OK so what is happening, in fact?

I separated from the Air Force 3 months ago. The plan? Stay with family for 2 months in Pensacola before permanently relocating to Flagstaff, AZ to go to grad school. Sounds pretty cool, yes?

Not much, because now, I've been here for a month and I'm in grad school, but it's lining up to be not the best decision. School isn't as exciting as I thought. I really don't feel like studying. Would rather do whatever the hell at home in my free time and do work instead for the things I already know.

Flagstaff is nice, clean, modern, with much to do and a lot of nature. I like it. But it's missing something. I actually do like a more quiet and less populated place. The nature here is beautiful, but in fact, I've been experiencing more stress than happiness. It's primarily financial trouble.

Supporting myself and my husband is strenuous. The GI bill's payments have not come out in full yet, we're both unemployed, and my credit card debt is rising. Right now, it's more a priority to have financial security. Money really does make the world go round. Thus, I plan to drop out of grad school in this first semester to go work.

Flagstaff does not have many opportunities for IT and networking, but after cleaning up my LinkedIn and aggressively applying to about 8 positions, including Raytheon, DVS, and Link Solutions (all military contractors—except Goodwill, funny, they're looking for a network administrator too), I've scored two interviews next week.

Most of these positions are based in southern Arizona in either Tucson or Sierra Vista at Fort Huachuca. Link Solutions seems very nice. They say my resume matches the skill set they seek and they are "very impressed," which is a surprise to me. Should I get any of these positions, the initial salary is, at minimum, $70,000. That's a monthly paycheck of $5833 or hourly rate of $34-37/hr.

So now my mission is to go for the money. I feel bad about having not done it earlier. I made a plan, followed it, and it did not work. If I had known grad school and moving and financial burden would be this intense, I would have just skipped Flagstaff and school entirely. It feels bad to have gotten here, just for break the lease I signed and say "fuck school."

But there's something missing from all of this, since I separated. No place has quite felt like home. We keep jumping through hoops and relocating place to place without any specific one feeling like it's the one, do you know what I mean? 

But the future looks promising. Wish me the best in these interviews. I need this offer. And when it comes, I'm getting the fuck out of here and starting a new, real life. 

this camping trip is shit

Nothing but constant discomfort. 

It's not like I wanted or asked to be here. the only reason I'm here is because it's my brother's birthday and it's one of the extremely rare times our family is going to be together all at once. 

So here's my designated bitching and whining: no privacy, little comfort, too hot, too humid, too much noise. I can never take air conditioning for granted again.

It's been too long since I lived in a home. Not just some house or dorm or stint for a few months or whatever—a bona fide home. A place of comfort and safety where I've made many happy memories. But I haven't had it since I left Connecticut in January 2021. Four and a half years of not having a place I can truly call home.

Census

 i will call you the census

we may swim cross the fog

and blink for moments seemed

thin and vaporous and twine

curling in a peculiar smoke

flattest lies this plane

of great green and gold leaves

that penetrates the eyes

as it feels an ocean you

beautiful and spinning

what formless shapes can i release

from parted lips that say

this will destroy you

to find heaven in the sun

may be another dimension

into greatest transcendental

for something like self-census

I have a dare for you

no internet for 24 hours

can you make it? 

Inadequacy

well

I hate the ego 

A Distaste

I see it makes sense that I'm not fulfilling every part. Others can do it better. 

Absolute

What do you call absolute solitude

The absence of eyes

Or a language of only the mind

Man's signatures lay dormant

In the past fortnights, One is sold the visions of isolate, private, and beautifully lone fantasies

Constituted, as they were, from a long time ago—regular immersions into the mind: transcendent heaven in oblivion

And One is displayed the slivers, windows, of such magnificent oblivions, that he gnash his teeth and bellow stress through a concrete face

Convinced even momentarily (may we call it so) that One must create the facsimile of solitude

Thus acts "My World is a Construct"

Of space itself contested in its making

One's World as a Construct

Wishing that in time the world is found, not made

Jealous to be alone?

did you lose your "interest" now?

well, anyway, i hope you have fun.

Register

This vessel shall remain unattended

Such were the words of their

Opposite, pangs of desire

Or wherever nearby that self-things are found

Stifling

Loathsome, repeated triangulating

Your positions, so fixed

Stifling to receive voiceless and eyeless existence

These will be the strains today

What's a solution than fade to black

And in another scene the presences are absences

For if you cannot find a space

Somehow you will make one