After spending a shit-tastic day laying
around my house lamenting the fact that I have very few shifts at the bar
coming up (we haven't been busy, so we're cutting way back on shifts) and I
have no money and my relationships are all more like Giant Fucking Train Wrecks
than actual relationships and and and...
I busted out my new tea pot (thank you very
much, guilty kind-of-ex-boyfriend with a credit card), heated up some water and
went digging through my cabinet o' tea.
I’m not picky about tea, so long as it’s not
lemon. But I do prefer my tea with caffeine. And yet, the box I chose is
caffeine free fruit tea. I went with blueberry. Let me explain why (other than
the fact that it’s blue-purple, and who doesn’t want to drink blue-purple tea?).
I’ve had what amounts to a summer and early
fall of extreme highs and lows. During the high times, I have been confident
that something is going to work out for me with regards to every aspect of my
life. The lows have been more like today, where a fear over the future crashes
down on my head like a shitton of bricks. And I don’t mean the distant future,
will I ever be stable again kind of thing. I mean the
holyshitwhereismyhousepaymentcomingfrom? kind of fear. These fears get stoked
in the fires of the fact that I have very few friends in the mid-Atlantic, as
all my people are in Michigan and Ohio (OK, not all of them, but you know what
I mean). And a Doom Spiral to rival anything Steph has ever gone through
starts. And by the end of the day, I’m sitting on the couch watching Love Actually for the seven millionth
time, identifying with roughly 9/10ths of the characters in some way or another
(I don’t have a dead wife, so Liam and I share little there) and eating an
entire family size package of macaroni and cheese with hot sauce.
So, by early evening my shirt cuffs are
covered in dried snot and salt water (who can afford Kleenex?), the dogs are
sniffing around to see if I’m going to attempt to squeeze them to death
anymore, and I’ve compulsively checked my email seventy bazillion times to see
if the immaculately stupid message I sent this morning has garnered a reply
yet.
Not that I’ve had a day like that, ever. I am
calm and well-adjusted. Or something.
Which brings us back to the blue-purple tea
of no caffeine.
My birthday was a day before one of my
camping trips this summer, and my good friend Amy was sweet enough to buy me
presents. Most of the things were stuff I have talked about here on the blog. A
box of Dots, deviled ham, ramen noodles. All individually wrapped, so it was
like a mini-Christmas for a birthday. A roll of toilet paper! A bottle of
BoonesFarm! Because I’m the girl you can birthday shop for with $20 in a CVS.
AND BE HAPPY WITH WHAT I GET!
In the packages of happiness, there was the
box of tea from which I selected the blueberry passion excitement that I’m
currently sipping on (and damn, it’s good with some honey in it!) And here is
where I started to climb out of the Doom Spiral and back to Happy TassieLand.
In the crazy Civil War thing I do, we all
belong to teams. Teams make up regions, and regions make up our national
organization (think conferences in college football). There are rivalries
between teams in each region, and national rivalries as well. For the last six
years I belonged to a team rife with amazing shots, the best eight of whom made
up our A team, and who won national competitions like it was picking apples off
a tree. (OK, it wasn’t THAT easy, but they’re damn good shots and they won over
and over and over…there are lots of folk who don’t like us for it.) (They don’t
dislike me for it, as I’m not that good. But still.)
As the summer progressed, I made a decision
to change teams. Over the weekend, the team I decided to move to voted on me
(they don’t just take anyone, you know!) and I was voted in. I didn’t know it
(I mean, I assumed I’d get in as I know all the guys, etc. But I didn’t know
when they were having their meeting, etc.) and on Friday night I went to a big
membership meeting for the whole organization, because there were elections for
Board of Directors and blah blah blah too much information.
Suffice it to say, I walked into a crowded
barn full of people to go to the meeting, and I was mobbed by the guys on the
team. There was much smiling, hand shaking, hugging, congratulations, and
welcome. These guys seemed genuinely excited that I was joining. When I went to
their camp later that night, there was much of the same (and possibly some
moonshine). And drinking this tea reminded me of that whole thing. So, even if
I did make a complete ass of myself this morning with the stroke of the send
button, and even if I’m flat broke, and there’s a mouse in my house, and my
hopes for a decent job are mostly a little puddle of dried tears on my couch,
and I may have to sell my car back to the dealership along with my soul…I still
have one more weekend this fall to spend with these guys, to hang out around a
campfire and relax, to shoot a little and more than likely freeze my ass off in
a tent in Ohio in mid-October. And that might sound not that great to a lot of
people, but I didn’t realize until today that it’s been propping me up all
summer. Even when there has been drama and I’ve shot like shit, it’s been the
basis for my sanity.
And so, a giant public thank you to Amy for that box of tea. And here, all she thought she was giving me was a tasty beverage.