The bus life…

My heart was pounding, it was dark and I was scared, had no idea what the hell was going on… I waved my hands this way and that like it would help…other people arrived but in spite of everybody’s best efforts it still happened… I couldn’t believe it! It had been all so sudden. A day before, we’d been together like life had no end like there was no tomorrow to fear and now it was all over for both of us…I put my hands on him and said my goodbyes as they pulled him inside the house… I started to feel think just how much I was gonna miss him but that was that and I had to move on so I turned away and opened my front door, but just before I re-entered my house I took a last look at my broke down car who had so suddenly died on me that evening.

It was tough to recover, but then again next morning after taking my son to school had to fnd a new way of transportation since I had to go to work eventually (meaning later that day). I asked my dad for his, deciding to start with the most traveled road, who absolutely refused; not that I wasn’t expecting for that comeback, still I played my part of the hurt child and made him feel like a total fraud. What do you want from me? It had to be done. Later, I asked my husband who just laughed in my face and gave me my…((insert thunder noise here)) bus money!!!

It’s not like I’d never traveled by bus before, it was just that things had changed so much since then, frankly I was a little frightened.

That evening around five-ish, I set myself to a new land, the land of the ((creepy echo)) bus people!! ((now the thunder)).

I sat confortably on the, now ergonomically enhanced, chairs, which by the way just make my ass slip off the seat every time the bus stops. I braced myself putting my feet againt the edge of the front seat and stared out the window. Now there lies the root of my problems, time to think…

I watched how people came on board screaming and of course getting screamed right back; and I thought just how bad things are out there. How sad it all is. Have we really made such a horrible world for ourselves? We can’t even ride a bus to work without ripping our heads off. The bus driver could certainly grant a couple seconds to board without stepping on the pedal making people fall face front on the floor, and people could try to avoid standing on the steps at the electronic bars so the passanger count doesn’t go wrong. It really bothers me to see that we’ve taken hate to be the best course of action for our daily lives.

Then, I see a lady carrying her groseries and no seats available. Every man, young or mature is ready to give up his seat to her and every woman ready to help her with her bags. Kindness does make an appearance where there seems to be none. I find that so amazing. It’s puzzling. It really doesn’t make any sense.

I stare back at the window and try to get lost in the cars and the buildings, just avoid thinking for a while, but then something else catches my atention: a person eating strawberries. The smell caught my nose and I turned. I smile at myself thinking now much that person my be enjoying that moment and then my heart hits rock bottom as I see him throw the stem away onto the next emty seat along with the rest he just ate. We think ourselves so much above any other life forms, but even animals know not to crap on the place they sleep or rest, why can’t we? I strongly believe we are taught not to care. How do I know that? I’ve seen more than my share of mothers nowadays and for some time now telling their children: Just leave it there! We’ve been passing the “Not give a shit” torch for far too long and now it’s eating us all alive. It’s just not the way to do it. Anything…it just can’t be done…we might hate it….myself included sometimes…but it’s just the way it is. We have our things, but the greater things are OUR responsability, not just the one.

So many things, people drinking, fighting, crying, etc…

The bus can take you so much farther away from where you want to go. I had forgotten that. It can become a window of truth to the world you’re living in. I started to ride the bus to work a couple months ago and have gain a bit more than I expected. It’s been good, it’s been bad at some points, but as everything that happens in my life, it’s been an experience, one from which I can talk about, one from which I can learn to grow some more.

Get on that bus, and tell me…what can you see?

Life on the trash lane…

I sit in front of my laptop everyday, push aimlessly at the power button and wait for it to load while I lay my mind on my kid staring at me from behind the fence at kindergarden this morning; the light of the monitor slaps me right back on the messy couch and I scroll down my Facebook account to find my hundred and something contacts haven’t post so much as a Hello to me  yet again. I laugh at their news and comments while I think how they ignore what I say, ask, think or even request for my somewhat tedious online gaming.

I check my messages, answer them all and leave my account open for all to see. I get up in search of my first task of the day anxious to start feeling useful in this God given day. I’m alive after all, might as well do something good about it. I go around my house at a steady pace and pick an object here and there taking it from one room to the other til I find it’s right place, slowly but surely restoring the perfection that is my home. Home? Funny word to use, but it is nonetheless since my heart goes wherever my son dwells so…enough said.

After piling the last dirty sock into the hamper, I answer the horrible greasy monster yelling from beneath the pile of dirty dishes from the day before and this morning’s breakast. I put away all the dry ones and start washing away the leftovers which our dogs so badly crave. I feel a sense of ease as the pile goes down and the lemon scent fills the air with a soapy touch to it. As I finish today’s sculpture of clean cutlery I walk away. I always have fun doing it cause I am the only one who can take a plate out of there without having it all crashing down. Nobody else has managed to do it, not my father when I did it at 7, not my husband now I’m married. Except maybe my son’s who sneaks a glass dropping only a spoon or so in the process.

I pick up my son from school and it’s duty time for both of us. Upon our arrival, we go straight to the bathroom sink and fight over the hand soap to be the first to get rid of whatever fly bug is around nowadays. After that, we settle in the living room with whichever snack we can find and set to do the homework. We laugh, fight, write, read and after tears, hugs, kicks, shouts and pulled hairs and pants we succesfully finish his assignments for the day or week. Later, it’s time for a well deserved nap where we just lay wherever we feel like it; or perhaps watching cartoons would be the order of the day. SpongeBob is practically a Deity around our joint! so is Blue’s Clues or the Pink Panther. We could hit the X-box 360 which would only mean my kid pushing his way through the same ditch screaming I’m winning! Maybe even just sing and dance to our hearts content.

Around five, happy hour ends. My husband arrives. Tells a bad joke where he calls me fat, crazy, bitch or lazy and laughs on his own. He scold our son for laughing, playing, talking, or otherwise just standing up and sits around. I have to go to work. I get dressed as my chest gets right back into that slimy knot of pain again. I stare at the mirror and see what an ugly person I become when he’s around. Then again, I would be living on the street with what I make, so…enough said.

I kiss my son as much as I can as I pick all my stuff for work and then some more before I hit the road. He begs me not to go or to tag along, breaks my heart. He should be happy enough to stay home a couple hours. I blame me. I’m the one staying. I’m trying to be a good mother as much as I can, but I do recognize where I am screwing up and I have my reasons, someday I hope my son can understand me.

I climb that bus and stare out the window. No matter what music I play on my headphones it only makes me want to cry. My face is still but my tears just escape on their own. I wipe them away as they keep coming silently and almost without me noticing them anymore. No, I don’t think I’m thought. I think I’m just… tired. Still, when I come home I always, always have a big smile on my heart and face for my son, it brightens my whole day all over again to see him peek out the window when I’m opening the front yard door and running to open the front door to hug his Mommy back home. Nothing else matters to me in this world.

I can take it all.

Who R U?

Who are you?
It’s easy to say: I’m me, but what does that mean really? I believe we are a combination of all the mass of crap that has happened in our pitiful lives. Pardon my lovely description but as always I base my know-it-all description in my life.
For example, I often recent my mother and father for not being there when I needed them in the most important moments of my life or for giving a shit about what I needed them to, but then if they had I wouldn’t be the person I am today…I mean how drastically would it had changed my personality, my very life if they had?
The problem with this kind of questions is: If indeed my life had been very different from what I am now…would I be OK with it? Alright, alright, I constantly complain about how my life has turned out but hey…shit happens. If my life had turned out in any other different way I miht have hate just as much or even more. We can always be worse, trust me on that. Don’t believe me turn on the news once in a wile there will always be somebody more fucked up than us somewhere ion the world.
The fact is that somehow the neglect and the bullshit that happened to me made…me. If it had happened some other way I wouldn’t be me. I would be me but another version of me. Not my same mind in the same body if I’m as unlucky as I was in this scenario.
It’s true. I do hate so many facts of my life right now. I hate the fact that I’m unhappily married, but I do not choose to be a single mother paying absolutely everything in a house and paying my way and my child’s half-eating and shit, so I put upo with unjustified screams and insults; feeling alone and not being able to sleep cause it’s just gets so damn lonely.

My life sucks. Who’s life is perfect? Hollywood’s? They keep dropping dead from OD’s. I don’t call that perfect. They keep knocking them into the Loony bin. Personally, I’m half-way there as it is. We all got our good points and our low. Even perfect little families have to pray for some uncle who went the wrong way and they just won’t mention at Christmas time, poor shame. You know it’s true, don’t deny it, suck it up.
Again, we take some choices in our live and others are taken for us which make us being ourselves. How can we tell which are the correct ones and which incorrect? Nobody can really tell. Boy, that sucks huh? All we can really do is flip the coin.
We talk to people we trust about which could be the right move, again with the parents most times, but then again come in handy if you got any good ones, being the ones that recognize you without a drop of alcohol in then and in plain daylight; or God even, inserting your favorite Deity name in the space blank right now in your mind, meaning praying and feeling closer to your faith.
I guess there really is no right move. We choose what we wanna be most times. Sometimes we are posed with a moral dilemma and we deliberately take that wrong turn pretending we don’t know it’s the wrong choice, but we do. I can’t truly define myself in a religion I guess, but I do believe that if your heart’s in the right place you should be alright in the long run, and if you keep doing the wrong thing and keep looking the other way…well, let’s just say that the surprised face will not fool anybody not even yourself. Think for a second…are you really ready for what’s coming to ya? It might not be a long time before you have to settle the score. We just don’t know…no way to tell.
Sometimes, we wait too long to find out who we are and our books are closed shut with a snap. Don’t wait for other people to tell you who you are because they can’t. All they can tell you is what’s on the surface and that’s just a face, is that all you are? No, but you have to let people know, you have to let yourself know that. It’s important that you do.
I lived more than my life being, breathing, and thinking what they told me. That was me according to me, boy did I hit the ground hard when I realized who I was when I was let go; when I started thinking for myself. It was like: Why the hell am I doing this if I hate it? I don’t believe in this!!

At some point we have to meet ourselves. It sounds strange but yeah we do…we have to take two steps back and see how the job was done (our parents I mean) cause like I said at any given time it’s just out of their hands. And we have to…sort of like clean up our room, you know? When you clean it for yourself the very first time and you find crap that you didn’t even remember you had or even know existed anymore…sort of like that. You rearrange your brain. Get you know you. Introduce yourself to you.
Hello, I want you to meet: Me.

Don’t ask…don’t tell…

Why do we bother asking questions we just don’t wanna know the answer of? If we know the answer is going to upset why do we insist in makins the question on the first place? It really puzzles me because I try really hard to avoid it and still sometimes curiosity just shoots the cat in the fucking head…. but then I try harder not to complain because I knew that was gonna happen. I basically asked…begged…for th trigger to be pulled…why is what’s a mystery to me.

Also, people in basic common life, meaning life from my perpective, couldn’t tell you otherwise, mostly just go ahead and auto-shoot themselves. Is it because life looses interest if we don’t ahead and make ourseves miserable? Probably this would be a good enough explanation from a medical profesional meaning a psychiatrist. I know it would be from mine that’s why I try to stay away from deep thought questions, I mean I get about 30 minutes every six months so I have to save the time for the mostb life threatening questions you know? Jut plain common sense…still got some around.

Let’s take a drastic example of my life. I don’t mind sharing…you know…private stuff. I went out on Saturday night to a gay bar to celebrate my birthday. Question automaticaly raised in your heads answered as automaticaly: No, I’m not gay and I’m not Bi. My girlfriend is and she was the only one who cared for me enough to make a space for me in her schedule to celebrate my damn B-day. He was busy so we went out a little later. Still, never let’s me down.

Anyway….umh…where was I…right. There was transvesti look-alike show. We had couple Mexican celebrities, Britney Spears, etc. not the best I’ve seen but it was cool enough after a couple pineapple vodkas. Upstairs, there was DJ and strippers, too young for my eyes. I’m a teacher so I could almost go and cover them up! LOL But amongs the crowd there was a waiter shirtless and with a tight lycra shorts. He had a tattoo that covered all his upper back. That did for me. I found him extremely attractive. Now, if you expect a pic of me you’ll never get it…so I’ll just say that I’m over thirty since Saturday…chubby, red-haired, overly freckled, acne, tallish, yellowish teeth, not a great price huh? Now you don’t want that pic! LOL

The thing was that since it was my B-day I didn’t want to go home without having made a move on the waiter. I caught him on one of his trips to the bar and told him as close as I could get to his ear without biting it: “My girlfriend is making fun of me because I like you better than the strippers” He smiled and said “Sorry. I’m married” Just to finish the story before I get into it. I asked him a birthday kiss and hug and I was well satisfied because I got to make my move I didn’t chicken out…so…weeh!

Now…let’s get into it: I focused in enjoying the whole experience and so I plan to continue doing, let’s make that perfectly clear. That being said, there are several options for what could have been the actual truth of the situation.

He wasn’t married. He just wan’t into me but didn’t want to blow me off to hard being my B-day and all, which I appreciate anyway.

He was married, but that wasn’t the issue. Still not that big of a problem for him but not his type at all.

He was married. He respects his reationship. Not very common, but it does happen.. Knowing my luck though don;t think this was it.

But again what good would have come from asking the real thing if he was perfectly nice to me in the rejection part AND I got a friendly and perfectly skin-contact B-day gift? I sure as hell wouldn’t have trade the truth for feeling more miserable than I already do in my birthdays!!

I totally agree even when the truth is hard on the person you’re laying it on to there are always ways to let it fall a little less hard. Always try to let the truth hit like a pillowcase full of feathers not full of bricks.

Take another one from the same life. I tell everything to my husband… everything. Focusing my everything on sexual fantasies. He just plops nright back to the floor and yells at me so many fucking ugly things. After a while, he says it’s OK. He’s really not. I can tell. He’s just curious. He asks…but he doesn’t really want to know the truth. He just wishes to hear what he wants coming out of my mouth and that is so not the way things work. Maybe that is the explanation we’re looking for… We always ask because we WISH TO HEAR WHAT WE WANT COMING OUT FROM OTHER PEOPLE’S MOUTHS when we ask them! That’s it! That’s the reason! We’ve solve it!

WE’RE….. SOOO…… FUUCKING…….. STUPID……That’s never gonna happen!!!! It rarely will!!!!

We have got to stop trying to make other people give our answers if it not here just go look it out there…somewhere else don’t force it! It won’t be the best for you or for the people around you. Maybe it’ll hurt that the woman of your dreams it’s just…not, but in the long run it’s better you work it out and don’t ignore it or you’ll just end up hurting each other haven’t we all seen it somewhere sometime…Think about my friends.

Please, a bit of restrain…if you really don’t wanna hear it…don’t ask!!!

A friend in need is a friend indeed…

My birthday is coming and instead of being a joyous ocation the whole ideaa i making me need a lot more medication than I usually take for my depression condition. My mind just goes back automatically al the way back to the last birthday it can remember…being number nine or so where a friend from school would come and play a board game witj me while my grandpa woulld buy me the cheapest cake he could find in the store on hi way back from work, but…I guess it was fine. My father took a couple pictures and people said Happy Birthday unenthusiastically as they went in and out of the house throughtout the day no real party is what I mean…still I guess it didn’t matter.

Years went by and still it didn’t matter to me. Up to my 15th birthday, which in Mexico is the sweet 16th, a very big deal you know. I didn’t wish for a big party because my family had no real relationship with me they hardly knew my name to put on the card for th present let alone to actually wish me hapiness or any other blesing you know? Plus, during junior high school I wasn’t particularly popular. I wasn’t bullied either…I was the A average girl who just occupied a chair from time to time and nobody really cared for except for the ocational answer for a test which I denied…so sue me they didn’t talk to me I ate alone like a dog why should I had made their lives any easier?

Anyway, my mother pushed the whole party issue down my throat as she only knows how and I tried to invite over a hundred people my age of which around two showed up…se, my math was cruel but I was accurate!! After that I decided I never wanted to have another birthday party in my life ever!! I just had no friends I ha to deal with that fact as I had to deal with the fact that I couldn’t make a party for no one to show up.

I dropped the issue for about another 15 years. I let go easily as you might imagine, I’m a Leo so you can just forget it…and my husband organized something with mutual friends and family. By the middle of the afternoon, he was wasted, I was sitting in a chair at a corner on my own bored out of my mind listening to songs I so greatly hated but my sisters-in-law loved so they were singing out loud for the whole neiborhood to hear at 2 oçlock in the morning. I told my husband as sweetly as I could I TOLF YOU SO…YOU SON OF A BITCH! because he had pronised on his future grave that he wouldn’t leave me alone and of course…he did. I don’t see the future or I’d be rich by now buying lottery tickets but I do follow patterns I learn ffrom other people’s behaviors. It’s just good common sense. Being smart that’s all.

This year, I’ve decided to go out and invite a bunch of so called friends. I’ve got my money ready. If no one shows up I’ll hoarse from singing in the damn karaoke all night all by myself! I’m NOT waiting for anybody. I’ll be very happy if they show…shocked even, but I’ll have a good fucking time one way or another…hell yes…also, I asked my father to buy me a cake. I want an orange cake witr purple frosting. I’ll order it and I’ll even sing Happy Birthday to myself if I goddam have to but I’ll have th cake I want exacty the way I want it!! Also I asked for a change of clothing because I have absolutely nothing yo wear to go to the bar. My dad said “You’re pretty big to be asking for party now!!” and I said “Am I really asking for that much dad, think back for a bit and then answer me back?” he was silent after that.

I guess I’m tired of not enjoying the fact that I was born because I never made real friends. I certainly tried, I certainly needed then. I thought I had made a few durin my way but when I think back at the shitty times I find myself each and every time alone nobody was by my side…shit….I never trully noticed. I just thought I had bad friends…but as it turns out maybe I just didn;t make any true ones…Happy times sure, but shitty which have been many for my ife…nobody to hold my hand or tell me it’ll be alright even when they know it just won’t be but because it’s their job to hold your God damn hand when you feel like you just don’t have a place in this world. I’ll get into each shitty “frienship” later.

Couple months ago, I thought I had made a few new friends. We’re still in the process we’ve just met after all, but I had an anxiety crisis and one of them had to calm me down in the middle of work…as much as I wouldn’t had wanted to it just happened I’m sick and that shit happens to me sometimes without notice. Now, I’m worried he no longer will want to be my friend and I’m so sad because I reall like him. We have so much in common and he makes me feel peaceful. I don’t know exactly how it works on the depression crazy world, but there has been only two people in my life who can calm me with the sound of their voice; one was a true friend from college but he had to move to Tenesse a few months ago haven’t seen him since don;t expect to see h9m again; and then there’s this other boy from work whom I kind of scared with my anxiety crisis. I just asked him to tell me something so I could hear his voice but since we just started to know each other might have been too much, but then again if I scared him so soon by inevitably being me, maybe we’re just not meant to be friends at all…??

All this is just really killing me, what are your thought any advice would be helpful if you got any LOL Anyway as ever thanks for being my crying shoulder.

We only get one life but… can we live it upside down?

In spite of what some people may belive, myself included, that we may live though many lifetimes, we always live or at least should since we can’t be sure of anything… with the mentality of “We only live once.” However, we don’t really get a ruleboo on how to live it. Our parents as hard as they try teach us the path we are supposed to follow all the way through our lives, but we hardly ever listen at least not as much as we should.

As we tango through tha path of our life, we mae our desitions and follow our own desitions but what if we actually did do what our parents told us almost to the dot? Go to school as we were told and passed every single lesson with an A or a 10 depending on the country; Behaved on every single situation you had the chance not to and missed the experience of a lifetime for a quiet night at home with a nice book now nicely saved in a well educated brain on thirty or so because you ept on school duty till you finished your career as you obviously pushed into and studied what you were programmed to not because you wanted to but simply because you wanted to make your parents so proud and damn it you had the ability to do that and whatever other thing the could as of you. You obeyed the whole way through.

After that period of demmanding and pleasing table tennis game they generally as you to get a life…but afraid and ambarrasing as that might be: you never really learned how to do that. You realized that certain things you now how to do well by now are not pleasing or even bother you in an utterly disgusting way. You just don’t lie who you are, you just hadn’t noticed because…let’s face it who had the time?!

My birthday’s coming and my dad asked me: What are you planning to do?

My answer was simple, predictable and boring: You know I never celebrate my Birthdays, I stay home and read, probably go out for dinner and eat at home watching a movie, if I’m lucky somebody will remember this year and say  happy birthday through a brief phone call. Then I chuckled. I thought he would he pleased…he wasn not…

“Hell no…Go out! You never demanded anything when you were a teen! I loved it then but now it just drives me up the wall! Go out and have fun! Go out for drinks, dance, sing, go to the movies to the cinema if that’s what you want but don’t stay home celebrate honey!”

Even my dad doesn’t realy like the fact that I missed the fun part of my life. I am indeed trying to live my life upside down. I’m married. I have a five year old, but I can make the dance floor burn like a SOB! and I can carry a tune more than most people in the karaoke, I always loved to sing. I might do things differently now but I can surely still have fun and lilve my life as it just had started.

I’ve seen a lot of movies where people have done it. I always admired them, like Patch Adams and the like, but I just never saw myself doing what they did. I never thought like I needed to, but I eventually had my epiphany and I see things differently now. I had my revelation and I went through some pretty rough shit to get there so I’ll try not to waste my oportunity and live it up, I can feel the life their way now…see? I couldn’t before because I didn’t feel it right for me but now it my moment to join them…to start living my other half… my end of the story…

…or is it the beginning?

Once upon a heart…

I have died every day waiting for you,

Darling dont be afraid I have loved you for a thousand years,

I would love you for a thousand more…

(Cristina Perri – A thousand years Breaking Dawn ST)

Wouldnt we all all want to hear those beautiful words said to us sometime in our lives? Love can be so utterly beautiful? Yes, it certainly can be, but that is as scary as hell, isnt it?

I mean beautiful yes, but just as painful. Lets take a closer look Jack and Rose from Titanic. Would we be as moved by their love story if he hadnt frozen his ass off saving her life? if he had managed to stayed afloat and lets say…life with no legs? Probably, but not as much am I right.

Lets take another peek…mmm… Romeo and Juliet. Who wouldnt wanna love soo deeply? But oh dear lord did they suffered their agony only matched their love for each other. They actually had to die to be together forever, talk about a bummer I mean perfect ending who can bother you in heaven? or hell…you know the whole suicide thing…? alone at last.

Love is a wonderful joke between God and the Devil I say. God thought we just couldnt miss it and we should be worthy to deserve it and the Devil just wanted to see us squirm.

To me love is…simply this…

Once upon a time somebody somewhere told me this story, might have been a tale or simply something he or she had read and had stayed inside his brain waiting to come out into the right pair of ears that turned out to be mine…

I heard the tale intently but instead of my ears it went straight into my heart and it had lived there ever since.

There was a young man showing off to every one who would listen his brand new heart. Red, shiny, beating like crazy, perfectly shaped, smooth as a ripe apple, not a scratch in sight that would damage the perfection of it. everybody applauded mesmerized to this young mans fortune and he smiled ever so proudly.

There was however an old man between the crowd picking up leaves who was not laughing, after a look at the young man he smiled and shook his head in dissaproval lookind back down at his dull job. The young man caught his eye however and curious he walked to him.

“Are you not impressed old man? ” said the yound man.

“I’m afraid not ma’boy” said the man unceremoniously.  The young man still smiling answered.

“Have you seen a heart more beautiful than mine then?” To his surprise the old man nodded slowly with a knowledgeable smile. The young man’s smile faded for a second.

“We demand that you show it to us then!” he laughed along with the crowd. The old man unbuttoned his old winted coat and showed his old heart. Mishaped, with pieces missing, crooked pieces, hardened pieces, blackened pieces, broken and repaired pieces. “You call that more beautiful than mine, are you mad?” They laughed.

“Indeed” he said firmly. everybody went slowly quiet. “Don’t you see, son? I have broken my heart into so many pieces because I have given my heart to so many people in my life and they have given me a piece of theirs in return. Some have broken mine and others have made amends. Where you see holes is because Im still patiently waiting for those people to give me their hearts. There are hard parts where my heart has been beaten and harmed. Can see you why my heart is more beautiful, son? I have love and have been loved in return! Thats what makes it beautiful, son!”

After listening to the old man, the young man took a piece of his heart and gave it to the old man so he could give him a piece of his.

What kind of heart do you have? Mine probably has so many holes by now by its so beautiful that I don’t think I would trade it if I had the chance. I dedicate my tears to all your hearts tonight….GO OUT THERE AND JUST LOVE!

Vote: Your right or just a filthy habit…

Today, yet again we had local elections. We normally have several parties to choose from so basically it sounds pretty fair right? ….wroooooooooooooong!

First of all, here in my country the whole process has become a real media circus. A stand up comedy competition between the best clown available. They have no respect for each other which makes me think: why would they have any for us if they won? Isn’t that how how it works you show your values through your actions and NOT with empty words?? I  sure thought so.

Later, I discovered that the the process is now profesionally handled by children. I’m a teacher I can recognize one when I see one. He is a booger face bigger than me shouldn’t be the kind of language a politician who is about to sit in an office and decide the people’s fate should be, doesn’t it make it sense to you? It doesn’t to me!

I don’t hate my country. I’m quite in ove of my flag and I’m quite respectful of all the blood shed beneath my feet by all those generations of fighting for the rigbts I have every single day of my existence. Do other people just forget? Do they give a damn people have died year after year, ideal after ideal trying to set the tone for a better nation for us to live in? We’re wasting it all. We’re not making those rights right. We’re letting the bad ones stomp on things that should be sacred and held so dearly in our hearts and minds. It’s our nation, if we don’t give a shit, who the fuck will? It’s not the leaders that have to keep it from letting it fall apart, it’s us. Us. The people. It’s people. We’re it. It’s us.

Our rights and obligation lie in a tiny book called our Constitution. Stop letting people walk all over it! Stop doing it yourself because it’s easier than dloing the right thing…it’s hard…nearly impossible at times…but it’s the right thing to do. We must choose who we wish to be. Life gives us choices ALL THE TIME, CRAPPY ones mostly but choices still…

The million dollar question right: What the hell for? What’s the point? It won’t change a bit. Eventually it will. When? who gives a shit? Do the right thing!! Be the bigger person. Be the right man or woman right now that’s what matters. Speak up brothers and sisters, DON’T LET THE BADDIES GET THE BIGGER VOICES, WE CAN GET PRETTY LOUD TOO CAN’T WE!!!!! LOL HELL YA!

Believe me. There’s a world out there waiting for us all to SPEAK UP! so they can too.

Always, always, peace!!!

Today in my city gunpoint voting, homemade bombings were the meal of the day and the comments about it were just plain stupid: What’s the point, we won already? Who can posibly win from having elections at gunpoing for crying out loud! Can’t they see what all this has come to? Is this an acceptable way to live for them to say things like that?!

What’s it like in your country?

Remember: Those who don’t learn from history are damned to repeat it!

Black Friday…it’s on.

Combat boots at the ready, credit card cleared, comfortable clothes, running shoes, game face on…let’s do this!

It’s a dangerous day in an already dangerous time. It’s a day when being a smart shopper just doesn’t do. You have to be assertive, patient and aggressive at some point. Shopaholics tremble when they speak of this day.

Basically, it’s sales day. A way in which stores get rid of some merchandise with a minimun profit to make room for the new stuff and new season. It’s a good oportunity to buy those things you normally couldn’t and being so close to Christmas, your present list should be fulfilled with the least of your cash. The downside is that most people over do it. They buy too many things and most of them not even needed or wanted. How does this happen?

The idea of things being on sale is tempting, but be on the lookout for things you actually need or at the very least could potentially get advantage from. For example, about a year ago, I went to search for a TV because we were going to move. I tried online, but it was sold out. So, I went to the elctronic store decided to come back with a brand new LSD screen. Imagine my hope crashing loudly to the ground when I arrived at the overly crowded place! The line or the TV’s on sale was at least two rounds around the store, so I decided the TV wasn’t that important or even worth that amount of time in line. I bought some other things I wanted for Christmas that didn’t involve making a camp site to buy.

Later we went to the clothes store next door. The variety was truly amazing. There was about every piece of clothing and every color you could posibly imagine. People had armfulls of clothes while picking something else with their free arm. It was totaly insane. Now, there’s absolutely nothing wrong in buying clothes but do you really need that many shirts? I mean, do you plan to wear a different one each day of the year?

Anyway, I sighed and left the store to go to another, where I searched for clothes for my son. I took a couple outfits on sale and went to the register. Now, this was a total different matter. The lines for accepting cash are soooo much faster everywhere. You could take up to three hours to get a decent pair of shoes but in a second you could be charged and bagged ready to go. I thought the “Money” sounds cashiers did was only that continuous in online games, but I guess sometimes reality exceeds it.

I sat on the floor for about an hour and a half waiting to be picked up and then we went to a place where a salesperson yelled at the door at the top of his lungs: “BLACK  FRIDAY SALES! ONLY TODAY! WELCOME WELCOME” People went in like crazy, but they didn’t seem to come out. We took a plunge into the depths of the store which wasn’t all that nig and realized there were people sleeping next to the outfits on display. Men and children sitting on the floor, loaded with clothes that clearly weren’t for them, while a crazy woman or teen, also female, landed more stuff on the already heavy pile. We realized these people had been in this store for a longer than they could take. That’s just not fair. I took some acomplices but willing ones. We all knew what we were getting into. All girls of course.

We visited the toy store and made such a long line to buy a couple boardgames. In this case, we had to be patient cause those games were from a Santa list, top priority. Last, we went to the supercenter and bought the majority of our lists, yes…we had lists. We didn’t go with our pocket full of plastic, we had a budget to stick to. Hey, you can’t buy more than you can pay if there’s no way you take it out of the store, right? It was just good sense not to trust ourselves completely. I renewed my microwave, which suddenly stopped working a couple days before. I bought an electric grill which helps a lot when I have no gas to cook.

Salespeople were scolding shoppers for taking the merchandise before the scheduled sale time, but they kept bringing them out so I guess they weren’t so upset after all. Shoppers were crazed here. People taking things from shelves as if it were the end of time and survival would be guaranteed by a Barbie doll for a dollar or a family frame for three! For crying out loud! I took my time to look at things before I put them in my cart! Yes, maybe I didn’t get it all, but…who needs it all?

I was looking at the book section when a riot started in the electronics department. I stood there shaking my head in disaproval when I see my mother-in-law peeking though the crowd. I went brick red and dug my head in whatever book I was holding. I didn’t even bother noticing which one it was.

There were some pajamas for kids. I took the liberty to search through them but people kept grabbing them from in front of me. I said: “That does it!” I took a bunch of them into my cart and started looking at them calmly. I took a couple for my son and threw back the rest.

As I walked down the aisle, there were ladies who threw dirty looks at me. I was just going around looking for something good enough to stop by, but they meant business. Apparently, I was in this imaginary race I had not signed on. She stared and me and sped up. I was so upset by then that I pushed my cart further and beat her to the front where she stopped for plastic containers and I just kept going. I had to beat her, I needed to assert my womanhood. Nobody messes with me.

So, I bought what I needed and a couple within-budget ones as well. It was much more fun watching people on this day than actual purchases. By the way, did I mention we started on Thursdayy at 6:00 pm and finish at 7:00 am the next day? You have to pull an all nighter but it’s an experience you will never forget.

I just can’t wait to do it again!

Wanna join…?

At the Hardly Save…

A woman goes into the grosery store and pushes her cart ever so gently through the SALE tables at the back of the check outs. She puts her purse in the baby-seat at the front and pulls out a long shopping list which entices her to a lengthy stay at the glorious excuse-to-spend-money store. She unfolds the long list, which fall onto her bag, and starts turning her head this way and that while entered aisle 1. Now, this store is her weapon of chice because of the excellent service that characterizes it all throughout the country; and as she enters the long first hall she can see store clerks fixing up merchandise all over the place.

She paces slowly through and finds the dairy products. She bends to take a pack of sliced cheese and asks the first clerk:

Woman: Excuse me, is this low fat cheese?

Clerk1: Well, if it says so on the pack it probably is, even though we can’t absolutely guarantee that the farmer took the time to take the extra fat out of the cheese so people like you could eat fat-less cheese slices.

The woman smiles back at him and walks away with the weird out cheese still at hand. The underappreciated pack hits the bottom of the cart as she aproches the end of the aisle. She reaches out for a Yogurt and reads the moist letters on it. She aproaches the second clerk:

Woman: Excuse me, is this the family size Yogurt?

Clerk2: No, we have an even bigger jug that is the family size, but for a woman your size I recommend taking this big one since the personal one seems to be quite lacking for your nutrition and the family size would probably stay in the fridge too long and go bad anyway.

The woman slightly chuckles and walks into the second aisle putting the Yogurt in the cart. As she enters her second aisle she sighes as she sees more than five people in the aisle. She takes a deep breath and takes a plunge forward. She grabs a box of cereal and starts reading the side for nutritional facts, when the third clerk aproches her:

Clerk3: Ma’am this other cereal is on sale, plus it contains more product.

Woman: That’s OK. I like high fiber contents.

Clerk3: Oh, this is high in fiber as well, probably more than the one your holding, except that this brand is new and unknown which doesn’t necesarily mean bad quality. Meanwhile, that one is known for its fiber contents but also for its pricey cost.

The woman takes the box from the clerk’s hands and then when she’s out of reach she switches back to her favorite brand. She moves along and tries to choose a jar of jam from the lower shelf. The fourth clerk smiles silently at her and continues to fil up the bottom shelf. She read in silence: “Artifitially sweetened.” She thinks for a second and then she turns to the smiling clerk.

Woman: Excuse me, does this mean it has a sugar substitute? (she points to the yellow letters at the front)

Clerk4: Normally when it has a sugar substitute the brand shows on the front, if not it’s probably sweetened with regular corn syrup, which in turn is worse for a person with diabetes, which I assume you are?

Woman: Ummh…

Clerk4: If you are corn syrup can raise your sugar levels up to the roof so I wouldn’t recommend it. I could recommend this other with “Sugar free'” label which could have some sweatener but not as high in glucose which would work just the same if you’re looking to loose some weight.

She decides to take the Sugar free with an ackward smile goodbye. She pushes the cart further into the aisle and she finds her way blocked by a wet floor sign between her and the dried cramberries.

Woman: Could I have a bag of the dried cramberries, please?

Clerk5: No, ma’am. These lot has expired and I’m waiting for another clerk to remove it from the shelves. If I sold a bag to you it would be good for the store but it could be potentially hazzardous to your health and I couldn’t posibly live with myself after that.

Woman: OK…? Thanks.

She smiles and walks away trying to set her mind right back at the shopping list. She stares at the items on it and notices she just doesn’t have as many specifics as she asks on the list. She decides to leave the cart to another clerk to take the products back to their place, and leaves the store to try another day…

What happens when we get much more than we asked for? Like this lady. We ask people a lot more than we deliver, but what about people who give a lot more than you’re willing to accept. How to tell a person than being too honest or too specific bothers us? We can’t without hurting their feelings. Why? Because we really don’t wanna know that much. We keep everything and everyone at arm’s length to keep safe.

It”s not always a good idea, let me tell you. I’ve had some of the nicest conversations with total strangers. I mean, I never go telling my name and credit card number, but I can communicate with other people just for the pleasure of it. You should really try it. It will make you feel you’re not alone in the world. Again, being careful is the rule here, so you might as well not touch either…I mean shaking hands. I know. It all sounds too restrictive to actually be allowed but it’s good to feel connected outside your circle of trust. How can you help the world if you don’t know it?

Go out there and be part of it. Don’t be shy! Welcome TMI’s, as long as they don’t go describing vowel movements. Share yourself more and it will make you a much more confident person.