's a treat because there are things here that I don't have in Norfolk. You make me not like being home, I don't like coming back to Reston because things in the house suck. You fucking smoke weed all the goddamn time, I never say anything. I never said a damned word when I heard you and your girlfriend having sex. When I come home and we're eating I next to never say a word about whatever's on TV, I'll watch it, or I go away because I don't like it.

That's my problem, I stay quiet too much, I never say anything. Maybe I'll start speaking up more, maybe that will make me happy. I always talk big when I write, but nothing ever changes. But I try. I try valiently, in my opinion, to roll with whatever happens. I try not to let him get to me. But in this instance I can remember them not like That 70's Show all that much and my wanting to watch it. Now it's not so much that I didn't want to watch it, I wanted the choice of watching it or not.

I'm also annoyed because I did so much work yesterday. He had next to nothing. He made cornbread, and he put the dishes in the dishwasher. He took a nap after doing nothing to help. I on the other hand, made sweet potatoes, mashed sweet potatoes, a turkey, a ham, mashed potatoes. My other brother made macaroni and cheese, stuffing and string beans. I did the heaving lifting, they barely said 'thank you'. I am so fucking under-appreciated. I feel that way if it's not the case.

I feel unloved. I don't feel like anybody really loves me. I know they both care, but really, how much would change if I didn't come home? We never do anything all together, I come home to see my friends. I always say things about 'the three of us' it feels more like it's 'the two of them, plus me'. As an adult, I'm still a hanger-on. I felt more welcome or appreciated when my brother's friend was here yesterday. Then I felt alone in a crowd. I want to disappear and not tell them where I go, see how much they care. Seriously, were I to drop off the face of the earth, would they care? I saw not him so much. More out of obligation than real caring.

Once I was angry I didn't care. Back the what started this I might have chosen 'That 70's Show' to watch anyway. That's the retarted part. Give me the chance to see what's on first. I don't get respected and it upsets me. I want to be loved, feel like someone loves me, cares about me. More than that, I want to feel respected. He was too dense to even notice that I said that I bet. I try to stay happy, content. I try so damned hard.

I'm fucking tired of crying, I'm tired of being depressed. I damn near want to hop in the car and go back to Norfolk today, after I finish my laundry. I'd be alone, and I'd have Borjo. I'd have people who aren't my brothers. I'd have my independence back, I'd feel like an adult. I'm independent here, I feel like and adult but I'd have respect. I would be respected in my own domicile, I'd have people to chit-chat with. I wasn't alone in the house yesterday, but for the better part of the day I was alone. Between 9am and about 9pm it was me in the kitchen. The guys made and appearance, then went to the basement, one of them was around for about the hour. The other barely did anything.

I damn near want to find a bar to escape to, but drinking alone in the epitome of lame and depression. I'm tired of being alone.

I'm tired of so much shit. I think it's time to take a shower, venture out to a coffee shop with a book, but on a day like today, trying to find a comfortable Borjo like atmosphere would be that much more difficult. But an adventure could clear the head and cheer me up.

Why do I make fewer typos when I'm upset?

Jasmine P.

Thanksgiving Break Review

[I don't think I posted this before, but I did write it over the break...then I never felt like actually concluding it, but que sera sera.]

Bronx, New York

Thanksgiving 2007

The date is November 21^st, and I’ve been up for a few hours shy of 24 hours. I woke up at 7 yesterday, Tuesday morning at 7 for a math test, took the friggin thing, then headed over to Wesley House and chilled there for the rest of the morning and for lunch. I kind of dozed, but I’d decided to attempt napping downstairs so every time the door opened my half assed rest was disturbed.

The food there wasn’t the best, but ehh, it worked. I hadn’t eaten anything else and it was free. You can’t knock free that often. Hmm, Glenn showed up and I told him where the CD was and we chatted for a bit. I’m supposed to hold off on the creation of the Relay for Life team until after the officer’s meeting which I assume, will be Sunday or so. I dunno.

Before leaving Wesley Lizabeth called and vented. She was all sorts of angry, even threatening me. I wasn’t afraid and I let her words just roll off me and told her to relax and calm down. Her roommate has just been being a bitch about everything and Lizabeth is getting tired of it. I left Wesley and went to Whitehurst to get my things packed to go. On the way I ran into Emily and she told me CR was feeling under the weather. It’s probably compounded fatigue because he barely sleeps and has been super busy with play practice for the past month. He should be fine after the holiday. Well, I hope he is.

Anthony and Billy picked my up from Whitehurst and we rolled out. The drive went by quick enough until we got to NoVA because we ran into traffic up there. Woohoo! [/sarcasm] I dozed for a bit, maybe about an hour before we stopped in Fredericksburg. We stopped once because Billy needed to use the bathroom, but stretching our legs was nice. We dropped him off out in Manassas, then Anthony dropped me off at my place in Reston before he went on about his merry way home.

I picked up the car keys and grabbed a few things while I was out. I grabbed “Shawshank Redemption”, another book of short stories, and some goodies from Trader Joe’s. Picked up dinner and then returned to the house and chilled. I got my clothes washed and took care of some things before chatting once more with CR and Lizabeth.

This time when I spoke with CR he told he how he was, but the problem was both our cell phones were in sucky reception so we could barely hear one another. Lizabeth called and apologized. I told her it was alright, she was mad and needed to vent. Her roommate was giving her hell and she’s just so passive that she hasn’t taken up anything with the bitch.

I stayed up all night and we left Reston at about 2 this morning. I was awake for about an hour before trying to sleep. I slept between about 3.30 and 5.30 I think when we stopped at a rest stop. Migs and Dor were tired so they napped kind of. I was actually wide awake and after going to the bathroom I stretched out and did a few lunges which helped. My wrist has been popping and I think I can feel my muscle forming and etting stronger. This reminded me I need to work my left arm too. I did a few off side lunges like Bal and Ed suggested and general stretching and some advancing. I didn’t do any blade work because…ehh, I didn’t feel like getting my sword out.

We rolled out and I was wide awake for the most part. I fell asleep once we were in New York and woke up when we got to Gramma’s place. Some crazy, half deaf old lady confused the shit out of me and Dorien. Gramma figured she was trying to tell us to reorient the car. We thought she was telling us to move the car for the street sweeper. In any event, we got here about 7.30 or so and I tried to find a working wireless network and they’re all fucked. They won’t work for me, so I’m writing this here and I’ll post it in blogger when I get home. I’ll just make one long post of it.

So yeah, I’ve been up for a broken 25 hours, maybe abut 20 some hours, those last 5 hours were very broken up so I’ll probably be mean and want sleep tonight.

Thursday Nov 22, 07

We did jack shit all day before sitting down to a full dinner of turkey, candied yams, potato salad, macaroni and cheese, stuffing, gravy, rice, rice and peas, potato stuffing, ahh, what else...more food?

I went out for a walk, in the big scheme of things, it was a short walk, but it did get me out of the house.

After dinner we watched Live Free or Die Hard. Good movie, and straight up goofy. Yesterday was very relaxed. It was also the smallest thankgiving table this family has ever witnessed. I mean, for one, we all ate at the same time. There were ten of us, but seating for 8. I can remember back in the day having to have 2 rounds of service because there were just that many people trying to sit down for food. Things also weren’t as nice because Mom wasn’t there. It wasn’t something I dwelled on, but I did notice how things were different, a different overall feeling to everything.

I spent some time calling around and chatting with people. I spoke with Lizabeth, Glenn and Allison on Thanksgiving. I sent out a few text messages and left a few messages with people. Nothing special, aside form making Sunday night dinner plans. Invites and such will have to be issued on Sunday so…

Friday, Nov 23, 2007

Today we went downtown, into the city. We went to Manhattan Mall, but some funny shit happened before we got there.

We hopped the 2 train from Allerton all the way down to 34^th and 7^th. We were across the street from the Macy’s. So, whilst waiting for our cousins Nikki and Eboni to get to us Dorien got shitted on [for the 5^th time ever] by a pigeon. He was pissed, but it did miss his new coat and only landed on his sweatshirt. It made me laugh because this has happened a whole bunch for times. I swear, this boy should be the luckiest bastard in the world for all the times the birds have shat on him.

So, after getting him a new sweatshirt from Conway the boys reminded me of a funny story from when I was a kid. So, way back when, when I was about 4 or 5 my father had taken us into a large, department store sized Conway my brother were supposed to be watching me because that’s what the rules were for when we went out with mom. I’ve always had a penchant for wandering away, or for looking at or focusing on something of interest. So, instead of holding my hand like they were supposed to do, dories kind of didn’t quite pay attention to me and I wandered away to look at come Barney hair things then when I went back to where Dorien had been he wasn’t there and I tried walking around the store looking for my Dad, or Titi or Abuela or my brothers so I wandered outside the store thinking they had left and I guess I started crying and a police officer found me. Apparently, Miguel thought to go outside to find me and he found me with the cop. My Abuela and Titi were sooo mad at Dad, my mom was pissed at Dad and my Abuela and Titi were just plain grateful that I was safe.

So back to today, we walk past the Macy’s and there is the line to PETA picketers. I swear, it was the funniest shit ever. They had pictures of skinned animals saying they need their fur more than we do and other stupid shit. I don’t wear fur to begin with, by my goofy cousin was tripping because her jacket had fake-fur around the hood, but it was obviously fake.

After that we got to Manhattan Mall after waling down Broadway for a bit. Migs bought a couple of hats from Lids and then we ate a late lunch at the food court. After kicking it in the mall for a bit longer we looked around Brookstone for a bit before hitting the street again. Dorien picked up a name poster thing for Lindsey and I was finally able to buy another box cap. This one’s all green, now, all I need is the blue camouflage one and I’ll be set. We walked out to Lane Bryant, which was coincidentally across the street from the Empire State Building. We took some dorky photos [to be facebooked] before going out separate ways.

When we were getting on the express 2 back to Allerton the friggin’ door damn near broke my wrist. The car was crowded as all fucking hell and Miguel wasn’t quite far enough in for me to get in. So I had my hand inside the car trying to stop the door from closing on it then I had to shove my way in to keep from being left Downtown. The train car was crowded for like..78% of the trip [yeah, arbitrary numbers]. Friggin hell! We stopped by the bank to get some monies for Yonkers. I’ve got a fair bit to gamble away. Money situation to be update either late tonight or tomorrow.

~~~~
Adios for now
:salute and bow:
Jasmine P.