As I type I'm at a friends' house doing emergency babysitting duty...she got sick and one of her kids is just getting over it.  I got my flu shot, though, so no worries.

A lot has gone on lately, and I can't divulge every little thing but here's what I can talk about.  First of all, getting over a friends' suicide never gets any easier.  This was the third time a friend killed himself but this time it was my best friend.  His father still blames me because I was the last person he spoke to. For a while I was getting a lot of emails and phone calls, and right as I was getting ready to change my number it all stopped.  It may still happen, though, so if you're on my contact list do not be surprised to get a text one day to let you know that I did.

I took a break from my work with the fire department to recover and got back to it in the first weekend of September.  Then, on the 11th, as I was headed to a doctor's appointment, I started having trouble breathing and nearly the worst chest pain I have ever experienced (perfect timing, right?).  The doc sent me to the ER and while at first they thought I might have pneumothorax (a collapsed lung), it turned out to be pleurisy.  They also discovered that I have hypothyroidism and am becoming anemic.  That could explain how I'm building enough muscle to push a truck but not losing the weight I've been trying to fight off.

Just before that incident, however, I went on a date.  I started talking to a girl who seemed to be very well put together, had her head on her shoulders, and seemed to be VERY into me.  We went out and had a fantastic time.  Then, I heard nothing from her.  I sent her a couple of text messages to no avail.  About a month later I ran her email through Facebook and found her under a different name--and listed as being in a relationship with a specific person who had left convincing messages all over her page.

There's been a lot of crap that's gone on this year.  As I said, there's a lot I can't talk about.  I will say that time and a lot of thinking have brought me to the conclusion that I have trusted people who never deserved my trust.  As I mentioned in another blog, I let a person back into my life after we hadn't spoken for three years.  When we parted ways she didn't know the truth about what had gone on.  She apparently didn't understand, however, that people change; words and deeds cannot be taken back, and once you've hurt a person you can't go back to the way things were.  I tried to start over but she wanted to pick up our lives from before the big meltdown and when it didn't happen that way, she dropped me like a hot rock again.  What floors me still is that she openly said that she understood that I had been hurt by everyone around me but she wasn't willing to be a part of the solution.  In so doing she, too, proved that she had never been a real friend.

I had one coworker tell me I should ask another one out because, quote, "you never know, Mel, it could turn out to be the best thing that ever happened to you!"  It turned out to be a disaster.  I didn't even get to the point where there was any asking out, because I figured out the truth the hard way.  Seems this guy just wanted some drama.  Then when I let him know I didn't appreciate him lying to me, he turned it back around on me and said, "people will talk, honey, you need to get used to that."

I've had enough of all the shit going on in my life.  I don't understand why people can't be the loyal friends they claim to be, why they can't be straightforward, why people would lie if the truth would do them better.  I'm no angel.  I've made my mistakes.  But I've also tried damn hard to make up for the stupidity of my younger years.  I do my damndest to do right by everyone around me and somehow I still get hurt in the end.  Either I have poor taste in friends or I really am still trying too damn hard to matter to people who will never really care. 

In the meantime...I'm getting ready to get back to school.  I'm taking advanced pharmacology and EKG this semester.  If I don't get accepted to the 2011 paramedic program, I'm going to start working towards finishing my criminal justice MA.  My dad picked up the guitar again and once he's gotten comfortable with playing a few songs we'll start jamming together. 

I'm really beginning to wonder when I'm going to get to enjoy life, though.  I don't want to live to be too old.  I'd like to think there will be something to look forward to somewhere along the way.