A New Day

The loud buzzer signals the start of a new day. I groan into my pillow. I want to punish the messenger. I briefly contemplate the damage I could do with one blow. The carnage of plastic that would litter my bedroom. The feeling of satisfaction at having destroyed the bane of my existence.

But it's not the alarm clock that makes me feel this way. It's not the alarm clock that whispers in my ear every morning upon waking "why bother?" It's not the alarm clock that pries its way inside my chest and replaces my heart with poison.

I drift back into blissful sleep until my enemy returns. I hit the snooze button two or three times more. Until it's inevitable. I must get out of bed. I must begin my day. I must put out of my mind, at least temporarily, the Thing that wants to steal my future and poison all that I hold dear.

It's a new day.

Some days...

The Hell Beast that is my boss has returned from her vacation. She was back one day and someone was fired. It seems that just when I think this place can't sink any lower I am awed by another ridiculous scenario. After messing around with this guy's hours (he worked as a printer upstairs doing signs and banners) he is then dragged downstairs and told to do Reception. This happened because while the Beast was away, the incompetent girl she hired to replace the competent woman who worked here for 20 years and finally quit because of her, also quit. He was doing fine when she returned from her vacation. She was back one bloody day before she fired him, saying she gave him a chance and it didn't work out. She is a liar. She tried to justify it to one of my coworkers by saying that "a man shouldn't be doing that job and I gave him a chance". I was not here when this all went down, but apparently, this very quiet, very soft-spoken guy just completely lost it. He even called her the 'C' word. I can't say that he wasn't justified. He called her on her bullshit, told her she is a horrible human being, and that he feels sorry for everyone who works here. She was apparently too shocked to respond. Kinda wish I had been here to see the look on her face, but knowing her like I do, I doubt any of it seeped into that thick skull of hers.

My two days off were pretty uneventful. I think I just wanted to delay working with my boss again. I will be going on my actual "vacation" to see my family in a couple of weeks.

I think I get migraine headaches. I always just assumed when I had a nasty headache like this one, that it was part of the flu or something else, but I do have some other symptoms. My dad and my sister also get migraines so I guess it runs in the family. I just wish I had inherited one good thing from my parents, but it seems like I only inherited the bad. I really thought I was going to have hair like my mom. She didn't discover her first grey hair until she was like 50 or something. I was pretty put out when I discovered mine a year ago. I always said that I wouldn't give in to the pressure to dye my hair once I started going grey. I said I would just let it all go naturally. I also said I would not give in to the pressure to cut my hair short once I hit a certain age. I'm still holding on to that one, but I don't know if I can picture myself with long grey hair. I feel old enough as it is, you know? It's funny how something so natural can feel so...wrong. It doesn't seem right that I am aging. It doesn't seem right that everything feels like it's going downhill before my real life has even started.

It may be pretty obvious from my blog, but I'm having a hard time finding anything to be happy about. And some days, it just doesn't seem like it's worth it. Some days...

What to do...

So, the disaster waiting to happen never happened. I was freaked out for nothing. And my bf didn't get to see his brother. Or meet his nieces and nephews. They came all the way to this province only to do their thing in another city, and turn around and go home. They were only three hours away as opposed to fourteen, and his brother didn't even bother. I can't say I'm not enormously relieved that they didn't come. But it sucks that my bf cancelled his holidays so that he could stay here and see them, only for them to not show. Now it's too late for him to book holidays.

And then there's me. I was so stressed about this for two weeks. Everyday I would learn something different about the situation, and if I was going to go home I had to ask for the time off sooner rather than later. So I have the time off, starting really, really soon, and I do want to see my family, but now it's a bad time. I feel bad for taking off on the bf when he is apparently unable to go anywhere, and to top it off, my hometown is on Evacuation Alert due to surrounding wildfires. There's an air quality warning because of the smoke, and my parents don't want to leave anytime soon to come here like I suggested. They were also disappointed about the timing of my potential visit because apparently what they actually wanted, was a little family reunion with my sister and brother-in-law in another city, at the end of the month. Now I have no idea what to do. I don't know if I can change my vacation time and I'm not sure I want to change it even if I can. I want to go home, but I don't want to breathe in smoke.

I am going to scream. I want a vacation. A real vacation. Where I do stuff. And have fun. But all I ever do on my time off is go home to visit the parents. I was hoping to make the best of it this time, and try to arrange camping and hiking and all sorts of outdoorsy-type stuff. But that's out due to the air quality.

What to do...