itsjoysworld.net

Monday I drove the three hours it takes to get to my parents home. I promised them that I would deliver a couple of things to them, and decided to just make the trip. The house that they live in now is not the house that I grew up in. I actually lived in it for a little over a year, before I decided that I should move to Texas for a guy I met on-line. (yes I know) (NO REALLY I KNOW)

My parents are some of my biggest supporters. I can do no wrong in their eyes. Yes, I have them completely fooled. I only stayed a half the day, but it was refreshing to see them. I got to meet my nephew (don’t faint ladies. He is only a dog.)

I guess I should explain that one. My brother although he is six years younger than I am, got all of the looks. I don’t know how it happened. He is handsome, and he knows it. Don’t believe me? When we were younger I had to have this conversation with many, many, many girls.

Some random girl drooling over my baby brother, “That’s your brother?”

Me rolling my eyes, “Yes”

Stupid girl with her eyes now glazed over at my brother, “Same parents?”

Me trying not to rip her arm off and beat her with it, “Yes”

Random girl now walking past me on a mission, “OMG, he is so handsome. You guys look nothing alike.”

I would put a picture of him on here, but then you guys would try and find his blog.

Anyways…what was I saying.

Oh, so I had a good visit with my parents and brother. I got to talk to my mom about a situation that I have been avoiding like the plague, and she gave me information that will allow me to continue to avoid it with less panic. Ahh..mom thanks.

Cutest mom ever.

I should have grabbed the picture with my dad in the kitty ears. Damn. Next time.

Now, I always try and go through my room when I am there. My bedroom is set up like a shrine. The museum of Joy. I am guessing that October is going to be the month for time travel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aizCMO-mI1Q

I feel awful that my room is dedicated to me. I always try to get rid of the clutter. My parents don’t mind, and tell me not to bother but I can’t help it. I was able to go through about three boxes, and threw away a lot of stuff. It cracked me up to find a lot of my old writing. Most of it is cringe worthy, but it shows that I had some type of writing virus even when I was young.

While going through some boxes I realized that Breaking Faith has accomplished what I wanted it to do. I used the process of writing Breaking Faith as a way of finally putting an end to my past. I was pretty much done with living in the past, this just sealed it away into a locked box to be thrown to the bottom of the ocean. (Hopefully it will get a couple sharks on the way down. Fuckers.)

The reason I know that Breaking Faith did its job. I found these in one of the boxes, and felt nothing.

Now during my time in Texas I would have been smart to buy stock in Post-its. These were the only three that I kept. These three were very significant in my old life. They signified a physical object that I felt I needed to validate my sanity.

After I post this I will be throwing them away because I don’t need the validation of them anymore. These are no longer my life, and in all honesty I forgot about them until I saw them. (Yes, my top lip moved. So, we know I wasn’t lying. Or was it my ears wiggled. Hmm.)

I felt nothing when I saw these.  I realized that I don’t care about that anymore. I knew that I was there, but seeing these and feeling nothing was a huge thing for me.

I stopped working on Breaking Faith for awhile because of something that happened with one of my readers. She called me crying about some of the things that I have Faith go through. I freaked out. I don’t want sympathy when people read this book. I want them to be entertained, and hopefully they want to read the next installment.

After seeing these, and feeling nothing I knew that Breaking Faith went beyond what I needed it to do for me. I have been going through and editing parts that I wrote for me and really have nothing for the readers. It is now a book. It has a beginning a middle and some kind of ending. (I need some stuff to go on for the next book 😉 )

I have moved on to another point in my life. It is exciting. It is scary. It isn’t me dragging along the past.

We all have triggers that when we see, smell, or hear them we are hurtled back to the past.

Every October I am thrown back to my Junior year in high school. I forget all about it and then boom. I am thrown back in Mr. Guests Honors English 3 class.

My Junior yearbook pic.   Mr. Guest

I am sure you are wondering, what is this time traveling object that only comes out in October . . .

The answer . . .these mother fuckers.

If you have never experienced a Caramel Apple Pop, please let me explain. This evil candy is a green apple lollipop, covered is sticky caramel. They are addicting.

During October my junior year my lunch consisted of one of these suckers (haha) and a Pepsi.

The green apple part of the sucker is thin, and the caramel gets warm in your mouth. They become very pliable, after a minute in your mouth. I need to explain, they will be in your mouth over a minute because the caramel gets stuck to your teeth and it takes forever to extract it.

Before going into Mr. Guest’s class I removed the stick, and molded the sucker to the top of my mouth. I really didn’t think anything of it.

I talked a lot in English class. I used to love discussing books that we were currently reading. Mr. Guest knowing I would never shut up, hardly ever called on me.

Except, for this one fateful day where I had a damn Caramel Apple Pop molded to the top of my mouth.

I can’t remember what he asked me, but when I opened my mouth. A glob of caramel apple flavored spit plopped out of my mouth and landed on my desk.

Everyone was staring at me, as I removed this retainer like piece of candy. I started laughing hysterically as I cleaned up my slobber.

So, my time warp happened a couple of weeks ago. I am once again addicted to them, and will most likely get another bag before they evil suckers are pulled off of the shelves. At the end of the season they will go into hibernation. I will forget about them as the months go by, only to be thrown back into Honors English 3 next October.

I have a particular disorder I think the medical term for it is…avoidance. I am not sure if that is the actually term. I have a bad habit of ignoring anything that is uncomfortable.

I have decided that my name will also shape my outlook on the world. I try to make everything happy.  Unicorns shit rainbows and pee glitter, that sort of thing. I also have long term relationship with avoiding conflict.

I have mastered the five D’s…Dodge, Duck, Dip, Dive, and Dodge.

I astounds me how other people have no problem with conflict.  They seem to be best buddies.  In fact if I were conflict, I would seriously think about getting a restraining order out on some people.

Now, I am not saying that speaking your mind is a bad thing. In fact I not so secretly wish I could be more assertive with my opinions.

The grass is always greener, and other cliches like that.

What I do have a problem with, is when people voice their opinions on others work negatively. Tear someone down for no reason except to be mean.

The past couple of weeks I watched an authors debut novel get annihilated in very personal  degrading reviews. They were painful to read.  I understand that not every piece of creativity is for everyone.

Someones passion may not be for you, and it is ok to voice that.  It is not ok to be mean about it.

Who cares if wasn’t your cup of tea (or super big gulp of Diet Pepsi.) You can state that.  You can even explain why it wasn’t for you.  A review like that may help someone out that would enjoy that piece.

For example . . . I am not a huge fan of pain. There are a lot of books out there, thanks to Kindle allowing books to be anonymous, that have S/M in them.  Pain and sex is not my idea of a good time.  (A little biting and hair pulling that’s fine, but don’t hurt me.) My aversion to pain stems from my ex, and I feel my excuse will stand.

With the amount of S&M books out there I feel like I am a minority. That is ok. This is just my opinion.

If I read a book that I don’t particularly like, I will still leave a good review. What I don’t like may be the draw for another reader. Who am I to judge what others enjoy. I wouldn’t dream of giving a bad review. I have stated reasons why the book wasn’t particularly my Diet Pepsi, but I  also explained that if a person is into…blocka, blocka, and blocka that they should consider reading that particular book.

I would never think  of criticizing someone and crushing their dream. Not that others peoples words should kill someones passion. Yeah, it will hurt because it is yours, but really, fuck-em’

Who cares what anyone thinks of something that you love to do.  As long as it isn’t hurting you or others, have at it. (I need to insert that sometimes doing something you love hurts you, because you are putting part of your soul inside of it. That is different.)

If you are able to make a living off of something you love, hop the fuck on that gravy train. If you have to supplement income do that. Don’t stop doing something that you love just because someone doesn’t like it. If you like it, someone out there will like it.

Just remember to treat other peoples art as you would want yours to be treated. Even if you don’t like it, there are others that will.

Uniqueness is what makes the world go round. This has been a service announcement from your local Batman.

Mother nature decided to flex her muscles this week before succumbing to the choke hold of fall.

We had three days of 106′ weather. It was fucking dreadful. My tiny brain was unable to handle the heat, and decided to try to force itself through my eyeball in search of colder temperatures. In short, I had an awful mind shattering migraine.

I now have three post in drafts, but I was unable to come up with an ending for them.

My mind is still healing from the pain that was enforced on it.

I almost skipped this week of blogging, instead I decided to go for a laugh.

About a week ago one of my family members went to visit my grandma and grandpa’s grave. It is about four hours away, so I rarely get around to visiting. 😦

I started to think about the two of them, and the impact they had on how I turned out. LOL

I will share stories of my grandma, soon. She was just as awesome as my grandpa was.

They recognized that I was different. I was the odd duck of the bunch. (I will admit this because they don’t read my blog, but I have a gorgeous family. Seriously, I never felt like I fit in with them.)

My grandpa used to tell me to own my weirdness, and I am sure you can tell I took his advice.

One day when I was little (I couldn’t have been over ten) my cousins and I were playing in the sprinklers. It was a scorcher. One of my cousins pissed me off (I couldn’t tell you why) and I scratched her. Of course I got in trouble.

My grandpa took me in the house. I was crying. I never had my grandpa get mad at me before. It was devastating.

He looked at me, and told me. “Joy Eileen, I am going to count to three and clap my hands together, and I want you to scream like I spanked you.”

I  was crying even harder not really understanding what was going on. I remember sobbing, “No, grandpa.”

He started to count.

One…

Two..

Th…

I should have explained that heat, and stress do not mix well with me.

Before he could finish saying three. My nose spurted blood like it was a blocked fountain that had just been unblocked. I sprayed all over my grandpa’s flannel button down shirt. We stared at each other as my nose continued to convulse blood. Springing to action he ran outside to get my grandma.

When all of my cousins saw my grandpa’s blood soaked shirt they started screaming and running around saying,

“grandpa killed Joy”

The heat reminded me of this story.

I couldn’t think of what to write this week, and so I decided to go with something that makes me smile.

I promise next week will be better. Unless it isn’t.

I  have plunged myself into some major renovating. No, I haven’t decided to do any home remodeling or DIY projects. I have not harassed the Home Depot employees to find out if the black caulk is bigger than the white. (That was a home renovation joke,people.  Get your mind out of the gutter.)

I have cut, and pasted my non existent ass away as of late. I will not go into the details, because honestly I am not ready for that. I have been dragged out from under my blanket fort, and shoved into the real world. I am not sure if I am thankful or upset, for that shove. My blanket is really really comfortable, and hide me from the outside world. They are nice to me.

I removed myself from my renovations when my eyes started to go cross. To get my mind out of the zone, I did what any normal person would do, I looked around on Facebook, and realized I may not be a real writer.

Let me tell you why….

Every post I read from an author, I am not kidding, everyone of them mention wine. They were all snuggled up to their computer, with a glass of wine.

Yeah no, not me.

When I was three, a bottle of wine tried to kill me.

True story.

I don’t know what really happened. When I ask my dad about it, all he will say is “there was so much blood” before he turns green and walks away. My mom isn’t much help either, when I ask her, all I get is, “You were so brave.” Whatever the fuck that means.

All I know for certain is I was in a rogue shopping cart that decided to flip, and a wine bottle was shattered on me. Twenty three stitches, and to this day some very ugly scars, I survived. I know it sound sketchy, but this is all I have ever been able to garner out of my parents.

Because of this, the smell of wine makes me sick. I have tried, I really have tried, but I just can’t do it. I have cringed through a couple of glasses in my life, just so I would fit in. I have also “accidentally” spilled a couple of glasses, and watered many plants.

(Another secret of me trying to fit in. When I lived in Texas all the women drank beer out of bottles. I couldn’t, and still can’t drink beer. To me it tastes like bitter bread in a bottle. Now, being a California girl in Texas I had certain stereotypes pressed upon me. I already did not fit in, but I am a problem solver. I flashed the bartender, and in return he would pour my strawberry daiquiris into a beer bottle. BOOM.)

Ok, where the hell was I. Oh, yeah. Nasty wine.

I can’t do it.

My drinking preferences are that of a fifteen year old girl. I have been known to describe my cocktail of choice to the bartender by telling them it needs to be… pink, green, blue, or taste like candy.

Honestly, I don’t really drink that much either. I am a light weight, I mean it is pathetic how much of a light weight I am. When I go out with friends (once or twice a year) I actually prep for the evening if I know there is going to be drinking.

Seriously, I make sure to down plenty of water, and stuff a piece of bread down my throat for good measure.

I am revealing this little secret, because none of my friends actually read this.

So, now you are wondering… what beverage do you partake in while writing until all hours of the night?

The answer Diet Pepsi. (The nectar of the fucking gods. Yes, the fucking gods. I think that they would be more laid back, than the non-fucking variety)

Sometime when I am feeling sassy, or I am in a major freak out I add a cap full of vodka. (birthday cake, marshmallow, or red licorice depending on my mood.)

Please, do not go into the horrors of drinking soda. I know them all. I don’t know if I have revealed this, but when I was in college I was a biology major. I am a super nerd, and I wear it proudly. I have taken classes, just because they sounded interesting. My counselors hated me. One actually gave me an exasperated sigh, when he asked why I took a biology of cancer class, and I told him because it sounded awesome. (It was. I learned so much from that class. The human body is fucking amazing.)

I know that my drink of choice is not good for me, but honestly I don’t care. I have realized that I am not the sophisticated writer. So while all of you out there are creating these epic novels, while sipping on your chardonnay/Merlot my ass is slurping down a Super Big Gulp.

Another attempt at procrastination happened, when I pulled out my yearbook. I wanted to prove how deep my love for this drink goes. Also, I had to prove myself when someone didn’t believe me, that I was in fact, sucking down a Pepsi when the senior class photo was shot. Always ready to make a point, I pulled that massive fucker down to prove them wrong. I don’t make this shit up.

In my defense for this soda horror, they said that they were going to count to three before they snapped the picture. They fucking lied. Now when people look back on my life, and they are trying to describe me. They are now able to use the phrase… ” You know the girl who was drinking a Pepsi in her senior class photo.”

I guess there are worse things people could say about me.

For anyone that thinks I am a nice person, I’m sorry I am about to murder that notion. 

I was at Sam’s Club today, and I was in a weird mood ( I have been in this mood a couple days now. It is a mix between hyper, and feisty.) 

This poor unsuspecting snake oil salesman came up to me. He handed me a sample, all smiles having no idea what was about to happen.

The sample itself was a clear liquid with a tinge of pink coloring it. I tried it, nothing special. It tasted like it looked, liquid nothing with a tinge of taste. This poor salesman decided then to make a crucial mistake by talking, and I fucking pounced on that shit.

He asked me. “Wasn’t that amazing?”

I raised my eyebrow, and gave him a nod. 

 “What if I tell you it will make you lose weight.”

For a fraction of a second I was going to walk away. I looked down at my watch, realized I forgot to put one on about ten years ago, and decided I had time. 

“Did you just call me fat?” ( I know I am an asshole, just wait it gets worse)

“What, no. It is just the raspberry ketones target the belly and thigh fat, and shrink them down.”

All I heard was Wayne, and Garth yelling “GAME ON.” 

I let him finish his little spiel, and pounced.

“So, are these raspberry ketones born biased, or were they taught to hate?”

Poor guy had a chance to run away, but he didn’t.

He answers with a very articulate “Uhhhmmmmm”

I figured he wanted me to continue.

“Now, how does a raspberry ketones.know it is near belly and thigh fat? Are they like little homing pigeons (damn those pigeons are everywhere) and they target these offending cells with decimation as their only thought, or does belly and thigh fat have some type of genetic marker that sticks out. I can see it now, these ketones are riding along in the blood stream when they see this marker, and pull the string like you would in a bus “this is my stop, that fat is mine.” 

Poor Sam’s club dude was just staring at me at this point. I kept going.

” The only thing that about the genetic marker argument (I know, I am the one that brought this argument in play) is that I know a lot of people that have had fat removed from one area, to be placed in another area on their body (this is so there is no chance of rejection.) Now wouldn’t that mean that these cells would realize they are in the wrong spot, and migrate back to where they came from? You know to the same marker.” 

Poor guy finally found his voice. “I don’t know how it works, but I know it shrinks the cells”

Why didn’t he just shut up. At this point, I am simultaneously cringing, and jumping up and down clapping.

“Ok, now adipose tissue, oh I’m sorry fat cells, are attacked by little ketones that eat away at it? Fat cells have many different functions, but the ones
<!–more– that your ketones are after, are there for a reason. When a person ingests something and the body doesn't want it floating around, it creates a cell to store it in. It is like wrapping something potentially dangerous in bubble wrap. A lot of what is stored, is not good for your body. This is why when people lose a lot of weight really quickly they become sick. These cells are releasing some nasty toxic shit into your system. What you are telling me is your ketones are basically popping the bubbles around the nasty shit, getting it closer to the surface."

He still had not run away. I was shocked that he was sticking around this long. 

“Well, have you heard of (juicebag Dr. on T.V.) he endorses it.” 

“Ok, I know I don’t have time to get into that juicebag. This is a man with so much reach, not only is he a doctor, but he is on T.V. (which in our society means a great deal more) He could be helping so many people, but instead he endorses all of these fad diets and exercises. He frustrates the fuck out of me. He gives these quick fix solutions, and people believe him. Why research anything, when the doctor on T.V. did it for me?” 

And this was the statement that made poor Sam’s Club guy turn around, and walk away. 

Game over. Not sure if there was a winner, but I got a blog post out of it. SCORE