Dorienne's Log

Yes! Finally, I have my blog back!

It has been a harrowing few weeks since I decided to leave Acenet and realized that I had no idea how to begin changing my MySQL databases over to the new account at Lunarpages. I have just this instant figured it out and I am more than ecstatic. I have had so many things about which I just longed to write, but I had no venue in which to display these thoughts. I will transfer a blog post I created in my TV.com blog here since it was pretty significant.

The thing is, last Tuesday, I received a rude awakening. Upon realizing that a fanfic-novel I had been writing was about to become yesterday’s news, it finally occurred to me just how much time I waste on forums and the like. Time that would be better spent accomplishing my many projects. So, for the past few days, I have been away from the TV.com cold turkey. I do not expect that my absence will affect anyone, but still I do wonder. I have been focusing on my writing and today I decided I need to start seeing project through to the end instead of starting up new ones half way through the old and never finishing anything in the process. Some may call this behaviour textbook ADD and bipolar, but I can beat this myself sans label. I just have to focus.

I got a job! It is with Chase and we have yet to get into our actual work since we are still in training. I can’t help, but feel that I am the odd one out in the class, though I think that some of this has to do with the fact that I sit directly in the middle of the room and I do not share a desk with anyone in the training room. It maybe because I have been more or less isolated from people, church members notwithstanding, for quite some time, but I feel just odd in comparison to everyone else. I cannot really explain it, but everyone else seems so different from me that I feel that I almost struggle to relate to all the others. Maybe it’s because I keep finding all these errors in the training materials….I am having great difficulty in finding my niche, which just pains to no ends because, like all humans, I am ever-striving for acceptance and belonging. All in all, though, I just wish we could get through the material and get out on the floor. I fee like I am being robbed each day I spend in training because that is another day where I am working at close to a dollar and hour less than what I should be paid. What irks me the most is that I can’t help thinking that if I just had my degree, I could have applied for a position more suited my interests like the company’s IT department or anything else. I see myself truly testing the limits of the “you have to stay at your level for a year before moving elsewhere” idea. I already want to master this information on competitive spirit alone and there’s no telling how I will be once we are out of training.
The good thing to come out of this, however is that I may have my first web design job. It will probably be just a fifty-dollar job with a very small maintenance fee, but it is a job nonetheless. It excites me so much, I could just dance and sing. And speaking of sing, I had been stressing for several days about the fact that since I work on Saturdays, I will not be able to attend choir practices. Thankfully, most of the songs we do, I already know and our director gave us a CD of a bunch of songs that we will be singing in the coming months. Knowing those songs will be enough for when we are to sing. Today, I sang with the choir even though I was unable to practice with them this month and I think we did great. I was worried about our director for a bit, because I can tell that she is still sick and looked like she was about to pass out while she was directing us. In fact, I was very worried probably because I had dream last night, Saturday night, about one of our church members passing away suddenly and I woke up very upset. In my dream, I was crying over her and no one could understand why I was crying and was upset since she was saved and therefore we all knew where she was going. It was one of those sit straight up in the middle of the night dreams that stay with you for a while and I made sure to hug this person extra hard in church today.

Phew! I have managed to clean my room and catch up on my “correspondence” tonight all in efforts to procrastinate major items further. All this behaviour makes me think that I really am not ready to return to OSU after all. I don’t want to believe it, but here I am under the same stresses and I am struggle once more. I think I just need to press forward and just get my stuff done so I can have more time to write and do what I want to do.

….time to work…

Leave Xanga for two weeks and they change everything on you…

Oh well. I’m back and again, nothing much has been happening.

All my “friends” hate me now. It happens, but I know when I’m right and this is one of those situations. A-B is effectively screwing me over for the rest of this year and the next, but I will hold my head high and smile nonetheless. This week is going to be excruciating there. I have so much to do it’s really just ridiculous. They do this every year. The “let’s wait to until the last second and ask Dorienne to do a million tasks at once” attitude is getting old. I have to teach, that which is difficult enough to learn for my own needs let alone teach when no one else knows what’s going on. The whole thing just makes me sad and I’m in desperate need for a vacation. Luckily for me, I’m having surgery again and I’ll have plenty of time to “rest.”

I’ve just been feeling so low and useless lately and I’m not sure what, if anything, I can do to remedy the situation. I think I’m just ready for a change. I’ve been here for far too long and I need to see some new faces and do some new things. I think I just feel especially down today, because I was just soooooo tired in church today and I left immediately after the service. The Lord’s Supper service just kept going on and on and on. I had half a mind to just get up and walk out; I was just so tired I could barely focus. I understand how important communion is. I really do. But I have yet to see the significance of saying the same exact things over and over again in a hundred different ways month after month. It’s always the same people there every single Sunday. We all know what’s up. It’s getting to the point where I’m considering not attending the first Sunday’s service, just to avoid these annoyingly long lectures about communion. Every month, I just feel like, “Please! Just give me the cracker and the juice and let me be on my way!”
I think I’ve also been annoyed with church recently, because last week our pastor made such a big to-do about coming to afternoon service as well as morning service, and when I showed up, it had been cancelled. I drove ALL the way down there and then had to drive ALL the way back. Then yesterday, I got to our 10:30 choir practice at 10:33 and waited another 20 minutes before anyone else showed up. Our director was even late. And today in Sunday School, the little booklet they give us, said something I thoroughly did not agree with in regards to evolution versus creation, blah, blah, blah….I honestly don’t see why science and religion feel they must mix. You can’t test faith. You can’t make experiments on it. It is what it is. Science is based on testable, reproducible facts. Religion is based on faith. Why must the two be set in comparison all the time?! Why is that I can’t believe in both evolution and creation?! Why can’t anyone else agree with the idea that evolution is what got everything on this Earth to this point and that God is the “why” behind everything?! Why is this a principle that is so difficult for people to understand?! Science is the “how” of anything in the world and faith is the “why” behind that “how.”

Sigh…

I just feel so very sad and I don’t know why.

Maybe because it’s another September and I’m coming ever closer to another birthday without feeling that I’ve accomplished anything. The other day at work, I told everyone that I felt old, like I was closer to my late 30s than my early twenties and they all just laughed and said that I was “cute.” Why? It’s not like they ever felt fifteen years older than they were at my age. So, what’s with the laughter?

I set some goals for myself in my last entry and it was like the next day, that I went back on those same goals; the McDonald’s one anyway. I haven’t had any more since then, but it’s very discouraging to have a goal fresh in your mind and squelch on that goal when you feel trapped. Oh well.
I’m going to work out this week. In one form or another. I need to lose at least ten pounds before my surgery. I’ve told myself that to keep from gaining an exuberant amount of weight like I did with the first surgeries, I was only going to eat when I needed to take pain medication. We’ll see how well that’ll work out.

Okay, time to uplift myself….
Today I will:
Do all my laundry
Clean the bathroom
Finish the subdomain for the wedding pics
Clean my room
Make this stupid video thingy work
Work on my book
Study for next and winter quarter’s

It’s a good list and the best part is that it’s quite doable!

I’m still going strong right now. I’ve got my plans in place and we’ll see how this goes…

I’m still off fast food for the month. I’ve actually gone hungry instead of stopping at a Wendy’s or something, but I know it’s for the best. I caught myself wondering what I would be like at the end of the month. Will I be so accustomed to not eating fast food that I wouldn’t even notice when the end of the month came and perchance I could make it two months without any fast food? Doubtful, but there’s always the hope. I’m pretty sure I’ll be standing at Chipotle’s front door waiting for it to open on August 1st, but there’s still hope.

I’ve been finessing a lot of things lately, especially the code the websites I’m doing. One of the people on Coding Forums, brought up a good point to me as I was attempting to give advice to another. I know CSS and its basics, but I don’t know the theory behind it, so I end up with a lot of redundant information in my code. I get the style, just not the cascading part, but that will soon change.

I’m planning to start another blog, but the new one will be run completely by me since I’ve found the code to make a perfect blog under my own domain. It’ll probably be blog.doriennesmith.com, but I haven’t decided yet. It’ll be a lot on how the website is going and the “hows” behind a lot of my updates.

I’m taking a web class right now, I try as I might, I can’t resist the temptation to show off a bit. Hopefully, my instructor won’t mind that I used XHTML 1.0 instead of the crap code they suggest in the book. I mean I want to scream just looking at the code they are suggesting for their readers; especially since the book is no more than two years old. In fact….okay, the book was published in 2002, which brings up a whole new set of issues. Why on earth are we using a book that’s this old in the first place, especially when the class is on the internet and standards and such change every few years. I mean, honestly: the book is telling people to use uppercase letters and inline presentational code! For a class like this, all the textbooks should be less than a year old. Otherwise, the information is most likely ridiculously out of date by the time class starts. For that matter, I don’t see why a textbook is needed when the W3C is online all the time and holds free information for anyone who wants it; not to mention something simple like w3schools.

Speaking of being annoyed by this web class: we are forced to create our web project. (basically just a simple web page), using Geocities, which both “sucks and blows.” It is so irritating to go through all the work of creating beautiful code that validates using a Strict doctype and have to throw the whole thing in Geocities, which flays my code into some horrifying monster with its stupid and unvalidating side bar. Speaking of validation, I don’t know why I love, or am obsessed over having my code validate. It’s as if seeing the green “Passed Validation” page gives a bit of validation to my life….

Anyway, I always feel bad when I do work on my own website instead of making more progess on my church’s site. I think it’s just that there’s so much more to do for the church site. I mean I’m practically rebuilding the entire site. I’ve got the layouts already sketched out, but it’s matter of going through the daunting task of making my designs come to life in the code. Some things just are feasible from my inexperience, which means loads of time asking questions on Coding Forums and then waiting for answers, not mention all the new things that I need to create my “vision” for the site. (Sigh) There’s just so much to do, but one step at a time I suppose.

Last week looked like the end of my relationship with my mother. Honestly, it looked like we may never be on good terms again. That is, until I got a good look at what other people have to go through with their parents….It was only then that I realized how lucky I was to be in my situation, but have a clear, defined way out of it and with the support needed to keep me from failing. I’m just glad that Jesus helped me stay calm enough from going off the deep end and saying or doing things that could not be taken back later. I was so emotionally I had to revert back to the “Tweety Book,” my old handwritten journal, mostly because my language was getting slightly out of hand and there were things I need to write down that really are not meant for the internet. That’s something I think a lot of people don’t understand about the internet and blogs. EVERYONE can read them, and even if they’re are private, if someone wanted to, they could get to it still. I’ve never put anything on the internet that I didn’t want to be shown to the world. Pictures I would have problems explaining or truly personal moments don’t belong on the internet.

Anyhoo – It’s time to get ready for Sunday School. I haven’t been to Sunday School, literallly since I was seven years old, so this will be a sort of adventure in itself. We’ll see how it goes…

In my life I’ve faced
Many trials
And also tribulations,
And I know
That many
Too many
Far more strenuous exercises
Lie in my path ahead,
But now
Right now,
I simply feel empty.

I know
Really, I know,
When one door closes
Another will open.
I know
Honestly, I know,
Jesus will guide me
Every step into the light.
This is part of a plan
However unpleasant
And I must go through with it.

One day, someday,
Hopefully,
I’ll look back on this and smile,
But now,
Right now,
I simply feel empty.

I didn’t start this out as a poem,
It simply flowed.
What can I do
But make make myself feel better?
I trying restlessly
To not feel empty,
So very empty.

I helped a homeless man today.
Why?
Can’t say.

Maybe I just felt bad for him
This man
This white man
Who looked as if he had had every opportunity to succeed.
A pale face and blue eyes,
Sitting on a bench near campus
All I could think
Was, what had truly gone wrong in his life
That he, this man
This white man
Should be sitting
Begging
Asking for spare change
On a bench near campus?

Only questions came before me
As I past him by and by:
Why had God forsaken him so?
Did he believe in the same God that I know?
Was his begging only for show?
Did he look at me and see
Only a nigger, so low?

I passed him once and lied
“No spare change” says I
I passed again, but he remembered
And did not ask his question again.
I prepared to pass him thrice
When I heard him call out his words
“Please, I’ll take
A piece of pizza.
Not just change.
I’m starving here.”
I continued to walk
My own endeavour
Of finding that damn book
Maggie: Girl of the Streets
Now fleeting
I heard him say these words
And they struck a chord in me.
Had I not just passed a place
That sold pizza by the slice
For two bucks?
Had I not just pondered to myself
Whether I should splurge for pizza
Or stick to my goal of Chipotle for the day?
I had a choice
I had could make plans
I, who walked the street
In a Coach bag and sweatpants,
I, who’s “mommy” had come forth
To pay a ticket, one-thirty it cost,
So I would not have to give the money myself
I, who was about to go home play
On two personal computers
With everything in my life
Built my own way.
I, who had everything given to her
On a near silver platter
Everyday of her life…
Was I really going to walk on by,
Walk by as if I’d never heard his cry?

I had taken some steps to my car,
The car I took for granted each day,
When his words played through my head
Again and again.
How could I live with myself
For the rest of the day,
Seeing him thrice
And not giving a damn?
I would be no better than all those that I hate.
I would be the same as the greatest hypocrites to date.
The same, just the same.
Preach about poverty in America,
Write about utopian societies
Act like I really cared about my fellow man,
But walk on by like it did not matter,
Like his words has fallen on deaf ears.

When I’d first walked by him
I’d thought,
How could someone allow this to happen?
What had gone wrong in his life?
The second time I’d passed
It occurred to me.
I had no concept
Of poverty.
i could not believe
I could not conceive
Of a time or a place
That that could happen to me.
There were too many that loved
Too many that cared
Too many that knew me
To allow me to sit there.

And so his words echoed through my head.
And I thought of my soul.
How was I going to explain this to God.
Should that day come.
I heard and I felt for him
This man, this white man
But did nothing.
He was my brother through Eve
My family through Jesus
And yet I did nothing.

And so I stopped in mid sidewalk
Walk back to the shop
Where the little New York man
I’d conversed with many times before
Asked me what I wanted.
I bought a slice of plain cheese.
Two bucks, no drink.
I had things to do.
I was to be giving
But could not reliquish
That bitch within me
I returned to give
The man his requested slice
And found that he’d walked down the street.
Why?
I pondered then.
What should I do
Eat the pizza?
I bought it,
Why not.
Maybe go back and get a drink too.
The Christian in me
Or maybe it was only my humanity.
Picked up my feet
And I walked down the street.
Caught up with him and said,
“You’d asked for some pizza.
Here you go.”

He looked thankful,
So thankful
And told me such
I nodded and walked away
And while I walked
I saw them
Two white cops in uniforms white
Were coming to rustle
The “vagrants” from the area.
‘Course, the man had been loud
Not louder than too many others
I’d seen in that same spot,
But some uneased student
Or shopkeeper perhaps,
Had called the “po-po”
To remove this man
This white homeless man
From his bench.

I walked by the cops
And back to my car
No smile of self satisfaction
Came to my face.
No feelings of pride
Over what I had done,
No joy, no absolution
Nothing.

I helped a homeless man today.
Why?
Still, I can’t say.
I don’t feel like I’ll now go to heaven
For doing what was “right.”
I didn’t know the man.
I didn’t know his story,
But I just felt after all that I have
After all I’ve done.
I could spare five minutes
To help another.
Perhaps he won’t remember me;
Perchance, I won’t he,
But at least for one moment in my life
I did something,
Not because I felt God watching,
Not because I would feel like a better person for doing so,
Not because I felt my one act could save humanity.
I did something
Just because I wanted to.

(3/8/2006)

I’m feeling better today. Maybe it was that I got to veg and watch tv for a bit. Maybe it was the good night/morning’s sleep I got. Or perhaps that I was up until the wee hours of the morning cleaning and getting myself prepared for today. It was probably the latter.

I’m no better shape than I was days ago, but at least I feel like things have the possibility of going up instead of further into the abyss.

Tonight, I am going to sit down and really write for once. I’m going to try to get as much done as possible on MMS. The entire ending will probably need to be re-written, so I know I’ll have to just sit down and write it out. I waste too much time trying to think creatively on a computer. It has never worked in the past and I don’t see as how it will start now.

Also, he wishes to speak to me about everything. I don’t really know what’s left to say. Basically, his actions have caused me to lose faith in everyone I know. And unfortunately for him, I’m not her. I don’t forgive and forget. I knew they were going to get back together; it was almost a given. I’m just happy that after a few months, the whole thing will no longer a problem of mine. I want to say vindictively that I can’t wait for him to show his true self all over again to her and for her to be just as angry about, but go right back into it, but I don’t truly feel that way. I’m fine with whatever because come September, this will cease to be my problem.

But now, for a shower and some preparation for class today. Hopefully, I’ll make some headway in the re-write….