3:14 PM
trying to learn good study habits. Living here, I see why I never did. I went from the tyranny of my dad standing over me every minute, cutting off my erasers so if I made a mistake, I had to do the whole thing over, etc. to the time when they didn't give a fuck and started trying to talk me out of going to college (when I was actually in college...before that, the thing had been that I'd go to college or else.

He didn't beat me everyday, I hate to give an exaggerated impression. Nor was it every week or even every month. It always seemed to happen around finals, actually. The tension, though, was almost constant. My mom says I just focus on the negative, but maybe that's because she wasn't usually there and because he only turned on her about 1/10th as much.

I was the property, after all, so it stands to reason that he had more of a "right" to beat me (using his logic for a moment). Thank you once again, slave masters for drilling this concept into black minds.

I'm not writing about this to complain or wallow, I am just coming to some realizations. I read something last night about a concept the writer called "success anorexia," when perfectly capable, intelligent people "starve" themselves of success. Ring, ring...it's the clue phone and it's for me.

It's been really frustrating living here. I naively thought it would give my mom and I time to bond again, since we seemed to get along so well during the funeral and so well when they visited me last Christmas. Instead, she's taken over the "It's my house, you can leave" routine and threatening to kick me out if I don't shut up when she demands it. She finds fault in even the most innocuous things I say.

My grandmother comes here and treats Mom like crap, rearranges the entire house, so you feel like an unwelcome guest in your own home and I get threatened with getting kicked out when I can't interrupt my homework to change the channel on the TV or something else stupid like that? When my grandma stays here for months, she's a big help, she's taking care of Kyle. I do the same thing and I'm a lazy, fat slob who won't get off her ass and work.

What a crock of shit.

Anyway, now I know why I have such terribly study habits. I learned not to even try to do my schoolwork, because there were constant interruptions by people who can't understand the concept of school and how much work it involves.

So I learned to fake it, since all I had to do in Liberal Arts classes was show up, take great notes, do the major projects and ace any sort of exam, especially if it was essay. I can write the fuck out of a blue book (essay) exam.

The problem now is, I can't fake it. I have a brochure due on Thursday. It's an actual thing, not a concept I can B.S. my way around. It takes time to write the text, to make the graphics, to lay out the page, to plan, to pick fonts. It can't be done in 20 minutes, even if I were just to take the easy route and recreate a brochure I've found.

One thing I'm trying to do with these projects is double dip as much as possible. Everything I've done so far has been something I can use for my sites/business-to-be or for John's site. I'm either going to make a basic service and price schedule for my editorial/dtp/web publishing empire-to-be, or do a brochure for Holly, who I met in New Orleans.

She runs an adventure tour company. She was a big inspiratioin to me, because she does this all herself and does what I'd like to do: work for myself, doing something I love. She travels the world and gets paid for it. Now that's the life. I always did want to be a travel writer...

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