More Bizarre Nocturnal Dreams

Today I am curious about the subconscious messages my mind is trying to share in my dreams. 


Of late, I've had dreams that I am transported into an alternate universe at night.

It's an interesting environment to dream about.

The dreams always start with me riding in a super speed rain train where I'm staring out the windows and marveling at the teal and white rocky mountains....

the people sitting next to me don't understand my shock.

I tell them that the mountains I'm used to are purple....

they laugh.

The lakes in the dreams are purple.

The grass is silver.

The cities look nearly the same.

In these dreams,

shopping is interesting.

I had a dream of visiting a Macy's where I walked past a display of Madonna brand perfume, her picture had glowing blue robotic eyes which emanated from her face.

I looked around and noticed some teens have adopted the style.  In my dream world, robotic eyes are a thing.

One wonders if robotic eyes prevent people from seeing the humanity around them.  Perhaps this is a statement of the way we have grown accustomed to conversing via technology.

The clothes are nicer in my dreams, though.  There are browns, oranges, reds, yellows and warm hues, the kind of clothes I actually like to wear.

They clothes fairly conservative rather than the slutty clothes one tends to find in the malls now.

At least I dress well in my dreams.

In these dreams I am cognizant of my life in this world and find myself wanting to find people long gone....

I want to find my mother and father in this alternative universe in the hopes that they are still alive in this world. I wonder what they would look like as senior citizens.

I wonder if I have any siblings.

In the last dream, I picked up a locket and find myself wondering if the Tom in this world was lucky enough to escape meeting me.…

and then I realized that...

there was probably another one of me in that universe which would double the odds of annoying him.

The dreams typically end with the thought that no world could possibly handle two of me and that it was time for me to go home.

*****
For the past thirteen years or so, I've pondered that whole unfinished business thing and the bizarre connection where I'd dream of Tom and he'd show up.  

It's crazy.

It's one thing when it's only in my head.  That makes it my mental issue.  It makes it fantasy.

It's another when the things in my head manifest in real life.

That can be a tad bit freaky.

In most of the dreams I've had of him, I've run away.

The last dream, I did not run away from him: I ran away with him.

That freaked me out a little bit.

In the real world, that seems to translate to me avoiding my home town and any environmental stimuli that reminds me of my youth.

A couple of weeks ago, I turned down a job in my home town working with disabled adults.  It paid fairly well for an internship.

In fact, I'm finding myself avoiding my home town again.  I'm spending more time in the small towns in the southern side of the state.

There are some wonderful internships and jobs in my home town.  I should pursue them.

I probably won't.

*****

What am I really running away from?

It's almost as if I'm trying to forget.

It took some pondering but I'm hopeful that I stumbled on the meaning.  If I understand the meaning, the dreams will stop.

I think all the dreams were about reminding me that I'm capable of loving people even if they're disrespectful and rude.

In looking back, that first relationship was riddled with unsporting sarcastic comments equating my music to a desire to be slut: he assumed that any woman who auditioned for a band with a guy in it only did so for sex.  As an adult, this man equated my activism with being a hypocritical welfare sucking author who ragged on the poor.

Sarcasm can be incredibly hurtful because it is often back-handed criticism that is couched as a joke.

It also makes it awfully hard to trust the person being sarcastic.  You never know what you share will turn up as shameful fodder on social media.

Perhaps I needed to remember why I didn't trust him enough to tell him what was going on.

I'm not saying this next bit out of pity.  I truly think it's time for me to stop trying to have romantic relationships.  I have been ripped off far too much.  Right now, the wrong relationship could take everything from me.

Quite honestly, the only healthy relationship I had with a male was with my Satanic roommate who wasn't into me.

Perhaps it is the entire Pagan openness thing.  Most Pagans espouse the idea of true freedom with unconditional love and acceptance.  Tying someone down or ridiculing them due to our own insecurities is the opposite of unconditional love and acceptance.

I even accepted him when he explained that he didn't worship Satan.  He worshiped the archetype.

As someone who loves Carl Jung I understand.

I dream of this guy, too.  His name is Sampson. He comes to me in my dreams when I've been attacked or beaten.  He also shows up in real life to threaten or stare down my attackers.

I think I saw him outside of my new office last summer: I was stopped at a light and he started to approach my car with a half-grin.  He dressed just as I remember, had the same filthy grin with the adorable gap in his front teeth. I started to reach out for him and the light changed, cars honked and I tried to turn around in a parking lot to talk to him.

When I looked for him, he was gone.

A couple of months later, I took a job on that very street corner.  I've worked there ten months now, when I look out the window, I never see him.

Maybe it was my imagination.

Perhaps these are mirages that I need to understand and heed.  Sampson knows my sister.  He always reaches out when he needs something.

Maybe the dreams of Tom and Sampson are supposed to clear out the mind clutter of my past.

Maybe the point of the alternate universe dream is to create a new world for me to live in right now.

One free of men who tend to be annoyed by my energy.

Perhaps I should hold out for someone more spiritually like minded.

******
I find myself wondering about the dream,

pondering

where it came from.

Where would I consider the possibility of living in an alternate universe?

I think I know.

There are some sorcerers who believe that the best way to cast a spell is to imagine transporting yourself to an alternate universe where the only detail of your life that is different is the very thing you're wanting to change -

be it a better job,

a new lover,

more money

or whatever you want.

That probably wouldn't work for me.

I would definitely over think it.

Luckily I have more tried and true methods of re-inventing myself.

*****

I'm very busy - too busy.

I'm trying to get back into a doctoral program.  I finally realized that student loans are a tax that professional people pay so that they can get the good jobs.

I've spent the past three weeks taking the CEUs for my insurance licenses.  I don't think I'll keep all 37.  I may keep my license in Washington, Oregon, California and Colorado.  I don't really see myself moving anywhere outside of these areas.

I'm also in school to get licensed as a drug and alcohol counselor.  The biggest issue I have right now is trying to find an internship and/or a paying job in the field so I can earn my hours.  It'll take about three years to earn enough hours for the license.

If I don't write for awhile it is because I'm super busy.

Everything will work out.

I pray everything works out well for you, too.

Live your dreams in this world, it's far more interesting.

Love ya,

S.

Drama and Insults

My father may not have loved his kids.  I should do my best to love my siblings, even the ones I haven't met yet. 

Today I am thankful for my past. 

I don't write about this much but I have nine half-siblings.  I may be confused, it may be seven.  I could be adding my step-brother into the mix.

It may be seven.  I have six-half siblings who were birthed by my father's first wife.  There was one that found me when she got her adoption paperwork as an adult.  I have my sister.

I have an older step-brother who was a back up singer for a well known pop star until he discovered cocaine.  He had a record album produced in 1983.  It never hit the market.  He wanted to go by the stage name Ronnie Lee.  I have no idea who has the album that graced our living room growing up.   I lost contact with him after his father (my step-dad) committed suicide.

6 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 9

I have nine siblings that I know about.

I don't know my half-siblings very well.  I haven't spoken to many of them.

My father was a bit of a philanderer.

I didn't care much for him.

I remember him beating me one day while I was wearing purple. I was five.  The pants were corduroy.  The shirt had vertical stripes.

I hate purple. I hate corduroy.  I hate vertical stripes.

I remember his guitar.

It was an acoustic.

I remember his fishing pole and how he would kick the table after mom prepared the fish he caught to try to convince me that the fish were still alive.

He was a jerk.

I remember hating him to the point that I was grateful that he was gone.

His sister sought me out in 1996 and told me that my father was dead.

We had the internet back then.  I knew better.  I had a Google alert set.  One day about fifteen years ago, I received a Google alert that my father had died in Texas.

No big deal.

I also knew better because my father lied about his name on my birth certificate.  In my teens, I wrote to the man whose name was on my birth certificate.

He turned out to be my paternal grandfather.  My father's father was a farmer in Los Angeles.  He must have made a fortune when he sold his family's land.

He wrote beautiful letters back to me telling me that he wished he were my dad because he'd be very proud of me.

I still have the letters.

When he died, his eldest son tracked me down to tell me.  It was 1989.  That was three years before I changed my name and hid from the world.

I think he was worried that I wanted a piece of my grandfather's estate.  No, I didn't.

It be more fair to say that I wanted to understand where I came from.

My uncle also expressed his disdain for his brother, my father. I clung to their life stories and felt encouraged to continue in school because my uncles and aunts made something of themselves.

One of my uncles is a doctor, another is supposedly a lawyer.  The eldest son wrote a book about genealogy.

It's strange that my father's sister didn't share that with me.  She told me that my father's siblings lived in Kansas and were farmers.

I learned differently.  .

One of my uncles is a world renowned plastic surgeon.  I remember reading his journal articles with a mixture of glee and wonder in the mid-eighties.  I couldn't understand them.

Yes, I've been published three times in journals.  I'm sure it was because of his inspiration.

I think my father's family inspired me on some level to push myself to try to be something.

It was in my blood.

I will be forever grateful.

My father was an actor who ran off to Hollywood.  I would learn from his brother that he ran off during the harvest which caused a lot of hardship for the family.

My father never made it big.

He spent his life living in regret.

He was an abusive jerk.

I'm lucky he was out of my life.

There is one thing that I absolutely cannot respect about the man.

He didn't understand gun safety.  I have a memory of him in a drunken stupor threatening my maternal grandfather with a firearm.

Grandpa just grabbed the gun, unloaded it and told my dad to get off the property.

I was six.

I never saw my father again.

It's funny.  When I was a kid, I wanted to be like my grandfather.  I wanted to be a person of few words.  When I spoke, I wanted to make it count.

Well....I talk too much for that.

I grabbed a gun from a drunk at the age of ten.  I don't remember trying to unload it before taking it to the fire department.

I thought that's what you were supposed to do when an idiot points a weapon at you.

Take it!

The cops chewed me out for that one.  I'm not sure that my sister or I would be alive if I hadn't snatched that gun away from my step-father.

Children learn what they live!

*****

Over the years, I found I went to high school with a half-sibling.  She refused to talk to me.

That's okay.

I assumed that she was angry.  Our father left their mother for my mom. Judging by the lie on my birth certificate, I'm going to guess that his marriage to my mother wasn't legal.

He had the audacity to force my mom to babysit my half-siblings

I actually have memories of playing with my half-sisters when I was very young.  They stayed for weeks on end with my grandmother, mother and I.

Our dad wasn't around.

Our dad was a deadbeat.

I am absolutely sure they were traumatized by his behavior.

I learned tonight that they've been looking for me all these years but I've been in hiding.

I changed the spelling of my first name.

I changed my middle and last name.

I have basically hid in plain sight.

So, they reached out to my baby sister.

My baby sister wasn't kind.

Oh my.....she had it the worst of all of us.  She was in state run foster care.  For some damn reason Colorado human services shipped her off to Florida when she was fourteen.  The Florida foster mom thought she could get more money if she had kids living with her that were pregnant.  She forced boys to have sex with my fourteen year old sister.

I lost my cool.  That tapped into anger I didn't think I was capable of.  One can be so angry that fear, self-consciousness and shyness go straight out the window.

I didn't know I could talk so loud.

That was when I became a political activist.  I was barely eighteen.

I tried to adopt my sister out of foster care.  I even got married to do just that.

The Denver Department of Social Services awarded custody of my sister to a pimp.  I understand my sister won a massive settlement over that which put her through graduate school.

I don't trust the government farther than I can spit.  I have damn good reason for that.  If you ask me what I think about Trump's kiddo detention centers, I'll tell you what a shitty parent the government makes.  

It shouldn't have taken over a year to get my sister out of that sexually exploitive home.

This is probably why I'm a libertarian.

The government is too big.  It loses sight of the people in its charge.

Foxes watch the hen house, so to speak.

Too many government employees lack oversight.

Apparently, my sister let our half-siblings know that her life was horrible.  She expressed hurt and shock that they didn't care.

She put them in tears.

I don't think she understands that they were hurting, too.

They were children.  What could my sister have expected them to do?

Deadbeat dads ruin families.  Colorado, at least in my experience, supports deadbeat dads.  Society cannot manage if one gender is responsible for all of the financial and emotional responsibility to bringing up the next generation.

It's our parents' fault our lives were shitty.

So....blaming our siblings isn't the right answer there.

It's not their fault.

It truly isn't.

One of our half-sisters is dying.  She's just a few months older than I am.

I'll call her tomorrow.

I had no idea they reached out to a local news station in an effort to track me down.  Um.....they don't know my name.

I've actually been featured on that station in the past but not with my birth name.

Wow... this might get interesting.

******

My sister has a confidant who is the mother of one of our D.C. lawmakers.  Since we only have two people holding these seats in our state, I can't say what the office is or you'd guess the person's name.

I can say that I've built numerous websites for the lawmaker's opponents over the years.

That woman is a staunch Democrat as is the legislator.  My sister is also a Democrat.

My sister always knows what to say to piss me off and make me want to start another Political Action Committee.

The last time I spoke to my sister, the lawmaker's mother allegedly told my sister that I am "certainly good at advocating for myself."

That's a slam towards my libertarian stance.

They claim that people like me are greedy and don't care about other people.  The claim is that should libertarians have their way, we'd all live in a post-apocalyptic world of ruin.

Yeah....I'm Mad Maxine - lol.

Sure.....Whatever.

Today....the insult was even worse.

Apparently, this lawmaker's mother informed my sister to ignore my "tough girl act." Deep down inside, she claims, I'm hurting over my childhood.

I can't say that I am hurting over my childhood.

I had a lot of wonderful advocates.

I don't know of any other way to feel.

I was lucky.

I had Baptist ministers and Mormon bishops who helped me find families to stay with in times of need.  They came to the house to make sure my sister and I were fed.  They brought clothing.

They taught me to tithe, even if my only tithing is to the local food bank.  If we all give what we can, we can make a difference in the lives of others.

My childhood taught me NOT to trust the government- trust private charity instead.

In my case, I can pay it forward.

I had talent scouts, teachers and many other prominent figures in my life who helped me find out who I was.  They taught me to allow my gifts to flourish even in the face of adversity.

Adversity makes artistic works deeper.

My sister didn't have that influence.

Politicians helped me.....sometimes.

When they didn't and I knew I was right,

I bitched like a heathen out of hell until things changed.

Some things are left undone.

I'll always be busy because there will always be more hellish fires to put out.

No....I am not hurting from my childhood.

It shaped me into the barking hellhound I am today.

I had great friends, for the most part.  Many of my childhood friends are still in my life.

I've pissed off a couple of the liberal ones with my rants against silly taxes and Red Flag laws.

Yeah...it's the staunch liberals that tend to stay away.

That's okay.

Yes, I'm hurting from stupid crap I did as a teenager (it's more regret for not telling someone how important he was).  If he's happy, it's all good.

I'm not sure if I could be happy with someone who dislikes the Constitution or TABOR.

Things always work out they way they need to work out, don't they?

Sigh....

Yes, I'm running from a stalker because I never learned discernment and allowed an asshole to take over my life.  That lesson is just to not be so patient.  I turned my cheek far too many times and this guy got away with stealing so many things from me.  Yeah....this guy got to hurt me because I allowed him to boil me in hot water.  It was many changes done in an incremental fashion, I didn't realize where I was until it was too late.

Now, I'm not so patient.

What is life but a series of lessons?

I don't understand what this woman is trying to say about me.

Or maybe my sister was projecting her grief on to me.

I don't know.

One things is for certain, I do not grieve for my childhood.....not one single bit.

After working with people who appear to come from happy families where the abuse was hidden, I realize how lucky I am.

I knew the shit in my life wasn't right.

Most abused children think it to be normal.

*****

I am tough.....as is my sister.

Denying me my strength is an insult.

I would never change the script of my childhood - not one single line.

Those adversities made me the person I am today.

Those kindnesses I benefited from have taught me empathy and charity.

I honestly think my childhood was pretty damn good.

Nothing can be truly bad if you learn from it.

Love ya,

S.

Edit: I don't accept Facebook friend requests anymore.  My sisters are reaching out and trying to friend me that infernal website.

I saw their pictures and had to laugh.....

We all have the same curly red hair!

Maybe this won't be so bad after all.

Ugh! I hate Facebook! I really do.

Today I am thankful for a Facebook discovery.  

In June, my stalkerish ex-husband told me that he didn't want to comply with the divorce decree because I lied about being stalked and was actually stalking him in an attempt to get him fired.

That's his excuse for not sharing income information to recalculate the child support that we gutted last year due to his alleged drug and/or alcohol addiction.  If I don't know where he works or how much he makes, he reasons, I can't accuse him of stalking me.

Of course, he doesn't have an addiction...at least that's what he tells me.

I assume he's living with his mother and working as a tax auditor.  I have no real reason to believe otherwise.

Later in the same conversation, he admits I've been stalked and blames this guy I dated on and off for six months about five years ago.

The guy I dated has the same name as a famous football player hailing from San Francisco.  This guy told me he had a cluster B personality disorder....then he said he was joking about it.

Then he started sending me obnoxious and abusive emails.


I didn't initially believe they were from him given the crap my ex-husband had put me through.

Then he started posing obnoxious and controlling crap to my Facebook feed which irritated my friends.  He would be upset that I wouldn't answer my phone (because I'd be at a job interview or with a client) and make threats.

Then he started doing crazy crap in person.  He'd take on the demeanor of a child and accuse of doing things his mother did.

He choked me.

One day he got violent over potatoes.  There were no potatoes around, mind you.  He was on a low carb diet.

I'm allergic to everything that most people put on potatoes.

He was upset that his mother made him eat potatoes.  I guess he assumed I agreed with her.

No...I don't like empty calories.

I bid him farewell and started walking home.

He got worse from there.  Every time he'd act out, he'd see another woman.  So I assumed that the acting out was to get me away from him so he had time for this other chick.

After a couple of weeks, he'd call me and try to do Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) with me.

DBT is the treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder - a cluster B disorder.

Like an idiot, I gave him another chance.  We agreed to buy tickets to two events.  I bought tickets to a three day pagan festival.  He bought tickets to a three day concert.

They were nice seats, right up front on the dance floor.  When we arrived, he claimed to have sold my tickets and presented me with tickets for the stand.  I spent my first night alone while he danced with another girl on the dance floor.

The next two nights, he'd sneak out of my tent to go see this girl.  He told me that she was saying bad things about me so he wasn't trying to hide it.

It didn't help him that he put this girl up to calling me several months after I refused to see him.

That's when I figured out what was going on.

I couldn't deal with it.

I never wanted to see him again.

I told him to leave me alone.  He threatened to get a restraining order if I didn't call him back saying that he could lie to the police like he did about his ex-wife.

I called someone I knew at the Sheriff's department to alert them to what was going on.

He threatened to get me committed.

Um.....that was funny.  I work with shrinks.

Then he claimed his mother and father worked for the FBI and they could make my life a living hell.  Shorty after that, he claimed I worked for the CIA and was following him around.

I laughed.

I blocked his emails and calls.

He tried using apps to harass me.  I've blocked the apps.

I don't answer the phone any more.

Every so often I have to block him on social media.....still.

He started to attend political groups I had attended in the past.  I quit going.

He had his other girlfriend call to dig up information.  When I'd warn her about him, the line would suddenly disconnect.

I wound up giving up my phone number.

Sometimes I'll see someone who resembles him around my office.  That could be expected, I mean he basically works across the street.

Life is good without that crap in my life.

I ignore him.

He started to make up fake names and post to my social media pages.  I knew it was him.  He claimed we lived together (we did not).  He claimed I was a CIA agent stalking him online  (too busy for that).

I now avoid social media.

Everything is locked down tightly.

No one can comment on my pages any more.

I do not accept friend requests.

My social circle is very small now.

******
I will go to Facebook if I am tagged in posts.

Since some of the peace officers in my area are acting like racist thugs, I'm tagged in more posts than I like.

I have hope that our new mayor and police chief will fix the problem.

If I have to don a girdle and paint my face to get in from of a camera for a three minute tirade, I will not be a happy woman.

I'll give them a chance, first.

They've already piqued my curiosity.  I'm starting to investigate people who want to raise taxes just to gain money for their organizations.

The b!tch will probably be back sooner than anyone realizes.

I hope not.

That's what happens when I'm pinged online.

******
Today I was tagged in a post from a budding musician.  He wanted to know which musician inspired me the most on stage.

That musician is Angus Young of AC/DC.  He hops up and down and all around in his Scottish shorts and shreds the heck out of his guitar.

I wish I could be like him.

Alas, I play bass.  I'm old.  My joints would probably give out if I tried that.  My playing would get worse, too (not that it's good right now....I'm terribly rusty).

My breasts are so floppy they'd probably put out an eye.

The person who asked the question is young.....maybe he would find Young inspirational.

I started to type the name:

A..n...g..u..s……...Y

and then this would pop up on my screen.....

St3v3 Y0ung, Unc0mm0nS0lutions (yes, I've changed parts of the name).

That's the name of the creepy dude with the side chick.

That is the name of the company across the street from my office.

Here's the thing...…

I'm not friends with men who have his name (including acquaintances in the liberty movement).

I've blocked anyone with that name.  I've blocked his company, his family and any one with his name.

Unless Facebook changed something, this must be a new page.

I think I've been blocked from the page because I can't find it to block it!

This is sick.

So....if old Steve is watching this thing I'm going to issue a tiny warning.

The stalking isn't over.

I'm still dealing with property damage and bizarre phone calls.

I know who is doing it because it's been going on since 1992.

The police may or may not know who is doing it.

If I turn up blue, the last thing Steve wants is to be a suspect right?

Stop it!

Don't come near my property (the neighbors tell me things). I hadn't heard about you banging on the door since November 2015 but perhaps I was too quick to dismiss the most recent sightings.

I assumed the guy was an arborist. .

Maybe I was wrong.

I'll talk to my neighbors again.

Don't watch my Facebook page.

Everything we do online is recordedsomewhere.

Just.....don't.

We shouldn't have any connection any longer.

I know this is new.  I mean I use the word young all the time.....I write about Young Living essential oils, I crack jokes about being old...…I have other friends with the same last name.....

this is the first time typing the word young in a comment tagged this guy's Facebook page.  Facebook must think we're connected somehow.  In the past, this would happen quite a bit and I'd block the page or the identity.

This time, it wouldn't let me find the page to block it.

Strange, it still comes up when I type the word young.

I didn't even know he had a Facebook page.

******
Men send nasty, threatening messages to women to run her off so they can have sex with other girls.

I know the game.

I don't want a STD.

Yeah, it's my monogram.

The doctors and nurses at work have a fun with that because everything I do has to be signed STD.

That's all I want those initials to mean for me.

Steve....

Leave me alone.  Don't do it for me.  Do it for yourself.

Seriously.....you don't want to get caught up in my ex-husband's game.  When (and if) he is caught, the very first person he's going to blame is YOU.

Then he'll blame someone I dated 32 years ago who lives on the west coast.

That won't go very far.

That's why I document everything - documentation lets people know what is going on should I suddenly have the inability to speak because I'm busy fertilizing the soil with my innate components.

You have a criminal record....so....you don't want the drama, do you?

Besides you told everyone I sent demons after you.

Yeah...…

You're too silly to realize that any demons bugging you are of your own creation.

Besides....if I could control demons I'd probably drive a better car....

have a bunch of uzi's….

and Steinberger basses....

Oh, and I'd have glowing red eyes and smell like sulfur (just teasing).

But....since you buy into that crap....

let me tell you that I have too many black, non-reversible male candles.

They're used in weight loss spells

or spells intended to kill people.

Use your imagination.

Oh....and if one wants to cast a spell that impacts another person, they need that person's birthday, full name and bodily imprint or psychic energy.

Staying away keeps me from having your bodily imprint or psychic energy.

Knock it off....just....knock it off.

I stay away from people to protect them.

I would highly suggest you stay away.

May all your little games come back to bite you in your arse so you can learn from them.  DBT should help you stop playing shit games with people.  That is what drives people away.

People don't like no win situations.  People are not lab rats that you can mess with to try to gauge what we are going to do.

Stay in therapy.  If you've stopped, go back.

Oh and.....don't harass people using your company's name - that's a great way to get fired, by the way.  If I turn up blue, I'd hate for the cops show up to your place of employment and impound the computers.

Seriously...….you're lucky my ex-husband is wrong about my trying to get people fired.

I don't do that.  People who act like jackasses tend to get in trouble all on their own.

Oh great....I googled the name of the page and the Google descriptions suggest he is acting like a hacker extraordinaire!  That is all the more reason for him to stay away.

I get hacked all the time.  I probably should disclose that the hacking started years before I met this guy.  The cops need to know that it started in 2000 when my ex gave my passwords to his sister.

I met him in April of 2011.

Sigh.....

I wish that he finds a girl who can tolerate the games and has so much fun he never thinks of me again.

If he believes I have djinn, maybe he'll believe they heard that.

Sigh....

I'm off to write to Facebook to try to discover why his name would show up in comments if he's been blocked and I'm not following his pages.

I'm changing my passwords.

Hacking me won't yield anything fun or important.  It's not like I talk to anyone online anymore.

Cheers,

S.

Edit after research: I was informed that Facebook will autofill based on things my friends post and like.  I searched the employees of the place this guy works and noticed that they all know one of my liberty activist acquaintances.

I blocked everyone except her.

It appears that one can go to the search bar and type "employees of [name of company]" and, lo and behold, get a list of people that work there.

Another person told me that Facebook will only fill in popular pages.  If that is the case, why I don't I get an auto-fill for a former San Francisco quarterback?

Sigh....

Facebook is strange.

Maybe the warning is to be careful about who I date because I may be avoiding them for a long, long time.

This guy isn't the reason I don't do much online, my ex's family is the reason for that.  This guy just hastened my grid avoidance.

Moving from Sympathy to Empathy

Today I am thankful for realizations and revelations. 

In June, my ex wanted me to drop everything and drag the kids out to a theater.  I called him to try to talk to him about a static visitation schedule.  He's only had one visit since he was court ordered out of my house for the second time.

It was at a theater.

The visit ended fairly abruptly after the movie.  I was under the impression that he would visit with them over dinner and take a walk with them.  I had allotted the entire afternoon or the visit.

It was over well before the two hour mark.  I was still at my eye appointment and my eyes were dilated so I wasn't ready to drive.  A local teenager drove out to pick them up as he had left them in a parking lot.

That's not something I want to repeat.

In that conversation, I asked to exchange income information as per our divorce agreement and he refused.  In his refusal, he accused me of stalking.  He stated that I called his workplace with crazy stories in an attempt to get him fired.  He didn't want to share his income information out of fear that I'd harass him at work.

There was one June day in 2015 when someone banged on the door, set fire to something on the porch, turned on the water house and cut it.  They also broke apart little dolls I had gracing the herb garden in the front of the house.

That last bit still goes on to this day - This year I had metal and glass flowers decorating the herb garden: They were cut last week.

My ex-husband refused to move from my house.  He claimed that he traveled 90% of the time for business and only wanted to sleep there a few nights a month.  He bought a security camera for the front window that piped a live feed into his phone - he had access to our activities and private conversations.

I only agreed to this because we had a stalking event at least twice a month (often more) and I wanted to catch the perp on camera.

He claimed it was his sister.  Then he claimed his sister died in January 2015.

Even though she was allegedly dead, the shenanigans continued.

I called him during that June incident to ask that he send me a snippet of the video.

Of course, he couldn't do that.

He was allegedly in California and flew home the next day. I was not expecting that.

He was fired a month later.  I don't know why he was fired.

This was the second time he was fired in six years.  Over the course of the next year, he also became a licensed insurance agent and I funded his business trips, gave him my mini-van, and paid his auto insurance in an effort to help him get on his feet.

He didn't take care of the van.  When it died, he wanted my car.  After the bullsh!t with the gps box that was found on my mini-van prior to our divorce, I wasn't going to give him my car.

He claims he was fired from the third job because I wouldn't give him my car.

He's gotten his child support lowered because he submitted a letter to my former lawyer stating that he was in an alcohol and drug rehab program.  Numerous lawyers have told me that I should have known he was a drinker and any judge would agree to lower his child support to $0.

I couldn't afford the legal fees.  I agreed to gut his support.  The state wants to make me responsible for the health insurance and all fees connected to health.

This is why I am not doing the work I was trained to do, rather I am taking a call center job at my favorite health care company trying to get the insurance for the kids.

It's not going to happen.....the company is losing money.  They keep extending the time frame that I have to wait for insurance.  At first it was three months, now it will be a year.

I'm only working to get insurance. I realized that I need to start looking for another job.

Of course, my ex now states that he never touches drugs or alcohol.  I've never seen him partake either.

I don't know who he is.

I truly do not know if he was fired for his own behavior.  He worked in the trucking industry, they do random drug tests - maybe he failed?  I don't know.

I do know that I never once called his boss.  I have NEVER tried to get him fired from any job.

Yeah, I'll admit I felt sorry for him but I am no longer in the position of fixing his problems for him.  In fact, he's created a few problems for me that I need to solve.

His creditors are calling my business line five to six times per day.  I received one message asking for him.  After that, I've gotten a slew of hang up calls.

It's getting exhausting.

Something must have hit my credit so I'm going to have to get a copy of the report to see what is up.  As far as I know, I'm current on all of my bills.

I'm too busy to mess with him.

*******

I found myself pondering how it felt to box up his stuff at work.

Then I realized that I had been in that position numerous times.

I lost an apartment after his mother and sister harassed my landlord.

In '92 his cousin would call me at work incessantly.  I felt pressured to find a new job.

In '94, someone told my Christian boss that I was having sex out of wedlock.  He started to write me up when I had the stomach flu.  I wasn't allowed to take a day off but he thought I was pregnant when I got ill in the bathroom.  The last write up session included a chastisement about an abortion I never had.

Fortunately, I found a job at a saddle shop, my boss was a cowboy who ignored the crap.  My sister-in-law took a bunch of whips and  spurs without paying for them.  Thankfully, I took an inventory of everything she grabbed and was able to pay for it after she left.

I wound up losing that job three years later when my ex took my money and bought a house away from any bus line. It didn't take very long for him to start taking my vehicle without my permission.  I chose to quit rather than make my boss scramble for a temp.

I choose to volunteer for the District Attorney.  This would be different because the office was a straight shot from my house.  Car or not, I could get there!  Alas....one of his friends was a wife beater, child murderer and he'd harass me at the new gig (can't imagine how he knew I worked there).  I wound up leaving when my boss had called me and my ex stood behind me raging into the phone.

I had to give up my therapist office in my favorite part of town (it was literally the pharmacist office at the drug store I used to frequent with my old friend in high school as a kid).  I gave it up after my office mate said people were coming around during her business hours to ask about me and Doug (my sister-in-law's fiancé) roughed up the billing clerk.  They were too scared to file a report with the police.  Those were hard boxes to pack.

After the divorce, my ex refused to leave.  I literally had bug out bags packed for myself and the kids.  There were times I'd have to use them due to the freaky rage attacks.

In sum.....

I HAVE had the experience of boxing up my stuff to leave jobs and homes I've loved due to harassment.

It's not a good feeling.

I realize now that he's only experienced a few times in his life and it was probably due to his own behavior.

My sympathy has turned to empathy.

I can't afford to continue to pay for his stalking, or pranks, or whatever the heck they want to call it.

********************

The stalking has made me wiser.

It has been a horrible experience and I never thought it could be useful.

There a man I'm incredibly worried about.  I've blogged about him before.  People have tried to set us up -but- it's the religious thing.

He's a devout Christian.

I'm a devout deviant.

It just would not work.

I've known him for twelve years.

He's amazing.  He's saved me from the bees that flock to my red hair at public events.  He chewed out a lawmaker he caught telling me that stalked women should never have firearms.  He tried to support my business, help me get insurance when my ex refused to cooperate with the divorce decree and even helped support my journey to get health insurance licenses.

He's big on rescuing animals.

I don't get out much any more.  I keep in touch with everyone online.  He'd been posting some worrying things about a person in the neighborhood acting strangely.

The more he wrote, the more worried I got.

I tried to keep my mouth shut as it just got worse and worse.  I thought that maybe my fear was due to my situation and what I was possibly reading into his.

It got to the point that my worry was overwhelming so I finally asked him to go the police.  He refused.

Well....it wasn't very long before someone in law enforcement got wind of what was going on.  Let just say my friend is not safe.

Things are worse that I imagined.

In not in a place where I can help him.

Sigh....

This has taught me to try to take that crappy experience of being harassed and stalked since 1992 and turn it around into a experience that I can use to help others.  This is part of the reason I'm back in school.  I'd like to be certified in helping domestic violence victims and perpetrators.

I often felt that I had no one to talk to who would understand.  I still think of that licensed counselor who told me that married women should not talk to men.  I tried to laugh it off, asking her if I was supposed to use smoke signals to communicate with the men I ran against during a political campaign.

She didn't answer.

She's probably the reason I'm terrified to date.  Dating leads to marriage.  Married women, allegedly, cannot talk to men at work or in the political arena.  I'll find another therapist to work on my fear of dating.

That therapist was unhealthy.  She also told me about her mother's murder at the hands of her father.  She didn't believe me when I told her that I also had a master's in psych and tried to caution her about self-disclosure. I told her clinical supervisor.  I realize now that I should have just gone to DORA but I didn't want to risk my situation being made public (due to the stalking).

That sad thing was that the next therapist was horrible, too.  He claimed I was lying about the stalking and that I could lock my ex out of the house legally if I truly wanted to end the problem.  Um....no.  I was told time and time again that changing the locks would be an illegal eviction.  I had to wait until my ex started to turn over the money awarded to me in the divorce so I could afford to hire a lawyer to get him out.  That process took nearly three YEARS!  He still owes me money from the bank accounts, too.

Sigh.....

The next therapist believed me and we worked on safety issues: new anonymous job, new gadgets, new car, alarms all over the place, pepper spray, safety plans for the kids and those types of things.

It would seem that there is a need for people who understand stalking.  Maybe I can turn my horrible nightmare into a positive for someone else.

I've also learned that I need to get my house in order so that I can be there for people I care about.  Stalking can cause people to leave their homes and offices for a period of time.  I can't let a friend stay here.  The problem isn't a lack of space.  The problem is that I haven't yet cleaned out the entire mess my ex-husband left.

I have a basement apartment that is in disarray (with radon - getting a mitigation system).  It wouldn't be too bad to let someone have that key when it is habitable.

I'm off to do some cleaning.

I may have to find a private loan - just not sure if I can qualify. I'd prefer a private solution to a government one.  

The last time I tried to get a loan my income was too low.  I'll keep searching.

The local government has offered to help me with a perplexing issue.

I've got to cut down a tree on the property line.  The last owner was a jerk.  He tore down my fence and put a really ugly one up about 18" from the property line.  That left his dying tree in my yard.

He sold the house.  This new guy is the gun toting neighbor.  He scares the hell out of me.  He and wife scream into my yard when people are outside (me, the kids, the pest control guy....).  He has pulled a gun on people parking in front of my house because he claims they are too close to his yard (yeah....the cops don't care).  His wife has gone so far to harass me online (cute....like I'm not accustomed to that already due to my ex's family).

It is to the point that I fear for his wife and kids. I think she acts crazy because she's trying to keep him happy.  He seems a tad bit controlling.  He has a firearm and, apparently, a lack of respect for the rights of others and local gun laws.

I don't want him to know that the tree is on the property line.  I want to get it out of there without him being responsible for it in any way.

I don't want him involved.

I just got a call from the city.  They want to tear down his fence...…it is against code.  It was put up in 2007. I called the city when my former neighbor was putting it up and they told me to let it go.

I did.

It's not the new guy's fault.

Well...…

This is going to get interesting, isn't it?

It's obvious the fence is his because it is several inches away from the logs this guy uses to gauge his property line.

He's going to go into a rage if they tear down his fence.  If he has to pay any money towards repair or rebuilding, he is going to go insane.  I hear him talk about having to have two jobs to support the family.  Money is a stressor for him.

Maybe I should just cut the city out of the tree issue entirely.

I'm going to try to get another loan so I can hire another company to cut down the tree.

It's not worth the potential bullet holes or the possible crime scene tape if this guy goes off like a firework.

I'm not afraid for my safety.  I'm afraid for his wife, three kids and two dogs.

I'll let you know how it goes.

*****

Disordered people are all around us.

It's up to us to stay safe and protect ourselves without inviting attention from people who are prone to act out against others.

If you're in that situation, reach out.  There are people who have been there.  It may take a few tries but eventually you'll find someone.

The best help I have received has from the Colorado Coalition Against Domestic Violence (many states have a DV coalition).

The city DV program.....uh....they gave out misinformation.  They're staffed by volunteers so it's hard to expect perfection.  Perhaps someday I'll be in a position to volunteer there after I get my licenses.

Love ya,

S.