My Kind of Life....

Well, as we draw into the beginning of August and the sad realization hits me that we will be moving AGAIN I find myself thinking back on the circumstances that took place leading up to all this. Crazy to think the wheels were set in motion 10 years ago and I now no longer hate the person who started it. This is going to be long and complex and jump around a lot but the pieces should fit together in the end.

Scientists compare the human brain to a complex computer. So complex it's inner workings are still not truly understood. I believe the brain is truly the most complex computer in the universe. Like a computer the brain is only capable of so much storage. Newer files are more accesable, whereas you often have to search through folders for older files. Sometimes older files are deleted to make room for new files. Though I'm still young by many standards I already feel much of my older information has already been deleted. Something that will forever be stored in the complex coding of this computer is Sleepy.

Sleepy was my first real memory. She was in every memory after that. Before Sleepy, I remeber nothing. Every memory for nearly 18 years after that first included her. She was there for everything. She was there when my parents divorced. She was with me through every sickness, through every death, through every life. She was family, everyone knew her and she was loved everywhere you went.

Scientists are WRONG in one thing, they think they have proven that dogs cannot love. They argue that human emotions are so complex they cannot be physically paralleled by any other living thing. Bull.

Sleepy loved us

Almost exactly 9 years ago I was a freshmen in High School. I remember that day like a generation before me remembers Kennedy's assination. Like people remember exactly what they were doing the moment Lennon was killed. Like a future generation will never forget the murder of a man/woman who changed the lives of their generation. For me the event was 9-11. I was sitting in Speech/Debate class, wearing my favorite patchwork jeans that the older kids in that class teased me for wearing everytime. Mr DeLeonardo was standing at the projector, I was copying the notes on the screen in my compostion book. The topic of the day was Red Herrings. I noticed the drama teacher from accross the hall silently slip in the room and wait by the door to be acknowledged. D stopped the lecture for a moment and nodded his head in the other teacher's direction.

"A plane just crashed into the World Trade Center."

Without a further word D turned off the projector and moved the cart away.

"This can wait," He said "This is BIG."

He rolled over the cart with the TV and turned it on. Without even having to turn a channel, there it was, the Twin Towers. A strong and powerful symbol of NYC that I had always taken for granted in my youth growing up on Brooklyn. Aflame. My people in chaos. There in front of the entire class of 50+ students of all ages I wept.

Sleepy was there. She wept beside me.

Sleepy was there when what I believed (at the time) to be one of the Devil's own came into my life. I rue the day my dad discovered the internet and chatrooms. I often wish he had never bought a computer. We were living in that little apartment in South Florida, only a short bike ride from the beach. I had my own room, all the privacy I wanted, and every pokemon video game to date. What more could a teenager ask for?

"I'm going to Texas for a couple weeks. I'll leave you some money for groceries. Make sure you don't miss the school bus." And with that he was gone. Off to Texas.

2 Weeks quickly became close to a month. The bills were paid and there was plenty of food. I only skipped a couple days of school, but was fine otherwise. If only I had known what he would be bringing home. Jessie. 16 years my dads junior, red flag numero uno.

More specifically, Jessie, Keith (her oldest son), Ashley (her middle daugher) and Haylee (her youngest daughter). Her eldest daughter lived with her father. All of these kids had different fathers. Red flag numbers 2-5.

My dad brought her from a barren and poor cow town in TX to beautiful sunny FL! And you know what? SHE HATED IT! All we ever heard was "Back in White Deer" this and that. She missed her family and friends. She missed White Deer and wanted to go back.

To me they couldn't pack fast enough. In a month my privacy had been sullied by 2 little girls. My clean room had become littered with dirty clothes and plastic bed liners. The smell of pee from the youngest's bed wetting diapers stowed away under the mattress haunts me still. The son's dirty greasy fingers all over my gameboy, his rough handling of my CD's and CD player. Every moment a living nightmare!

Yet, for some reason, he was IN LOVE with her! HER! The trailer park trash that couldn't wash a dish, couldn't do a load of laundry, couldn't get her lazy ass off the computer for 5 minutes to do ANYTHING! Christmas came and he was crying that he missed the kids! How do you miss the direct spawn of satan destroying a home you put so much effort into building?! Christmas day came and our belongings were already packed. The tree was out on the curb by that evening. We were in TX before new years. I never even got to say goodbye to my friends. I was 15, a sophomore in HS, I had just gotten established in the JERFSA program. I had a future here. HAD. All gone for a dirty dusty cow town and a trashy woman. I never even had a choice.

6 years he tried to make that relationship work. 6 years he gave and gave and took from me and denied me things to give to her children. He never wanted to look like he was playing favorites. 6 years of fights and breakups and makeups. The day I graduated HS and turned 18 was the greatest day ever! I MOVED OUT! NO MORE JESSIE!

After moving out I moved in with a guy friend whom I ended up dating for the next 3 years. Man that was a wasted 3 years. Shortly after I moved out my dad and Jessie called it quits FOR GOOD! YAY! In 6 years my dad luckily never thought about marrying her. She got remarried a month after he left. A real winner she was.

As fate would have it a series of events (some unfortunate, like working at Wal-Mart with my ex, some fortunate like buying my first car) led to me meeting someone new, who happened to be from FL. He was in TX for work.

Just when things looked to be getting better, the glue failed to hold.

In July 2009, Sleepy died.

She had melanoma cancer in her jaw. Many surgerys had prolonged the spreading for a few years but it had spread to an inoperable place in her esopogus and was starving her body and brain of air. We made the choice to have her put to sleep the next day. She never made it back to the vet. Sleepy died in my arms on the kitchen floor that night.

She choked on a piece of food. Fate is truly cruel.

I still haven't stopped blaming myself. I keep wondering, if only I had waited for the anesthetic to wear off more before feeding her. Maybe if I had cut the pieces smaller. So many questions never to be answered. She was cremated and placed in a beautiful urn. I long to have it in my room. It's safe in m dad's room at least. I figure he can have it for the next 20 years of his life before he dies of old age, then I can have it for the next 40 of my life before I die. It seemed fair.

I was glad I had bought the puppy 2 weeks prior. I knew I wouldn't want another dog after she passed but I was glad he was there now. He was all that kept me going. We joined a local non profit SAR organization and I worked to train my puppy for SAR in my spare time. It kept my mind from wandering back to the tragic events of that night.

Shortly after Obama took office my bf was laid off and the economy in that already poor cow town went to hell as oil wells, pipelines, and plants suddenly began to shut down. We deiced with nothing holding us there is was time for us all to go back to where it all began, FL.

I never wanted to live in Perry. Most of those people were just as trashy as the rednecks in TX. I worked only to get the bills paid. Our living situation was horrible. We had a 2 room (not 2 bedroom, just 2 rooms, total. No bathroom, no kitchen. 2 square rooms) trailer parked in his parent's back yard while my dad stayed with friends. The roof leaked and was always too cold or too hot. He and I barely fit, much less Barley, the now 6 month old rapidly growing saint bernard. His parents were wonderful, though, and I tried to help them as often as I could. Soon it looked like we were finally catching up and would be able to move out soon.

Then Barley was hit by a car. I wouldn't let him die. It was touch and go whether he would survive the shock and the concussion. A week later his life was no longer the issue but his leg. The shoulder plate had been shattered and the nerves badly damaged. The bone could be fixed but it was likely the leg would never work again. We took that chance. A few thousand dollars in high interest loans later Barley was out of surgery and eating thanksgiving dinner in a splint at home. I think Barley was worth sacraficing my credit over. He has healed almost completely since then and has regained full use of his leg with only a minor limp.

With nearing 4 grand in vet bills, moving out was no longer an option. Stuck in the trailer for God knows how much longer. That trailer was soon moved from his parent's backyard to behind a small trailer on his grandmother's property where his younger brother lived. We were closer to the backdoor now so it wasn't such a trek through the rain to go to the bathroom. However I was still miserable. My job was corrupt, full of favorites and game players. Apparently I didn't fall into any of those categories as my hours slowly got cut and we struggled more and more.

I really have to thank Sugar Sand Farms for this next chapter in my life. Their son Jay and my boyfriend are best friends, he was the first real friend I made in that town. When Jay was home on leave and we would go out to his paren'ts farm to visit it was like a day vacation for me! I was so comfortable out there among all their animals, especially the chickens! It was here I had my first encounter with Silkie chickens. Everyone on BYC, you can thank Sugar Sand Farms for getting me started in chickens. She gave me a few to start and I just took off from there! I saved my tip money every day and whatever didn't go on bills went for gas in my car to and from chicken swaps, and of course on chickens. Having the chickens, a new hobby, really kept me going. They were so relaxing. Everyday after work Id get out of my car and trudge over to the pen and just stand there and watch them for a few minutes. Sometimes Id lose track of time and my BF would call me and ask me when I would be home
"I'm already home. I'm outside with the chickens." Id say then check the time and see I'd already been off of work for 30 minutes. It made going to work easier knowing I was working towards something I loved.

After months of struggling to get our half of the bills paid, which we often paid more than half and all of some, I decided the living situation needed to change. I wasn't going to stay in that tiny 2 room trailer and be the only one in a house of 4 working and then come home and spend my days off cleaning up everyone elses messes. Maybe if my other roomates hadn't been such slobs (and content to love that way) things would have been different. In the 6 months of living there I had bought most of the appliances and paid for Cable and Internet in full every month. I think our roomates did laundry maybe twice in that whole time? The point is these were people who could live comfortably alongside Jessie and her pack of dogs. If we were going to live there and pay most of the bills and be the ones cleaning up I wanted to live in the bigger trailer and clean up my own messes. They could live in the small trailer and make all the mess they wanted and I would never have to see it and never feel obligated to clean it up. They wouldn't budge and actually had the NERVE to complain about US! I couldn't take living like this anymore. We packed our vital belongings and some of my favorite chickens and headed south. Luckily my dad had gotten a place in an unincorporated town near Juno Beach.

Now, I like to think we are good people in general and good neighbors. We don't complain and have enough curtesy to think about what we do and how it might affect others and our neighbors. I ended up rehoming my favorite rooster (the loudest crower) and his favorite hen so my neighbors wouldn't complain. I moved the pen so that it was up against the abandoned house next door in a corner where the sound of the remaining roosters crow would be quieted a bit more. I spoke personally with all my neighbors about the chickens. Asked them to talk with me if they had any complaints and I would take care of it. Every neighbor except the antisocial neighbor from hell right next door.

We had alread been through one episode with this woman. Holding out mail and sending it back. My dad wrote her a polite little note which he taped to her door asking that she not send the mail back but if she didn't want to come to our door to give it to us to please just put it in our mailbox. The PO makes mistakes. We've all ended up with our neighbors mail at some point or another. I don't know of anyone who hasn't just put it in their box for them or had neighbors do it for us. She then had the nerves to call the police on us accusing us of tampering with the mail. Somehow during that arguent she accused my dad of being racist and started shouting about how she was legal and had a blue card. I thought we were talking about the mail here, where did this come from? So that was the first week I lived here.

The second week I got screwed out of a job. Not one, not 2 but FIVE people walked out on heir check. And, wait, woah, I'M RESPONSIBLE?! Thanks for telling me. I thought that was the cashier's job. So, 6 hours of work later I had made 7 dollars. Just enough for gas to get home.

Week 3, Zoning and Commissions shows up at my house. Apparently theres been an anonymous complaint about my chickens and I have 2 weeks to get rid of them. Once again I went around and had a talk with my neighbors, each claiming they had no problems with my chickens or my rooster crowing and that they liked them. This time I went to speak with the neighbor from hell.

Anyone remember Bomb Bags? I played with them a lot as a kid. You'd step on it and a chemical reaction would take place inside, the bag would inflate then POP. This was like having a whole box of those go off in my face. She just started screaming at me, that I was harassing her and called the police on me AGAIN! Second time the police show up at my house. I feel bad for that cop, I'm sure he had better things to do. Even he shook his head and said she wasn't wrapped to tight but politely asked me to just not bother with her anymore. I happily agreed.

Week 4, the landlord complains about my Saint Bernard. Their afraid that he's going to destroy the house or hurt their grandkids.... BTW, my lady neighbor from hell is their daughter. I've been here a month. She has kids? I've never seen them. Unused toys litter the yard covered in dirt from the rain. That was the only sign any child lived there. But seriously, my saint bernard with the bad leg who spends most of his days sleeping. Hes a real threat!

At least I got a great job! Working for a private exotic animal breeder. 4 hours of cleaning cages, preparing diets, and feeding the animals. 4 hours of playing with baby monkeys and lemurs. I seriously get paid for this?

Week 5. Zoning returns. I refuse to let them on the property without a court order or a warrant. I secretly relocate the chickens to the garage. I call zoning and agree to the reinspection under the circumstances that they give me a curtesy call when they are on their way so I can leave work and meet them at my house. No return phone call. Seems thats where this whole thing started. We called Animal Control, the Sheriff's Dept, the Police Dept, the Court House, the County Clerk and everyone else we could think of to ask about the chickens before we moved here. No one knew. We called zoning and commissions 3 times. No one ever answered or returned our phone calls. Tax dollars hard at work there. The landlord comes over to complain that she can hear chickens in the garage and that when they come for the reinspection they want to search inside as well. We refuse, saying its a violation of our 4th amendment rights. The landlord then complains about mine and my BF being there saying more people now live in the house than they originally thought. It's a 2 bedroom house with 4 people. How is that too many?

p.s. I LOVE MY JOB!

Week 6. I temporarily move the chickens to my boss's lnd for a few days. Zoning comes to do their inspection. No chickens but they say I gotta remove the cage (seriously?!). The Sheriff is with them (SERIOUSLY?!) third time the police are at my house. The landlord pulls out the lease agreement and tells my dad he's in violation by having dogs and cats as the contract states no pets. The lease was signed a week after they moved in and the owners knew the animals were already there. They asked to have it crossed off but the owners just waved it off and said don't worry about it. The Sheriff tells the landlord thats not his dept. I remove the cage, they re-reinspect. ARE WE DONE YET?!

Week 7. I've now been here almost 2 months. I've finally seen these "kids" I hear my dog is a threat to. The mother rushes them from the house to the car and vice versa. Cops were here again next door. thats FOUR TIMES in about 6 weeks. We can't handle this anymore. We can't handle these people, the traffic, the attitudes. We're not even living in a city and we hate it. Now we all just wanna live out in the middle of nowhere somewhere with no neighbors where no one will bother us. The hermit life is starting to sound good. I had to quit my past couple of jobs to move, but the thought of quitting this one brings me to tears. I love the animals. I'll never find another job this great. Is quitting this wonderful job really worth it to move someplace we can live in peace? Probably. Its for everyones benefit, especially our own animals living in confinement because of peoples unjust complaints.

My dad tried to talk me into getting rid of the chickens or just getting rid of the roosters but I refused. Give them an inch and they take a mile.
"Even if I did that still wouldn't stop them" I argued "They'd find something else to complain about." I was right. I wasn't going to budge. If I got rid of the chickens the next complaint would be the dogs, then the cats. I refuse to budge on any of them. I just want to live somewhere we can be in peace and no one will bother us.

I'm just so tired of being harassed and stressed. I'll never admit this to her, but I see what Jessie was talking about 10 years ago when she wanted to leave FL and go back to TX. Living here makes me miss that dirty cow town. Living here makes me miss Perry. I never thought I'd ever miss any of those small towns and their rednecks but I now choose rednecks over the rich anyday. At least country folk are decent folk and good people. If my dog got loose it wasn't unusual for a neighbor to chase it down and bring it back. If I was pulled over on the side of the road with my hood up at least 10 cars would stop and ask if I needed help. My car has broken down quite a few times since I've been here and not one offer to help yet. i can't begin to explain how rude the people are here. Things have changes so much since we left, we just aren't use to this kind of life anymore. It just isn't for us anymore. I miss Midnight Rodeo and Spring Creek Lounge. I miss living a simple life where the guy in the truck driving up the road waved, even if you had no idea who he was.

Things are so complicated. Life is so hard.







I wish Sleepy were here....







I've decided, though. I will only quit this job to move if my BF will be working and paying the bills. I won't work full time again. The part time work will be extra money for misc things like the chickens. I want to spend most of my time at home learning and preparing to be a stay at home housewife/mom. I want to fine tune my cooking skills and know that the house will always be clean and neat the way that I like it.

But most importantly, I want to write. That is what I want to do with my life. I want to get everything swirling around in my head, all the crazy thoughts and ideas, out of there and down on paper. I want to write all the books of ideas I've been scibbling down on notepads for 10 years.

Or maybe I'll get lucky and find a job working with animals again. I doubt I'm that lucky twice in my life.






I miss Sleepy.....

 

Thanks for the wonderful responses everyone.

I have another 8 months before I can fill out my own FAFSA and go to school. I still haven't decided what I'd like to go to school for. Trust me, I've been looking for a place to stay on my own, but nothing here is affordable. The BF knows he is on thin ice. Funny thing, and I didn't mention it because it sounds so contradictory, I don't really want to have kids. I am pressured by everyone around me, my family, my close friends with children. Some of my friends from HS already have 2 or 3 children. I know that having children will kill everything I love to do because all of my time for many years will then be spent on a child rather than my pets or some other hobby I love and would hate to give up. I know, it sounds a bit selfish.

It drives me a little crazy to look back on the past 5 years since I graduated. It's going on 6 now. All of my senior class (which was only 30 kids, I graduated dead center, number 15, so I guess it's not saying much to say ALL) have already done something with their lives. Many are married, have children, many have already graduated college, some have even gone and studied abroad. The same for the class that graduated after me. If we'd had a 5 year reunion I would have been too embarassed to show up. I really have done nothing progressive with my life in 5 years except get by. I guess in the times we live in now getting by is an achievement in itself.

Funny, if you had asked me my senior year where I saw myself in 5 years, of the many things I may have answered, raising chickens would never have been on that list.

I've been arguing with my dad since I was a junior in HS to fill out my FAFSA. No college will take me without one and I can't apply for loans or grants without one either. I have NO IDEA why he refuses to fill it out but it has been an ongoing argument more frequently (like every month now) for the past 5 years. I finally gave up this year, knowing I only had 1 year left till I could fill it out myself. The system is complicated and stupid.

vetgirl, my mom is crazy too. She wasn't mentioned because she's a drunk and an embarassment. She had original custody of me as a child and lost it when she went out and got drunk, drove, got arrested and assaulted a police officer. Her aunt that we were staying with didn't want to take care of me while she was in jail so they gave me to my dad and he refused to give me back. Those were years of Hell on par with those spent with Jessie.

Thanks fr bearing through my rant everyone, and my apologies for so many typos. I was on such a roll that it seemed my fingers couldn't transfer the information from my head fast enough.