- Location
- REDLANDS, CA. (SoCal)
Greetings, salutations and an assorted lot of generic pleasantries, I’m new here and I would like to take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Bent, for a time severely; and although it was once nearly “Broken”, it is in fact merely “Bent”. While I’m at it I figured I’d share some of my favorite hobbies and pastimes.
My favorite activities are/have been isolating, avoidance, denial, phobias, insanity, hiding from nearly all of life, neglecting great friends, long time friendships and Jeeps, spinning in circles; and just feeling trapped. I have been going to school for some time now but still very short on credits. I’ve been taking classes on how to crawl out of my shell, breathe, rekindle friendships, those things I enjoy doing; mostly, though, trying to live in the real world and not just in my head. The classes have been a slow go at times; I’ve flunked a couple, dropped a couple, and I have passed a lot of them. It’s just that if you don’t have a method of applying what was learned, it tends to be forgotten. “This is important, you’ll need this later”, blaw, blaw, blaw…
I may not graduate for some time yet. For that I am required to figure out just who I am; many of those answers are turning up in a study guide, “Who I Was”. It’s been a slow read and a little hard to understand at times; the missing pages don’t help much; and there aren’t any numbers on any or the pages either. The next class is a hands on class, well in so much as that it meets in a Lab half of the time.
According to the catalogue you have to complete only one project to pass, it also says to be prepared to take the class more than once. I can live with that, I like building things. Like a typical class with a lab I had to get two books; one for the lecture, a workbook that I just have to fill in the blank spaces. The title is, “Exactly The Same”. Same as what; who knows? Who makes up these titles anyway?
The workbook for the lab is the same fill in the blanks format as the lecture book; piece of cake; right? Nope! The front of the book has another one of those stupid titles; WTF? In big bold print the title simply reads, “JUST DIFFERENT”; no author, no edition number…not even a UPC in the corner on the back! In a fleeting moment of intuition it came to me; different from what? Different from exactly the same; this class is sounding like I ought to be able to skate through it in no time; I can definitely live with that!
Today was the first time we met in the Lab; after about an hour I began to pick up on something a little odd; I don’t miss much. There was no “WE”, and after a moment or two I figured out that I was reading it upside down; it really said ME. A Lab class with no partners works just fine for me; most people just piss me off anyway. Thinking this is going to be a dream I began to thumb through the workbook; and then I started to flip through the pages; faster, faster….faster…! Panic grabs me by the neck and begins to cut off my air supply as I realize that EVERY single page is blank; blank as in not even a page number kind of blank. No table of contents, no instructions, no glossary; not even any pictures. Absolutely blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, freak’n emptiness; it’s straight to the trash and it goes with all my strength.
Books in the trash, I turn around and find that all of the stools, all of the counters and cabinets are gone; even the instructor is missing. All that remains is exactly the same as when I walked in, it’s just different. The book is different too. It is no longer in the trashcan, which by the way is now gone too; and the book is thicker and heavier than when I trashed it.
Note to self: Don’t mistreat the book, don’t drop the book; don’t get it wet (so much for pissing on it); simply put, be nice to the book.
After what must have been an eternity I finally pick up my pencil and start to write in the book. Sitting here for a while now I’ve written a few of pages, ripped out a couple, wore out an eraser, broke a pencil…or two; and had major writers block. I will be writing for a while I suspect but will the words come easier with time; there are a lot of them that are indeed exactly the same; will that help? It is when I write about what is differently the same that I get the feeling that there is someone reading over my shoulder; and as the number of pages grow so do those that are reading over my shoulder. They might as well pull up a chair; I might be at this awhile. It certainly took what seemed like ages to get to this point, not to mention the windmills I had to face; the real ones and the one’s that only I could see.
For now I’ll continue to fill in the empty pages. Don’t worry about reading over my shoulder; I only ask that you understand that some chapters will be brief, some will be long; some clear and to the point and there will be such that I will struggle to understand. There will be no chapter “Help buying a car”; read the forums, use the f’n search button or if by now you still don’t have a clue just buy a KJ.
It is good to finally be writing this book; scary, but good; there were so many times I wasn’t sure that I would ever have the chance.
My favorite activities are/have been isolating, avoidance, denial, phobias, insanity, hiding from nearly all of life, neglecting great friends, long time friendships and Jeeps, spinning in circles; and just feeling trapped. I have been going to school for some time now but still very short on credits. I’ve been taking classes on how to crawl out of my shell, breathe, rekindle friendships, those things I enjoy doing; mostly, though, trying to live in the real world and not just in my head. The classes have been a slow go at times; I’ve flunked a couple, dropped a couple, and I have passed a lot of them. It’s just that if you don’t have a method of applying what was learned, it tends to be forgotten. “This is important, you’ll need this later”, blaw, blaw, blaw…
I may not graduate for some time yet. For that I am required to figure out just who I am; many of those answers are turning up in a study guide, “Who I Was”. It’s been a slow read and a little hard to understand at times; the missing pages don’t help much; and there aren’t any numbers on any or the pages either. The next class is a hands on class, well in so much as that it meets in a Lab half of the time.
According to the catalogue you have to complete only one project to pass, it also says to be prepared to take the class more than once. I can live with that, I like building things. Like a typical class with a lab I had to get two books; one for the lecture, a workbook that I just have to fill in the blank spaces. The title is, “Exactly The Same”. Same as what; who knows? Who makes up these titles anyway?
The workbook for the lab is the same fill in the blanks format as the lecture book; piece of cake; right? Nope! The front of the book has another one of those stupid titles; WTF? In big bold print the title simply reads, “JUST DIFFERENT”; no author, no edition number…not even a UPC in the corner on the back! In a fleeting moment of intuition it came to me; different from what? Different from exactly the same; this class is sounding like I ought to be able to skate through it in no time; I can definitely live with that!
Today was the first time we met in the Lab; after about an hour I began to pick up on something a little odd; I don’t miss much. There was no “WE”, and after a moment or two I figured out that I was reading it upside down; it really said ME. A Lab class with no partners works just fine for me; most people just piss me off anyway. Thinking this is going to be a dream I began to thumb through the workbook; and then I started to flip through the pages; faster, faster….faster…! Panic grabs me by the neck and begins to cut off my air supply as I realize that EVERY single page is blank; blank as in not even a page number kind of blank. No table of contents, no instructions, no glossary; not even any pictures. Absolutely blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, freak’n emptiness; it’s straight to the trash and it goes with all my strength.
Books in the trash, I turn around and find that all of the stools, all of the counters and cabinets are gone; even the instructor is missing. All that remains is exactly the same as when I walked in, it’s just different. The book is different too. It is no longer in the trashcan, which by the way is now gone too; and the book is thicker and heavier than when I trashed it.
Note to self: Don’t mistreat the book, don’t drop the book; don’t get it wet (so much for pissing on it); simply put, be nice to the book.
After what must have been an eternity I finally pick up my pencil and start to write in the book. Sitting here for a while now I’ve written a few of pages, ripped out a couple, wore out an eraser, broke a pencil…or two; and had major writers block. I will be writing for a while I suspect but will the words come easier with time; there are a lot of them that are indeed exactly the same; will that help? It is when I write about what is differently the same that I get the feeling that there is someone reading over my shoulder; and as the number of pages grow so do those that are reading over my shoulder. They might as well pull up a chair; I might be at this awhile. It certainly took what seemed like ages to get to this point, not to mention the windmills I had to face; the real ones and the one’s that only I could see.
For now I’ll continue to fill in the empty pages. Don’t worry about reading over my shoulder; I only ask that you understand that some chapters will be brief, some will be long; some clear and to the point and there will be such that I will struggle to understand. There will be no chapter “Help buying a car”; read the forums, use the f’n search button or if by now you still don’t have a clue just buy a KJ.
It is good to finally be writing this book; scary, but good; there were so many times I wasn’t sure that I would ever have the chance.
