Memorial Day

THANK YOU VETERANS AND MILITARY
FOR YOUR
DUTY, SACRIFICE, AND HONOR!!!!

FREEDOM ISN'T FREE, IT IS PAID BY THE BLOOD OF SERVICE MEN AND WOMEN.

THANK YOU!!!!

Simply Amazing!

My Joy and I are moving this week, so things are more than a little chaotic. I have found stuff that I'd been looking for and other stuff that I never knew I had. It's amazing how much stuff you can accrue in a matter of a couple of years.

And as we are taking box after box out of the apartment and hauling it to storage, since the new place isn't ready but the lease runs out before hand, I am simply amazed by the sheer number of boxes and amount of stuff we have in this place. My kitchen alone is about the size of a full bath in the average home, but I love to cook, so I found ways to get everything I needed into it.

Now the next part of this of course is the fact that we have unpack everything at the new place and try and find room for it. Yeah. The fun never ends. :) Actually, I don't mind moving. I just prefer a bit smoother transition.

School's Out!

School's out until July 1st-ish. I finished the semester about where I thought I would. I'm still waffling over what I want to be when I grow up, but I figure it's okay since a) I'm paying for it and b) I'm too far into this degree not to get it. It's a bachelor's, I can use it.

My summer entails summer classes, motorcycle rally, the beach, a lighthouse, a couple of ren faires, and hopefully some more genealogy.

And writing. Plenty of writing! I'm excited for my summer.

The Hard Part

I've been so wrapped up with school, I've hardly had time to write, which is bothersome to say the least. So last night, after a fraternity event, I sat down at my friend's place since My Joy is with her Godparents for an extended visit, and wrote. Or tried to. Not edit, but write. And not to start anything new, for which you have (well, I do) the built in excitement of starting something completely new. No, I pulled out something I've been working on and started to pick threw it again. I erased and changed a few things, and admittedly there is a bolded line that says "insert description here" because my internet was down - again - and I didn't have the necessary details. I did however manage to write 1,036 words - completely new from where I stopped the last time. Doesn't include the edits in previous paragraphs or pages. And the hardest part of the whole thing, the first 500 words. It was almost easier to take the GRE than to write those few pages. Ugh. But I did get them done, and I will try to hit at least 500 words tonight, so that the first few pages aren't that hard again. Not that I'm not going to go back through and cut about half of it, but this run is to write it ugly, not pretty it up. That's what revisions are for.

OOps...Again?

So I said I would participate in this writing challenge of Brynn's, and I said I would write 5K words a week, which isn't even 1000 a day. This should have been easy. It was suppose to be after mid-terms and major projects. Not so much. And then what did I do this weekend since I didn't have gobs of homework and projects that needed to be done? Visited friends in the hospital, participated in Relay for Life with Teams Med-Head and Phi Sigma Pi, and took My Joy to the school carnival where among other things we have acquired a new goldfish named Goldie - that was Saturday. Sunday, I was supposed to go a movie night, but didn't. Instead I spent several hours Saturday night and most of Sunday working on my genealogy. I did find about forty new people and tons of info and several dozen brick-walls for my effort though. Today, was meetings with my advisor and financial aid and classes. I'll write tonight. After the last meetings. I only have a one thing due tomorrow and a quiz, so that's good to go. Now I'm battle school burn out and trying to find a job to salvage lost hours. Small steps. Submission to agent. Letter to editor. 2 NEW pages. Yes the new is important, since I'm editing right now too. Or trying to. Did find out grad school is only 24 months at one of my schools of choice not 36 months.

Soap Box

The Chris Brown - Rhianna story is all over the tv right now, and everyone is condemning Rhianna for returning to the man who beat her. It's easy to sit here, on the other side of the table and say leave, and destroy cd's, remove posters and songs, and say "because you're a star, you're suppose to think of me and the message you're sending me first" or "leave, he's never going to change, just leave". THe thing is, if you've been there - think about when you were there, would those things have worked on you? Why would you think they would work on anyone else? And why are you only now saying something about your abuse? Why not work consistantly towards educating people?

I am a survivor of abuse. I am no longer a victim, but I was. And I didn't leave and I didn't leave and I didn't leave. I was told by the church, by society, by my family, that good girls don't get a divorce. That divorce is always wrong. My child and I will go to hell because I failed at my marriage. I. I failed it. Not him, not his actions, but me. I failed because I wasn't good enough. The thing is, I would never have been good enough. Never. And I still didn't leave. These same people would have turned a blind eye to the motherless child who would have been raped and abused by the person who should've protected her unless presented with her image. And then they would have scorned and shamed and condemned my dead body for not leaving this same man.

I finally got the courage to leave when my child was threatened. It took that threat to finally get me out of there. His indifference to her severe illness. I couldn't leave for me, I could leave for her. And I did. It's taken years for me to work through things. I have deliberately chosen abuse as a topic in speeches and papers for school with the hope that the signs will be recogonized, that behaviors will be seen, that courage will be gained and help saught. I hope it has helped, I think it has. It will make things uncomfortable, because it's a dirty little secret that everyone will know. But, it's time. Just as soldiers should no longer be punished for seeking help for PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), abuse survivors shouldn't hide in closets, afraid to speak out because they don't want to continue to be seen as a victim, or are ashamed, or whatever.

When the abuse just happens, you aren't necessarily capable thinking about anyone else and what their perception of you and your situation is. Yes, Rhianna, needs help, she needs counseling.

Another Friday Night ---

But this time ---

I'm in Chicago.

And what am I doing? Sitting at the hotel, surfing the Internet for a few more minutes before I go upstairs to my room and write. All of the homework that needed to be done before I went on Spring Break, is done. I do have several papers and projects to do, but I don't want to do them, even if I had brought them with me, which I didn't. Well, aside from the paper that was due at midnight last night. :)

Why am I in Chicago? For a MidWest Regional Conference for the SVA. My university sent me as a delegate, and while my fellow vets are still out and about, I returned to the hotel a couple hours after dinner. It was loud, and I need to keep what remains of my hearing.

There are differences in conferences, I guess I knew that, but I didn't really think about it until after we were here. I packed for a business conference, a writer's conference, which is mostly business all of the time. Not so much here. Not that it's a bad thing, it's not, it's the best way to network for us, and to discuss the highs and lows of what was heard throughout the day. It's different. At a writer's conference, aside from still milling around whereever we were at, if I wanted to bring my laptop down to the lobby, I was guarenteed to find at least one writer, usually three or four hanging out, writing, brainstorming, or just talking about anything and everything. Now it's quiet. My Joy is safe with Grandma, and I feel a little lost and a bit lonely. It's just a different feeling. Again, not one I thought I'd be feeling, but life is nothing if not an adventure. This to will pass, and all will be well. Needless to say I didn't pack exactly right, but not bad.

As far as the writing goes -

I'm .... inspired. :)


A lot.