Drones in the Valley

 I’m doing better now. I appreciate the concern. I always get so depressed, and then feel like an ass later for being so self-involved. I’ve missed birthdays, hangouts, and who knows what else due to being so focused on only myself. I suppose nothing has really changed, I’m just…I don’t know. Up and moving again. You just start living again, however it happens. 

I’m trying to be a little more honest, that seems to be helping. I look around, and all I see is bullshit. Everywhere. Work is the main offender, but it happens with friends also. People aren’t really honest. They hide behind formalities and small talk, they pretend. Being truthful isn’t convenient. The truth generally comes out. I don’t want to add to it. If I don’t like someone, well, I’m not telling them directly, but I’m at least stopping with the small talk and the laughing at jokes that aren’t funny in the first place. Silence seems to get the message across. Perhaps it’s just another way to isolate myself from people, like being straightedge was, and will be when I get back to that. Soon school will start, so that will take up a lot more of my time, and I’ll be alone more. I’ve been hanging out with people from work more, and my group of friends is starting to collaborate more and more. Once summer is dying down, it seems to be easier to get everyone together. 

I have this week left and then I’ll be on a different team at work, the one I was on originally. I won’t have to deal with my horrible supervisor, so that will be nice. I won’t get as many hours in theory, but I often get shafted on hours as it is, and I should barely be able to scrape by. I have to shuffle around my school schedule a little to make it happen, but it will be worth it. I’ll have school Tuesday and Thursday, work the other three weekdays, and the weekends off barring getting extra shifts or demo work. Until I find a new job that is, I don’t intend to stick with that place. There’s bullshit with any retail company, but it really seems worse here. A fresh start would also be nice. I won’t be as willing to help out with my next job. I won’t be a jerk, just not as helpful. It leads to being taken advantage of, and more expected of me without any benefits. I could be a more confident person. I’ve started working out, which should help with the confidence. Some friends are also starting to work out, so hopefully we can all keep each other focused so no one slacks off. 

I’m not sure if my best friend from Michigan is going to move here or not. He keeps shuffling between claiming he can’t afford it and can’t do it and saying he’ll find a way. I feel bad, I could solve things for the most part by rooming with him, but I don’t want to. I’d rather room with my current roomie and another friend; we’re going to move into a townhouse next month. It’s difficult to do what you truly want to do and not cave in to what is easy or better for other people. I see that with other people, especially one of the work friends I’ve been getting close to. Her boyfriend is clearly a dick, and I feel bad for her, but she caves in to him every time and enables the abuse. Some of us were hanging out Friday and the experience was kind of ruined because she kept feeding into his anger by texting him and arguing with him. He wasn’t even going to pick her up, and she didn’t want to go home because she knew they would argue(I’m pretty sure he beats her but she won’t admit it), and she definitely didn’t have to go home, but she did. She caved in, and sadly she probably will for the rest of her life. I don’t ever want to compromise. I’ve always done it. I need to follow my desires. Other people will manage to get by. I’ve been the one who has managed to get by due to others’ decisions. I know what kind of person I want to be, I just need to project it. People seem to think I’m the goofy sidekick, that I’m inoffensive. Someone even compared me to Milhouse from The Simpsons the other day. Ugh. That’s not me at all. Really, I have a bit of an ego, probably due to my obsession with becoming successful, I’m a cynic, confident(in my mind anyway), etc. I just need to pull it all together. I feel like I’m making baby steps. I don’t want to end up like the people at work, like the people in this valley. Miserable drones who fail to change or evolve even though they’re capable. If my friend doesn’t move here, well, maybe I should be moving somewhere else. There’s not really anything for me here, just friends. If we’re not going to start the band, I could be anywhere, in theory anyway. I constantly flip back and forth between being glad I moved back from Arizona and regretting it.

Summer is winding down. It was really cold a few nights ago. The mornings are definitely getting colder. It’s depressing in a strange way. There’s a gloom that seems to hang overhead, at least for me, during winter. It’s the season of death and decay. I have a lot of bad memories, it seems like things never go well. That seems really superstitious…I don’t know. It sounds ridiculous. Maybe I have seasonal depression or something. I merely know things seem different. Maybe this winter will be different than the rest, and things will be better. All the ingredients are there, I just need to combine them correctly.