New Mexico
Traveling across the USA had not been done in my family since the 70's when we moved from Florida to California and then to Washington State. This time we went south and then east for greener pastures, more job opportunities as the population of the United States burgeons in the West. Being an unemployed Graduate Student(should that be capitalized like profession...? If I do not get work soon it will be my profession,"student" ).It seems the better a person gets at things the harder it is to find a job. I have been to school for everything. Kindergarten where I would chase a little boy with brown hair to kiss him, he must have been terrorized. Then on to grade school where a big Italian Girl named Tony beat me up daily(Contrary to developing social say, It did not make me a stronger person)Then to Jr. High where I was alas a social wall flower during the day and a wild party person, stoner at night. Or that is what they called it. I had come from LA where kids were into different things and the only kids that I fit with were the ones who wanted out of that organized institutional situation. When I was a senior I began leaving school whenever I wanted to, a repeat of my earlier days in grade school. After a beating I would leave tearfully, glasses lost, just hoofing it out the gates with no one alert enough on the playground to care.
Middle School: a broken leg, sitting on the bleachers during PE, or crutching it class to class, too often beating the cruel (tripping and pushing me), gangster girls off with my crutches.
I was bored with school, not to mention tired of being assaulted and belittled and discriminated against that when the big world of knowledge called to me and sitting behind a desk lost its hold on me. I got a car in High school after riding a motorcycle for a while. (Wrecking a family car, by backing it up a dark rockey drive with the windows all fogged,"I Got This." I thought, and then a crunch... "you forfeited the red and white Torino from the Starskey and Hutch show in your haste" said dad. of which I was always reminded of when I complained of the big Yellow Bomb I was stuck with sporting tire skirts and 4 doors. Hardly a car for a young person. Yet, I made due. Loading it up with as many of my fellow students that were willing to skip school to go adventuring in the world of weekday adults.
Shortly after arriving and being accounted for we met in the parking lot. Usually there were 8 (if we squished), a six pack of beer hidden in the trunk with special sliding speaker grills, and a pool of cash from each rider for fuel for the big 429/4 barrel. We flew down the freeways to Seattle , the airport, parks and lakes were a backdrop to underage drinking and smoking, and watch the ducks, geese and sailboats on Lake Washington or on a bad day the windshield wipers. More towards summer we went to the airport where we parked near the jets taking off and landing to marvel at how low over us those jets got. Then back to school in time to make the busses.
We must have thought we were quite clever. Apparently not clever enough as I one day was called out of my class in the morning by an announcement on the intercom. I remember that day poignantly, as there I sat waiting for the principal. "Gulp...." Even making peace with the one and only boyfriend I dated my whole high school career, there also to see the "Man" couldn't distill the fear in me at that moment. I remember that day like it was today, my palms perspiring and my attention distracted to staplers on desks and the blond hardwood chairs which were worn on the arms. Scenarios of my mother beating me with the broom as I ran away after she was informed of my transgressions made me shiver. I should clarify a bit: so as no one thinks my mother a child beater. She used a kind of passive aggressive discipline. She would confront me and I would lie, lie, lie and then she would grab anything close enough to hit me with. Sometimes it was a broom or whatever she had in her hand; spatula, garden rake, curling iron, telephone(comical to say the least, as she ran after me until the cord pulled the phone from her hand.)
As an adult I understand her frustration with me, I was a willful child, confrontational and argumentative and not very respectful. I drove her to hitting me, perhaps, psychologically,I did not feel loved if she did not strike me. Who knows? She now says she struck me as discipline with objects because I was so solid it caused her pain.
So, here is this brat sitting in the principals office contemplating sudden death issues when the door opened and my old friend came out, I think he was smiling. I thought about reaching out and grabbing that stupid choker he had on and twisting that smile off of his face. (18 year olds are emotional) (Just did not like the guy) Plus, how could he be smiling, he had just come out of the principals office?
Then this middle aged, motorcycle riding, polyester pant wearing principal said my name out loud! I acutely remember thinking,"Whose that?" Ducking under his arm as he held the door into his office I went.
It was a short meeting, and as I settled in to the same chair I had just vacated, or so it seems. He pronounced, my sentence," You're a senior? Right? Correct? Want to graduate?" "Yes, I do want to graduate," "Stay in school" he said. That was it he got up opened the door again and I exited.
No one had called my parents, and I had survived. I did stay in school and I did graduate.
Junior College, law Enforcement: The RCW Laws book was so thick and the class so full of future police officers, I dropped out. The only girl thing did not hold any attraction for me.
I then moved back to California and became a Veterinarians Assistant. Still going to school yet, a different major, DVM. Unfortunately, I was not focused enough for the mathematics and dropped out again. Became home sick, alone in Los Angeles and went back to school in Washington. Journalism and Photography, and graduated!
However, the same old story an economically struggling small town had little employment for an idealistic writer. I became briefly employed writing obits and current events like weddings and births.
Beauty School:"Cosmetology" at the time cutting hair seems like a fun profession. I had no idea one had to be a chemist to preform hair coloration. Really that was not it so much as the pedicures, ugh! I do not see the beauty of the foot outside of its functionality. Thank you feet for walking. I quit at 16,00 hours.
Plan B executed, Marriage. For myself, a temporal institution as children grow up, and marriage takes two and considering my marriage, when one person doesn't apply themselves, they get fired. Staying married had already been attempted for 20 years. Plan C executed, divorce.
Because, I am not the type to disrespect individuals by committing adultery, being single seemed like the right thing to do.
Back to school, Plan A: Psychology, Graduated 2011. Yeah! An original Valley Girl makes good. Minus the spoon and the long hair sleeping on my front lawn.
Leaving the state I had called home for many years did not seem to make much of an impression on me and may never. The employment scenario has been bleak, the local job market being a joke with a miss mash of service jobs and local skilled labor fighting over a combination of mill and processing jobs. I couldn't even get work in an office. Benefits offered , hugh? What benefits? More joking... the pay always, minimum wage. Friends, church, not many and none. Suffering from middle aged schisms.
My little car bursting at the seams, with items in order of importance;dog,check,textbooks, check, bicycle on carrier,check, 2 houseplants,toolkit, electric drill,Guitar(bummer won't fit),Pictures,laptop, first aid kit, hiking boots,check, check,and check.
My mom equally loaded in her car, plan B was executed.
Plan A involved a motorhome that once repairs began for the road trip it became cost ineffective and had to be abandoned. My brother will inherit.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>MORE TRAVEL ADVENTURES TO COME<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
