Chapter 111: Genius

Today was a day. I wouldn’t say it was a great day but I wouldn’t say it was a terrible day, either. Unfortunately, I am not able to say that I took any major actions to make it a more interesting day than the past few have been but I can say that I have at least put myself much more in the frame of mind that I need to be in than I have been before. I spent a lot of time today thinking about projects that I want to work on, like hand painting some clothes and creating a vision board. I didn’t actually talk about it in last night’s blog because I came up with the idea after writing the blog, but I have decided to create a vision board. A vision board, for those who don’t know, is essentially a board on which you place images or words or whatever it is you want out of life. They are great tools for visualizing the things that you want and keeping you focused on those goals. I have started a little list of things that I want on my vision board, although they are mainly just things and people that I draw inspiration from and aspire to have or become. I am thinking it would be a cool idea to do a large scale one for home and a smaller one to keep at work, because I spend the bulk of most days there and feel like I could kind of use the inspiration there more than anywhere else. I also came up with a few ideas for t-shirts that I might like to try to paint – so far, I am liking the idea of doing handwritten quotes from music that I love on t-shirts. My favorite idea so far is doing a t-shirt with the line, “I can’t pay my rent, but I’m fucking gorgeous,” from the song “Semi Precious Weapons” by the band Semi Precious Weapons. I just feel like that line really kind of captures the mindset of so many people today, and a mindset that I fall into pretty easily every now and then. It is that mindset that feeds the fashion industry. There are so many kids out there who can’t afford to pay their rent or bills or can’t put food on the table but are completely dedicated to fashion. There are just as many kids with the same problems who are completely dedicated to music or filmmaking or art of any type, and those kids deserve to be celebrated. They are the kids who are going to fight like hell to find a way to be the next Lady Gaga or Christian Siriano or Scissor Sisters, etc. I am one of those kids, in a lot of ways, but I may be slightly more sensible than some of them. Sometimes I wonder if that isn’t a bad thing for me. I wonder if those kids have it right. I wonder if perhaps by living lives that are not the most secure currently they are really, without even realizing it, taking the time to cultivate their talents and planting the seeds that will eventually grow into a personal revolution. I don’t necessarily feel like I am cultivating my talents at this time or planting the seeds for a future where I am going to make a difference in the world. Sometimes I see those kinds of kids and find myself wondering how in the world they get by in life… but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe they are looking at me and wondering the same thing. Maybe to them, I am just wasting my life and squandering my potential by giving so much of my focus to my 9-to-5. I don’t know.

I have always thought that there are people who have ideas and there are people who have plans. The people who have ideas are those really artsy types who dedicate their entire lives to their crafts without deviation – the people who call in sick to work because they’d just rather spend the day drawing or painting or whatever. My friend Rachel was telling me about her friend who will spend the majority of her time coming up with random crafts to make and she decorates her entire house with all these things she makes out of empty cigarette packs or bottle caps or whatever else she can find and figure out how to make something out of. I found myself feeling kind of envious of this person, or wishing that I could be like that. That is a person with ideas. I have plenty of ideas, but I have more of a tendency to turn those ideas into plans. For example, the random drawings I was doing at work. I took those from being just random ideas in my head to pass the time and turned them into plans for designing t-shirts. I went from playing around with my keyboard and coming up with ideas for songs to plans for music lessons so I could be “doing it right.” Maybe the idea people have it right. After all, the problem with plans is that they often fall through. I was watching NewNowNext Pop Lab on Logo earlier this evening and saw a video by this woman named Rachael Sage for a song called “Too Many Women.” It was a really great song and I was really impressed with this woman, considering I had never heard of her before. I looked her up on Wikipedia and found that she has released 10 albums and has been working since back in the 90s. I also discovered that this woman had never had any professional music lessons and taught herself to play piano. This was pretty crazy because the piano on “Too Many Women” sounded amazing. This is kind of like one of my favorite artists, Jay Brannan, who taught himself guitar but plays amazingly well. I’ll bet they were idea people. At the same time, though, the problem that I always see in these idea people is that they have strokes of genius but they always seem to lack the drive to do anything with those ideas. Of course, there are always cases that go against the grain – Lady Gaga, for example, is pretty clearly and idea person and she has managed to make a name for herself in a huge way. It just seems like if you have an idea, but don’t have a plan you aren’t ever going to get anywhere. I don’t know. I am making myself feel bad, though. I need to remember not to be envious of anybody, whether they are idea people or not, because I know that I already have everything I need to make my dreams come true – I just have to figure out the method by which I am going to do it. I know that I will figure it out. After all, the Universe is working in my favor and I know that it will never steer me wrong.

So, I didn’t work out again this morning. I went in to my Mom’s room and she seemed to still be feeling really badly and I didn’t want to try to make her do it when she was still feeling so bad. Of course, I could have done it by myself. I am willing to admit here in this blog that I was simply feeling unmotivated and tired and didn’t really want to do it. That is terrible, I know, because I have to dedicate myself to losing weight – I just keep allowing myself to give in to my laziness in the moment and not do it. It is terrible. I suppose all that I can do is keep working at it and force myself to fight through laziness/lack of energy when I start to feel it. After all, I know what I need to be doing and I am making a choice not to do it. I just have to force myself to do the right thing, no matter how much I feel like doing the wrong things. I know it will serve me much better in the end to have lost weight and be wearing gorgeous clothes than it will to have had a little extra time that one random morning. Unfortunately, I don’t know if I am going to end up working in the morning. This time, though, I will have a pretty valid excuse, (more on that later.)

Work was pretty busy today. It wasn’t really busy, but it was busier than it has been lately. I finished reading “How To Make Someone Love You Forever In 90 Minutes Or Less.” The entire book was about finding the person you want to be with, your Matched Opposite, and how to make them fall for you. The last portion, though, tried to talk a little more about falling in love and keeping it that way. I found this part terribly cliché and unrealistic. I hate that about the concepts of love that are put out there by authors and filmmakers and even songwriters half the time – it is cheesy, contrived and unrealistic. Because it is what we are inundated with as a society, that is what we have come to believe love really is and I hate that. It seems so rare that you find a really genuine, accurate depiction of love in the media. Love, as I understand it, is certainly an amazing feeling to have but it is not all sunshine and rainbows and such. I don’t know how to really articulate the idea that I am trying to get across here, but it just doesn’t seem like you get a lot of expressions of what love is really like for so many people out there. One of my favorite concepts of love in music is the song “Genius” by The Murmurs. The chorus of this song says, “She’s kind of freaky. She’s kind of weird. She’s kind of freaky, but I don’t know… I think she’s a genius.” That, to me, is love. It is about seeing a person for all of their quirks and flaws and such but still finding them to be wonderful and amazing and, well, a genius. That is the kind of love that I am looking for. People have a tendency to think I’m kind of freaky and I’m kind of weird. I am looking for that person who sees all of that, but still thinks I’m a genius. I am also looking for that person that I can say the exact same thing about. How do you find that? I don’t know, but I intend to figure it out.

As I mentioned, my Mom was really sick over the weekend and missed work yesterday and the day before. That sucks and could wind up hurting us a little bit financially in the coming weeks. Fortunately, with the overtime her account offers, she has managed to figure out a way to still get a full 40 hours for the week, which is a very good thing. I really don’t think it is going to make too big a difference overall. However, it has prompted me to make a decision about something that I was kind of excited about. I have decided not to buy tickets to Sheryl Crow at Universal Studios. Those would cost about $100, and $100 could go towards a lot of different things, like the remaining balance on my phone bill right now or helping out with my Mom’s car payment or something else that is much more of a necessity than seeing Sheryl Crow. After all, a part of my reasoning behind this is the fact that Sheryl Crow is still in good health and doesn’t show any signs of retiring or anything like that, so I anticipate she will be touring for years to come. Plus, by the time she comes back to the area I should be in a much better financial state than I am in currently. Another contributing factor to this decision is the fact that this show is at Universal Studios and will mainly be filled with people who are there for the park and just happen to be like, “Oh hey, Sheryl Crow is over there – let’s go watch.” I’d much rather go to an ACTUAL Sheryl Crow concert with a crowd of people who are pretty much all there for the same reason – to see an artist they love. It just seemed like the best decision to make right now. Plus, I kind of feel like I have been spending too much money lately, even though I know I haven’t. In fact, I had $46 and some change in the bank and $300 was deposited yesterday. There is currently a balance of $267 and some change. I really haven’t spent that much, especially considering I bought a carton of cigarettes out of that, as well. I think I just feel like I’ve been spending too much because I have been looking at a lot of stuff. Of course, I have a couple of bids in on items on Ebay. Even if I win both of these things, they will only set me back about $50. Plus, they are both items that I will get a ton of use and enjoyment out of. As I mentioned in previous blogs, I’ve already purchased a John Galliano t-shirt and 3 Christian Siriano for Victoria’s Secret eyeshadows on Ebay, both of which I am really excited to receive. Well, the items I am bidding on now are just as good and I am just as excited about them! First of all, I am bidding on a limited edition MAC eyeshadow trio designed by Heatherette, who I absolutely love. I also have a bid in on a pair of limited edition Van’s designed by Heatherette designer, Richie Rich – they are high top Van’s with a cool futuristic black on black checkerboard design covered in lips and dollar signs and letters spelling out Richie Rich. They are gorgeous and I am REALLY keeping my fingers crossed that I get them! We’ll see.

That paragraph didn’t go where I was initially intending it to go. Like I said, my Mom has been sick for the past few days and still isn’t feeling at her best, (although she does seem considerably better this evening than she did this morning or yesterday.) I also noticed a lot of people at work have been sick with the same type of symptoms she has. Unfortunately, this afternoon at work I noticed myself starting to get a bit of a scratchy throat and a heavy feeling, as well. It wasn’t anything that seemed overly severe while I was there. When I got home, though, I suddenly found myself feeling completely drained and spent the time between when I got home and when my Mom got off work laying on the couch and lacking the energy to even hold up the TV remote. This is definitely not good. My whole body has that achy feeling and my head is feeling really heavy and I feel really warm even though I know it isn’t warm at all in the house. Essentially, I am pretty sure that I am getting sick. This is really not a good thing. I do not want to miss work. I don’t have enough issues that I would get written up for it or anything. I’m less concerned about what it would mean for work than I am about what it would mean for my next paycheck. It seems like I would be defeating the purpose of trying to save money because of my Mom’s missing money if I wound up missing money from my next check, as well. I took some Nyquil tonight and I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I will be feeling fine in the morning. Sadly, though, it seems that most people have been hit pretty hard with this. Still, I am going to give the Nyquil the night to work and hope for the best. That Nyquil does seem to be kicking in, though. It is only 11:19pm, but I think I should probably get to bed. Here’s hoping for a morning of feeling much better than I do right now.