A message in the dark

So Stephen has a great job. They give him free food, free drinks, and free shirts on the regular. They went a little beyond recently, when they bought every employee (+1) tickets to the new Star Trek movie.

Wow! We were pretty stoked. We had a couple of weeks to look forward to the movie. Stephen got half the day off, I dressed, he got a haircut, and off we were.

As fate (or dumb gps) would have it, we were a few minutes late. Less than five. Nothing was amiss as we strolled into the dark theatre. We grabbed some complementary popcorn, and headed to our seats.

Ascending the stairs, a dormant feeling yawned and rubbed it's sleepy eyes. Fear. It distinguishes itself from the normal discomfort of being in public. It's SO dark. I can only see tiny LED lights on the sides of the rows of seats. Row A, B, C... we're in row J? As we climb higher and higher, the room seems darker and darker. The fear stirs and stretches it's limber arms, but it goes ignored.

Finally, the letter 'J' peered through the darkness like a beacon. I look up from the ground. Our seats are in the middle of the row - the row filled with people who just got comfy, who want to watch the movie that JUST started. I guess previews are a thing of the past? Fear slowly slides the covers off. "It's fine," I lie. "We're just gonna have to be annoying for a couple of seconds as we find our seats. Not a big deal." I don't look forward to navigating legs and purses in the pitch black, but I push myself...right up to the first pair of legs.

Suddenly, fear has me by the throat, and I can only feel panic. Oh my gosh, I can't breathe! Someone has pushed all the air from my lungs. I need to get out of here! I turn around, and carefully fly down the barely-lit stairs. Tears well up in my eyes, but I can't tell if it's from fear, embarrassment, disappointment, or all three.

I manage to find a bench in the hallway, where I breathe as deeply as possible without drawing attention. I try to stifle my tears, and vigorously wipe away the ones I can't. My head hangs in shame and disappointment and fear slowly, reluctantly releases it's grip.

Stephen eventually realizes I haven't gone for drinks. He materializes, sympathy in his eyes. "What happened?" he asks. I managed to blubber out that I was sorry and that, fear's red finger marks still hot on my neck, I didn't want to go back in there. He consoled me for 20 or 30 minutes as we went back and forth on what to do next. I just wanted to retreat home. He wanted to see the movie, but not without me.

It was around this time that I was hit with an unexpected thought, a message in a bottle that had been sloshing around in the subconscious sea of my brain. "God didn't curse me with this so I'd be unhappy and crumble beneath it's weight."

Of course, I'd been connecting this one incident to every incident in my life and just general, overall reclusive state. How miserable it is. How I just wish I could be free - to be myself, have a job I'd love, to go out to movies or church and just have some control. This message pertained to everything.

I wasn't going to crumble. Fear won't have this victory. Not entirely. I agreed to go back in the theatre, but only if we found seats on the end of the row. Stephen found some in the perfect place, we got some soda, and we enjoyed the remainder of the film.

Grateful (a blah blah blah post)

I don't know why (sometimes I wonder if I'm actually bipolar II), but I felt good today. I did some dishes, made dinner, and cleaned half the stove! For some reason, I'm thinking of going back to college, too. I guess possibility is inspiring.

Recently, I took two personality assessments. The Ipip-Neo, and a holland career quiz thingy by Truity. The Ipip-Neo is a professional test to measure neuroticism. I got the HIGHEST SCORE POSSIBLE (99, and then almost perfect 99s in every subcategory)! That was *shocking* to me. I thought I'd get average, tops.

Then, the holland career test. The highest score was "Thinker" type, with "Helper" and "Creator" also high. The others ("Builder", "Organizer", and "Persuader") were scored as low.

Well...the only things of interest that matched my categories were psychologist, sociologist, social worker, and epidemiologist. Interestingly, EMT, Surgical Technician, and Massage Therapist include "Builder" (along with at least one category I scored high in), and funeral service worker included "Organizer" AND "Persuader". It makes me wonder if I haven't had success because I've been chasing jobs that aren't cut out for me. Not to mention "Helper" jobs are iffy with my social phobia - they like to help people.

I know I've considered it before, but I think I'd LOVE to be an epidemiologist. And social work is awesome.

Ugh! I don't know!!! But I'm excited for possibility again. I'm ready to try again.

Taste this bitter fruit

Guys. Life is good.

It's hard most of the time. It's exciting, unpredictable, and full of absolute bullsh*t. A trainwreck. And then, there are those few moments, days, or weeks between, when the storm finally pauses and time stands still. You get a moment to breathe, and realize that you have so much to take in and give back.

Thank goodness change is constant.

Nothing wretches your soul forever. The good times don't last, so we make them memories. Hope is a state of mind, not a result of situation. Life is bitter so we can become better, and warriors are baptized by fire.