Looking In

The night that my mom took my dad to the hospital replays in my head all the time. You see, that night I sat at the table with my mom, my dad was on the porch smoking. I remember playing with his knife and I pointed at him with the tip of the knife. I was teasing him. He waved at me and I laughed telling my mom that my dad needed more attention then a pregnant woman.

Now looking back at that, I wonder if my dad was waving bye to me. I wonder if he knew at that moment that our lives were about to be destroyed.

I also wonder if my dad is still on the outside looking in. I wonder if my dad is watching his family while we go through this. I wonder if he is hurting for us. I know he wouldn’t have left us if he didn’t have to, if he didn’t have something much more important to do. But I wonder if he is looking in or down at us, watching as we work through our suffering.

The more I think about it, the more I think that maybe I am the one on the outside looking in. Maybe I am peeking through a window at a world that no longer makes sense. I was window shopping for a new life and I was conned into picking a life that wasn’t as advertised.

There are other things about my dads last week with us. Things that happened that make me wonder if maybe…just maybe, if I had a time machine I could go back and save him and save my family the heartache we are going through right now.

The day before my dad went to the hospital his truck died. My mom text me saying “Your daddy’s truck died.” His truck is still sitting in the yard, broken down, needing a new water pump (or so my dad thought.) My parents were supposed to go the next day (the day after he went to the hospital) to get the new part so he could fix his truck.

Maybe a few days before, I posted on Facebook that now that we had a nice new home I thought maybe I needed a new life to go along with it. It was my way of saying I was looking for a new job…but I got a new life alright. A new life that I didn’t expect.

He worked so hard to get us into the home we are in. He was also super quick to get things into the house, things he knew we needed. It was like he was trying to rush us to get everything in and unpacked.

My dad also had more back pain the last week. He has been living with pain for something close to 20 years because he got hurt at work and was disabled. So no one thought it was weird, just that he had been working himself too hard. I wish we would have stopped and thought about it. He died of pancreatitis. Symptoms of that is back pain…back pain. Something my dad had lived with for a very long time. Something that didn’t strike any of us as odd when it got worse because it was normal.

See, this isn’t the first time that our norm has changed. Before my dad became disabled life was good. We had a home. My dad would get out in the yard and play with me and my brother. We lost part of my dad when he got hurt because he couldn’t do all that stuff anymore. Not like he used to. But we still loved my dad. We still loved him and stuck with him even when we were homeless.

It was good for me because where we had lived I had slipped into a really bad depression that was going downhill fast. So fast that I was thinking about killing myself. When my dad got hurt we had to move away and moving away took me away from the people that picked on me. Moving away took me away from all the dark things that made me want to hurt myself. I sometimes blamed myself for my dad getting hurt, because someone knew I needed to get away…and that was the way we had to go.

Life doesn’t make sense! It doesn’t make sense and it’s not fair. Why can’t it be fair? Why can’t the man upstairs let people live long and happy lives? So little would have to change for life to be fair. But I guess everyone has a different way of deciding what is fair.

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Reality

Today marks 2 weeks since my dad passed. Sometimes I think the word “died” and it makes it that much worse, so I tell people my dad has passed. He has passed from this world to the next, to what ever we have to look forward too once our earthly bodies can no longer hold us down.

It was a hard day for me. A very hard day. I had to work open to close, around all these people that are going about their day and I am still shattered. I am a picture that has fallen off a while while the home owners are away on vacation, so there is no one to sweep up the pieces. I just lay on the floor broken into a million pieces.

I have thoughts that I shouldn’t have. Thoughts about not wanting to be here anymore. But I have so much to do now. My dad gave me a story to write and I have to write it. And it has given me more and more ideas to write. I am a writer and writers do best when they have pain to draw from.

I also fear something happening to my mom and my brother. Anytime I can not see them I fear something has happened. Is there a word for a fear of anyone leaving the house? Agoraphobia is the fear of going outside the house…I feel that developing a little too. But it’s more of a fear of anyone I love leaving my sights.

I looked it up, a fear of loved ones dying is called Thanatophobia. I guess there is a phobia for everything. Before my dad died I had a fear of something going wrong, like if I didn’t love my family enough one of them would be taken away. It’s almost like my heart knew it was about to get hit. Or maybe it’s just my anxiety. I may worry myself to death one day.

I keep thinking how eventually someone is going to die. Someone close to me. And then I think that maybe I don’t want to fall in love or have kids, because that is only more people to grow close to that could die. And maybe my whole life I have been protecting myself from all of this. Maybe that is why I didn’t have too many close friends and I didn’t get to close to a lot of family. Maybe this whole time I have just kept people at a distance so it wouldn’t hurt when someone died. I just thought I had more time with my immediate family. I thought I had more time with my dad.

Isn’t that the problem with everyone though? We all think we have more time, when in reality we are ticking time bombs, waiting to explode and destroy someone’s norm.

Does it make it better when you are close to more people? Does it help if you have more close friends to huddle around you when you lose something so precious? Maybe I only made it worse on myself by not being closer to people. Maybe the more pieces of your heart you give away, the less it hurts when someone dies and takes that piece with them. OR maybe not matter what you do, when a parent dies it just hurts more than anything you have ever experienced in your life.

I wonder sometimes if this all happened for some greater being to show me how minuscule my other problems were, how lame my anxiety issues were. Because it all just seems so stupid now.

We are all ticking time bombs, waiting to explode and destroy someone’s norm.

The Bubble

The world around me moves on. Everyone goes to work. They go to bed at a decent hour, get up early…or late. They skip breakfast, rushed lunches, and lonely dinners. For friends and family, their world was upset, but as of now, just a small piece of their heart is missing. They will see something that will remind them of my dad, they will smile, and move on. Their life has changed, but only slightly. It’s not something they think about constantly, it’s just another passing thought.

For me, the thought is constant, all day every day. I sale a fidget spinner at work and I think of how my dad loved those stupid things. Someone talks about going fishing and I am reminded that my dad really wanted to go fishing again. Someone asks a question about how to get rid of ants in their yard and I recall my dad walking around the yard with a gas can and a lighter, burning all the ant hills he could find. Someone has car issues and I instantly think “my dad can fix that.”

The world continues on, nothing much has changed for people that didn’t see my dad everyday. But for my mom, brother, and myself, or norm has been flipped upside down. Our norm was 4 people and a dog. Our norm was leaving my dad and the dog at home while we did things around town or got dinner because daddy didn’t like going out much and “someone has to stay with the dog.” That was his excuse for not leaving the house anyways. Our norm was bringing home food to my dad after we ate out. Our norm was coming home after work and my dad having dinner ready for us.

But we have a new norm now. We are 3 people and a dog. The dog now has to sit at someones feet or sit in her chair if no ones lap is available, because daddy’s lap was always available for her. We now go out to eat and leave the dog home alone, or my brother uses it as his excuse to stay home. We no longer bring food home for my dad, and only sometimes bring home food for my brother. When we go on vacations, the dog will have to stay in the hotel alone, because I still won’t leave her with someone, at home, or at a doggy daycare place.

Our new norm is something I am still trying to wrap my head around. It doesn’t feel real. It hurts like nothing I have ever experienced in my life. My new norm is constantly worrying about losing someone else in my life. My new norm is being scared to death that I will not survive another death in my family right now. I can’t lose another grandparent, aunt, uncle, or cousin. I can’t lose my dog and I shouldn’t worry about that because she is only 3. But my new norm is realizing that no matter how safe you think you are, death will find you in some way. But can my heart take anymore pain?

What I have realized through all of this is that the human heart is the strongest thing in the world. I know I am not the only one that has survived a parent. Some people have lost both of their parents younger than what I am now. And I am so sorry to all of you that have. I understand your pain now and I want nothing more than to hug you. But so many have survived and moved on and done great and wonderful things in their lives, even after a devastating loss. Our hearts can handle it. Our hearts can be broken into a million pieces and crushed into the ground and we pick it up and put it back together. We may not have all the pieces again, but it’s enough to function, to move on, to be happy again.

I am part of a new world and I don’t like it, I don’t want to know this world yet.

I am not sure if I am happy yet…I feel like I will never be happy again for more than a few seconds. But I am trying. I am moving on like my dad would want.

Better yet, I am writing again. And not just writing, but researching. My dad told me a story once, it was a dream of his, and he wanted me to write the story so bad. I would roll my eyes at him and laugh. I wish I had worked on it sooner, but I know this is what he wants me doing right now. I am a writer and I have found my muse again. My heart break has brought me back into my element and I know my dad will take this walk with me.

The Truth of the Matter

A friend tells you that their parent has died. You give them your condolences and you move on. For you, nothing much has changed except one person in your life you have met and know will no longer be there. For you, life goes on.

No one tells you about the heartache and pain that they suffered. Because it can’t really be put into words. Seconds will go by without thinking of the one you have lost. Hours will go by when all you can think about is that person. You go to sleep thinking about them and wake up with them on your mind. It’s a never ending trail of darkness and depression. It’s anger and pain. It’s rage. You are angry at whatever higher being you believe in. You are angry with the person that died because they left you. You are angry at every person that still has their dad.

But it doesn’t end there. I am angry at the world for moving on while my life has flipped upside down. I want to shout at the sky and punch the clouds. I’m angry because my family has had such horrible luck and just when we think things are getting better the rug is ripped out from under us. I’m mad that the world stolen away my mom’s soul mate. I am mad that the world has stolen away one of the greatest men this world could have seen. I am mad because I am a daddy’s girl with out a daddy.

I am mad that I feel so much when all I want to feel is normal. I want to stop expecting my dad to come walking through the house only for the realization hit me like a ton of bricks that I will never hear him stomp through the house again.

I can’t tell you how many times I have wished to go back in time. Or even to ask my dad how he is. I want to know if he suffered in that hospital bed for 3 days or if he left before then. I want to ask him if he knew what was coming.

But most of all I want to ask God why it was my dad’s turn to leave. Why when things were finally looking up for us did he take away one of the best things we had?

And then, after all my questioning and yelling is done I am terrified that I will be punished for all of these feelings and questions. I fear that God will take more from me because I didn’t appreciate the things I still had because I was too busy mourning over what I had lost.

What people don’t tell you about losing a parent, a young parent, is that there is just so much anger and sadness that it consumes you. You want nothing more than for the world to stop and mourn with you.

All I want to do is be okay again. I want to be able to go about my day with out the smallest things setting me off. I want to be able to sleep again, without the tv staying on all night. I want to get up in the morning without being crippled with sadness. I want everything to go back to the way it was before, when my family was 4 again because it was too soon.

Suffering the Storm

At 1:30am Sunday morning my dad passed away. Yesterday was a great big party at my house and today was the memorial.

The memorial was the hardest thing I have ever been through. This whole thing has been the hardest thing I have ever been through. I have been through some dark moments in my life. I have had moments of depression where I was just sad for no reason and all I want to do now is just throw a brick at my younger me and tell her that things could be a million times worse. And I know even this, the death of my father, is not the worst that has happened to people, but it is the worst that has happened to me and I can’t stand it.

Half the time I stare at the wall like I am going to make some sense of what has happened. The other half of the time I am crying or trying to tell myself this isn’t real. How could this be real? How is it possible that everything my daddy has been through, this is what does him in? And how is it possible that the man I thought was invincible is gone and will never come back. I will never hear him laugh again. I will never fuss at him for bothering me. I will never again tell him something that happened. He will never hug me again and tell me that my speeding ticket was not my fault and that the cops were just out to get me.

I just moved into a brand new house with my family. We haven’t even made the first payment. The house is in my daddy’s name and now we have no idea what is going to happen. There is a possibility that we will lose the home. But I feel it in my heart that this is home and no one will take that away from my family and me. This is where my dad wanted us and this is where he plans for us to stay.

I feel so broken. And for some reason I am trying to fill my dads shoes, trying to take care of the family myself when I know that we all have to come together and take care of one another.

My dad was my hero. He had been through so much in his life. He was hit by a car, survived the abuse of his parents, broke his neck, and fought his way through life. He loved his knives, guns, and guitars. But most of all, he loved his family. Someone told me that my dad told them just the other week that my mom, brother, and me were his world. We were his everything, and I love that he told someone that, someone that would tell us.

I don’t know how people get through this kind of stuff. Maybe it’s just having others that need you that helps you keep going. I thought when something this bad happened to me I would just sleep through it. I can’t even sleep. I fall asleep and wake up in a panic. I have decided to go back to work tomorrow, but I don’t know if I can actually do it. I don’t know if I am ready.

Right now I just want a time machine to go back to before everything happened. Before the old house was torn down and we had to live in the rental for 6 weeks. Back to a time when my daddy was alive and well. Back when my family was still whole.

How Do I Do This?

My dad was rushed to the hospital Wednesday night, and he has been there ever since. His condition has gotten worse and worse, but there is still hope that he will pull through.

It seems he had gallstones and one passed into his pancreas. This caused the pancreas to bleed into itself and caused infection and swelling. At this moment he is on 4 types of blood pressure medications to keep his blood pressure up. His kidneys and liver are failing and his lungs are having trouble. It’s a lot going on. But there is still hope.

I don’t know how people go through this and still function. We just got a new home and finally moved in. We had been here a week Tuesday. And now this…Home is hard. The hospital is hard. I just want to disappear or travel back in time. If any of you have a time travel machine, please please can I borrow it for a minute?

So that is where I am in the world right now. Lost, broken, dying inside. I am a huge daddy’s girl and I am so not ready to let my dad go. I just keep praying that he fights his way through this…because above all, my dad is a fighter.

Any prayers would be appreciated. As well as a time machine I was asking for earlier.

That’s Different

Hello Friends!

As some of you may know, I have a bachelors degree in Computer Science. I have been working in retail since I lost my “big girl” job in 2014. Retail is not for the faint of heart. It takes a lot of patience and knowing how to hold your tongue. The truth is, I just can’t do it anymore. The customers are getting worse and it has nothing to do with my degree. So…I started applying for new jobs!

Oh yeah. I stepped out of my comfort zone and started applying to knew jobs. The first place I applied to was a book store…obviously that would be my dream job. Well, one of my dream jobs. I didn’t hear back from them so I guess I wasn’t what they were looking for.

A couple of days ago I applied to a call center that helps with tech stuff. You know…the stuff I learned about in college! Yesterday I got an email to follow a link and do a virtual interview.

Virtual

Interview

WHAT??

Seriously, when did this all happen? I know it has been SEVERAL years since I have had to do an interview (I didn’t really interview for my current job, or the job before that) and I feel like I am completely out of the loop here. I get that this job has a lot to do with working with computers and being on the phone, but a virtual interview is kind of crazy.

Anyways, I did the virtual thing. It was actually really close to just doing an assessment. Which I am okay with. I am a pretty honest person and I catch on pretty quickly when they try to rephrase a question to see if I answer differently.

Spoiler alert: I always have the same answer.

Not even an hour after I did the virtual interview I got a phone call and they wanted me to start training Tuesday! I would have been all on that, but I have to at least work a 2 week notice for my other job. It’s just the right thing to do, especially when I am one of the main managers and the only assistant manager that has an open availability.

So now I have a phone interview Friday. A PHONE INTERVIEW!

I don’t know about you, but I like the idea of this whole virtual and phone interview thing. These companies talk about not discriminating when hiring, but come on, you are totally judged when you go into an interview. It’s kind of cool to not have to worry about being in pristine condition when going into an interview. And I am totally still nervous!

Hopefully with a new job I won’t be as stressed and can get back to writing and get back on my track to being a traditionally published author!

What has been the strangest interview you have done for a job?

 

What is Coming is Better Than What Has Gone

Hello friends!

I know, it has been a really long time! Like…4 months! Let me fill you in on what has been going on. You see, back in March my parents started the process of getting a brand new home. A home that I would be moving into as well, because until I am married I will be staying home (it’s just smart.) So the whole process started and then…there was a ton of waiting! During that waiting I just couldn’t find the drive to blog. I wasn’t reading as much and I had pretty much stopped writing anything. I started to hate writing book reviews and I really disliked taking request from authors. I just lost all gumption.

Come to find out there was actually more to my loss of drive then I was seeing. You see, our old home had mold. So much mold that it was slowly killing us. Don’t worry though, no one ended up in the hospital or to terribly sick. It did cause some health issues and a lot of them are straightening out as we speak. I was always tired, I didn’t want to do anything, and there was some pain.

In July we found out that the home would be ready and they would be tearing down our old home and bringing out the new one. This meant that we had to get out and find somewhere to stay during the whole process. This lead to 6 weeks in cannibal woods. It was a small home out in the woods. We had no cable, no internet, and even our phones had trouble getting service. It was like stepping back into the stone age!

Here is a picture of our front yard in Cannibal woods! THE FRONT YARD! Nothing but trees all around.

We hadn’t planned on being in the rental for so long, but things happen. Tuesday of this week my parents were finally able to sign the final papers and the rest is…still in progress. We are at home. WE ARE HOME! I have an office!! I am in the process of setting it up and getting my books out, but I have to dig out my bookshelves first. The old book shelves are going to be temporary though because I am doing a whole 10 foot wall of shelves for books. I can’t wait. I will even have a reading area in my office. I’m so excited to get it all set up! And the best part is that I have a whole separate room for my bed! It’s great.

So, this is my blog to let you all know that I will be back. I am back! Hopefully starting next week I will have some fun book related blogs going on, maybe only once a week for a little bit. I am even considering joining the whole booktube world and get a YouTube channel going…though not many people are happy with YouTube at the moment, so I’m still considering that.

Tell me, what have you been up to!? I have so many blog post to catch up on!

Rejecting a Review

Hello friends!

So, I know that I have not been active on my blog lately, but I have still been reading and writing in my own time. I do a lot of writing now days, at least 1,000 words a day, though I am not working on any one particular item. I am waiting to get my new office set up, hopefully with in the next month or so.

The other day I was contacted by someone who wanted me to read and review a book for their client. I was ecstatic seeing as I have not had a review request in a while. With an inactive blog like mine, you don’t get too many. I forgot how stressful it could be. I took the request and gave it my very best and the worst thing happened…

I could not finish the book. Oh yeah, Heather DNF’d a book. I don’t like doing that. I hate not finishing a book, but when you have so many books that you want to read, that book you are not enjoying can terribly slow down your reading progress. Sadly, this resulted in me having to email the publicist and informing her that I could not finish the book. I thought long and hard on how to approach the situation and I was afraid of cutting ties to other reviews.

Here is what it all comes down to. As a reader and reviewer, what I read is my choice. No one pays me to read their books. No one pays me to put a review on my blog for their books. Yes, I could get more traffic to my blog, but enjoying what I read is a little more important for me.

The thing that I hate more than anything is giving a bad review for anything. I will give semi bad reviews, but most of the time I will avoid really negative reviews. Although, I have been known to leave a few bad reviews on Goodreads.

This book that I read I did give up to 30% before I sat it down for good. It’s hard to know when to put down a book. And to be honest with you, why do we feel the pressure to pick a certain spot to stop at? Again I say, most of us read for the joy of reading. No one is paying us to do this. If you don’t like a book, put it down and move on.

One day, when I have published my own book, I hope to get honest reviews. I want to know if someone disliked my book so much that they couldn’t even finish it. As a writer, listening to things like that could make me a better writer. I am not out to please every reader, but if someone were to put down my book I would want to get down to the reason of it. Did they put it down because it just wasn’t their cup of tea? Did they put it down because I needed to put more work into it? Did they put it down because the writing was horrible? The more you know about how your readers feel, the better a writer you become.

With all that said, I have learned a valuable lesson with this rejected review. Reading is what I do for fun. It is a hobby just as my blog is my hobby. If something causes me to lose interest for my hobby, you leave that thing behind so you can get back to the love of the hobby.

I will also give any book a try, but as soon as I am not into it, I will not feel bad for putting it down.

How about you? Do you DNF books? Why or why not? And if you do DNF books, at what point do you let yourself be okay with moving on?

Just a Little Thought

Hello Friends!

I realize that my blog has been very inadequate lately. In all reality, it started dying about August on 2016. I don’t know where my head has been. I mean, my head hasn’t been here mentally. Physically, I go through the motions of everyday life, just the things that will keep me going, like eating, sleeping, and going to work. I think I have become a good little actress, pretending to be present when my mind has been so far away. Hiding from something maybe. Well, I know what I have been doing. I have been battling demons. Battling demons and digging my way out of deep holes of…depression, regret, anxiety?

There is also the issue with the fact that I have been dealing with what to post. I want to post things that are meaningful. I want to inspire people with my words, because it’s all I have to offer. I have written book reviews, movie reviews, and little tidbits about TV shows I am interested in. I have written short stories and random ramblings. But what does it all mean? What is the purpose? I have a few hundred followers, but not many that even comment on a post. Which I deserve because I don’t comment much on other blogs myself. But it also means that things I have been saying just don’t mean much to others.

I am facing the music. When I sit down to write a book review, I am not writing about the author, the structure, or the tone of the book. I am writing about the story, which means I pretty much love everything I read. As a writer myself, I know the work that goes into writing a story. I have that in the back of my mind with every book I read. Usually what I read is exactly what I wanted to read. I don’t get stuck too much on the structure, the proper use of this or that, or any of the technical stuff, so what am I really adding to the world with my review?

It’s the same thing with movie reviews, though, I tend to be a little more critical with movies. Mainly horror movies because that is my genre of choice. I always feel like I have more to say about a movie than a book and sometimes that just makes me feel like an idiot. I feel like, maybe I am not getting what I should be getting from books. But who is to say what I am actually supposed to get from books? I read for pleasure just as I watch movies for pleasure.

What it all boils down to is what am I writing this blog for? Who am I trying to fool with a review here and there? What is my purpose for this blog? I have had so many blogs in the past and they have always been about feelings and what I have been doing. This blog started off with stories of how awkward I am and some how came to this point where it was about reading and writing. Can I really have a blog that is just about that? I want to say my life is about more than reading and writing, but here lately that is basically all it is. I don’t do much more than that.

With that being said, I am learning to listen to the world. I am hearing things that people say. I am on a journey to learn how to control my temper and my urges. By urges I mean eating, sleeping, and just laying around. My urges to be lazy. Nothing crazy like hiding bodies in my closet…don’t look in my closet.

I am trying to get a handle on myself and become more of a well rounded adult…isn’t that the adult thing to do? Not that I am much of an adult, trust me, age is just a number. I am a reader, writer, and a dreamer. I will always have my head in the clouds and a story waiting to bust through. But I want to be more than just that. I want to be…

Truth is, I don’t know what I want to be. I want to be a published author. I want to be healthy. I want to be fun and outgoing.

Okay, so maybe I do know what I want to be, I just don’t know how to get there.

So, while my blog will continue to be about my writing and what I am reading, it will become more. It will be about movies that I absolutely loved…or hated. It will be about my new passions and old. It will be about how things in my life change and how they stay the same. It will be about me pushing my own limits and stepping up to my full potential.

I just don’t know how to make it all happen, or how to put it into words that people want to read. I am a writer though, and I will figure it out.