I have a cell-phone-shaped tumor on my brain.

A couple of weeks ago we had this night of Hellacious Demon Storms; my mom and I were driving back from Bryanna's wedding shower and it was terrifying. We couldn't see anything. We couldn't even hear the radio over the thunder and hail. The lightening was so frequent and bright it was like daytime. My mom was driving me to her house where Tony was supposed to pick me up. So, we made it through the storm and I sat in the front room, waiting for Tony. And I waited. And I WAITED. And he didn't show. I sat right by the window - Every time I'd see headlights coming down the street my heart would beat fast and my throat would close up, but it wouldn't be him. I sat by the window for forty minutes, waiting, sure that he was dead or stranded or worse.

Pair this with the fact that we keep driving to Canada with the engine light on and we find ourselves facing a necessary evil: the cell phone.

For years I have abstained and turned my nose up at these annoying little machines. I've hated them with a passion. I've rolled my eyes at the greasy executive in Kroger, pretending to scream at his broker to sell a million shares of some imaginary stock in the express check out line. At work, I've done entire pretests with bored housewives who refused to stop chatting with Blanche Down the Street about the mink-lined mules she got at Von Maur long enough for me to use the goddamned puffer. I've had entire confused conversations with people [studying me very strangely] who were NOT actually talking to me [although they were LOOKING at me], but to someone speaking to them through one of those tiny earpieces. ANNOYING.

But then I thought Tony was dead.
And I broke down.
As the great Bruce Silberburg once said to me [when I was a wee lass of seventeen] O, how depressing that my gods have feet of clay.

But. Christalmighty these things are convenient.

P.S. Could be worse, I suppose. I could be Tony. HE bought the belt-holster.

Because I am too tired for anything aside from a disjointed list:

It's been four days now since I've helped/seen/imprisoned any homeless people. I guess the word is out and they're all avoiding my neighborhood.

Yesterday at work we were forced into a two-tech/ 25-exam day. We usually have at least four girls and do somewhere in the neighborhood of 12-20 exams. My brain is mush. Last night, as I was closing, an angry woman who was upset about her husband's long wait for the doctor came in and started yelling at me. She wouldn't leave. She kept HALF-leaving and then turning around and running back - shaking and obviously fighting back tears, saying over and over 'YOU JUST CAN'T TREAT PEOPLE THIS WAY DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND?!' I was so exhausted from my Day From Hell, I giggled through the whole thing. Had to try extremely hard not to answer her I'm not coming back here ever again with a Do you see the THOUSANDS of files behind me do you REALLY think I give a shit - I get paid the same. Was successfull. Subsequently, am not fired.

I'm moderately happy because I only have to do three things today: Vaccuum, upload all the pictures from my best friend's wedding, and two months of schoolwork that I've been putting off since MAY.

The jaws devour; the jaws are devoured.

Last night on my way to pick Tony up from work, I saw another homeless man in front of the hospital. I mean, I assumed he was homeless - he was laying in the grass, all sprawled out at 8:45pm. I couldn't see his face, but somehow I knew he was an old man. As I was driving towards Tony's bookstore, the status of the horizontal old man started changing from homeless to possibly dead/dying. I asked everyone at Tony's work what they would do in my position and - universally, unanimously - they all told me that they would ignore the man and continue on their way.

So I called the state police, who gave me the number for non-emergency assistance. I called them and THEY connected me to emergency assistance, who hung up on me after I admitted that I didn't know the cross street of where my dead guy was. I was a little frustrated, but. Absolved of all guilt.

I drove back down the road with Tony a little later just to see if he was still there. Getting closer to the Mystery Cross Street, there was a firetruck, an ambulance and two sheriff's cars all with their lights on. It's a good thing you went ahead and called, Tony said. He actually needed help, Tony mused. Hey, why does he have handcuffs on? Tony asked, incredulous.

So. Good Samaritan that I am, I called the authorities because I thought the poor old man was dying, AND THEN THEY ARRESTED HIM AND HE WENT TO JAIL. What?

My life is ridiculous.

Homeless pizza.

Last night I saw this homeless man twice. He was tall with long hair and he was walking around wrapped in this thick, dirty looking, black wool blanket. It was huge. The first time I saw him, he was walking down the sidewalk in front of the hospital, staring at his feet. There was something about him that wouldn't let me look away. You know. Until I had to look away. Because. I was driving a car. A moving one. The second time I saw him, Tony and I were on our way to this white-trash pizza buffet we're addicted to [all you can eat bread and cheese and sausage for $3.99! Erm. No wonder the gym has NO EFFECT ON ME...] and he was sitting on the side of the road, right outside the restaurant. He was holding a sign that said, 'homeless...please help'.

So. I'm generally too shy to do things like this, but when we were done eating, I bought a takeout box and filled it as full of pizza as I could. I was really nervous about giving it to him. I didn't know what I'd say and I didn't want him to be embarrassed. While I was moderately calm due to the fact that I was currently under the influence of fucking elephant tranquilizers, Tony and I got in the car and started driving toward where he was sitting and I practiced what I would say to him. After much deliberation, I figured that I would say something like, 'Here' or 'This is some pizza...I hope you're not a vegetarian because there's pork all over this shit'. But it didn't matter. BECAUSE HE WAS GONE. I made Tony drive up and down the street, but he was NOWHERE. I was really depressed about the whole thing. That is, until we went to D's house and I mixed my sedatives with some malt liquor and spent the rest of the night drooling on myself and playing Dr. Mario.

I gave the pizza to D who is, coincidentally, a vegetarian.
Fuckit.

Embrace your inner snake.

Monday morning I called my doctor's office in hysterics. Twice. Because that's how many times it took me to choke my phone number out correctly. I remember saying something like, "MY NAME IS KELLY AND I NEED HELP PLEASE HELP." My mom came over while I was waiting for the doctor to call. She mainly took the dog out and hugged me for three hours, promising that my soul is not black and charred, nobody is out to get me, it's all because of that Geraldo show I saw when I was four when the little girl got killed and left at the side of the road, and that I would once again feel human.

I made it to the doctor's office and left minus two vials [the black and red marble kind] of blood and holding approximately eighteen different prescriptions for various sedatives/nausea pills/seratonin-fixers/work excuses. The FIRST vial told us that I am DEFINATELY NOT - NO WAY POSSIBLY - pregnant. My lungs may be full of fluid, but my womb is empty. Bone dry. The SECOND vial was supposed to blame my anxiety disorder/ paranoid hysterical outbursts on my thyroid, which sadly proved false. But I knew that, anyways. I've been like this since I was four. Every so often, it's like my brain/psyche just needs to shed a few layers and begin anew. Like a snake. A really crazy snake. One who thinks that everyone is out to get him and the FBI have set up cameras in the dark window of the house across the street just to make sure he's behaving. Poor snake. The Man wants to crush him with his giant lawnmower of oppression but all he can do is tremble and count everything in sight.

The nice part of all this is that while I was de-crazyfying [I took TWO WHOLE DAYS!] I did nothing but sit on my couch and watch the entire first season of Popular and read the entire first half of Bellefleur. God bless TeeVee and Joyce Carol Oates. GOD BLESS.

Anyways. So.
The moral of my story:

Sedatives. Are. Good.

The End.

I'm having trouble eating and sleeping. Happens every couple of years. I'm weak and shaky and tired as all fuck. I'm afraid of everything. Today it seems like every bad thing I've ever done is looming black and sinister on my life's horizon. I'm afraid that if I don't make amends, something terrible will happen to me. I leave the house and see smiling people driving their cars and walking down the aisles of the grocery store and waiting for their greasy pizzas. I look at their normal faces and feel like I am the only person in the world who has ever done anything shameful. I feel tarnished and horrid when everyone else seems to shine - towering, shimmering pillars of fucking virtue.

I know somewhere that everyone has secrets. I also know that the reality is that my secrets are cuddly little bunnies compared to the fiery monster-secrets MOST people have. [considering the fact that I am emotionally paralyzed by the mere thought of doing something mean or wrong or bad or illegal].

I just want to feel normal again, and as usual, I'm afraid that I never will.

Strep is the best diet I've ever been on.

My arms are lead and I'm dizzy when I'm sitting down. Whatever it is that's wrong with me quickly surpassed "pregnancy" and became "some sort of crazy X-files virus" last night. I came into this room with the intention of cleaning it, but had to sit down and rest for a couple minutes. I mean. It's a good fifteen feet from the couch where I was sitting to the office where I am sitting now and I can't seem to catch my breath.

Since I only have these two days off this week, I'm trying to convince my friends and family that it's okay to hang out with me. This is becoming difficult, seeing as how I now sound exactly like a Skeksis from the Dark Crystal. If only my throat would stop closing long enough for me to laugh without falling down on the floor coughing. Or, I would probably settle for the energy to pull myself back up again.

Please pray for my immortal soul.
Wait. Don't.
Bake me some fucking cookies or something.
Mail me some slippers before I die.

73.5 reasons not to have sex while you're ovulating*.

So I bought a pregnancy at the grocery store near my house this morning. It was locked up in a plexiglass case in the pharmacy - along with about four different types of condoms and eight thousand different types of home yeast infection treatments. I'd walked up to the counter to ask someone to help me and wound up having to ask some seventeen year old boy to unlock the case for me. He was apologetic and told me that he doesn't understand why they lock that stuff up. I crazily, desperately mumbled something about old women stealing their yeast infection medicine, snatched up the cheapest test they had and took off for the register.

I decided that I needed to buy the test after two days of dizzy spells and not being able to eat anything besides baby carrots and cherries. Today, they sent me home from work six hours early, when I started gagging and tearing up, insisting that the old man twenty feet away from me looking at safety glasses smelled exactly like burnt cheese. Because he did. And. I think he winked at me. But I suppose that's beside the point. Anyways. I took the test and was blessed with one red line which means I am still only one person. Although: After I took the test I noticed that I'm not technically supposed to take it until at least one day after a missed period and since that's not going to happen for another week, I suppose today's test results may be considered pretty much worthless. Regardless, pregnancy or no...It bought me an almost-three day weekend, even if I'm going to spend the whole thing on the couch with my arm over my eyes, exhausted and groaning because I can smell the neighbors and it's making me FUCKING NAUSEATED.

Butseriously. Don't worry about me. I have industrial strength fans. And everyone knows: FANS HEAL ALL WOUNDS.


* According to Blogger spellcheck, "ovulating" is not a word. Seriously?