You’ll notice I updated my profile picture to have my new glasses… This is why layers are so important in drawings! I just hid the ones for my old glasses and added ones for the new glasses. I really like this drawing and I didn’t want to do a new one for such a trivial change. But I have to say, after drawing my new glasses, this may be the last new profile picture I draw for a very long time. What a pain in the ass! It’s my own fault, really… I can’t ever choose normal looking glasses. I like funky. Is it because I’m an artist? Because I’m a half bubble off center? Who the hell knows. But when I put them on, I just know they’re me. Unfortunately, I never think about the consequences of drawing difficulty…

I actually wasn’t planning on writing a blog entry today… I have a lot of stressful things going on right now, the biggest one coming up on Monday. I haven’t been myself lately and have been suffering some nasty, emotional outbursts (mostly angry ones) over stupid things because I’ve been holding things in and it’s been making me physically sick. I have heartburn that makes it feel as if Vesuvius is erupting in my stomach and my poor esophagus has been paying the price. It’s so sore, it feels as if I’ve been drinking lit gasoline every time I try to swallow food. Sounds delightful, doesn’t it? Yeah, I thought so, too…

However, there is a reason for my writing a blog, no matter how random it seems. I now have 56 days left to adjust to my new glasses or it’s trifocals for me… My ass is not that old! Well… It’s getting there, but it’s not trifocal old yet. I think of people in their 70s or 80s when I think of trifocals. I’m not even 49 yet! Yet… I have less than a month to go… In any case, I think I’m getting better with figuring out how I need to look at the world to use my distance and my non-prescription close up part of my progressive bifocals. But the midpoint… I haven’t been working on it much and I couldn’t when I was drawing because I needed them off to reference them. So this is mainly to help me try to adjust. I hope…

Speaking of my old ass birthday… I was at my mother’s house one day and she was showing me some of the things she had been sewing lately when I noticed a shirt strung over a chair. I questioned her and she said it was my sister’s, it needed a new zipper and had been there for about two years. It was black with a beaded front, sleeveless and not my prudent sister’s style at all. I also told my mother she was too fat to fit in it (which she is). So I tired it on and it fit wonderfully except in the bust. So we came up with a solution to that issue and I decided that, since it looked like a clubbing shirt, I knew exactly where I wanted to wear it and for what occasion. There has been something I’ve been wanting to do and have never done, and since I’m turning 49, I decided then and there to do it for my birthday so I could do this before I turned 50 and I wanted her to go. I wanted to go see male strippers. My mother replied simply, “Somehow I knew you were going to say that.” I was rather surprised that she’s on board with this… It’s not like her.

I’ve even conned my prudent sister into going, though I’ve not told her where, exactly… I’ve dropped hints, but she’s still unsure. I’m not telling her or she won’t go and it’s important to me that she does.

But this almost didn’t come to fruition… There was an incident, a fight… Someone close to me flipped shit on me over a totally unrelated issue and had told me that certain people that I thought liked me? They didn’t. They knew the real me because this person had told them what I was really like. They weren’t my friends, no one liked me at this place (which is the local diner I frequent). I was so upset because I had asked two of the waitresses who I thought were my friends to go. After that conversation, I decided to cancel my plans and not to eat at that diner anymore. Was that the wrong choice? Sure. But when the same person has been gaslighting you for years off and on, you can’t help but start believing what they tell you sometimes. And this particular person (a relative) has admitted to saying things specifically to hurt me and, when in a much calmer, non crazy bipolar state, told me to resume my plans, I told them what they had been doing for years was gaslighting me, explained the term and told them to look it up. By definition, that’s exactly what had been going on. This person was causing me to doubt myself as well as relationships with friends and family.

However, my friend M&M pointed out to me that, first of all, don’t ever let anyone think I have no friends. I can imagine that was a bit insulting to her… We’ve been friends since I was 16 and she was 14. That’s over 30 years of being best friends… She also pointed out that I always get like this the closer it gets to my birthday. Admittedly, I do. If I plan something big, it blows up in my face and no one shows except like two people, every fucking time (gee, I wonder why I feel I have no friends). This has gone on my entire life, so I usually just don’t do much. And what’s to celebrate? Getting another year older? “Shorter of breath and one day closer to death” as Pink Floyd says? And every year is just another reminder my friend, my birthday buddy, Michele, whose birthday was the day before mine and hated celebrating as much as I did, is no longer here to try and avoid a celebration as much as me. I miss her terribly… I’m sure that’s playing a part in my foul mood as well lately.

Well, I’ve somehow made it to the end of this blog… I can’t say it was easy because, well… it wasn’t. This is really difficult, trying to figure out where I need to look, how I have to hold my head, in order to look through my glasses correctly to see clearly. And just when I get it perfect, I move my head without realizing and it all goes to shit and I need to find that sweet spot again where I see clearly. 56 days… That’s all the time I have left to get my shit together and have this all become second nature to me. I’m beginning to wonder if this is ever going to happen… Mind you, 56 days may seem like a long time, but when you’re struggling to see (and constantly having to correct typos because of it), it’s not a very long time at all. Plus there’s the whole I can’t fucking see right thing that gets in the way… What a bother… I’m also getting a lot of headaches trying to adjust to this whole thing. I like being able to see my laptop better, but what a pain in the ass this is. Sometimes I think I was better off half blind…