This is Halloween

This picture doesn't do it justice.

It’s Halloween again. Last year, I spent my Halloween night with a large bowl of candy (no trick-or-treaters came to my apartment) wearing a Slytherin T-shirt and my black Snuggy turned around like a wizard's robe. In all seriousness, that’s exactly what I did.

I did carve two pretty impressive pumpkins last year though. This year I’ve realized that pumpkins last, maybe, two days in Florida. I was smart enough to just paint my second smaller pumpkin, which you can see above. Not to be conceited about my pumpkin acrylic-ing skills, but that sugar skull is pretty wicked.

I’m not sure how anyone else feels about the whole Halloween holiday. I know my current boss and her husband love it and my middle school choir teacher thought it was the devil (for real). Some people hate dressing up because they feel stupid, some people love that they get to act crazy for a night without alerting their friends to the strange things they’re into. Some people don’t like how grim and dark Halloween is; personally I think that part is awesome, this is coming from a girl that has thought she was going to die before every major milestone in her life. As Lydia in Beetlejuice says, "'Live people ignore the strange and unusual.' I myself am strange and unusual."

To me, fall = the most nostalgic season. I understand every season has specific memories associated with it, but think about how sober and, you know, serious the holidays are in the fall. Halloween centers around death, think about it. But not everything can be sun shiny and hunky dory. I tend to be more on the bleak-side, but that works in the fall. Maybe I associate my personality with this season, that’s probably it. Actually, when I was a kid, I loved Buffy the Vampire Slayer so much that I used to sleep with my head turned to the side and the blanket away from my neck so a vampire would come bite me. How many other people can say that? Probably not many would admit to that at the very least. 

If you don’t feel wistful at all during October just go back and look at really old Facebook pictures. I’m talking really old, those ones from high school football games, college Homecoming etc. If that doesn’t remind you of cool weather, jackets, flannel, the smell of leaves, pumpkin flavored things and candles I can’t help you and you are probably heartless anyway. 

In honor of my love of Buffy and how that show naturally lends itself to Halloween here's a song from the musical episode (the best one in my opinion) that's actually a love/hate song from Spike (the vampire) to Buffy (the slayer). Writing this out makes me feel crazy. Whoa. 

 And look, the lyrics are on there, too. Talk about a total trip down memory lane, I just made my blog reminiscent of Xanga. Remember that really early form of a blog? Yea....me neither. 

What's the worst part about a break up?

This is kind of a trick question. Unless you are completely disgusted with your partner and see no redeemable qualities in them, there are lots of terrible parts in a break up. But, you all know what I’m going to say the worst is, don’t you? If you don’t then I’m pretty sure you’ve never gone through one of those terrible breakups that cause you to drone on and on to people about your former life. 

It isn’t just the memories of the good times you had. I know that’s what you were thinking. It’s something a little more specific than that. In reality, it’s every little thing that reminds you of them. OK, I’ll admit that this has to do with the memories, but you aren’t seeing my point here. It’s that song that has lyrics that so perfectly fit what you had that you have to turn the channel every time it comes on the radio. It’s the cute bunny you see on your run that you would have taken a picture of to send the other person because cute animals were something you shared to make each other feel better. It’s seeing an insignia for a group they were in and immediately turning away and simultaneously wanting to rip it down. Maybe it’s as simple as seeing a city you’ve been to together in an article you are reading. Anything can trigger a memory or a thought of that person you’d rather not think about.

This part of the break up can last months, but more likely it will last years after you’ve been apart. It’s just a lingering feeling and reminder that you possibly lost the best thing you’re going to get – or it just reminds you of how much of a tool they are. Either way, it’s a painful experience. And short of burning out a little section of your brain, it’s something that even getting into a better relationship won’t heal. 

Listening to those songs you shared or wearing those clothes they loved after you end things is like pressing on a bruise. You know it’s tender, but you want to feel how sore it is to test to see if it’s healing or just to see if it still hurts. You know you shouldn’t do it, but you have to see how it feels anyway. And even if you can stand listening to the entire song, do you really feel better? Maybe you feel a little more empowered, but then again, you spent an entire song probably thinking about your old relationship. Now how do you feel?

Here, I’ll help you feel better. If you don’t like chocolate (we aren’t friends if this is the case) go pick up a pack of WarHeads.  Yes they still make them. If you do like chocolate go pick up a pack of Butter Fingers.  I bet you haven’t eaten those things in a while. Are you thinking about how delicious those sugary morsels are and about how simple things used to be the last time you had them? 

There you go, feel better?

DISCLAIMER: If the candies above are directly linked to a past relationship of yours I just made my point. Go pick up a box of Lunchable Pizzas, you’ll feel better. 

My newest motivational sign

I felt like I needed to create this after my friend showed me a similar motivational sign, if only because my week started out terribly. And although Brit Brit had a bad 2007, went crazy on a very public stage and exposed herself as being a complete nut job, now she "sings" music for adoring fans everywhere. She can't even sing or dance anymore and she's still famous, so things can always get better.

Enjoy.

The serial blogger

I have had many different blogs over the years. 

Most were forced on when I was studying journalism in college. Really, it’s a genius idea. Professors want you to create a journal entry anyway, this way you’re learning to blog at the same time, which is a useful skill in the media world. I probably had at least three different blogs that I had to post on about whichever newsroom I happened to be in that week and about my experiences. Then there was the one about mobile journalism and how to apply using cell phones for journalism in the real world, which was the only one that actually had a large following. Then again, it was probably because my group and I were delivering useful, real-world advice.

Even after I was no longer forced to blog for a portion of my grade, I kept trying to create a blog I would love/look forward to post on. The one that stuck around the longest in college was a Tumblr about poetry.

That sounds just as hipster and ridiculous as it actually turned out to be. I had written poetry and from time to time I still did, so I would upload those, silly memes of Edgar Allan Poe, other poems that I wanted to share from various authors – and that was about it. Think about how interesting that was for people to read. Most likely, no one read it and it wasn’t interesting.

Then I graduated, drank with my friends for a summer and acted like highschoolers with over-21 IDs. Unfortunately, all frivolous youthful tromps must come to an end, and I was one of the first to get a real grown-up job that sent me to Montgomery, Ala. 

Let me get one thing straight here: I love the South. The food is the tastiest (albeit most fattening) the people genuinely do want to help you and it’s just kind of a comfortable down-to-earth environment. DISCLAIMER: This is coming from a woman that owns two pairs of Ariat cowboy boots.

While in Alabama I started a blog –  as in, a real, true blog. I wrote about recipes I tried while I was teaching myself to cook, delicious pastries I baked, interesting makeup techniques and outfits I put together. All of this is very Southern if you couldn’t tell.

Unfortunately, as much as I liked the feel of the South, my job was extremely unsatisfactory. As luck would have it, a friend of mine from college told me about an opening in sunny Florida. Long story short I moved down the Gulf Coast.

I forgot all about blogging, I tried twice in six months to start up my blog again until I finally realized I couldn’t revive it. I wanted to transform it into something new, I tried redesigning it and finally gave up. That blog was for my life in Alabama. Nearly a Belle was about a Midwesterner learning Southern ways, in general learning to be an adult and wanting so much to be a lady.

My life in Florida has been a constant struggle with everything from personal relationships to losing my phone two separate times, and I’m not sure it’s going to get any easier, but this blog is for my life now and everything that entails - which right now is overwhelming.

But just for the record, I still try ridiculous recipes that tend to be amazing and if they happen to end up on this blog, so be it. You’ll thank me later. 

To my Word doc, because I've exhausted my friends

Dear… Doc, 

Let’s put it this way, I think I have thoroughly exhausted most of my friends. I’m sure listening to my hemorrhaging self-esteem is enough to merit a little vacation from me. I need to give them a break before they snap and run for the highest, nearest tall thing you can climb – you know, bridge, water tower, parking structure – you get it. Unfortunately, I haven’t figured out how to stop picking at my scabs and pulling out my stitches. So, I’m in constant need of a friend to staunch my ever-depleting sense of worth. Ay, there’s the rub. 

I assume someday there will be robot therapists or some other form of technology that would be able to take in the worries and cares of a person, spit out a recommendation/prescription and be done with it without getting mired down in the patient’s feelings. Then again, they could learn human emotions this way and take over the world, so maybe we should steer clear of that. 

Typing this letter is going to be my surrogate bandage, or maybe more like my own cone that goes over dog’s heads so they can’t lick their wounds. It’s my stand-in for the friends I’ve already alienated because my life has been one endless parade of mistakes I’ve made and then proceeded to dwell on. No one wants to be around the anxious girl that can’t get her shit together. But this Word doc can’t get away from me, so these words are going to spill from me whether Microsoft likes it or not and hopefully they take some of my negativity with them.

Here it is, plain and simple: I want to be happy. 

I want it so much that every time something less-than-stellar happens I fall apart. 

I completely crumble. 

I got a speeding ticket this morning and had a mini-mental breakdown in my car because of it. In my defense, it was my first speeding ticket ever, but people get them all the time, I just have to pay it, I didn’t get in an accident and the cop (although he was not persuaded by the fact that I was shaking like an addict) reduced my speed. That was actually really nice of him. Of course as soon as he leaves I start bawling like a little child and it takes me so long to try to get back into traffic a second cop pulls up beside me asking me what I’m doing. I’m still crying and shaking and I say I just got a ticket and I’m trying to get back into traffic. That was it; I somehow managed to drive to work looking through foggy, smeared glasses. And you know the people in the trucks and cars around me could see me losing it while attempting to drive. So, that’s cool I guess, I hope they appreciate the fact that I stayed in my lane. 

I’m not sure this is a typical response to a normal snag. I was pretty happy on my way to work today, I slept pretty well, didn’t have any outrageous dreams that have been plaguing me recently, but I disintegrated as soon as I made a mistake. 

So, Doc (that’s what I’m going to call my Word docs from now on when I need a friend to dump my emotions on, it reminds me of Doc Holliday and I guess a therapist. Now, I have a vision of talking to a robot therapist dressed like a Western gunslinger – which is pretty awesome) I’m going to say what I always say to my friends when I get trapped inside my own head, which is frequently. 

I’m going to get better. 

I said this to my ex-boyfriend so many times, I’ve said it to my friends that I think are going to give up on me and now I’m saying it to you. 

I’ve tried running myself better, painting myself better, sleeping myself better, drinking myself better, baking/cooking myself better, blogging myself better and talking myself better. But I want it so much it hurts. I’m not going to stop trying until it finally happens. 

Maybe I’ll try heat yoga… as soon as I pay off this speeding ticket.