In the Wee Small Hours...

Here I sit, as usual. Up late, at the computer... somewhere between multi-tasking and drifting aimlessly.

My guitar teacher once pointed out that one cannot REALLY multitask. It's a myth. You can only actually ever do one thing at a time. And often (almost always) it makes more sense and is more economical and productive to complete one task in full before moving on to the next one.

Of course, I know what he means. I also know what multitasking is generally referring to, and it's not quite what he's thinking. I mean, when I throw my clothes into the dryer and then jump in the shower, I consider that I am multitasking. I am doing laundry and taking a shower at the same time. Both things are being accomplished at once, even if in the given moment the only activity I am engaging in is showering. So there's something to it, but I do take his point. When you are leaping from one thing to another, shuffling papers around, trying to be in twelve places at once, you typically fail miserably. At least I do.

Right now I am waiting for video files to upload. There's only so much you can do on my computer during this process. I mean, my PC memory is not what it could be. So I try to keep it all to a dull roar while uploading or downloading massive files. It's all been a bit frustrating this evening, to be honest. I was trying to be proactive and FINALLY fix the audio to one of the videos I've got posted all over, which is pretty crappy. I didn't have an appropriate video program to deal with it before, but thanks to my sister I finally do. So I fixed it, and am happy with the result, and I uploaded it to YouTube. It took a while, but it will take care of YouTube and MySpace once it's all approved and whatever.

Sonicbids is a different story. I've actually been holding off on sending out booking requests because this video was not working properly at Sonicbids (on top of it having crappy audio). So tonight after fixing the audio I decided to upload it again to their site, this time as an AVI file instead of a WMV file, thinking this might solve the other problem. But OF COURSE they only allow you to upload up to a 100MB file. And OF COURSE the video program I am using has no option for choosing what size you'd like your saved video file to be. The one I saved was over 700MB. Great quality, but not going to work on Sonicbids. So I opened it in Windows Movie Maker, thinking I could compress it there. Duh. It only saves as a WMV file, and I'm pretty sure that's why it wasn't playing on their site before. Some kind of crazy codec deal. All that is really over my head, and annoying, frankly.

So after a lot of time wasted resaving the file multiple times without being able to get what I wanted, I'm just trying to upload the smaller-sized WMV file and hoping for the best.

But this is so typical of my life. I'm trying to just accomplish ONE SMALL THING that needed to be done to take additional steps in my musical career, and it's got to be a friggin' PROJECT and take HOURS. This is why I never get anything done. Because the rest of the time I have work, and the coffeehouse, and life, and the time that's left for the things I REALLY want to pursue is so limited, and I'm so fried, that I'm useless. I have this one precious weekend off, and all these plans to be productive, and they're just being completely blown apart by various bits of circumstances in my world.

Like my headlight blowing out. I have to deal with that tomorrow. And of course, it's money I don't have, and I have to buy two headlights, not just one, because that's how you do the headlight thing.

Our hot water heater decided to spring a crazy leak today, just as I was going to take a shower in preparation for the dinner plans I had with a friend. So I went out, feeling gross and dirty, and I still do, and I'm not even sure if the thing got fixed or not... though at this point I'm too tired to care, but tomorrow I'm really going to need a shower.

I'm finding it hard not to be overwhelmed by all that's bearing down on me. All that I see down the road.

I'm filing for bankruptcy, and it's going to cost me over a thousand dollars to do it. And in the end, it won't help me much because until recently none of those people were coming after me, so it's not like I was making monthly payments toward any of those debts. So I'll still be paying all the stuff I'm currently paying, and THAT'S the real problem. And none of those things can be written off. They are life expenses, and debts to my mother, and other non-negotiables. I don't see how I'm going to manage any of it.

My CD has been put indefinitely on hold. I haven't had any money to get into the studio in months now. And I don't know how I will. I applied for this grant that a local venue sponsors. That could get me up to $2000.00, which I'll hear about by New Year's... the sad thing is that I'll still need about another $5000.00 and I just don't know where it's going to come from.

When all of these things pile up, it's hard for me not to think of Andy, and lay all the blame at his feet... I was so dysfunctional this past year because of the pain he caused, and everything fell apart and has piled up because of it, and I just hate him for that. And then I start the cycle of thinking of all of it, and it just gets me all upset again, missing him, and trying to understand why it all happened, and not being able to, and feeling like it's never going to get any better.

There are so many stupid small components to it, too. I was thinking tonight about sex for some reason. And how I just don't want to have to train anybody else. I don't want to have to start over with the likes, and dislikes, and what feels good, and what works, and all of it. I don't WANT to go through that again. I don't want to get near anybody and give myself over to them if ultimately it's just going to fall apart. I mean, this time nearly killed me. What happens when it's a six YEAR relationship instead of six months that falls apart? And that's all I can think now. That whatever comes to pass, no matter how good it might be for a little while, it WILL fall apart. That's the only guarantee I see in this world: that things WILL EVENTUALLY SUCK. And for me that's really an unpleasant thought considering how much they suck already.

And I try really hard to get over myself. To focus on what's good. To recognize how lucky I am. But mostly my heart hurts so much I just can't get there.

And I do SO much faking it these days... for the masses, and for the people who WANT me to be over it, or feel like I'm just a downer. This is the one place where I'm allowed to just feel like shit. Because nobody even knows about it, except a few people. So I try to do all this processing, mostly alone, and it just reinforces the feeling that I AM alone, and always will be.

An old school friend who is on Facebook reached out to me a couple nights ago based on one of my status updates, and I thought that was really nice of him. That's pretty much where I get the most sympathy and compassion these days: from virtual strangers on the internet. And this particular friend told me I should reach out to my friends and family, they'll probably surprise me. Ha. My family are all completely clueless and/or uninterested. My mother used to ask me how I was doing, and I was dumb enough to tell her. Anytime I was upset it was like it all came down to my medication. Was I on it still? Well, maybe it's the wrong thing... Like it couldn't possibly be that I'm just STILL UPSET about my world being completely turned upside down, and everything I'd ever believed in being shown to be absolute bullshit. No, that couldn't possibly be it. Emotions aren't things you express in her world. They are things you "control." So I just stopped telling her how I really felt. The rest of them are oblivious. My sister started dating somebody just as Andy and I broke up, and she felt like she didn't want to shove it in my face. I didn't realize that once she started dating somebody that would be the only thing she could imagine talking about. I'd have thought we could have still gone out and just hung out and talked about OTHER STUFF just to help me get away from my inner turmoil for an hour.

My friends are great, don't get me wrong. But honestly everyone is so busy. Everyone has families, everyone has enough of their own shit going on. I don't doubt for a second that they feel for me, and want to help, but what can they do? There's no one I can get on the phone at 4:00 in the morning as I'm crying my eyes out. There's no one I can spontaneously sit with over a beer unless they don't mind paying for it nine times out of ten. It's just a complicated world and a busy time, and even when people care, sometimes they can't be what you need. And it's not like I KNOW when these terrible moments are going to hit me. And there's nothing they can really do anyway. No one can actually make it better. That's the worst part. There's just no cure.

I miss therapy. If I could afford health insurance I'd be there in a second. I was doing pretty well when I was able to go regularly. At least I had someone I could cry to consistently.

Anyway... I'm tired of this post. I'll write more later when I'm in a better frame of mind.