January 2, 2025

A Ghost Ship Sails Into 2025

I can’t let a New Year arrive and not do my usual post… I’m almost certain I’ve done one every Jan 1st since I started my first ever blog on Xanga. Granted, I am a little late by doing it on the 2nd. I was otherwise preoccupied yesterday as I was adhering to the restrictions of the “Cline – Hensley Christmas Truce of 2005.” I am proud to say that peace has been maintained for another year.

Before I go any further I must warn you that this is going to be sad. I don’t mean it to be. Nor am I trying to garner sympathy. I am just sharing my experiences within the wake of loss and grief. Just know I am fine. I am powering through. There is no hint or whiff of self-harm anywhere in my body. Were you to have metaphysical powers to examine me, all you would find is the comfort and acceptance I have for my own mortality. So, fear not dear reader!

There was an urge to write this last night before the day passed, but I couldn’t be bothered. At home all I have is my phone and, if I am feeling the energy to do so, I can lug my huge laptop into the living room where I balance it on my sweaty thighs to do my writing. Neither of those really spoke to me. Therefore I decided to wait until I was sitting in the office at my PC to quickly write this out. (I’m on commission. It’s fine.) And here it is:

I have no hope for this year. None. I do not think that it will be bad, which it most likely will, but I also do not think it will be good. I think we’re all going to collectively have another parade of lessons we better be prepared for, which I am certain no one is. If Covid taught me anything it is that society has an unhealthy amount of willful ignorance and stubbornness.

As I look into the stretch of another year spinning through the Milky Way, I lack any ambition or drive to complete anything. Most people have “Travel more” or “be more kind.” On the other hand, I just want to exist. I see no sense in trying to set up some ambitious goal I will most likely break. No grand pronouncement on some digital platform is going to force me into adhering to it. The fact of the matter is, I don’t care. I don’t see any hope or joy on the horizon, even when there is very much “joy” within sight.

I have a bunch of fun vacations planned throughout the year, but they pale in comparison to the fact that my job is only getting worse. Whether unintentionally or by design is yet to be seen. I’ve given my “boss” a year deadline and if Trump doesn’t magically turn the world into a wealth making machine “for everyone” then I’m fucked. So, in short, I’m fucked.

Do not despair, dear reader. I am not giving up without putting in the last bits of gusto I have left. I promised my husband I would complete my education to achieve the next step in my career. He had wanted me to do this while he was still alive, however caring for him at his whims and doing the courses would have genuinely driven me insane. I told him I was going to put a pin in that, but I promised, promised him that I would complete it once he was gone. It’s been over six months and I have at least purchased the required courses. They sit, unopened in my on-line school “library.” All I have to do is, well, do them. Once those are completed I take the required proctored exams for each one, apply to the state office, (if approved) take the ultimate exam for licensing and then pay the fee. So. No need to get overwhelmed. One thing at a time…

Some would say this is a New Year’s resolution but it isn’t. It’s baggage from a previous engagement. Again I am not in control of my own choices. I am bound to promises from long ago. Which is fine, not a complaint. More just another example that our lives don’t seem to belong to us, but rather to outside forces that tear at us from opposing sides.

I enter 2025 with no hope or promise, just apathy. I am an empty vessel. This may turn out to be a good thing. It leaves me at the ready for new experiences and opportunities. Ultimately this current state of existence protects me from the stress and anguish that is absolutely coming.

December 24, 2024

Rainy Day Ruminations

I like when I try to write a post that comes off more as a school essay than an artistic piece pouring forth from my soul. I prefer the ones that come in uninhibited. They exist to exist and serve no purpose other than to impart how I’m feeling in the moment. Think of them as literary snapshots. Little photographs I can look back on, if I ever decide to re-read anything I’ve previously posted, and say to myself “Man, I was feeling it that day.”

Today I started some ridiculous piece about how if the government banned tiktok it would do a huge disservice, other than breaking it’s only fucking laws. With the app I have learned so much about myself in this very roundabout way. Most of the videos that scroll across my FYP have to do with trauma. Haven’t a clue why… But the algorithm knows all, I suppose. I never thought I was one who had responded negatively to it. However one evening, wading the sea of my thoughts, it occurred to me that I have.

Growing up I was a very emotional child. My parents never were one to stop me from feeling them. The outside world on the other hand did not agree with this parenting tactic. So for all my mother’s efforts to make me emotionally mature, the populace had other machinations. And they will do everything to make sure they perpetuate the myth that everyone will and should fit into a mold.

As I grew up, my peers and mentors would tell me that I was being too emotional or over-dramatic. Whatever I felt or expressed was brushed aside. As a result, I chose to hide my feelings instead while suffering in silence. Regardless of my attempt my body refused to hide anything. It manifested as something else. Always. I imagine it is the same for most people. It’s why some turn to addictive substances. It’s numbing. Only then can we ‘fit.’

In the early days of dating my husband, I was already spiraling into alcohol addiction. He saw it VERY clearly. He even made a deal with me that if I stopped drinking, so would he. So, I got sober. However, without recognizing the trauma I was drinking to escape I instead to turned to sex. Having a chemical dispenser in my head, ever at the ready to dole out my own make of dopamine, was much easier to conceal and carry out.

This behavior was my husbands and my biggest hurtle. I regret so much of my past and how much I hurt him with the lies… He’s forgiven me but I can’t. I don’t like that I ever betrayed his trust.

This is the moment where I realize that this is why I write. I clack out my thought because I have all of these “big emotions” that society otherwise would tell me I’m being annoying or I need to get over. Here, on this blank page, I get to be myself. I can share on an open platform where someone, just maybe someone, will read it and I will be validated. I realized this last piece today. Finally all the points connected and I understood.

All it took was my husband dying.

So many people have graciously given me the space to share my emotions. Ones in which I thought I did not feel. Every day I worried I was some kind of monster, as if I was happy he was gone. Even though I know that is absolutely not the case. It is just that I have spent my entire life pretending to have no emotions because I was “too much” for some. And obviously I wasn’t meant to be around them, because the people who genuinely care about you will not feel that way.

When I hide my emotions they always, ALWAYS manifest as anger. Absolutely every time. Boys/Men are allowed to have anger. Anything else is unacceptable. The biggest flaw in that, especially with me, is as someone who feels things deeply my rage is worse. It’s compounded with my anguish/sadness/grief with the anger I feel with all of those in my past that told me I was too much and at society for forcing me to be a “man.” What was just a small fire has turned into an inferno.

The one person who understood all of this about me, who let me have my fits of rage, with patience, sympathy and grace, is gone. I am once again left to handle all of my feelings alone, or in blog posts, because I will always fear isolating myself with my feelings.

Merry Christmas.

December 21, 2024

For the longest time I thought there was something wrong with me because I never really “missed” someone. Not in the sense that their absence caused me pain. I would miss things I once did or situations but people was not one of them. This feeling was made worse because the moment my husband would leave me he would text and ask “miss me?” I didn’t. I never missed him. I rationalized it that I knew he was coming back. Once he returned I would be just as content as if he wasn’t with me.

Some time in the past couple years I learned that this is a trait of ADHD. We don’t miss people like neurotypical people.

I say all that to say that I miss my husband. Immensely. It’s not an obvious thought it’s more in the little things, like when all I want to do is to talk to him.

I know that at this point I’m just a broken record. I will make the same complaints now that I will in a few months because this missing piece is just not coming back. I will try to replace it but nothing can or will ever replace the giant hole he left in my life. He was a huge presence.

With the holidays I feel this more and more. I’m stressing about money like I never have before, and all that does is make me think of my husband. I was the irresponsible one who spent like it was going out of style, but here I am taking up the mantle.

Today I am just filled with irritable rage. Everything and everyone infuriates me. Even being alone makes me angry. Nothing can appease the emotions bubbling inside my chest.

December 11, 2024

Family Weekend

It’s been a busy month. So much and so little has happened that I’m a little overwhelmed on how to write it all out. Which is another reason why I’ve avoided writing. That and the fact that I have lost any and all interest in the things I once enjoyed.

The other night as I lay in bed, forcing my brain to shut the fuck up so I can sleep, it occurred to me that the things I once enjoyed doing (writing and performing) have gone away. Now I look at things like narrative arcs or turning myself into a character for the stage/screen with confusion and fear. I imagine that it’s just grief. Or, most likely, depression. In the past I used these things as outlets and now I could not even be bothered. I’d rather just sit. Looking at the TV or my phone has become my favorite past time. And I genuinely hate it.

The only way to get back to doing the things I love is to do them. It’s really quite simple. And if it turns out that I genuinely don’t enjoy these activities anymore, then so be it. Life is always changing. For the good and the bad.

This past weekend my whole family (my in-laws, brother hubs, and bf) all went to Vegas to celebrate my husband’s birthday. It’s the first one without him, since he came into my life. I wanted to mark it with something notable. When the BF was offered a comped suite at the Rio, we booked it for this weekend. All 8 of us filled the room for three days, and it was wonderful. On my husband’s actual birthday, we went to a drag brunch, my family got to experience Omega Mart at Meow Wolf, and then in the evening we ate an amazing dinner at a high dollar restaurant. If my husband had been there, I think he would have enjoyed it too. And maybe he did…

The first morning in Vegas my brother hubs and I got some very bizarre news. We are distantly related by blood. We both had suspicions when his aunt told us, during our first and only visit to her place in Texas, that there were some “Hensley’s” in their family tree. I was taken aback because my surname is very unique and if you encounter one in the wild, there is a 80% chance I am related to them. Every generation preceding me had 6-12 kids a each. Legitimately. I am one of the few branches to only have a single child.

When Ancestry had a special on the DNA kit I bought one for the brother-hubs because I HAD to know. Plus it would make for a serendipitous coincidence.

The only part I don’t quite understand is that when I search for him, nothing comes up. HOWEVER, when I search for his aunt our DNA matches are either: half third cousin 1x removed OR third cousins 2x removed. So, it stands to reason that since she shows up for him, in his matches, then he should for me. The only caveat is that his aunt’s father is different than his mother’s, however the Hensley name is from his maternal grandmother… Maybe it just hasn’t updated yet?

The one person I want to tell all of this to is my husband. I know he’d be excited about it, and probably make the same joke our friend Kyrus made “evidently I have a type. Hensleys.”