Am I really a bleeping jackass? At least that's what it's looking like these days, with blog posts that exclude what I've had to go through - such as being called a bleeping jackass multiple times.
As John and company have pointed out, candy wrappers and flung pens don't amount to the exasperating anger I'm feeling at this point; although, I'm still not very pleased with having my most expensive pen (a Christmas present) flung backwards, possibly hitting the glass screen of my very expensive television, a present to myself after years of watching TV on a cracked 13 inch television.
This summer, I've given up so much for Allison - too much to endure what's going on at present.
1) The trip to Missouri - I missed several job interviews and turned down a job offer at a school which pays significantly more than any of the public schools in the area. The job would have begun the week Allison and I visited Missouri.
2) I invited Allison to move in with me when her lease was up. She was stressing out about her cost of living in the heart of Los Angeles, especially with the rent going up, the cancellation of visitor parking privileges at her apartment complex, and the $250 dollar charge for a single parking spot. On top of that, her money was stolen at the Elephant Bar several weeks ago - about the amount she sets aside for rent each month, so that didn't make things any better.
My invitation to her to move in was a very big deal. I've lived alone for several years, meaning I have my own way of doing things, and I like them that way. For example, when I get home after a hard day at work, I like being able to grab a soda, sit down on the couch, and either watch the news or listen to some music - none of which I've done much of lately.
Well, you would have thought that I was offering her a death sentence. Despite the fact that I was offering her the opportunity to live at my place at no cost, and providing her with her own dedicated parking spot, and abundant space for her things, I had the offer thrown in my face like garbage. What followed were a million reasons why where I live was beneath her, and why it was okay for her to move in with Roger, but not me.
3) A few weeks ago, I went from having no teaching position offers to having five! And, not only did I have five, but they were all within easy driving distance to an Elephant Bar - because I was accepting interviews only for positions that would allow Allison to continue working at the Elephant Bar - this is very very hard when there are so very few of those restaurant in not only LA and San Bernardino County, but the rest of the country.
Now, one of the teaching positions was in San Bernardino, which is the heart of San Bernardino County, an infected, pestilent, violent heart at that. To give you an idea of what San Bernardino is like, it is composed of people who moved East out of South Central Los Angeles and Compton - the parts of LA that end up on COPS and movies about violent crime. I was afraid to stop anywhere, or roll down my window for fear of death. The school I was going to be teaching at if I accepted the position was so low performing that the state was threatening to shut them down unless they improved soon. Their best students were performing worse than my worst students from last year. A simple comparison of scores would be 626 to 922 on a one-thousand point scale. And, I found out that at least 96% of the people living in the area were living far below the poverty line. Let's be honest, poverty is closely related to crime, gangs, and violence. Did I want to be teaching in a violent environment? No. (More English teachers are killed by students than other types of teachers).
Nevertheless, Allison lobbied strongly for just this option. To her, the wonderful housing, in the nearby cities of Redlands and Loma Linda, and the added combat pay for my position more than justified working in such an environment. And, it justified my having to drive about two and a half hours to work each morning, at least for the first two months of work.
To make matters worse, one of the positions I was being offered was for Junior English - American Literature, all AP and Honors courses at Hollywood High AND during their magnate (super smart and motivated) track, as they have various tracks since they run year-round. This position was a DREAM. This position still is my dream, and the dream of every English teacher out there. For those who don't know, positions like this are impossible to find. Most teachers in California wait their whole lives for a position like this, accumulating enough experience points working at the same school for decades. When you have enough points, you can request to fill a good position at another school in the district, or you can fill a vacancy at your own school. How often do you think those positions are vacated? Never. They are vacated when someone either dies or retires.
Did Allison support me? No. She didn't even try. Erica was there when I got the job offer. She saw how offensively selfish Allison was about the whole thing. Allison didn't want to live in or near Hollywood High and that was "that." All she cared about was herself. At no point did she ever even show a shred of understanding, sympathy, or support and instead lobbied me to work in Gangland. It's true that I dislike driving through the middle of LA, dislike parallel parking, wasn't very excited about a lengthy commute, and that housing in the Hollywood area is far more expensive than what I'm paying right now - all good reasons why I may not have wanted to accept the position at Hollywood High. However, Allison is the primary reason why I turned down the dream I've been holding onto for five years, the dream I'll likely be holding onto for at least two more decades of futility.
4) Flash-forward a few weeks. I gambled on a job offer and secured a position teaching 10th grade at a high school that is neither outstanding nor bad. The school's about 12 miles West of my current apartment, or an hour away, regardless of whether I take the streets or freeway. Anyhow, I was very excited to land this position because it meant I could stay where I was for the moment. I wouldn't have to move while trying to grapple with being a new teacher at a new school; I wouldn't have the stress of resettling while trying to study for my Masters exam; I wouldn't have to be hours away from my university; and I wouldn't have to move away from my father, who I drove to and from the hospital during his heart attack ordeal and recovery.
Nevertheless, as with my opportunity to pursue a dream, Allison didn't care about my concerns whatsoever. All that mattered to her was finding a new place, particularly one with a fitness center. But, not only did she want to move so bad, she went around with her passive aggressive attitude mentioning here and there how bad my place was. For a fitness center, she wanted me to pay several hundred dollars extra a month, spend extra time driving to work, and inconvenience myself in all the ways listed above. So ... I helped her with her search. In fact, I was the one responsible for being serious about finding a new place. I spent days searching online, and finding apartment guides at convenience stores, printing off prospective apartments, their addresses, and directions to those places.
5) Now that Allison's moved in - because she hated my Sealy Posturpedic Twin mattress, I bought a Queen size bed for nearly $700 dollars, and spent ample time looking for that mattress so we could get the best deal. The usual price would have been $1,012 dollars.
ARG!
This is what I've received in return for what I've given up.
1) Allison rearranging everything and getting huffy when I ask where my things are.
2) Allison practically telling "me" where I can and cannot feed my own cat (i.e. the counter).
3) Allison telling me it's okay that I only save about 1/7th of my salary each month because I "make more" than her.
4) Rude, piss-contest-like behavior.
a) I complain about how cold my shower was, she responds by saying only that hers must have been colder earlier in the day.
b) I complain about how much I spent at the mechanic, and all I hear is how much worse it was for her, and what a genius she was for buying her own cabin filter.
c) I talk about how tired I am having to get to work by 7:30 am, when the drive is terrible even without crashes, blackouts, or road construction. All I hear is how much worse she had it for working at Starbucks, regardless of the fact that she did not have early shifts five days in a row, as I do, or have to drive so far to get to Starbucks in the morning.
5) Rude-behavior just for the sake of being rude. For example:
a) When my pen is flung, the response is not, "Don't mess with my nose." But, something to the effect of, "Oh, it's completely okay and I would never feel bad, never, about something as lame as your pen. Your pen is stupid and since you used it it can't even be expensive." What? It's one thing not to be sorry, another to be flagrantly offensive and proud of what you did.
b) My shirts - (the ones I like and not the ones that should be thrown away), the bed sheets, the pillow cases, and the towels have been bleached different colors by the face cream Allison uses. Her responses have ranged from screaming at me that it's not her make-up (this is maddening since no one believes it was make-up and we both know it was the face cream), and stomping out of the room. Not until yesterday night did she finally admit it was the cream. And again, what did I get after that - that I should be thankful I don't have to use that cream. I completely understand that she needs that cream, but when my things get irreparably harmed, I expect something better than being shouted at about make-up, or being told that I should be grateful I don't have to use the cream in question.
c) When I've brought things up in the past few weeks that she didn't feel like thinking or talking about, she's turned her head away, mumbled something under her breath, and then pretended like I never even spoke to her.
d) She's pretended to be asleep during the day only to start arguing and cursing at me the minute I need to go to sleep. I do not appreciate having to go to work on the first official day of school with only five hours of sleep. Five hours is enough to get by the day, but not enough to interact with and teach almost two-hundred students at a school whose policies and curriculum I haven't yet learned.
e) She's complained on and off that I'm a pig because she found grease in the bottom tray of my fridge. (She ripped my hot dog packaging and allowed that grease to settle in the tray without cleaning it up.)
f) She's complained about my stale bread and then discovered that there was a tear in the plastic wrapping. That tear was not there before she moved in. And, now the set of hamburger buns I bought this weekend has a tear in it too! I wonder how that tear got there when I hadn't touched the buns until last night, when I discovered the tear. If you're going to complain about my stale bread, it would be nice if you didn't tear the packaging.
CONCLUSION
I'm really very mad that I've given up so much, only to be faced with rude and thankless behavior in the place I call home.
Allison is the first girl I've ever asked to move in with me, the first one I've bought a bed for, the first one I've jeopardized my career for, and the first girl I've ever put ahead of my own personal dreams. And yet, she's perfectly okay being rude and disregarding not only my needs, but my dreams.
