Nutcase 101

I don’t know if I’ve honestly shared where the term “Nutcase 101″ came from with you, my lovely readers. My bio use to state a blurb about “after twenty-six years, many degrees and hundreds of hours of classes” but there was an actual moment where I felt like I couldn’t handle my scholastic career, I felt like I was going batshit crazy. This is that story and the inspiration for Nutcase 101.

The time on my bedside clocked glowed 4:30 and no light filtered in the window, there was no moon that night.

This was a common practice for me to be wide awake when most of the world was slumbering because I was in the second year of my double masters program and twenty-four hours a day was no where near the amount of time that I needed to get all of my work done. Since the start of August, I had been tasked with going to class, studying, go to work, running a project team of undergrads, organize and implement a recruitment campaign for my program, try to find a job and sleep (plus all of the other things that we have do to stay alive and maintain some sort of acceptable hygiene).

Sleep was the luxury that I gave up first.

There was too much to get done and I had to make sure everything was a success because if I didn’t, I wouldn’t get the grades and if I didn’t get the grades I wouldn’t get the job and if I didn’t get the job, then twenty-six years of hard work would be for nothing.

That is the thought that would run through my head every moment that I wasn’t concentrating at the task at hand. So, anytime I tried to lay down I was thinking of the what had to be completed and that I just completed or that if I dared to play hokey, that I would be so far behind my whole life would come tumbling down.

Any slumber I did get was fretful and full of images of falling in endless pits. Being awake was so much better because I thought I had some sort of control.

But on this particular morning, the synapses in my brain were firing rapidly reminding me of a giant list of tasks and deadlines that needed to be completed and met. And that’s when I started crying and I couldn’t stop. I tried studying. Sobbing. Watching TV. Sobbing. I couldn’t call anyone to share my mental state because it was so early. My mind might have been broken but my manners were still in tact. The nausea started, my chest tightened, shaking from head-to-toe, dizzy spells and a number of other symptoms of being in a state of panic.

Then I got the brilliant idea that I needed to get to campus and camp out in front of my adviser’s office door, so that when he arrived at work at 7 am he could deal with a woman in full blown mental break-down and panic attack before his first cup of coffee. I wanted to quit everything – school, life because I couldn’t handle the responsibility.

I don’t remember the drive to the campus but I do remember entering the business school building (24 hour access) and feeling a sense of relief of being on campus. But that did not last long as the panic became a hundred times worse as I realized that by leaving the graduate program that I would be letting everyone down, that my parents would be ashamed and I was going to be labeled a quitter and a failure.

And honestly, after that point, I don’t remember the thoughts that went through my head or what I did until 7 am when my professor walked around the corner and saw me there. I just know that my professor found me outside of his office curled up in a ball and he patiently spoke to me for several hours until my panic attack was over. He let me babble incoherently and took the time to listen to my fears. All of them.

He assured me of my abilities, confirmed that I was overworked and that I would be fine. That life would be okay.

And he was right.

I woke up in the room my mother grew up in, under a quilt made by grandmother’s hands to the smell of breakfast cooking. It was a month after college graduation and it was my first vacation since I was 18, having worked full time while I attending FSU full time.

The only place I wanted to go on my first adult adventure was a location that was very familiar but foreign to me. I had been to my grandmother’s small, early 1900 house many times as a child but it was never with the intent to get to know where I came from and who my grandmother really was. I wanted to know the woman that raised my mother. The woman who got her nursing license in her forties to support her family of six children because my grandfather left for greener pastures. The woman who was only four foot ten on good days but a giant in my eyes.

I spent a week listening to her stories and to her snore in front of the TV. She drove me around to meet relatives that I had only heard of in memories that my mother shared, seeing my great Uncle’s dairy farm, running in pastures that my mother called her playground as a child. Grandma told me about the way my mom shouldered the responsibilities of cooking while grandma was at work. That my mom would bribe her brothers into the cleaning by letting them lick the bowls of whatever dessert she had prepared. I learned about my great-grandparents, that I have strong Canadian roots and that I didn’t inherit the Mohawk genes that allow a lot of my kin to tan over night.

Grandma gave me a real treasure the summer of 2002 by sharing herself with me. She never knew that I went up to visit so I could selfishly keep her to myself for a few days. And now that she’s gone, the seven days in the house that my great-grandfather built is a life time of memories that I’ll share with my children one day.

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A note on the previous post, that event occurred five years ago but due to modern technology people have tried to come back in my life.

She was my best friend. I was there for her when she got pregnant at 18 and married a boy of 17. I was there when she gave birth to her first child and her second. I gave her what I could when their paychecks weren’t enough because I couldn’t let her or her children go hungry. She cried on my shoulder when shortly after her third child’s birth, before her twenty-second birthday, when she decided to divorce. And I supported her. She was my best friend.

She felt the need to never be alone, taking on a new boyfriend, a one night stand and then the series of fiances. They all loved her and I was going to be a bridesmaid many times over.

During the parade of men, I had graduated college and moved on with my life. The time she and I spent together was sparse moments when I was home. No matter what was going on, I encouraged her to better her life.

Then came the day when she called me, exasperated. She told me it was all a big misunderstanding. And that she had not been called. It wasn’t really her fault and she was going to make the next court date. The crack pipe that Child Services had found under the bed of her second child wasn’t hers, it was one of her fiance’s friend’s. And no one from the court house had told her what time her custody hearing was, it wasn’t her fault that she had lost full custody of her children. Yes, she was still going to marry him.

That was the day I walked away and couldn’t help anymore. I had always seen her as the 18 year old girl I had shared my dreams with. I thought I could save her from the bad decisions by giving her what I thought she needed. But that day, my own dream of her saving herself with my help was shattered and there was more anger at myself, as there was at her and her poor decisions. I was her enabler and she was in denial and I couldn’t support either one of us in that manner anymore.

Friday, I was doing normal stuff and then broke my foot. You know because it’s there.

Of course, it wasn’t on purpose. And I won’t go into boring detail but I wasn’t doing anything out of the ordinary when the event occurred. Alright, got the boring stuff out of the way.

But the one thing that I’ve learned about having a broken foot, is that bathroom stuff SUCKS! Especially on crutches. Yes, I know that you’re shocked that being handicapped isn’t a breeze. The worse is taking a shower. Stepping requires a full strategic plan from what foot goes where and how to use a crutch to support your body weight. Then the important events of shaving your legs are out the window because you can’t put your weight on the foot with the broken bone. Stupid broken bone, getting in the way of smooth calves. I guess I’ll start the ‘be like Mo’Nique, hairy leg freak’. (And if for some reason Mo’Nique reads this – covering all bases – I love you girlfriend and your new husband Oscar!)

Because my foot was the target, I decided that I was going to try to balance as much as possible on the good foot while trying to shampoo, condition, scrub, exfoliate, and rinse. Guess what I found out? I don’t have much of sense of balance at all. But I think you all figured that out when I told you that I broke my foot. Thankfully, B was nearby in case I needed because after getting out of the shower, which required hurdle/tub jumping (I’m so ready for the 2012 games!), he helped me put on my pants. I’d go with skirts because they don’t require leg shimmying but please see last line of previous paragraph. I’m not that bold yet to show my new leg beards off.

So, now we’re all up-to-date. Tomorrow, I find out how bad the damage truly is to the metatarsal and determine if surgery is needed. We’re going with ‘please no surgery, I’ll be good and where the boot’ begging stance when I see the doctor. Until next time.

Saturday I did something that I don’t normally do, I was social with strangers. Not in the “Get out of my way” in the grocery store manner but a nice “How do you do?”

The week before I had decided to be adventurous and check out a new local knitting store that is right down the road from our apartment. (B, sorry, that means a lot more yarn is going to be adopted and making it’s home with us.) The owner had converted an old craftsman style house into a yarn store but kept all the warmth of walking into someones abode when you crossed the threshold.

You walk into a livingroom that happens to house yarn on the shelves instead of family photos and books. The dining area is ready for you to sit down to supper but the china hutch bursts forth with color of cashmere, not Grandma’s fine china. This repeats from room to room, except for the kitchen where tea, coffee, cookies and cupcakes await to be eaten.

Basically wants to make a knitter/crocheter fat and happy.

Anyone who walks in the door is encouraged to bring in their knitting, sit on the couch and just chat. So, this past Saturday I did. I was bold enough come in (and spend a pretty penny on some Cascade Ultra Pima), then work on the hat that I’m making for B. I met some wonderful ladies, learned about the various classes and had people complement me on my knits.

And the good news, I survived. I put myself out there to interact with strangers and it wasn’t too bad. I’ll definitely be back.

As B and I were leaving a building this evening, we had the pleasure of riding with a group of eight or so coworkers who were departing for home, bars, where ever.

The first on the elevator was a female from the coworker group and she put her arm on the elevator door to be courteous and make sure that all of us got into the car. As we entered, the elevator was emitting a high pitch alarm and the door holder stated, “I hate that the elevator always makes that sound when we’re getting on!” Others from the coworker group nodded their head or commented in the affirmative that indeed the elevator alarm was annoying.

Me, crowded in the back piped up, “You know, if you press the “Door Open” button to let everyone on the elevator instead of putting your arm in front of the elevator door, you wouldn’t cause the door alarm to go off.”

They turned, and I swear it was in unison, and looked at me in dumb belief. And finally, one of them said, “You know, I thought that there was something wrong with these elevators. I didn’t realize it was us.” Come to find out that they were consultants*. That explained so much.

*And if you’re a consultant, I love ya – I once was one, a long time ago.

SIDE NOTE: The feed for the blog has changed, you will need to update your feed readers – the feed is here: http://nutcase101.com/feed

If you, my lovely five readers, haven’t noticed that for the most part these last few posts have been phoned in. The only one that I can state that I’ve really taken pride in and wanted to write was the one about B and I’s five year anniversary. When I wrote that post the words flew off of my finger tips and I couldn’t wait to click the publish butt on and share with you all my love for my wonderful man.

My lack of creativity isn’t contained to just writing, it’s also affecting my sewing and knitting life. Projects that I’ve been jonsing to do are sitting on the side waiting for my motivation to come back from the vacation that it took without my permission.

And I know what chased part of it away and I don’t really want to talk about it because I’ve bored you enough with my inability to deal with my Grandmother’s passing. Sometimes it feels better to do nothing that to do anything, especially when she was such a huge part in fostering my drive to be creative in the area of crafts. There are also other pressures that are compounding it that I won’t bring into the blogging world.

All I can ask is that you forgive me for not having fabulous posts, or pseudo-fabulous posts of late. Writing isn’t my forte but it is part of the outlets that I have to get things out of my head and it’s much cheaper than therapy.

(This was supposed to have been published February 11th but I forgot – Ooops.)

Two million, six hundred twenty-eight thousand minutes.

That’s how long B and I have been walking this earth declaring our love for one another. And honestly, I had no clue that much time I had passed since we first decided that I’ll be his and he’ll be mine.

Ours wasn’t a traditional meeeting: Girl meets boy on couch of loud party. Boy talks to girl to not be bored at party he didn’t really want to attend. Girl responds to boy because she’s at a party that she didn’t really want to attend. Boy looks for common thread to make the time more enjoyable and Girl talks about computers, servers and connection speed. Boy gets really excited because Girl speaks fluent geek.

From that fun filled night of discussing processors and IT follies, we exchanged numbers and Instant Messaging accounts. Yes, we’re that dorky. And from that party until today, we’ve spoken every day.

We also knew that he was just visiting my locale when we left each other that night but decided it would be great to have friends in different locations. The friendly chats turned flirty and we decided we needed to see each other just one last time. Because what we had couldn’t be ‘real’, it was just harmless fun and a mere fascination.

But, two states, over 5000 miles flown and 600 plus miles driven and hundreds of thousands of cell phone minutes, we sit here married and very much in-love.

To you B, love of my life. I’m so glad you sat on that couch bored out of your mind five years ago. May we speak geek with fervor for many, many more years.

This weekend I was away in Phoenix with the lovely B, off to visit the Father-in-law and his second wife. We had a delightful time and I have no proof because I forgot the camera. Yup. I left it sitting on the couch all by itself.

The cats on the other hand did not get to stay home either. Since it was Valentine’s Day Weekend with the added bonus of President’s Day added to the end, our friends all made plans that involved them being out of town. So the infamous Lola Rocket and Sassy La Rue went to the vet, ahem, Spa.

So, now we’re home with no photos and two pissed cats.

And to put a cherry on top, B is sick again. He’s off to the doc-in-a-box to prove to them that they were wrong and that he does need an antibiotic. Poor thing was miserable on the plane.

That’s all folks. I know, excitement in a few short sentences. I hope I can give you just as much in my next blog post.

From Tuesday until about 3 p.m. on Friday afternoon there was nothing coming out of my mouth that didn’t consist of squeaks and honks. Finally, people’s prayers had been answered and I had lost my voice.

Now, if I had lost my voice ten years ago, I would’ve been able to email people my plights and scribbled on notepads my communications. Or performed various kinds of charades, dancing out ways to get my point across.

Okay, I did do some various monkey moves to try to let people know what I needed to communicate in person – I think my boss would’ve loved to have had a video camera when I got mad over a situation and there was no way to yell the FUCK I was feeling. Though, I will say that no computers, electronics, or coworkers were harmed in my hissy fit.

Thankfully, I had ways to tell the outside world about my situation – Twitter and Facebook. I could still voice my opinion even if nothing was coming out of my mouth. Let’s face it, nothing vital was really coming out of my fingertips either.

Also, Murphy Law sooooo applied during my period of muteness, EVERYONE called me. Honestly, I use my phone more for texting and email than I do for talking but my work, home and landline were all ringing because everyone but my mother wanted to talk to me. (Mom had contacted me via IM and knew I had lost my voice.)

And the kicker, my husband, who obviously was reveling in the silence contributed to the vocal frustration when he told the dentist office to call me about setting up dental appointments. That poor dental receptionists hearing will never be the same since my hearing my squawks which were supposed to sound like the English language. HA!