My So-Called Strife

I'd recently had a conversation with a friend about going into my blog archive to find an older post, and he opened up quite the collection. He mentioned there was two years of blogging and I thought,"Wow, has it been that long?" Apparently. I told him that that was way too much baggage...I mean bloggage to sort through. It's been quite the journey thus far and, recently, I've certainly attracted more than a few critics.

In May I upset a reader so much that, out of respect, I had to remove the blog...for now! I'd also found myself receiving a wide array of reactions. Most people find me to be generally amusing and even some may say I'm whitty and well-spoken. You're not a true creator unless you warrant the negative attention too, however.

Most of my blogs are personal diatribes about my life conquests, failures and success. Some allow you to see how crazy I am in actuality, and some dare to reveal my vulnerability. My readers who know me best, come to find me more endearing, and those who don't are often stunned by my verbal prowess and less-than-lady-like attitudes.

Some days I feel like I'm so crafty and mysterious but others, I'm pretty blatant and ruthless with my views. I like to think I offer a simple love-hate relationship with my writing and that goes the same with my personality. When growing up in a world where appearance is everything, living up to a desperate need to look civilized and put-together becomes part of the routine quite easily.

I do give off a specific persona of being ordinary, but we all have our secrets, our intrigues, and our insanities hidden behind the exterior; it's what keeps us interesting!

I've found out recently that, rather than offend by what was said, I really offend but what's done. People like to think I'm a certain way, they see me as a polite, amiable litte thing, who's pretty complacent overall. It's a decent act to keep people at bay. From day to day, I am relatively ordinary, but as I get comfortable you'll see the sassy, sarcastic, and loud version that is Alison, and she comes out to take names and kick ass. I feel like the people who meet that Alison should be flattered; you've passed the test. Others shouldn't be offended that she doesn't come out to play, rather, be appreciative that I'm attempting to respect you enough to keep her under wraps. When she comes out, she will offend you, but that's just her.

Wait, I think I just spoke of myself in the third person. How "Me, Myself and Irene" of me! I realize not everyone wants to read my bitching, or listen to it. I realize, for some, it's too much information, but the thing is, if I can get someone to relate and feel better by unleashing and posting these rants, my work is done! What more can a writer ask for?

Some readers may think, "What the hell does this chick have to complain about?" We are all lucky and unfortunate in our own special ways. But remember, as I've made very clear in past posts, what makes my shit more important that everyone else's, is that it's MINE. Really I'm just inviting my readers to bask in and enjoy my complaining and join in. After all, misery loves company.

I have come to a more recent realization, however, that upsetting people with my words is a powerful thing. Some may see me as two-faced, sitting here, hiding behind my shitty, Dell laptop and being pissed off at the world. I get it. I've had to own my anger and that's been quite the battle. I am an angry woman and every once in awhile it rears it's ugly head in some risky situations. I've seriously wrestled with not letting it overtake me. As someone raised by an extremely hateful person, becoming like her is my greatest fear. As annoying as people are, it's a lonely life without people around, even the ones we choose to dislike.

There's nothing in this blog, or any, I wouldn't reveal to someone in person. There's no cryptic or underlying messages that aren't eventually put in plain sight in my pieces. Anyone can whine and moan about life, but I'd like to think that making it fun, poetic, and verbally interesting is a gift I possess. I may be tooting my own horn but, people do read my stuff, even if afterwards they find it to have been a kind of waste of their time!

Mostly I'm just sorting through the crazy workings of my own mind in my free time, with this blog as the victim. Or I'm trying to keep my friends updated on my life, reassuring them I'm still just as off-the-wall as ever. I've tried to be aloof, puzzling and provoke some serious thought into secret messages with my creations before, and usually it's an inevitable fail.

I'm such a musical fiend that one time, I made a genuine "mix cd" for an old friend, complete with songs that meant something real and deep, and I forced him to listen to it in an attempt tho have him to decode the secret message: "You're upsetting me beyond belief, and tearing me apart." At one point he just commented on how random the collection was and then asked if we could listen to something else because, I was well aware he didn't really like all my music. I'd even just put on one specific song from time to time, trying to scream the message out to him, and he'd be oblivious. The problem was, he just didn't care, he didn't want to know even if I was legitimately upset. So now, when you read an Alison Chriss blog, you don't have to read between the lines...just read the actual piece.

People, especially women, really need to find the hidden meanings behind words and actions. It's like a psychological thing. We waste years definining moments, sentences, situations and memories. They have classes in college called "Women's Studies," for Pete's sake! It's all about the context and perception with us; it's exhausting! We are mysterious gender for sure.

We are even worse with each other. If you tell a girl buddy that her boyfriend is "just okay," she may dump him over it. If you tell a girl a dress makes her boobs look big, she'll freak out because that means her boobs are usually seen as small. The drama is ridiculous.

I spent years playing and losing the game. Now I try to play straight, no bluffing. Every once in awhile I run into an angry, bad sportsman and we get into it, but I'd like to think I'm not a completely terrible human. A friend I travelled with in London, once told me that I'm actually pretty easy to read. I carry the weight of the world and it shows. He didn't mean this in a bad way. It was funny, actually, because here I am waltzing around, acting as though I'm such a wiley and wonderfully strange being, only to find that a guy who's a relatively new friend, can tell most of what I'm thinking just by paying attention. There goes my feminine mystique!

Sometimes my lack of subtle-ness gets me into trouble, but it can also help keep me out of the strife that keeps me blogging. If you've become a victim of the tales of the life I call my own, it's not a purposeful occurence. Although I'm easily labelled as a "bitch," my intent is never to hurt or piss off anyone. If I really wanted revenge, I could do it. That's the angry, bitch side of me. If I'm going to attack you, it won't be some shady blog post. I'll say it to your face if I'm seriously upset with you. I'm not saying I've never talked about someone behind their back and never engaged in the ever-prevalent "shit-talking" session but I'll tell it to you straight if there's a true problem.

I'm still a big kid, overall. Becoming an adult blows! Who wants to do that? But I'd like to cast myself as someone grown up enough to at least play the good part. I'm not going to hide from people, situations and things just because I may upset someone. When you're around people, you're bound to clash and turn heads. It's a part of life. Our divine drama and ability to overdramatize is what actually seperates us from the animals...maybe I should stop writing and just start throwing feces.

I've weathered enough storms to keep a raincoat and umbrella handy. Does that say enough? What exactly would qualify me to be acceptable? Or what qualifies as unacceptable, I guess? There are some life questions to answer...

Even if this rambling incites some other reactionary measure causing my mind to spin further, I'll still going to keep on keeping on. I'd felt as though my ability to abuse this blog and create verbal masterpieces was taken away once before, and I won't allow myself to feel that badly ever again. I am who I am, I do what I do, and even when the clusterfuck hits, I will prevail.

I'm an artistic creature by nature and that's something you just can't un-do. It may be a flaw, it may be a quality found less than attractive, but it's me. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I fuck up but I won't wallow in regret. I own my mistakes and my fucked-up-ness. I own the fact I can be an angry, prickly, bitch. I'm not afriad to offend.

Perhaps it's a defense mechanism coming out to claim it's hostages, but I've let a lot of people into my circle of unrelenting truth, only to have them betray my confidence and be forced to kick their asses out of it! I do live and learn so, I'm able to weed out the good and bad better than past situations as each day passes. You have to work to get me to let you in. Perhaps if you break down the wall you'd join the ranks of the friends I amuse the hell out of, instead of those pissed off who add me to their "Shit list." Oh, come on, we all have one!

In the end, my so-called "strife," may be nothing but another day in the life and times of Alison. I may be over-dramatic and whiny but I don't feel like I'm pretending to be otherwise. If after two years of blogging, countless memories made, amazing days and horrific ones, someone is still reading my random musings, I consider myself to be doing okay. Even if this all ends up being nothing but a mental release for a live journal, it's a better way to spend my time than watching hours of Netflix Instant Queue!

Perhaps I'm just one entry away from insanity, but then again maybe one of my readers looked at this, laughed, and continued the day with a smile...I guess we'll see!

Clusterfucked...

I guess I'll just jump in and say that my husband and I are not the average, American married couple, and I'm anything but an average girl. We don't have an obscene amout of credit card debt- a little under $5,000-ish -we don't own fancy things, we share one car, we still have a tube TV, and my father branded into me the idea of living simply. My husband encourages me to live even simplier...so not a word.

I don't buy new clothes and shoes all the time, and when I do, they are purchased at Target, TJMaxx and Ross. We don't go to fancy restaurants, buy expensive drinks and such. We are pretty chill for the most part. Where does all our money go? Plane tickets, a splurge on concerts, or we turn to the credit cards for the, "Oh, shit" fund.

We rarely ask for help although who doesn't love monetary presents? But June kicked some Chriss' asses and man, today was the day of relief, worry and a damn good cry.

I'm pretty obsessive about budgeting and in turn, I've made Eben the same way. We rarely "overspend." But when it came to vacation this year, we just accepted our defeat. It cost us over $1,000 to fly home to Oregon. Eight hundred round trip for us and $250 to take the the dog with us, which we rationalized because he was little, we could take him as carry on and it was "cheaper than boarding him!" So, the tickets, the bags, the Brodie and everything was put on the credit card.

In the midst of this we are also in an amazing transitional phase where the old will be out and in will come the brand new, so balancing the two became quite the act! So Eben had just been awarded vacation pay, which we knew we'd have to pay rent. We also knew this fall, his pay would change again so we'd figured, we can deal with this later, we can wait! Fun now, pay later!

One glorious day an American Express application came with my name on it and I thought....oooh, now I'm a grown up. So we discussed it and I said, "It might be nice to have this as part of the 'Oh, shit' fund and then on the trip we just don't have to care as much." So I applied and got accepted. I kept my fingers crossed that I would get it in time for vacation so we'd have it for the incidentals and it showed up two days before our flight!

So off we went for the grand Oregon adventure. I swiped that AMEX like nobody's business! Not to mention it saved us in the long run anyway. Half of the crackpot plans we did have in place before we left got changed three days before, anyway so the card just helped us cover the bases no one else could.

We didn't over-spend too much on vacation. It helped us have a lot of fun and do the things we didn't think we could otherwise. I didn't even want to know how much, still don't! When we came home we thought we'd go back to work and be hardworking Americans who slowly pay down their luxuries. But does any story end that way? Of course not.

Eben went back to work for two days before the Clusterfuck cloud rained down on us. On a regular Monday afternoon while watching some comedy special on the Netflix queue and eating a homemade salad things went a bit crazy. I was in my undershirt and underwear getting ready for work when I sat down to eat for a moment and it all took a turn for the scary.

Eben was sitting there staring and looking strange. I joked, "You look disgruntled babe, do you not want to watch this?" All of the sudden his head nodded down low and he went ghost white! He put his salad down and his eyes opened wide and glossy, his body tensed up and he started shaking and having tremors. Every few minutes he would breathe in short, exhaulted breaths, hyperventilating. He couldn't talk. He looked at me like he could hear me but couldn't make out the words. Something was wrong. I panicked.

I fumbled with my phone to call work and say I couldn't come in. I couldn't dial, I could barely think. I called three people in hysterics, probably scaring the shit out of all of them and needed to get Eben some help! Clusterfucked: do we have insurance? NOPE! We're healthy twenty-somethings and it's not in the budget. Off to the walk-in Urgent Care we go!

I shakily get him into the car. He's only half aware of what just happened. I'm crying and swearing. I threw on some crappy, terry-cloth, way-too-short, shorts and a t-shirt and grabbed my flip flops. The poor dog just looked bewildered. We walked into the clinic and I told them he may have had an allergic reaction. They took him back immediately with about 5 other people in there that had been waiting before him just looking annoyed, and I started to fill out paperwork.

The asked me to come back immediately. His eyes were glossy, his memory foggy and when he stuck out his tongue it drooped to the left. They said, "You need to get him to the emergency room right now, it's neurological, and preferably get him there by ambulance." The hospital was across the street. The walk-in clinic didn't even let me finish filling stuff out. They didn't make us pay. I got him to the ER and they took one look at him: "Do you need a doctor?"

Clusterfucked: He was so trembly and trying to piece it together, and the circus began. They asked us what happened in admissions, he gave a full medical history and lack of insurance information. The stress hits me. We move to the emergency room. Who to call, who not to call, what to do? Luckily it was his day off, but it was safe to say he wouldn't be in tomorrow. Thank goodness I had two days off in a row!

The dog! We had to get someone to care for the dog. This is what was racing through my mind. I hate hospitals! Then the waiting game. We had to listen to the amazing bronchitis woman in the next area over, the wheezy lady, Senorita Spanish in pain screaming, "Hay dios mio!," and the gal beside us with a broken bone arguing with everyone. And we just waited for each nurse, doctor, and assistant to come in and let us perform the who-what-when-how ritual. It was 4pm and I was exhausted.

I finally called for back up. The only person who I knew wasn't going to be inconvenienced was my friend from work, whom coincidentally also loved our dog. She came a running. She was amazing and then came the question: "How's Eben?," followed by, "And how are you?" Me, I couldn't even think about me. Me wasn't important...everything else was.

Clusterfucked: They have to test him for everything from epilepsy to stroke. It was likely to be a seizure...then it WAS a seizure. They were keeping him overnight. A ray of hope that Eben saw as a sign because she shared the name of his Grandmother Chriss, came in to give us all the financial help papers. We could deal with all this later. Those bills wouldn't show up any time soon right? I could feel the stress in my ears and toes. This was bad.

Brodie goes with Auntie Em and I come home to pick up the house a bit. It's a scary place without him. Thank goodness for good friends and family checking on us. I'm already calculating the bills in my head and it hurts. I'm ready to put some family members on my speed dial but I'm not ready to fully surrender yet. It's only the first night.

Anti-seizure medicine is on. He's on a liquid diet. MRI at 4am. Neurological tests at 11am day two of the hospital. No food yet. Dinner and no test results. They've taken his blood four times. The IV in his arm is killing him, time to move it. New IV on the hand. The second night I cave and go home with the dog. Our friends visited him in the hospital.

If it weren't for the dog spooning me, I may not have slept. Plus I knew they finally fed Eben. MRI comes back fine, blood work is fine. No word on the neurological results on day three. Ultrasound for the blown out IV. Now he may have cellultitis. The saintly woman comes back to say we qualify for help. We wait. He has a clot in a superficial vein; very painful. We also find out he has sleep apnea and an extremely immense sinus infection. The results are in: small grade seizure, a combination of stress, sinus infection, travelling, and pressure changes gave him a neurological meltdown. No epilepsy. We're hoping for a one time freak accident!

They let us go home. Eben's still shaky and tired but all he wants is to see the dog. We drop off his presciptions at Wal-Mart. Clusterfucked: It's going to be almost 200$! Hello AMEX! We have almost no food. Hello AMEX at Applebees! We're stewing...should we ask for help or wait and see? We waited a lot. Things weren't working. Paychecks were small because of vacation, things were happening late. Bills were wiping us clean and I was desperate for interaction outside of my home. I'd never been so happy to be back at work.

Eben was exhausted and in pain. At home he puttered around the house. He cleaned, cooked, watched TV, played with and walked the dog. He was definitely taken down a few notches but he was stressed about going back to work. He didn't want anyone to fuss about him. It had been an emotionally tumultuous week and I'd had to talk myself into not crying wolf, but finally caved in to asking for help.

Clusterfucked...it was just too much. I started writing these cryptic, angry Facebook statuses and couldn't cry but needed to. Besides Eben, I only had one ally. She told me it was okay to ask for help. It was okay to ask for a lot of help. Eben's Dad was on a military kind of social security budget, my dad just got out of the hospital himself. Eben's mom was great for immediate help but what about next month? We needed to call the wonderful OZ of our family. I was going to shoot high and ask for a lot. Why not? Even if he said no, I'd still taken a leap. I didn't expect the moon but I can hope!

He knew when I called. He's that kind of guy. He asked what he could do to help. I gave him the first offer. It threw him! "What do you need that kind of money for?" To break even I thought! To wipe the slate clean! I immediately became upset and embarrased. I'd gone too far. It was too familiar for him. Like the days when my mom would hit him up for ridiculous amounts. I just estimated the total of those bills and got antsy. Now I felt bad.

I'd asked for a loan. I wanted to pay it back in installments but he said he'd give us a smaller gift instead. Now I just hoped Obama would pay for our entire hospital stay out of his pocket, if I filled out the right paperwork and wrote him a nice note. I found myself searching for one of those posters with the kitty that says, "Hang in there," just to give me some self assurance.

I text my cousin and bore my soul! I told him I shot high and hit rock bottom and felt so terrible for doing that. He told me that's what family is there for, and asking for help is okay, he does it all the time. I felt a bit better.

Clusterfucked: Eben and I feel like failures. We've paid our dues and we don't expect much. That's exactly why I shot so high. We never expected to be given that much -if any- but damn it, if we could just have it to solve our problems and only owe our family we'd do it. I didn't want this to come up at family dinners. I didn't want them to feel like we were broke, lesser beings. But then I started wondering, which let me to start talking to people and I realized, everyone does it!

I think our entire universe is in some kind of debt. Some people don't even care! I bet my entire family has thousands, upon thousands of dollars worth of credit card debt and then some. But we all hide it so well. If we have money to go out, or at least to appear to do so, we're fine. It's all about keeping up appearances. Any sign of weakness is unacceptable!

I'm still stewing a bit, with worry and stress to boot, but we got some help. We really got all we needed. Then I thought about how awesome my bargaining skills were. If I'd shot too low, we may be worse off - haha, kidding - but instead I negotiated myself a payment of rent for August in case it all really went to shit!

I wish we could get past this. I wish Clusterfucked was just a really bad ass word we'd say in jest, instead of the epitome of our situation but it is what it is. Twenty years from now when we get these kinds of phone calls from our neices, nephews, and kids of our own we'll remember that they helped us. So when they ask us for $10,000 to help, because by that time it'll be the equivalent of what $5,000 pays for today, we'll say, "Instead of loaning you that much, I'll just give you $3,000 as a gift and we'll call it even. Take care of yourself and things will get better."

We have to believe that things happen for a reason and this was all a sign. We have to remember that many people have it far worse than we do and that the Clusterfuck is an artful thing, a learning experience really! At the end of the day, we are surrounded by some seriously amazing people and we can still laugh. That's all there is!