you're never gonna leave and i'm never gonna leave, but you're never going to love me like i need

By the end of 2005 I had been sleeping with my coworker, J., for almost a year. For maybe about 2 months of that year we were what could have been possibly in some circles considered almost a legitimate relationship. But otherwise it was basically par for the course for Caitlinships and since like October of that year he had been in love with another girl we worked with who he was also sleeping with.

And you might be like, wow, was this like Brad Pitt over here? Quite the opposite, friend. If I had to compare J. to a well-known figure I would say Phillip Seymour Hoffman plus about 50 lbs. My sister suggested Tweedle Dee. There are many mysteries in the universe. One of the most significant is how this kid always got these really cute girls despite having few redeeming qualities. Anyway, all this set-up to discuss what happened the day after Christmas in 2005.

Around 2 am I start getting calls and texts from J. He was always a really big drunk dialer (oh I should mention he was pretty much an alcoholic). He was at the coast with his parents for Christmas. But because they didn't have enough room in their condo they had put him up in a hotel and he suggested I come out and stay with him at this hotel. "C'mon Caitlin. It's great. We could start a really nice life together here." I am not kidding you, that's what he said. And I fucking fell for it. So at 4 am I pack up an overnight back and head out to the coast, still wearing my pajamas. Incidientally I just realized I am wearing those same pj's right now. Think about it.
It was a 2 hour drive to his hotel and around 5 am I got pulled over for speeding. When the cop asked me why I was speeding I said, "Listen. It's the day after Christmas. It's 5 am. I am driving in the middle of the night to see a boy. I am wearing my pajamas and it's stupid." He let me go because he said my "honesty was refreshing." I showed up to J.'s hotel at 6 am and he was smashed, of course. At arounded 10 am we headed over to his parents' condo.

When his parents asked how, exactly, a friend of his from town was at the coast he told them that he had gotten drunk and texted everyone he knew asking them to come out, and that I was the only one who responded.

I am going to let that sink in for a minute.

I should have at that time gotten up and said it was now time for me to go back home. But I didn't. I stayed the weekend with him at the hotel. I even called in sick because I was supposed to be back to work after the holiday. And we didn't do shit. We laid around in bed and watched Dog the Bounty Hunter. We went to the aquarium and had nothing to say to each other. I dropped a bunch of change and he stood there while I picked it up. But the whole time I was fighting so hard for us to have this life together he had promised. After all, I was the one who cared enough to respond...not the one pathetic enough and eventually he would realize that. Right? Right?!?! No. Of course not. Every once in a while I do something sad enough that I have an out-of-body experience when I can actually see myself how I would look to an outsider. The last afternoon, sitting on his parents' couch while I tried to flirt with him and he ignored me to watch My Super Sweet 16 I had that out-of-body experience. "I'm going to go," I said. He didn't say anything. I cried the whole way home.

We continued to get drunk and have sex for a couple months after that. See: My issues with self-respect.

But I am working on it, so last night when I got a text in the middle of the night from this guy, apparently not satisfied about his starring role in ball less breakups, asking why he'd never been in a dating disaster post and then suggesting that perhaps I would like to come over, I declined. I think we all know that not a lot has changed about my dating patterns in the last 4 years, but I don't respond anymore to booty calls from people who don't care about me.

There you go, mister.

Measles Mumps Rubella

Here is a picture of measles:



Wikipedia says this is a picture of a kid with mumps. I suspect it is just an Augustus Gloop kid. Regardless, notice the swollen cheeks.


This is a picture of Rubella.



After the oil cleansing method's massive failure I decided to get back on some kind of acne medication. This was an extensive 2 months-long ordeal involving the insurance company and 2 stupid doctors and a bunch of frustration, until I finally went and saw a dermatologist that I liked. He prescribed me Retin-A and some other stuff.

The derm said that about 25% of people get worse before they get better but to "stick with it!!" I believe he may have been disingenuous about that figure, or I fall into the 25%. But basically, Retin-A was like, "Oh, what? You were self-conscious and upset about your face? Hm? You bail all the time on plans because you don't like to go out in public. Oh, well fuck you. Here, let me make you look like you went to get the MMR vaccine but it went horribly, horribly wrong and mutilated your face." For like 4 days my face just got worse and worse. The bottom of my face was all swollen up like Mumps up there. I will spare you the details of some of the nasty bumps, but it was a bad, measeley, pussy scene. And then it got red all over and hot and rubellaed. And also really hurt a lot. And also peeled and was flaky on top of the symptoms of MMR. Pretty awesome. This was all while I was home over Christmas...so the plus side is that I at least didn't have to come to work with my deformity. The negative was that my family, who I only see twice a year, now has to live for the next 6 months with their last memory of me looking like every Proactiv before image layered on top of each other.
It is now pretty much back to what it looked like when I went to the dermatologist and itches. Woo progress.

Anyway, supposedly my skin is gonna look sogood once it gets better. Fingers crossed, otherwise I am probably going to have to get a face transplant. I have decided that this is either a lesson on how to love myself from the inside, or punishment for every bitchy thing I have ever said about another girl.

squeaky clean like a rubber ducky

I did an intake today with a girl who is in a program at her high school for people with "school phobia". Did you know that such programs exist? I did not. Anyway, I asked her to tell me about the other kids in her class. I asked under the pretense that I was interested in if she has any peers she is able to socialize with. But really it was just my own morbid curiosity about what kind of kid is in a school phobia class. Wolf shirt kids, right? But this girl isn't like that, she's cool in a self-destructive Rayanne Graff kind of way, but I imagined she is an anomaly. She said there is a boy who carries a lunch box, but that was the only really good piece. I hope it has a superhero on it. Then we talked about how they were kids who have general social problems and try too hard. But I think my error was in framing the question as having to do with socialization, when really I just wanted to know about freaks.

I am possibly the most self-serving social worker ever.

FYI I carried a sailor moon lunch box in high school. And before you ask, yes it did have an included thermos.

Daily functioning Fail.

When I was in 6th grade (see left) I had a locker in school for the first time. I could not get the lock to open on my locker and it was a major source of stress. I had a lot of anxiety in the 6th grade. My mom even came into school after school to help me on more than one occasion, and still I couldn't manage on my own.
We may have even made up a rhyme to help me remember. We made up a rhyme to help me remember my bus, after I got on the wrong bus once in 1st grade. SE-23, in case you are wondering. it wasn't a rhyme so much as just the name of my bus set to a little tune.
Anyway the point of this, besides the opportunity to post this awesome picture of me that I love, is to tell this little story. I went to the 99cent store today to get stickers. They did not have any besides these jumbo Dora stickers that I did not want. But they had some other stuff I wanted, including a padlock. I have misplaced my other locks, I think when I moved, and have been using a little luggage lock when I go to the gym. It's not convenient, so I got this little lock for a dollar.
Well, you get what you pay for and I can't get the son of a bitch open. It's 6th grade all over again! Where's my clip-on tie and my Mary Englebret lunch bag (I didn't start carrying the Sailor Moon lunch box until 8th grade I think).
My mom said I looked like Annie Hall in that outfit, btw, which I think had a coordinating skirt. And my Grandma Sugar loved my glasses so much she was inspired to get blue ones for herself.
Also, I never did learn to open my locker. I began to share a locker with Marissa (who reads and comments!) and Ember (who is probably too busy being a grown up to read my blog)...thus setting the stage for my middle school career. What a happy ending.