In a haze and funk

It has been a rough few weeks, and days. Sometimes, it seems as if the dreariness that I fell will never end and go away. Things have not been going that great for me since my stint on active duty has ended. My mood has been really somber, and very much teetering on the edge of endless tears. The frustration and the emptiness of my current predicament weighs heavy on my mind as well as shoulders.

It is not easy for someone like me that comes off active duty to come to terms with the fact that, after years of a constant motion of duty, I have to start all over again, and that means starting off at the bottom. When I entered the military eight years ago I had worked my way up from earning minimum wake of 5.50 an hour to 7.75.

Now a days the minimum wage IS what I was making then. It is hard trying to come to terms with it, as well as the pressure that comes with the searching of jobs. When you are on your way out of the military they really do not prepare you enough (in my opinion) for the obstacles that you will face, once you are on the outside. Although, I'm not sure what they could do differently to better prepare us for the outside.

It is never a fun time when the darkness begins to envelop me and threaten to take me down. A lot of times, it will take me a few days to slowly come out of it a begin to feel better. Mostly it's thanks in part to my friends and my dog that help bring me out of the haze. Mostly I make my self suffer because it is just me here. I'm not as lucky as some people that have someone to go home to.

Now that I don't have a constant day-to-day interaction with co-workers, I have a lacking of social comfort. School does not count because I only talk to them once a week. My friends have busy lives, especially Minnie. Sometimes I don't know how that girl does what she does...but somehow, she does it with grace and a warm smile. It does get very lonely not having someone to go on new adventures with. Evil twin and Zelda are in Corpus Christi, Ducky is in Virginia along with Chiana, Alex is a new mom, and doesn't share the same spirit as I do. They all have separate lives and I miss them all. These individual people became my family over the years.

Thanks to them all, I don't know where I would be without them!

It's hard to push away the darkness, especially when you are someone like me that internalizes everything. As much as I do need help, I want to be able to make it on my own. When I was growing up, I never wanted to ask for help for fear of being though of stupid. It takes a lot still for me to ask for help, mainly because as previously stated, I want to do it on my own. The thing that I have to realize is, I do need help, and there are people or a person to help...Mom. She may not be fully aware of how I feel but she does try to help me.

To those who have someone to go home to every night, that has someone to hug them at the end of the day, and tell them that everything is going to be ok. Please, be thankful, no matter what that you do have that someone there to support you. Me, I just have Daisy to go home to, and sleep with, and sometimes that just isn't enough. Everyone tells me that I'll eventually find someone, but I don't feel it.

Finding a way out of the haze is an every day battle, no matter who you are. I do my best to be an up-beat and happy person, but when the world feels like it's going to crash down around me, that's the moment that I feel despair and sink to the inside. I am my own worse enemy, I am harder on myself than other people are, and I berate myself for than anyone could imagine. To me if I do something wrong, or mess up on something it's ten times worse. No one could possibly do worse than myself.

It is never a fun spot to be in, the haze. If anyone out there goes through it if they ever need someone to talk to my inbox is always open. The dark and haze is not the place to be, I have to make myself get out more even though I'm almost afraid to.The moral of my story tonight is, it is never easy starting over. Thar's all for tonight, my darling Dizzy (Daisy) is ready to go up-stairs and go to bed, and my hip is bothering my again, so the pain is making me bid you adieu until tomorrow.

Dogs, cars and lieshes

Tonight, was one of THOSE nights. The one out of a million or so mundane nights that you've had before only this mundane night turned into something very different from what was expected.

After getting a surprise visit by one of my dear friends Zelda, we decided to go to the Dairy Queen and get a snack. She opted to take the dogs along. Since I had taken Daisy before, and I knew Minnie had done the same for Cindy, I figured why not. They would be tired by the time we got back anyway.

The walk there was uneventful, we got out ice cream and water, then we started out for home. That's when all hell broke loose so to speak.

Zelda had Cindy and I had Daisy and we were about to cross in the cross walk before the entrance to Taco Bell. That's when Cindy pulled out of he leash.

There was something in the road and Cindy jumped around it to see what it was and so did Zelda, by the time she realized that she no longer had her coller on, it was too late, Cindy was on the run.

We gave chase of Cindy, and I really thought she would stop. I figured she knew better being raised by Sarah.

She stopped for a moment in front of the boarded up Checkers, and I was only a few feet from her, and as I was about to grab her she took off.

We started running after her again, and mind you that I'm running in flip flops and Zelda's running in platforms.

There were some really nice people that tried to stop and help us corral Cindy. It almost worked, we had her blocked in by two cars, then she got through an opening...getting closer to the road...I ran after her after she got through the two cars trying to tap her in. Zelda was on the other side and I honestly thought our ordeal was almost over.

But remember, it was almost 10 o'clock at night on a Saturday on a very busy road in Jacksonville.

The next thing I know, Cindy had ran into traffic....

I heard Zelda yell for her, saw car's slamming on brakes and trying to stop, then I heard barking. I couldn't see what was happening...there were cars blocking my view, but the worse thing that could happen did happen...

She got hit by a car...then she turned around and barked at the car...like it was the cars fault for hitting her and she was showing her indignation of being hit by barking at it.

Once again she was off and running...I lost sight of her and I couldn't tell where she had gone. I didn't know if she would run back to my house or run back to her house which is in the same subdivision.

As Zelda and I are run/walking down a poorly lit road by the house, a really nice lady stopped and told us to get in...mind you I never take rides from strangers, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

She told us that she had been following Cindy and she saw two other guys running after her, so she turned around and came and picked us up.

As she turned into our Subdivision, I asked her to just drop us off at the beginning of our street, but Zelda said let's just ride around and see if we can find her. As we got a little further down the street, we could see that the two gentlemen had found her...at MY HOUSE!

When we pulled up to the house and I opened the garage door they were a little surprised to find out that she had ran all the way back to the house.

I finally had Cindy stopped we put her coller on and led her back into the house...of course saying thank you to the two gentlemen who took the time to help us.

The thing I didn't realize was that Cindy was bleeding...all over the place. Not bad, but she had cut up the pads of her paws from running on the pavement. I tried to calm her down once we got in the house but she just kept panting. Next thing you know, Zelda, Cindy and I are on our way to the Clay County Animal Emergency Room.

After a two hour visit and some powerful drugs later Cindy is on her way back to being the same 'ole pain in the rear dog...I'm just hoping that Minnie finally takes my advice and gets her a harness.

That way she can't slip out of collier and scare the hell out of anyone EVER again.

The only bad thing or hard thing was having to call Minnie and her sister to tell them what had happened. It was so hard to do, and I feel really horrible for what happened while she was here. It's safe to say I will NEVER dog sit again.

I feel awkward and a little reluctant when I talk to Minnie. This is two days after Cindy got hit by the car, and for me it's hard to face my friend. Even though she said it wasn't my fault and said I did the right thing, I feel like maybe she maybe a little mad at me. She may not say it but I feel like it's possible, even though she's an incredibly nice person, I think she's subject to the human emotion of madness.