#like i just made my first mortgage payment & am just sitting here like holy shit i have so much money left over???

[xythlia]

it still boggles my mind that if I had applied solo for this mortgage I would've been rejected, even though I have good credit & stuff. I could "afford" a $1700 apartment smacking of landlord special & mold & a giant fucking hole in my ceiling they never fixed & two broken kitchen lights they never fixed & a balloon of paint in a different spot on the ceiling that was full of water because the apartment was water damaged n run down anyway before I moved in but I apparently couldn't afford a $560 mortgage payment for a decent, kinda old ish house but clean & not hazardous. okay silly ass

[saybees]

Ugh, my mother acts like a rich person, it drives me nuts.

She texted me a photo of her new microwave mounted above the stove and she said that now the stove looks ugly and she wants to get a new one.

It works. It works very well. It functions flawlessly aside from the little screen not showing the time anymore. It's the exact same stove we have in the house we are renting. It's older than me, but it works brilliantly.

I am SO tired of listening to my mother complain about this kind of thing. She's lucky that she has the money to be able to buy new appliances whenever she feels like it. She can repaint the whole house on a whim. My mother complains that they are always so tight for money, but they clearly aren't. They just don't always have the disposable income my mother wants so she can constantly be spending money on stuff she doesn't need to buy.

I have been poor for EVER. Even when I was living at home and I had my parents supporting me I didn't have an allowance or a job (lived out of town and didn't have a car) so I could never spend money. I was lucky to get a $100 bill from my grandmother when I graduated high school. That was a lot of money to me because I never had any. I had to rely on my parents for everything, which is fine, they provided me with what I needed and they did contribute quite a bit to my first couple tries at post-secondary education.

But I have been on my own for a long time now. I have always barely made enough money to get by with a little bit of spending here and there that I probably shouldn't have done, but did anyway because life is short and I want to enjoy things.

My mother was telling me once about how since her and my dad both retired they were only getting $[REDACTED] from my dad's investments and it wasn't enough for them to live off of each month. All I could think was HOLY SHIT because it was twice as much money as I had ever seen in a month and I could survive on it more or less fine. But that wasn't enough for my parents to sit at home doing nothing?? They don't have a mortgage anymore, that's been paid off for several years now. They both have newer vehicles that they got gently used. They have a new tractor my dad went out and got himself, real fancy. They really don't have much for expenses aside from hydro and car payments. Like it blows me away and it makes me so MAD that my mother acts like such a rich person and she can just go and spend that kind of money like it's no big deal while I'm struggling to pay for university that might get me nowhere, but I had to go and do it because I was going to have a complete mental breakdown if I stayed in retail any longer.

It just hurts, I guess, to see my mother living so frugally while I'm struggling. Even my little sister makes really good money at her job that she somehow stumbled into and I feel like such a loser because I'm the only one that's really struggling financially.

I feel like my mother put too much pressure on me to go to university and "make something" of myself. She always drilled it into me that she wanted me to be better off than she was and have what she didn't have, but so far I'm living in more poverty than she did. She pushed me to go to uni when I wasn't ready and I ended up wasting all my money and blowing through my small trust fund. I have nothing to show for it. My mother always put so much pressure on me and I have always felt like a failure.

It's just really hard. I don't want to be in the place that I am. Everyone else is doing much better than I am, but I'm the one that took risks and went out into the world. All it did was burn me.

And now that I'm in uni again I'm struggling through some of my classes and I'm probably going to fail at least one and have to redo it, which means paying another $1000 and spending another 4 months going through the same material. And that's only if I fail the one. I might fail another one yet.

Like my parents are by no means actual rich people. They're very middle class. It just bothers me that I have to work so hard to get nowhere and they have done so little and are so comfortable. I don't think I'll ever get to a place like that.

My sister struggled through grade school, but now she has a killer job that she makes fucking bank at. She bought herself a newer Jeep last year. While I have a 25 year old truck with 260,000 kms on it. Don't get me wrong, I love my truck, but if I had the money to spend on something newer I probably would.

My sister is also autistic, but that doesn't seem to affect her life at all anymore now that she's out of school and I'm here just now figuring out that I probably have autism and adhd and it's making my academic career a nightmare right now. I'm having such a hard time with everything right now because of that and I reached out for help and was completely shut down over it.

I just look at my life and the lives of my family members and I feel like I'm the only one that's ended up in such a crappy spot. Everyone else is so much better off than I am right now and it sucks. I know I shouldn't dwell on it and this is just some depressive episode triggered by a text of a microwave, which is really fucking stupid now that I put it into words, but I just feel so miserable. I feel like I'm stuck and I don't know how to get out. I thought university would help and change things, but so far it hasn't.

I just want to do the things that I love and be surrounded by people that I love, but that's such an impossibly distant goal at this point. I want more from life than this. I want to not have to worry about money anymore. I want to be free to do the things I want to do. I want a job that isn't going to drive me fucking bananas and pays well enough to fund my hobbies. Why does that seem so out of reach? Why can't life just be easier? It seems so easy for everyone else around me.

Money can't buy happiness, but it sure can solve a lot of the issues that cause me to be fucking sad.

[rainwashedhistory]

Quarantine Journal

Apparently I am incapable of maintaining a daily pace -- part of this is trying to fit ONE day in at a time and finish the day and then forgetting the next morning.  I'ma TRY to get back to it but let's go a little free-form right now.  Maybe I'll start posting weekly instead?  Today is 6/13.  Some shit's gone down.

Shawn, my old boss from WWP died.  I feel bad that I never got to tell him what he meant to me.  I wrote a pretty long memorial thing on insta/facebook.  I'ma repost it here too... with a couple, more honest updates.  Readmore at the end.

I'm planning to go up to Redding for Shawn's memorial right after Father's day.  Terrified of COVID but hey.  This only is going to happen once.  I'm gonna stay with my high school bestie, and hopefully see my friends Aleesha and Robyn, at least.  And get some chicken rolls.  The sushi place we used to go to is under new ownership buuuuuut.  And this will almost certainly be the last time in my life I'm ever going to go to waterworks park, so let's make it count, I guess?  I bought a cute romper onepiece swimsuit that hides a bit of the quarantine bod.

On the way to Redding, I am officially gonna hit up Liz's place!  I miss my girl. Need to meet Connor!

Stafford House is officially gone for good.  I have cleaned out my classroom.  There are rumblings that the school might be bought by another co. that wants to do more vocational training -- fingers crossed that happens and that I'll have a job there?  Yikes. Hello Future, indeed.  I also stole my CAE books.  Hell if I'm giving those back.  I also took my test binders and a few mini-whiteboards that Patti offered

There's been a ton of BLM protests here.  I feel guilty af that I haven't been to a single one or done much of anything -- I just don't feel safe doing so.  Both physically, at protests where cops are pretty openly inciting violence, and... situationally?  OANN is quartered here, and if my parents see me at one of them, I stg they'll kick me out of my place.  Things downtown are pretty boarded up.  And like I'd be donating but I need to fucking save my money because COVID relief unemployment is not gonna last forever.

I spent like 2 weeks not talking to mom.  Had a call with her a couple days ago, though, and it was... fine.  No major yelling about politics.  Phew.

Therapy... I went this week.  Meh.  I'm not sure it's helping all that much.  I really want to start going in person again, this teletherapy stuff is balls.

I've been applying to jobs.  It's the worst.  Especially because even though there are a handful of job postings, with COVID, who even knows what'll happen.  will schools reopen?  I should really start pouring myself into the online teaching stuff but so many sites make it so difficult.  I re-applied to ALI, god give me strength.  And I need to re-apply to Miramar.  SIGH.

I'm hanging out more and more (every saturday) with Ricky, Mat, Stazia, and Nick.  This is helping give me some balance.  And kitty time. Whenever their skittish cats come chill with me I feel blessed.

I killed my sourdough starter, somehow.  All orange tinged.  Nick gave me a new one (dried).  I built it back up and have since found a me hair, a cat hair, and a big ass bug in it.  WTF?  It still... looks good though?  Gonna give it a bit to see if it goes off, too.

Meals for this week incluced hot honey butter-glazed chicken, fettuccine pasta & mushrooms, and one-pan vegetable udon.  All three were good but not necessarily mind-blowing.  I probably should start food logging again?

Painted my nails all pride-y.  Will post a pic later.

Bought lighting for computer desk and bedroom, FINALLY

Cats seem mostly flea-free, though mimosa is still not sleeping on the bed like a psycho

FINALLY (like 8 months later) got my car engine steam cleaned, will try to get an appointment to get my engine checked before I try to drive up to fucking Redding

Got the prelim documents in for my RealID.  I need to get an appointment at the DMV but they're not scheduling them right now

School starts Monday. I am nooooot ready.

Mortgage is delinquent?  Inquiring about COVID relief stopped payment on our autopay and now things are all messed up.  SIGH I hope this doesn't go on my credit.

Haven't been walking nearly enough.  It's really hard to make myself shift into that again, and frankly I need to.  It's been three months since I've worked out at all.

Keeping up with RnM with Erica.... it's a fucking wild ride and I'm soooo glad she loves it as much as I do

Started playing Assassin's Creed Odyssey.  It's fun af, but also not like... engrossing like HZD was, which means I don't feel too cranky when I can't play.  holy SHIT the world is huge tho.  And gorgeous.  But again, maybe... too huge, and too samey-same.  I get that that's the region, but I loved how HZD changed so much depending on the area you were.  SPEAKING OF HZD, the news about H2FW came out and hooooly shit I am hyped.  We're going to Cali!

Here have some more mask GPOYs

Other stuff:

Temp still normal, in the high 97/low 98 range

RHR is hovering around 64-67

Steps have been in the 2-3000 range, yikes

Weather has been lovely, why am I not going out more???

Ok fam, that's it.  Time to shower, get dressed, and head over to R&M's for weekly mandated social time.

source

https://katalyst.livejournal.com/494991.html

Shawn, you were my first, and one of my best mentors. You promoted me to management when I was an anxious, terrified, by-the-book 18 year old who had absolutely no idea why she was even considered for the position. You had so much faith in me and my abilities and you were the most patient boss I have ever had -- you taught me every year, for years, how to start up the pumps again, until I literally could do it in my sleep, even now, over a decade later. You taught me how to fix almost anything in the park, and you never acted like there was anything I was too fragile or stupid to do -- even when others did.

You were tough, and I never wanted to get on your bad side... but you were also supremely kind -- I remember you yelling at almost everyone, at least once, except me. Even when I deserved it and I made mistakes that would cost the company money. I remember begging you to take it out of my paycheck and you just stopping and laughing and telling me it was okay, just not to do it again. I think you knew I would crumble, and all you ever wanted to do was build me up.

You knew the value, and the joy in a hard day's work... and you also knew how to take it easy, and that both are vitally important. I remember the day I slept straight through my alarm and you opened the whole park without calling me, just to give me a little break. I remember the way you taught me that management was never above any job -- if you expected your employees to do something, you'd always pitch in and show them that you weren't too good to clean a toilet, too. I'll never forget your 36 hour days, or your calling in well to work, or shiraz Saturdays. I desperately miss sitting in your office or up on the side of the river ride and eating pizza and talking. Everything I loved about Waterworks really came down to working with you and the community you helped foster there.

You taught me how to find my voice and stand on my own two feet in a job that I found utterly terrifying, after living with a family where I never had one. You were a second dad to me -- one who stuck up for me, who was always in my corner. I honestly don't think, if it weren't for you, that I would have found the confidence to pursue teaching. There is so much good in my life that you helped me reach for, and I will always be grateful.I'll be opening a big bottle of Yellowtail this Saturday in your honor. I miss you.