new life, new struggles, new hopes

Ok. This crazy year is almost over and I can tell you, this has got to be the craziest year of my life so far! A year ago, I was a teacher who thought my life was as good as it was going to get. Then, out of the blue, I was in Buenos Aires, visiting for a month and I made the most outrageous choice ever. I was going to move back home, no matter how hard it could be. After making that choice, my whole life was turned upside down, my mother passed away, my brother moved out of my parents' house and I had to quit my job.

When I got to Buenos Aires, I felt a sudden rush of panic, an incontrolable feeling of loss and sheer terror at the thought of having left a life of security for a wild dream. It wouldn't get easier with time, I had to move 2 weeks after I arrived, and now I have to move again and before the end of december, I'm going to have to move again. Looking for a job was no easier, I have spent 2 whole months looking for a job. I finally found 2 jobs and both called at the same time, now I'm juggling between them because one is hiring me and the other hasn't given me an answer, but it pays more. The best parts is, I like the crowd from the job that is hiring me, they are really cool and I have finally opened up and let people see the real me, for the first time since I arrived here.

I have also been on a roller coaster with the boy issues. The love of my life is still my friend and we have remained in contact. He doesn't seem to know what he wants so he shuts me out or he wants my company so he calls me. It's driving me insane.

On top of all that, I'm literally out of money, so I've had to ask my best friend from Dominican Republic for money, because my dad told me to suck it up and live with it.

The funniest part is, that I don't regret everything that has happened to me. I love it here and I will continue this struggle until things work out.

Life is a cycle

Do you believe that life is a cycle? I am starting to. One day, I met one of the most important, if not the most important person in my life. I was 12 and he was 14 years old. He was my neighbor, I went through life until that fateful day in March, without ever noticing the house in the corner or its inhabitants. One sunny summer afternoon, I was sitting across the street from my house and my friends decided to introduce me to him. He was a lanky 14 year old boy with the most amazing and lively eyes and smile I had ever seen in my life, and I was lost forever. I couldn't stop thinking about him after that. I was in love, totally and hopelessly in love with a boy I had met a week before. I told him, and he behaved like a gentleman, very unlikely for a 14 year old to do so. He asked me if we could be friends. That was the most remarkable and life-changing year of my life, before my father decided to move us away to a far away paradise. Everybody was so happy for me, and I was the most miserable being in the planet. We stayed in touch, we wrote and then he disappeared. This happened several times, he would fall off the planet and I would find him. Now, 20 years later, we are still in touch. Not only that, I saw him again for the first time since that year, so long ago. I realized when we met again, that I still love him with all my heart. He was in a deteriorating relationship that just ended now. In a matter of months I will be moving back home, which means we will continue to see each other and I cannot tell you how excited I am about that. 

I don't even know how he feels about me, but I know that I love him and I have not been able to forget everything he means to me. I haven't found anyone who can make me feel as special as he has without ever touching me or insinuating anything. 

Do you believe life is a cycle? I'd like to think so...

I went, I saw...and I am moving back home

In my last post I talked about how I was going back home. After a 20 year long absence, I had no idea how I would react or what I would see. My friends, my neighborhood and my city. I was afraid I wouldn't like it or something like that. It was the most unbelievable experience of  my life. I couldn't believe where I was or how little everything had changed. I was home, my neighborhood looks the same, my friends were there, and most important of all... i felt like I had never left. I have a hard time explaining to people when they give the good old question "so how did it go?" I can only quote Tom Cruise when he was asked about Katie Holmes (yes, I follow gossip... shoot me!) "It was amazing!" 

It was!! I don't know how else to talk about it! I couldn't have planned for a better comeback! And so now, after very little pondering, I have decided to move back. 

I'm starting life all over again back in the land where I was born. I'm quitting my job, changing careers and working hard to get the love of my life back. Sounds like a lot, yet it fits into one sentence. 

I guess since I have six months before I actually leave, I'm not scared yet. I'm sure at some point I will start freaking out. It just feels so right. I usually get successful results when I trust my gut. I have a hard time listening to my gut, that's how I know it's always right, because after I make mistake after mistake, I finally listen to my gut feelings and then I get it right. This time I'm trusting my gut right away, besides I don't think I have ever felt so sure of any choice I have made. 

It's going to be tough, and it's probably going to hurt sometimes, being away from my parents and my brothers. I know what it's like to be away from those you love, but in life you have to make sacrifices, and sadly I have to leave them to find my happiness. I definitely know that it's not here in Dominican Republic, I have been miserable more than I have been happy here. I have lived here for most of my life and, if it wasn't for my family, I would have no problems never returning here. I have learned to detach myself from people and places that bring back sad memories and this country is that, one sad memory. 

My parents have been sick, one of whom got sick because of the way people are here. My brother suffered the fact that he is foreign and payed a high price thanks to his dominican "friends". I have been in 2 abusive relationships with dominican men. One was an alcoholic and the other was over-protective and insecure. I have always been treated like a foreigner, even though I have never left this country and all my friends are from here. It is xenophobic and racist and ignorant and I can honestly say, with all my heart, I hate it. 

Sorry for the venting.... I feel better now. I will keep you updated of the upcoming events of my life-changing move. 

toodles

Dreams and Reality

Have you ever been in a situation where you are actually in the presence of something that happened in a dream and it's now real? Let me explain myself. 

When I left my country I held on to my memories like a castaway to a log. My life depended on those memories and losing them would be catastrophic for me. But after 20 years, they are no longer memories or anecdotes, they become this blurry image in the back of your mind, and you don't know if they truly happened or if you made them up to cover up for the fact that you forgot everything about your previous life. 

I am going back to Argentina next week and I will see the people and places that were part of those memories. I am going to see and feel and smell and hear those places and those people. It's going to be like a dream coming to life, becoming a reality. It sounds a bit scary, but I think that it is mostly overwhelming right now. I am going to cry like a baby, I just know it! I can't wait!! 

Going Home!!

I haven't written in a very long time. I guess the purpose that this blog was supposed to serve was done with some time ago. But here I am again, writing. I have been working and healing, growing and learning. Throughout all that learning and healing and working and growing I managed to purchase a ticket to my hometown of Buenos Aires in Argentina. I left my country 19 years ago, without a choice or any desire to do so. As a young teenager I had very little say in that kind of decision. I left heartbroken and hopeless. In many cases, in most cases actually, young people tend to adapt to a new environment with certain ease. Not me. 

I did not adapt, I guess you could say I surrendered!! hahahaha But all in all, it was not a bad life. I have a very fulfilling career, good memories and some bad ones too, but generally speaking it has been a pleasant ride. The only problem is, I'm getting a little motion-sickness here. 

Going home for a little vacation now, and who knows, maybe more! hehe

Impending Date

No, I'm not talking about the kind of date where you go out with someone and have some fun (I wish!!). I'm talking about the kind you see on a calendar, the kind that is coming real soon. The one thing we cannot avoid no matter how hard we try. In less than a month I am turning 31 years old.
On one side I am more than happy that my birthday is here, mostly because this year sucked!!! There are no other words to express what I felt this year. There were plenty of good things this year, however, none of them are of any importance when I remember the one thing that ruined this year completely and made me forget that I exist for the last 6 months. I have been living a vegetative life, holding my breath and feeling the worst kind of fear you can ever feel, the fear of something terrible happening to a loved one. The upside of this year was the fact that I FINALLY took a year off from the restrictive life of an employee and became self-employed. It has been great! No pressure, no stress, in the end... a happy existence. I also lost like 10 lbs. which is wonderful, because I quit smoking about 3 weeks ago and I gained weight the last time I quit, hopefully that will not be the case this time!
Anyway, I'm glad all that is finally over. I'm ready to jump into my thirties for real. This better be a good decade, because I just got out of a decade spent working. Not a lot of fun, if you ask me. I want to have fun now, I want to find the guts to go up to that 20 year old I like and say something to him, to risk everything and take that stupid trip I have been wanting to take for so long (back home.....the other one is on hold) And most of all, I want to stop complaining!!!! The only problem with that, is that I would have to become a blind, deaf, ignorant fool, that is, IF I stay in this godforsaken little land. Oh well, there I am, complaining again....lol

Dreams, dreams...

I don't usually remember my dreams, but when I do, there's probably a very good reason behind it. Most of the dreams that I do remember are disturbing or have some sort of meaning, like a premonition. Yes, I have had premonitions in my dreams, it's weird.
Anyway, the dream I had last night was not one of my favorites. Any situation in which I get yelled at and fail a test, is definitely not one of my most enjoyable moments. Well, I got both things in my dream last night. I'm not going to explain the whole dream, mostly because I don't feel like writing it all, it was long. This is the short version: I was carrying someone else's baby, I got yelled at for it, and I ran off to take a test, which I failed. That is the short of it, but if you must know the baby was not a stranger's, which is why I was so upset about getting yelled at, insulted really. It was very upsetting.
So I went to one of those web sites that interprets dreams, and basically, there is a challenge I am presented with and I feel like I'm going to fail. However, the baby represents rebirth or something like that. I don't like this kind of dream.
The other day I had a very strange feeling about a dream, it was almost like an out of body experience mixed with a dream. I was walking around my neighborhood, I was as old as I am now, so it was the present, but the neighborhood was in the process of being built, which was 20 years ago!!! It felt so real!!! Creepy..
I wonder why most of my dreams are completely gone before I wake up. I hate that. On top of the fact that my life is completely uneventful, I can't even remember the fabricated events of my subconscious. That sucks...