Thoughts on Pools

This will be my spot I think, as I spend time in our new backyard.  The backyard will be where I write during the day and my bedroom will be where I write at night. Well, unless my roomies are out of town and then… the world back here is mine! 🙂

I am nervous about the drive to my dayjob until I find my new job, because I have been saving money on the non drive to the location I am at now. My new job will need to be flexible but need to pay at least what I make now plus be consistently 35-40 hours a week annnnd I would prefer that it be be an office job. Ain’t no way I’m going to be able to pay the gas from here to North Las Vegas and back 4-5 times a week. Plus, if I am completely honest, I am in a serious dislike with my job. It drives me nuts that I still haven’t reached where I was in 2004, payrate-wise. A decade ago, I still made more than I have ever made with this company. All right, Annie… move it along.

It’s strange to think that in 72 hours I will lay my head down in a completely different place. It’s weird to think about, especially since it’s been forever since I had a change of address. Halloween 2006, I left Texas for Nevada, with intent to move to SoCal in February. Now in July 2014, we’re boxing up and heading to the other side of the valley… where I will be entering into a comfortable arrangement with a beautiful pool. Still, it’s a change of address and I’ll need to change it in several different places, not just my license.

At least my editor knows where to find me. Haha!

My brother’s birthday was today (the 14th). He turned thirty-seven. I sent him a text. That’s how we do things lately, well, since this time last year when he thought I posted what he considered to be an offensive photograph to Facebook. He promptly unfriended me there, sending me a three line private message explaining that he couldn’t handle that “gay shit.” (He thought that I had the smarts to post a photo of two men kissing to my personal Facebook page… where all my very Southern Baptist could see it and comment about it. Until I had my author’s FB page, I had to be very careful about what I liked and didn’t like, because I am not ready to have that conversation with my whole family.) We had a long drawn out argument that ended up with me not having access to my brother. It’s a unique pain, being two thousand miles away from your whole family, yet realizing that there’s a much longer road than can be measured, to reaching someone that you never thought you could lose. I went down to Texas for the Christmas holidays last year and he stayed at arm’s length, even across a room.

I knew then that I could never come out to my family, not and still have them as family. Religion has too tight a hold of them. I think it would even damage the relationship I have with my mother, who I’m almost certain knows, but doesn’t actually want to know. I’m not even sure I’m making sense, and I hope that I’m just being paranoid, but I feel like the conversation is coming whether or not I want it to do so. The thought terrifies me.

Going back to my brother after that tangent. So it was his birthday and I sent him a text wishing him a happy birthday, and he sent back his gratitude, but he also asked if I was going to accept his friend request. Without ever having apologized for the hateful things he said to me, without ever having talked to me about it since then, a friendship request lands in my personal email box on July 5… and nine days later, because I feel the need to let him sit for a while and because I’ve not been on my personal page in over two weeks, he says, “Are you gonna accept my friendship request?” Well, let me think, dear brother. My heart still hurts from where you bruised it and those kinds of wounds don’t heal as fast as physical ones. Of course, I know to pick my battles and even if I didn’t, I wouldn’t be the kind of sister that would ruin my brother’s birthday, so I kept my angry and hurt thoughts to myself and instead told him that I’d not been on my personal page in a while, that when I got on it, I’d accept it.

It’s not a complete fabrication, but I still love my brother… despite his bigoted beliefs.

Thoughts like these make me happy I have a pool. Now I can immerse myself in water and let the rest of the anger and hurt float away. Quite exciting and relieving.

Well… I will curb this stream of consciousness and get to work before my beautiful men lose their patience. For now.

Author: M. LeAnne Phoenix

M. LeAnne Phoenix would tell you that the worst time of her life was the two years that she attempted to take off from writing. If you asked her to explain exactly why she did such a thing, you would most likely get the mad attempt to arch an eyebrow like her dad and then a shake of the head as she told you it was unlucky to speak of such things. Suffice it to say, it will never happen again! Born and raised in Fort Worth, Texas in the mid-1970's, Ms. Phoenix was young and wild (and even free!) during the crazy wondrous decade known as the 1980's and the even crazier but now grungy decade of the 1990's. Music is second only to the muses that live and breathe to fill her mind with beautiful men, and music always helps them to tell their stories. She is never without her iPod or her computer no matter where she goes, although, she does like to hike and take pictures of the sky and the moon, and even the occasional shot of the sun through the branches of a tree. An avid cat lover, Ms. Phoenix has been owned by many throughout her life, though her current owner is one Gypsy Jo, who really would like for her to step away from the keyboard and pay her some attention! After all, hasn't she earned it? M. LeAnne Phoenix can be found on Facebook at www.facebook.com/mleannephoenix. As this is her first real foray into the professional world of writing, there will be more social media to come. View all posts by M. LeAnne Phoenix