Three Shades of Awesome

I really shouldn’t be stressing too badly, right now, but I’m starting to. I guess there’s just a lot of things going on right now. I’m down to my last thousand bucks or so. Which isn’t too bad… though I already owe four hundred to Rogers for my iPhone + taxes + normal phone bill. Pretty soon rent is going to be due, but thankfully I have a new roomie moving in, and in general everything should be good.

It’s funny, when you think of it, even a few years ago I felt like a thousand dollars was some amazing amount of money, that only wizards and lawyers had. I never really thought that. But still. I remember when as a kid twenty bucks was a big deal. Now I talk about a thousand dollars as if it’s barely anything.

Thing is though this is the lowest I’ve ever let myself drop since moving out of home. I’ve never understood how some people can live pay cheque to pay cheque. I think it’ll be a good long while before I let myself buy anything expensive after I get employed again.

As well, things between me and Chris have kinda stressed me a little. He’d told me he wanted to be friends, which I thought was a stupid idea. And boy did I prove myself right! Ah the joy of self fulfilling prophesies. Thing is, I’m still pretty bitter about the break up. We went for dinner the other night, and after a while I just wanted to smack him. Like, figuratively, not literally. All those little endearing quirks are now just annoying. Now his coy evasiveness doesn’t make me giggle with school boy anticipation, it just makes me want to tell him off and tell him to learn to be honest and upfront!

I think I kind of communicated that too.

Part of me feels bad, but most of me has moved on to resentment. Which when getting over someone is a good place to be… and then stay. I’d love to say that it’s easy to be over someone when you still think the world of them, but it’s not. That’s one of the reasons I took three years to get over Josh. I never let myself think of the things that should have bothered me about him, I just kept thinking he was the greatest guy ever, that he burped roses, and peed out the hopes of small children.

Thankfully that’s not really happening with Chris. I’d honestly still like to care for him. But the more I look back on our relationship the more I see where he wasn’t honest with me, where he didn’t necessarily lie, but intentionally avoided the truth. It just bothers me. It makes the whole thing feel cheap. For a long time I’d thought he was being shy, and I just needed to wait for him to let me in. Turns out he was just… honestly I don’t know what the heck was going through his head. The unfortunate thing is when we talk, neither does he. He’s changed his reasons for breaking up story so many times that it just doesn’t make any sense. I’m really sick of trying to figure it out. So I’m just walking away.

Lastly, I’m worried about my book. The writing part was easy. The writing part was fun! The writing part was inspiring and… now, it’s not done, but it’s largely done. The ending is nearly all finished, I need to flush out the middle, but you could essentially read it all the way through and you’d be pretty good to go. There’s a lot of parts that aren’t written well at all. But a lot of the other parts, especially the ending are just killer… least I think they’re just killer.

I’m reading up stuff, and apparently I’m supposed to send my manuscripts to an agent, and then they’ll read them, and tell me they think my writing is crap and that I should just give up and die. But after they tell me that a lot, apparently one of them will take pity on me and try and sell my book to publishers. They take a cut, but given the fact that I’m not really in it for the money, or at least not like… well whatever. That’s not a huge deal, and the standard is just 15% of what I’d get. So, really that’s not all that much, and I imagine they’d negotiate at least 15% better than I’d likely do on my own.

I just wanna get my book published. With everything that’s been going on in my life. I just want to know that I’m still good at something.

I confess, this summer has felt like the summer of failures. I’ve taken a lot of comfort in writing, simply because it’s been something that nobody’s really allowed to tell me is crap just yet. It’s art, you can say you don’t like it, but you can’t tell me it’s a failure. You just can’t.

I find that lately my entire sense of self worth feels challenged, and really my response to that challenge has been to walk away. Instead of arguing, I walk away and I create. I write about this world, and these events of these characters that exist only in my head. I write the sort of book that I would love and hate to read all at once.

This summer I’ve been inundated with the ways that we tell each other we’re not special, we’re not worthwhile, we’re not wanted, and we don’t have meaning. I think in a lot of ways my entire book is 90 000 words of me screaming back at the world, “You’re wrong!” So we’ll see how that goes.

I guess I shouldn’t worry much. I have a good editor to fix my grammar. I’ve got great ideas, and even if a publisher is never interested, I can still publish to your favourite electronic readers, and let Apple host my screaming… even as I should “You’re wrong!” In their direction as well.

OK so I’d been telling people I’d written 30 thousand words in three days, turns out it was more like 20 thousand. But either way, still a lot of words. The ending to my book has worked out thus far to be about 26 thousand words, which really not that bad. Considering my beginning and middle together are like 50 thousand words, and up until ten days ago I’d been working on them since february! Oh wait… I just realized I missed about four thousand words.

Yah, I’ve written some really good stuff the last few days. At least it feels really good to me. I’m getting various levels of feedback from people, a lot of people who’ve read it have just in general said that they liked it, and while that’s encouraging it doesn’t really tell me where I need to work. Brian’s been pretty good about telling me what he likes and what he doesn’t, though it’s a little frustrating when he says, “I”m not sure how much I like aspect X.” and I’m kinda like… well learn to like it cause that happens a lot over the next 85 thousand words! Thing is while I plan on doing a rewrite, I’m not really planning on profoundly changing the way the character talks, I love my character… he’s like me… but with super powers… and a greater sense of self awareness… and a little more craziness…

I found an editor for my book, a family friend/friend of my mother’s used to work as a reporter/copy editor/something else, and she’s really nice. One of those people who after I came out was really good about telling my mom, “It’s OK… it’s not a big deal… nobody’s judging you… except all your church friends… and everybody should have known… David’s pretty freaking gay…” I love her, I really do. I especially love the fact that she’s going to be editing my book!

We were talking on Saturday about getting a few chapters really polished up and then sending them to a bunch of publishers to drum up some interest.

I confess, I’m really, really really scared about submitting it to a publisher. I’m trying to prepare myself for the thought of someone taking their editorial knife and cutting through my baby as I protest “But without that part chapter 37 won’t make any sense!”
Only to hear the editor cackle, “We’re cutting chapter 37 as well! Who calls a Motorcycle an Invincycle, that’s just terrible! And we’re renaming every one of your characters!”

I mean, I don’t know that that’ll happen, they might read it and say they love and and they won’t make any changes… I might also discover that the tooth fairy is real, and he’s totally got a thing for me… then I can date him for his money!

I’m not looking forward to the rejection notices… but I am looking forward to telling people, “I’m trying to get my novel published.” Because I think that would just make me sound so starving artist it’s not even funny… and really what has my life been if not a long journey leading me to a cliché?

So, today I think the last shoe that could drop dropped. I don’t know that the sky has any more shoes to crush my hopes and dreams with. There just isn’t any ground left for more shoes to fall upon. Indeed I find myself trampled under a mountain of shoes.

Today I found out, that not only does Red River not want me, not only does Chris not want me, but Apple doesn’t want me either. Now granted, this shouldn’t have been too surprising. They were stupid enough to reject me the last time I applied, but I said to myself, self, I’m sure if they have a chance to meet you, to talk to you, to see you interact with people, they’ll see just how great you’d be working at one of their stores.

Nope. I’m not sure how out of that interview they’ll end up picking. I somehow wonder if perhaps the flaming idiot next to me somehow got interviewed. I swear if I walked in there and saw that guy working there I’d probably break my iPhone 4 in two right then and there. To be honest, I’m so entirely irritated by it all, that I actually plan on throwing out the iPhone posters I snagged from work when I was at Rogers.

I’m sooo angry about it, I was talking with Brian about him getting a smartphone and I almost encouraged him to get an Android phone! I’m sooo angry about it, I’m seriously thinking my next computer might be a hackintoshed Samsung! That’s how angry I am about everything! Actually right now I’m just depressed. But I’m sure I’ll be angry tomorrow.

Actually I confess I totally wrote an angry letter to steve@mac.com I realize Steve won’t read it, but I told them that I know people who go to the Apple store to play around with things and simply see how many wrong things they can hear the sales people say. I said it seemed like they were only interested in hiring people as plastic as a MacBook (thought that was a good zinger) and in general I said the whole experience left me feeling like I needed to take a shower.

I’m sure it’ll be almost instantly deleted, I’m sure all it’ll do is ensure that there is not chance I could ever get hired there. But frankly what do I care! To be honest what do I care about just about anything right now? You know, I know this is gonna freak people out, but I decided to google information about suicide. Not that I was seriously considering it, but the fact was the entire idea seemed much more appealing than actually living. Funny fact, try googling suicide. Everything that comes up is telling you not to kill yourself. It was actually one of the funniest experiences I’ve ever had. It took so much effort to actually find good resources on how to kill yourself, that I was actually so bored of the notion, by the time I found them I was wanting to go for a walk.

Interesting fact, it would actually take a lot more effort to find a painless way to die, than it would to actually make my life better. So I figured I’d just make my life better. I guess.

Only thing is, to be honest I’m not quite sure how to do that. Every plan that I had to make my life better this year has been completely at the mercy of others. Interesting fact, all those self made millionaires… unless you’re a total manipulative ass, it’s really hard to make a million dollars! There is always someone ready to stand in your way and tell you that you’re not what they want.

I applied to Red River, my portfolio wasn’t perfect, but it was better than some of the graduates so I figured I was sure to get in… nope. I applied to the Apple Store, I imagine they have at most five employees who would be better at selling or supporting their target customers… needless to say of course I didn’t get a second interview. Did I mention I have had friend after friend who has applied and gotten interviews and most of the time turned them down, or had criminal records they were avoiding mentioning, none of them work for Apple, but the fact is I woulda been better than all of them. (Though I do have one friend that I’m sure would have done an awesome job.)

When I resigned from Adullam I told myself, that I wasn’t going to ever put my heart and soul into something again where I could get hurt by other people not believing in me, or being willing to help. But it turns out, that for the most part that’s life. Every day countless humans will be denied opportunities to live out their potential in a role that would satisfy them, simply because of the apathy or fickle tastes of others.

I guess this is a really long and drawn out way of saying, life sucks.

I just can’t get over how this summer has gone. The last day of June I get rejected from RRC, I’m about ready to throw myself from a bridge and I meet Chris, an attractive, nice, kind, guy who seems to really like me, we date for two months, and everything feels amazing. In that time period I’m basically handed a job as a graphic artist, the field I’d been rejected for, only to have the person who hired me basically try and throw me into another position that I hadn’t agreed to at all!

After all that was done, the very next day I get an interview with Apple… or at least an email telling me I have an interview with Apple, so of course me being me, I decided well this must be fate! I’m excited, I’m super stoked, so I decide I’m just gonna take the time to relax, and almost vacation, since I hadn’t really had a vacation in a long time. Well, that was a bad idea, because apparently the managers at the Apple Store are far more interested in people who don’t know jack, so that they can tell them what to talk to people about, than actually utilizing people that actually know what the hell they’re talking about.

Oh did I mention Chris also broke up with me? I’m sure if you read my blog you’re already aware of that… but yah, I find out that in the end he never really felt terribly strongly about me, if anything talking to him it felt more like I was some sort of wounded puppy that he knew he had to give the boot but felt just terrible about it.

So here I am, and the only word I can use to describe my life today is pathetic. Abso-fucking-loutely pathetic.

I’d love to pretend this was some sort of Job moment, I’d love to believe that life had any meaning at all. But the fact is today… I feel like the entire reason for living a moral existence is futile. You don’t win life by doing what’s right, you win life by stepping on the corpses of people who weren’t fast enough to get out of the way of the falling shoes.

I can’t sleep tonight. I’m down behind the legislature wishing God would say something.

Chris and I broke up today, and despite my rather blunt bravado, I feel wretched. Mike is spending the night at my place, he and Logan took me out to Tony Roma’s tonight. By taking me out I mean Mike drove and Logan paid for me. Logan’s a really great friend.

I confess I’m rather lost. I really don’t know what to do or say or anything. I feel numb. I’ve gone from laying my head down at night and feeling nothing but thankfulness for life, to laying down and being kept awake by the knowledge that I am so profoundly alone.

Part of me wants to be angry, or cruel, or unkind. But at the same time I know that won’t fix anything. It’s hard to simply admit I’m unloved. Or perhaps it’s an easy admittance that just hurts like hell.

I didn’t want to blog about this. I wish I could just go on pretending like it didn’t happen. And so when friends ask me how all that is going I can just keep smiling and saying it’s great. But I can’t.

The reasons, they aren’t very good reasons. As always people make up excuses to do what they want to do. And they want to do whatever keeps them unchanged. Avoiding a new relationship is like making excuses not to go to the gym. It’s good for you, you feel better, but still it’s not the same as not doing it.

So Chris decided to break up with me. I’d say he’ll be back, but that’s not his personality type, he’s not going to consider wether he was wrong or not, he’s just going to find something else to do.

Thankfully at least he didn’t cheat on me like Dan did. He didn’t string me along either. Fact is aside from feeling lonely, alone and questioning my worth I hardly have a thing to complain about.

I’m revisiting the notion that God doesn’t care if I’m happy. I really felt as if God was actively bringing him into my life. But if He knew that this would be the outcome then why? It’s like allowing a dying person to be healthy for a day, and then yanking it. I had forgotten how it was to be that happy, and now the ash tastes so much more bitter.

I have a job interview on Sunday. Part of me thinks I will do well, though to be honest, part of me just, I can’t care. What’s the point of having a good job if you’ll never be loved? What’s the point of having a home if there is never anyone to come home to? I thought I could bring myself to just care about me. I can’t. If anything these last two months have shown me that I’m not best when left alone. So if I’m my best when I have someone to show love to, then why am I so utterly unlovable?

Tonight life feels meaningless the most important thing in my life right now is an iPhone 4. How absolutely worthless am I?

Why hello everyone! This, this is the “Invinsymbol” it’s the symbol. It’s going to be emblazoned on my hero’s costume. I also tonight finally came up with a title… I’ve been working under the name simply Hero for the book, but that’s already taken by another book about some gay superhero or something, I haven’t read it but I’m like ugh I don’t wanna be mixed up. Though I might sell more books that way… assuming I sell any.

I actually thought it would be really cute to register invincible.com and have a subdomain called mr so it’d be mr.invincible.com but that’s already. Either way the title I have now is great!

I’m gonna register the domain name right away… tomorrow.

Oh I should also say, my friend and potential room mate Kane has actually read nearly everything I’ve written thus far! And I emailed him the book like two days ago. It seems as if if you give it a shot you’ll get hooked. It’s also nice to get some really great feedback. The last person I knew who read it actually said that they felt like they were wading through chapters, and I was like… wow… that’s… wow. But at the same time that person’s really good for honest criticism and I’d been thinking that the later half of the book was turning out to be a bit more eventful than the beginning so I think I’m gonna move up some of that content, and even flash back to some earlier stuff early on. The nice thing about this book is since it’s written so segmented, the first 30 chapters can actually be rearranged in any order, and nearly no details would be confusing. They’re like the first several seasons of the next generation, the only indicator that you’ve gone far in the series at all are the uniforms, and whether or not Tasha Yar is dead!

Anyway, I really need to go to bed, Chris and I are doing breakfast tomorrow, and I need to show my roomie’s room tomorrow, so I better go to bed… Ugh I feel so happy about this, I’d been meaning to draw it for forever, and it looks pretty killer I think!

Well I got my iPhone 4 on Friday, at about 7:30pm… a 13 hour wait in line, mostly due to the fact that the Rogers systems crashed like nuts!  Though to be honest I think the Apple sales reps also were taking a bit more time than they needed to with customers, simply because they were trying to provide a quality sales experience.  So, I mean I could blame most of it on Rogers, but the fact is given how quickly mine was able to be processed when I knew everything I wanted, I think in most cases the Apple Store employees weren’t actually trying to hurry any customers through, thus technically the line could have been dwindled down a bit quicker but probably not nearly by enough to have justified any lax customer service… though when you’re waiting in line you don’t really care if anyone else is being served properly you just want your damned phone!  (That was supposed to be a joke.)

So I’m writing this from the line up in front of the Apple Store, I’m close enough that I can see the entrance I can smell the employees, and I can smell some of the incredibly ripe customers in line… actually wait that was earlier I think the stinky people left.  I’m now sitting in a lawn chair that Chris went home and got… did I mention Chris doesn’t love in Winnipeg?  Did I mention this was after hour six of waiting in line and we were entirely aware that he could leave and get home and get back and we’d still be in line!

Hey all, so I’m trying out a purdy need Safari extension, it’s called Scribe Fire, I confess I want to fix the icon… slash I will probably fix the icon, maybe I’ll email the developer, but the layout and everything is actually super clean and pretty nice.  Dare I say better than the default WordPress layout… actually very clean, very nice to use, I’m pretty impressed!

Now, I’m not talking about that menno style peace… you know… with your neighbours, that’s pretty hard to get to (kidding I’m actually fairly peaceable… if I’m not busy oppressing you…) rather I’m talking about that place where you say, I’m at peace with the world around me.  I’m cool with my situation.

Right now I’m in a place, that for some people might not be a calm place.  I just left employment at a company that was fairly lousy to work for.  But you know, I’m actually doing awesome.  Part of that comes I think from the fact that I try not to let a single thing define me, or at least I’m getting better at that.  I used to find myself in the things around me a lot when I was younger.  I was a Mac user, I was a Christian, and boy was I eccentric.

I revelled in the notion of being different.  Partly because, I wasn’t comfortable with the notion of being like everyone else.  Today, I certainly wouldn’t call myself typical, I’m hardly an everyman.  But I’m a happyman.  I’m finding more and more I’m getting to a place where I like who I am.  I’m not perfect, and I’m aware of that, there’s a million things about my life that I would change if I had the ability to drag and drop new aspects into my life.  I’d have a bigger apartment, sexier body, and life would be a lot more like on TV… incidentally I’d have a really big gun, no consequences, and a catch phrase!  Needless to say there’s be a new punishment for being a douche bag in public and it’d be named David!

But, I’m not a sexy gun toting law unto myself, and you know, it’s probably for the best… since a lot of people are douche bags in public you know.

Anyway, no I’m just really happy with where I am in life right now.  I have my nice little nook of an apartment, a great guy in my life, a Church that I love, and I’m gonna have an iPhone 4 soon.  So I’m just really content.  Not to mention the job thing will come, but you know… I’m just gonna keep on pushing forward, I gots money in the bank so I don’t really feel a crunch there.  I’m just kinda sailing along.  I’m making sure to be careful how much money I spend on random crap, and I’m just gonna be careful on stuff.

So yah, in a lot of ways I’m just choosing how I’m gonna be.  But I’m choosing to be awesome.