Yep, when the clock struck midnight it marked the official anniversary of that P.O.S. Ex of mine hitting the door.
When you discover the person you promised to spend the rest of your life with come hell or high water decides to leave you, it's traumatic. They say that having a marriage end is like having a death in the family and they're not far wrong. It was catastrophic. For a long time, I didn't know whether to scratch my watch or wind my butt. It was a rough first 6 months filled with doubt, self-blame, a never ending shame spiral and all sorts of regrets. I'd like to say the last year had been a breeze, but it hasn't. It's had it's ups, downs, pools of tears, raging anger and outright confusion.
When you find your husband at his girlfriends house, the 30 pages of text messages between the two at all hours of the day and night, the pile of receipts for all the clandestine meetings, the jewelry he buys her, the fact that he promotes her on his consulting company website, the fact that the car he abandoned here is filled with the Bassett Hound Faced Bitch's chihuahua's fur (which he swears up and down the dogs have never been in the car, yeah right) that I have to go down and make sure it still runs every couple of weeks...oh, the laundry list of horrid things he's done and the fact he finally admitted just yesterday that he's sleeping with a woman with the face of a Bassett Hound...which we ALL know that he's been doing her for the last 2 years...and he tells me that it's just recently he's started having sex with her. I just wanted to sit back and slap him and ask him if he really believes that I'm going to believe all of his half-truths and all of his lies. Big Eyerolling there. Sad, sad, pathetic man. I think if you would look up the word pathetic in the dictionary, you'd see his picture right next to it.
However, he's history, ancient mythology. He's made his bed and he has to lie in it. As I told him on the phone yesterday, "When you lie down with dogs, you're bound to get fleas." LOL. Yeah, he's not the brightest bulb in the box when we all know I'm talking about the Bassett Hound Faced Bitch and that reference went straight over his head. hehe. I'm sorry guys, I don't mean to be so negative, it's just that I think he's a wart on the butt of humanity and that yes, I'm culpable for part of what happened, but I'm not going to live in a shame spiral blaming only myself. It takes two to tango. Only difference is, I'm rising above him. Like I said, he's history, mythology and it's been a year...HE'S OUT OF HERE!
Funny thing is that he always told me how great I could be if I went into Advertising/PR but it would be difficult for me and he didn't think I'd enjoy it like I would teaching. He always pushed me towards education as a career and it's like what my mom told me the other day, "I can't really see you standing in front of a classroom and being paid next to nothing for the incredible talents you have." Mom gets props and kudos for that because it's really the first time in my life that she articulated her thoughts on it in that way. Don't get me wrong, she's always been really supportive of my intellect. She's always told me how bright I am. For that matter my whole family has. But, you really have to get out into the world and have it reinforced by perfect strangers to really have it get through. I always thought my family said things like that because they had to so they would appear polite in trying to be supportive. I guess it's not really the case, and that they were being really honest. (Remember, I have severe trust issues, I trust almost no one. And if you'd lived my life, you'd know why.) But now, after this semester, my ambitions toward teaching are no more. I refuse to be paid $36K a year for standing in a classroom where children may or may not be carrying weapons. Teaching is something that I do better than most without that precious piece of paper that says I can, it's a natural given and taking it up as a career I feel would be surrendering my life to a mere existence, something I'm not willing to do anymore. My Ex seems to think that it's just ok to exist. I strongly disagree. I want to live. Being someone who's never wanted to live before, that's a pretty huge step. I have ambitions and lofty goals and they will not be satisfied by standing in front of a classroom full of ungrateful adolescents. I hated high school, why in hell would I want to spend my career in one?
The semester wrapped up yesterday afternoon at 3:45pm with my final Journalism 100 discussion group meeting. My friend who we'll call "D" and I were partners for our final project, a survey we had to give then report our results to the class in presentation form. My marks for Journalism 100 have been perfect all the way across the board. All of the papers, presentations, speeches...perfect scores for all of them. Now the only thing that's left is taking my final on Wednesday evening and I'll walk out with a 4.0 in Journalism 100. It wasn't a hard class, but it did just what it was designed to do, give me an overview of journalism and increase my vocabulary. There is a sociological aspect to journalism that I really hadn't seen before and the class that I thought was a waste of money ended up being worth more than I could have ever imagined. Funny thing, out of a class of 60 students in my Tuesday morning lecture, I am the only one my professor calls by first name. Most of the time if someone has their hand up, he just points at them and says 'go'. To me, he says, "Sheri, go ahead". That's huge. Let's just ice the cake with the fact that he was the guy I needed to impress in the department because he'll be my adviser for the next 3 years as I strive for my degree. When your professor knows you by first name, that means you've made a good impression. So that's wonderful.
World Lit has been an amazing ride. An adventure through books. I've been all over the ancient world, traveling all over the middle east, orient, Britain, the Mediterranean, and all I had to do was put my hand on a page, just like what we do in the Myst Universe. It rocked. My presentation "A World of Books" didn't come out so good. Summing up 7 years of Uru in 7 minutes was one of the hardest things I had to do. However, the papers I've written have come back with perfect scores, with a few 19's out of 20 on 2 of them. The exams have been hard, but the extra credit has been good. It's kept all of my test scores at 90 or above. So, more A's. I feel almost unstoppable in my classes this semester, I just kept racking up A after A after A after A. It's been beautiful. I have confidence I've not seen in myself in 10 years.
So, I'm looking forward to a perfect 4.0 this semester to add to the 3.75 from last semester. It's amazing what you can do when you really WANT to do something.
But, my Journalism professor added the cherry to the cake. It seems as I need to take Journalism 432 in the fall of my senior year. Journalism 432 is the Marketing Strategy class. If the professor likes the work you're doing, you get the "tap" for the spring semester and privately given the call number for an exclusive invitation only Journalism 470 class in the spring. That 470 class, well it's the Campaigns class and guess what, the people who are tapped for the invite only class go to Advertising Campaign Competition. OMG. To me that's huge. That is a step towards my One Show Pencil. I'm drooling thinking about tackling that. I WANT that so badly I could cry. I want to get in there and show the world that I'm a force to be reckoned with and that I deserve to have money thrown at me for my brilliance when it comes to Advertising. I'm hungry for the challenge. I want to see how good I really am.
So, to wrap up the semester knowing that this fall I'll be a full time student going for a IMC major (Integrated Marketing Communications) with a Communications minor. I have to thank my sisters friend Lexie for pointing me towards it when I asked her about what her major was that got her into a phenomenal high paying job.
I guess my dream is to own my own agency. I'm more of a visionary than a foot soldier, but you know what, every great general at one time was a foot soldier. You have to start at the bottom and work through all the muck and mire that gets in your way. It's like Mom says, "We all have to do things we don't necessarily like to do, but we do them so we can get onto the things we WANT to do."
This semester, oh let's just say it out loud. I kicked ass. All the things my Ex wanted for me are coming to pass and I'm not doing it for him, I'm doing it for me, and by the time I get my degree and start really shining, I'm going to eclipse him and sorry for the language, but I'm going to bury the motherfucker. Let's see him live in MY shadow and come begging for my attention and help. You reap what you sow. He sleeps with dogs and he's got fleas that I will not allow to touch me, not for any reason. I offered him a chance to be a part of all the wonderful, positive things that are happening here, and he said no to it. I replied by saying, "Well, I just want you to know that you just consciously rejected the best offer you will ever get in your life. It was a one-time only offer and I feel sorry for you for rejecting it, because I promise you, you WILL regret it, because that THING you live with, well, she might be able to write grants until her fingers fall off, but she will NEVER be anything remotely as incredible as I am and I will become even more incredible as time goes on. You choose to promote her in your business and you are consciously CHOOSING what you will get. Mediocrity. So I hope you'll be happy living a mediocre life, because mine, well, it's going to be spectacular."
It's been a year. I want to LIVE not just exist and I will not be held back by anyone. It's been 365 days without the Ex and I'm doing fine.
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