Pity Party

I haven't been feeling very "blogerary" lately.

The down times lately seem much more prevalent than the up times. I would feel sorry about that, but reading the blog is optional, not mandatory: If you don't like whiny posts, stop reading now.

My biggest frustration is, which seems to be almost always lately, is the feeling of being trapped. I don't have enough psych backing (no Ph.D.) to go into clinical. I don't have a teaching certificate. I have a Masters in psych but that is almost a useless piece of paper. The M.Div. seems to be another useless piece of paper lately; good for answering Jeopardy questions and for getting into arguments with people who have no formal education but KNOW that God is telling them directly. (Gnosticism IS alive and dysfunctional in America.)

I feel like I am not able to give all I can to the church that is financing the major portion of my life and am giving my soul to a store that flips out the word (is it even a word?) "Famliness" whenever they can, but never puts the concept into practice. But they make up the shortfall in finances. And yet, even though they are the minor share of my finances, they take up the major chunk of my time.

I feel stifled in trying to find another job. The job market here is so bad and this job does give me the flexibility I need for the church stuff. But again, I feel guilty at giving the church all I can.

I feel like a house divided: Like I need to pitch one or the other. Drop the church and go after a management position at the store or ditch the store and pray that the church check will cover the finances.

Then we have Nick. He has been such a mainstay in all of this. I know it wears on him too and try to keep the frustrations to a minimum. But life has a way of producing frustrations. Lately, the computer has been a major frustration. First the laptop screen gets broken in an accident of the cd rack falling on it. So we got a monitor on freecycle. Then the power source on the laptop dies. So we replace that. Then the monitor on the desktop dies and we steal the monitor that we got for the laptop. Now we are waiting for the power supply and hoping to find another monitor on freecycle.

But Nick is working in a job that he can do but I am sure is not overly fulfilling. He brings in the lion's share of finances but the thing seems to be a constant source of frustration.

Shouldn't life be more than constant frustration and making do?

I didn't realize when I came to Michigan, now almost 10 years ago, that this place was going to suck me in and pull me down.

Now I need to find a Dr. to help me get the meds that keep me stable but can't afford. (Can't afford the Dr. either.) Of course the Republicans keep telling me that I just need to work harder and then I can be an all upstanding member of society.

Or, maybe I should just deny who I am, enter a loveless marriage, pop out some pups, troll for blow jobs in the rest areas, and call myself a heterosexual.