Starving Artist, West Side

It's been a couple weeks.

I've been gone for work.

Then, I disappeared into the world of Ruth for a while.

I like that world.

But, I have my own apartment now. Finally! For the first time in many years. I'm on the lease and everything. It's a huge FUCK YOU to everyone who hated on me while I was down. Because, let's face it, the place is fucking sweet as hell.


I took on a few extra writing jobs to pay for the deposit. Now I'm sort of addicted to the money.

Right now I have absolutely no money, though, besides what's sitting in a little jar.

I always do this to myself. Short-change myself on food. Only this time, I make ever so slightly too much money to qualify for food stamps. Hence, extra jobs, as that ever so slight extra bit of money is more than consumed by having to pay for food. I don't even eat that much, honestly.

Not having food stamps has warmed me to the idea of eating out more, though. $5-8 per day on food is not actually so bad, especially when you think about how much of a down payment it is for groceries.

I think I have to quit drinking at bars.

Supplies to live off of from yesterday through Friday:

• Half bottle of saki
• Pain killers (about 5 in bottle)
• Diet pills from the Dollar store 
• Bag of coffee, though no pot/coffee making apparatus of any sort. But believe me, I will make that work in some way
• Bag of frozen vegetables
• Tub of miso paste
• Habañero pistachios from New Mexico (found in gym bag– yeay!)

Fortunately, I am drowning in writing projects (NOT in inspiration, though!), and all of my painting supplies are here in one place finally and I have my dulcimer and music.

OH: I cleared out my storage unit and got all my things from my former place, and from Tamara's and my stuff that was still at Zeruah's for a whole year! HUGE WIN FOR MY LIFE! 

Thank you to Abel, Ruth, and Josiah for helping me move, and to Jezebel, too, for helping me move my shit clean out of Tamara's to avoid the muthafukkin law. And to Jerusha, for letting me crash at her place and for being kind during this transition. And to Eve, my mom. She was dramatically un-helpful, as was Sole who moved to Portland with her boyfriend on the same day that I moved and were weird about splitting use/cost of the truck. But still, they deserve some gratitude for making it possible, too, just cuz they're family.

I must say, I'm grateful that most people didn't give up on me when I was down. They never saw me as an unemployed low-life. I met some people who were that and maybe I could have gone that way, but I have a drive to be an artist and I've always been destined to be a writer... And I will always have the gift of being able to make it work. I'm so grateful that people never saw me as less when I was floating around Portland on my bicycle all summer and moving into an illegally-parked trailer in NoPo with an abusive asshole, or even when I was living in Hillsdale in a small room with a drug addict and a hanger-on douchebag mooch who thought working under the table at a food cart at age 31 was a huge life achievement.* Anyway, everyone has their own life lessons, and mine is just that I was being weighed down by those people and those choices and it made me miserable, so I knew that wasn't the track I needed to be on.

I'll never take my future for granted again the way I did in Grad school.

It is nice realizing how little you really need in order to live. After that, it's always fun and nearly astounding to me to have even a little money. Half the time I'm not sure what to do with it, so I just pay off all my bills and I saved up for this fancy apartment and I'll just keep saving for my next trips to somewhere and socking the rest away in savings and forgetting about it.

(*Jezebel has heard this rant + more about Cyrus tons of times, but...: It would have been an achievement, had Cyrus actually had any other goals and aspirations; though I grilled him about it thoroughly and he had neither an education nor a plan nor even a dream. His only aspiration was to make enough money so he could continue being a whiny shit bag of wasted space, and I'm sure he would gladly have just mooched off everyone else and watched TV all day if his stupid ass could get away with it. He screamed at his former roommies when they asked him to contribute to utilities, and as far as I saw were doing him a favor letting him stay there! I'm pretty sure this type of person has always annoyed me more than any other in life. HAHAHA that it didn't work out for you, you TOOL. He actually wanted to sign the lease at my old place, where he had moved himself into my room against my wishes, and if I had the means to leave then, I would have let him deal with the actual owner about it and bowed out myself. But, I had to kick him out because of course I didn't want to be with him anymore and hadn't since about Week 3. After being so frustrated with his mooching off me for so long and being such a fucking stooge, I still want to kick his teeth in. He fucking ruined my time at Oregon Country Fair and especially at Beloved!! I seriously do hope that Jezebel is right about my breaking his heart, though I'm sure it isn't. Fucker didn't love me farther than he could whine at me. Waaa waaa waaa. GET A NOSE JOB CYRUS. And I'm still laughing that you got mocked ruthlessly in grade school! You're an ugly dumshit!)