Posts filed under 'Carrie's Rants'
Six months. That’s how long I was told it should take for the divorce to be final. At first that made perfect sense to me. With no kids of our own, no house, and therefore nothing to fight over, it should be easy, right? Yet here I am after not two six month spans later, but a mind-boggling year and a half, and it’s still not over.
To make matters worse, even once the court clerk pounds his or her stamp onto our paperwork and it’s legally over, we’re still not completely done. They have to analyze our retirement assets, slice them down the middle, and then there’s still the matter of the ultimate disposal of my car, leased in my ex’s name.
It’s a frustrating situation, but it’s worth all the struggle to be free…
Free from an emotionally (and at times physically) abusive relationship. Free to be myself without fearing constant harassment. Free to enjoy friendships without abiding his disapproval and criticism. From being ignored by the one who should love me. From unreasonable demands. From being viewed like a utility. Water, trash, electricity, wife.
October 22nd, 2007
Over three years ago I proposed that we change our corporate name. After presenting my rationale, the board agreed. What came after was a needlessly long and painful process, because our management team severely lacks trigger-pullers. Over the course of that excruciating wait, all of our print collateral ran out or became outdated.
Though I tried hard to keep things moving where fiscal sense allowed, churning out promotions and miscellaneous stuff, it was an uphill battle to grow the business without the essentials in place. The “hurry up and wait” of the name change project wore not only on my nerves, but on my ability to take pride in my work.
After two and a half years poised on the starting block waiting for the gun to fire, they finally selected a name last August, and since then I’ve been off and running. To say I was busy over the last eight months would be an understatement. Logo, tagline, branding, website, mailers, booklets, brochures, signs, merchandise, posters, badges… Oh my!
I’m a one-person marketing department, so it was up to me to get everything ready for the April launch. Now that’s behind me, but my work life still doesn’t show any signs of slowing. In fact, with a more solid foundation in place, the frontier now seems wide open. After a long period of waiting, it feels good to make a positive impact again.
The labor of marketing is strikingly similar to bearing a child: conception, gestation, delivery. Each phase has a proper duration and things must happen in a certain order. The final output depends upon the quality of what was accomplished in those formative stages, however, if you drag any of it out too long you’ll endanger the mother.
If momma ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy, and this little momma is only happy when she’s being effective. Knowing it wasn’t right to print short collateral runs with the name change looming didn’t help me feel any better about being less productive. Certainly it wasn’t my fault, but I couldn’t work at one-third capacity and call it a job well done.
Once I read that procrastination was a major cause of depression, but since I’ve learned that being forced to put things off is even worse. Creative people need to run with ideas instead of waiting to be cleared for launch. Though I now have tons to add to my resume, I’m slightly more impressed by the personal trial I endured to get there.
Wheew… Time to get back to work!
April 17th, 2007
Sending tons of love and best wishes for a speedy recovery to my precious Aunt Cathy in New Hampshire, who’s having surgery today. We take heart in knowing that although you seem like a cute little cupcake, anyone married to Uncle Phil all those years has got to be one tough cookie! Get well soon.
April 2nd, 2007
When you have long hair, a good haircut can last months. Then one day you wake up and all of a sudden it just stops working. For me, that was last night, so this morning I called to make an appointment. First, they redirect me to a new location saying that my stylist was promoted. I call the new place and they tell me she has tons of openings… Should have been a clue that something was amiss since she’s usually booked two weeks out.
Twenty minutes later I’m on the freeway heading over (on my lunch break) when a call rings in from the appointment desk telling me, “Oops, she’s at the old place today!” No big deal. I continue a little further to the original salon. Then I sit there for twenty five minutes before anybody seems to notice the increasingly perturbed look on my face.
I ask, “Is she even here?” and that’s when I find out they hadn’t been able to track down my stylist. After I explain the misdirections that already occurred and review my time constraints, the receptionist summons a manager. Many apologies are made and she offers services on the house. So, I’m scared to death, but I agree to get it over with.
Big mistake! Only in Misty’s Wonderland does a complaint result in something marvelous. In my world, you walk out with crappy wet hair and a black eye. Yeah, you heard me. A black eye! She tagged me in the orbital bone with her blowdryer… That’s what I get for complaining!
January 30th, 2007
One of my kidneys decided to give me some grief last week. Ended up in the hospital for four days with a bad infection. Despite copious amounts of antibiotic my white blood cell count and fever didn’t show enough improvement so they locked me up. This kidney infection did a number on me. My energy is way down and I can see it’s going to take a while to fully recover… SUCK!
September 12th, 2006
Saw this “Mallard Fillmore” comic in the paper last week and it got me thinking. My mother may be far from a shining example, but she had me reading by age three… I kid you not! To this day I can remember our “play time” with phonics and flashcards. Those early years set the stage for a life-long love of learning.
These days, so many parents don’t view their children’s education as a personal responsibility. Either they feel ill-equipped, uninterested, or too busy. Of course, there are plenty of exceptions… My aunt and uncle are among them. They homeschooled my six cousins, the oldest of whom recently graduated from UCLA.
I was always a little jealous of their personalized education because I was always so bored! In both private and public schools, I had the same experience of waiting for the slowest moron in class to catch up so that we could finally move on and learn something new. The whole process was terribly painful for a bright girl with A.D.D.
Maybe some day I’ll have a family and face decisions about education. I wonder if I’ll have the option to home school, or if economic conditions will force me to subject my children to the boredom I once endured.
April 24th, 2006
What ever happened to the days when you could cry freely and openly? I think that privilege ended when I turned five. It’s a shame, too… Because right about now I’d like free rein to break down and weep instead of holding it in.
Unfortunately, people would think I’m a basket case, or I’d upset people who care about me. But really, what’s wrong with crying? Maybe we should be more concerned about people who don’t cry, and a little less about ones who do.
I will continue to relegate my wailing to the shower until social mores change. It’s the perfect place for it: You’re already wet, no worries about smeared mascara or puffy red eyes, you can wash the snot right down the drain, and afterward you feel clean… Inside and out.
January 23rd, 2006
January 11th, 2006
As I and my fellow misogynists lament over the current state of female behavioral patterns, the smidgen of human compassion left in me prompts me to try and isolate some potential causes.
Today one rather significant factor emerged: Women’s magazines. Humbly, I submit to you that we’re far better off without them.
Fashion — In all the years I’ve thumbed through them, I have yet to see a wearable ensemble portrayed in pictures. If I’m fortunate, maybe two items will appeal to me, and chances are those came from ads, not spreads. They put those scenes together as artistic expressions, not to help any of us get dressed in the morning! Furthermore, it’s not like we have a hard time outstripping our wardrobe budgets… Given the opportunity, we can find more than enough cool stuff without the aid of a magazine, right?
Relationships — Another bloated topic that they seem to hash to death in these magazines. Are we to believe that there’s some kind of cookie-cutter solution out there that will turn challenging interpersonal matters into a little slice of heaven? Girls couldn’t possibly be that naive. But let’s face it, out of needy desperation they’ll try anything… That is, anything other than looking within themselves to find a true and honest solution. No, they’d rather take all the contradictory and manipulative advice various magazines can dole out, and come off looking like total psychopaths… Brilliant!
Sex — Now, this one really gets me. There’s a generation of girls who grew up reading “the bible” (as the ladies of SATC refer to Cosmopolitan) and I propose that it didn’t do men any favors. I’ll bet money that all it did was release a glut of crappy lovers onto the market. Creativity, where have you gone? Not to be crude, but I’ve been married for a billion years, and I have yet to run out of new material. All it requires is half a brain… Which you won’t have at your disposal if you’re firing every synapse trying to remember which way Cosmo said you should swirl your tongue! Thank you.
January 5th, 2006
How do you know when you’re done with someone? Is there some obvious sign? There should be. Maybe that would prevent some of life’s more pathetic tragedies from happening. For example, one of my favorite people is hurting right now because his girlfriend left him… Guess she thinks she saw the sign. The problem: She’s screwing up.
This young lady wanted little more out of life than to be a wife and mother. She has watched friends and family achieve that ideal while she lived out the “always a bridesmaid, never a bride” cliché. However, when she was finally offered all of her dreams on a silver platter, she turned tail and ran at the first sign of a struggle… Pussed out.
Women’s behavior has long been a mystery to me, but this leaves me aghast. Though there’s still hope that things will work out beautifully in the end, it sucks to see someone willing to walk away from something so precious. At times I think people fear achieving their dreams every bit as much as they dread never reaching them at all.
December 23rd, 2005
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