My Light Bulb Moment (or Consider It a 2011 Resolution)

Welcome back!!

It's no coincidence that the time spent on this blog decreased dramatically when I started going out with my girlfriend last spring.

I found it hard to be open and honest on the blog while simultaneously trying to remain guarded and not open up "too soon" with her at the start of the relationship.

Why the sudden change now? Am I single?? No. No. It's nothing of the sort.

I just realized what this blog meant to me and my sanity. My mental health has taken a toll lately by keeping a lot of my "random" thoughts in my head. Purging my brian of these thoughts that have weighed heavy on my conscience has been cathartic. I've been depriving myself of the opportunity to be less stressed, less overwhelmed, and less helpless for the better part of 2010, which was a challenging year. I refuse to let that happen in 2011.

Those closest to me know that I am not one to open up or share my emotions/feelings very easily. That's what makes this blog rather unique. I don't really hold much back when writing here. There is something inherently impersonal in blogging that makes it easier to write whatever I feel without censoring the content. I do happen to know some of you that visit here, whether it's occassionally or immediately after every post. For the most part, I consider my "audience" to be anonymous. I admit there are times when I want to know EVERYONE that reads this blog. Nevertheless, I truly enjoy writing for the unknown readers (including the future me).

This time away has also forced me to accept something that is probably obvious to most folks. When in a relationship, you cannot force your significant other to like the person you want to be, or the person you try to be around them. They need to accept you for who you are. For better or worse, this blog is an extension of me and maybe even a bigger piece of who I am than I care to admit. After all, a lot of who I am is left in every entry of this blog.

I kept myself from writing much in 2010. That will change going forward. It's not as if I have anything to hide. ;)

For your continued readership and patience throughout 2010, I thank you.
For those of you new to RaUM, I hope you enjoy the sneak peeks into my life.

Until next time, faithful reader......

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Addendum (2 hours after posting):
For the record, those who know me well (and that is a very short list, folks) know that I don't share my emotions/feelings very well in the "real world". Blame it on my troubled childhood or poor social skills as a youth. Perhaps, it was never learning how to deal with rejection or never understanding how to accept that life can be fucked up sometimes.

That being said, I want to be clear that the issue with the gf and my blogging had to do with my perception of how she might (or might not) react to things I had to write about. I can be very self-conscious about what I post sometimes (believe it or not!) which can make me more sensitive to any potential feedback I might get from those close to me. I hope you didn't think I was using her as a scapegoat.

English Language Miscues (or Another Pet Peeve Unveiled)

My nerves are severely frayed and I can sense all of the muscles in my body tense up as I think about what I'm going to write now...

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(1) "Humbleness":
Have you ever heard someone speak a word and do a mental double take? You can make sense of what they said after quickly (or not so quickly) deciphering the mangled portion of what they uttered.

We get what they're trying to say. Sadly, we accept these mispronunciations and move on. After all, our own über-important lives are filled with serious concerns. Why should we bother bruising someone's ego and correct them when we have bigger fish to fry? Am I right?

A word already exists for what you're trying to say here, champ: 'humility'! <For some strange reason, right after I typed it, I read the word as humidity and giggled for a bit.> You cannot take any adjective and add the suffix '-ness' to the end of it and think everything is OK. It's as bad as those folks who think they can convert any English word to Spanish by adding an '-o' at the end. It doesn't work! Understand-o?

If you don't believe me, why not tell me how stupid 'strongness' sounds to you? Perhaps 'teachableness' suits your limited English language needs?

I rest my case.

[Side note: To be fair, I know the word 'humbleness' does actually exist but it isn't commonly used. After all, we do use the word humility more than humbleness. Keep up with modern society, please.]

(2) "At the end of the day, ...":
Ahhhh yes. The hot new saying that everyone seems to be using. It's one of the most overused phrases I have heard in a long time! (It's only rivaled nowadays by 'epic', IMO.) When a person starts every other statement with this phrase, my brain goes to two places (depending on my mood): either the person has nothing of value to share and is trying to sound more interesting or the person genuinely believes the BS that's coming out of their mouths which makes me wonder what the end of their days are like. Well, not really. At the end of the day, they're not that interesting to begin with.

Damn it!!! It's contagious!!

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OKOKOKOKOKOK....
I'll stop venting now. Do you have any other words or sayings that rub you the wrong way? Do share below in the comments section!!

I hope to hear from you.
Until next time, faithful reader......

P.S. On second thought, those people that add an 'o' to the end of English words are worse. Instead of trying to learn the proper word, they decide that Spanish isn't important enough to make an effort for. In fact, they're devaluing the language and, by proxy and perhaps unintentionally, insulting an entire culture.

Envy (or Why Can't I Keep It Together)

Welcome back,

Sorry to return on such a somber tone but... here goes.

It's at moments like these that I find myself at my most weakest. Not physically but emotionally. When I feel like I'm losing control of my life, I lose control of my emotions and my vulnerabilities seep through the surface...

I cried today... I cried at not having a father. It's not as if he's dead or if I didn't know him while growing up. It's quite the contrary. He's very much alive and he has had an impact on my life. The problem is that the impact was mostly negative. When I became an adult (the magical age of 18 when the law determines you're no longer a minor), I decided to live my life in a way that was opposite to the example he set for me. I credited him with teaching me how to be a man by showing me what NOT to do. But I realize now, many years later, I still have a lot of work to do.

I sit here weeping as I realize that I may have ended up more emotionally stable had he actually died when I was young. Or if only he had decided to leave my mom instead of staying and slowly inflicting the damage he did to me, my mom, and my sister, like a deadly cancer. Instead, I sit here, with tears streaming down my face as I type this, envying those around me who have a father they respect, and love, and can turn to in times of need. I hate them... well, that's not entirely true nor is it fair. I hate that they have the luxury of having a good man, or even just a decent one, at their disposal.

I need someone to turn to. I need to feel safe. I need a rock to lean on. I need the wisdom that only comes with age. I need a father. Just not the one I have.

I don't typically cry. But lately I've found it comes really easily to me. I want to do so much more for those I love but feel handcuffed by my financial circumstances. Although money isn't everything (this isn't a cliché thrown in for effect... it truly isn't) I can't help but look at the situation we're in and recognize that we'd all have a little more piece of mind if we just had a little financial comfort. Instead, we claw and scratch and scrape together what we can to survive. I'm tired of surviving. I just want to live.

I want to enjoy life without wondering if my bills will get paid. Wondering if I'll have an apartment to live in next month. Wondering if I can get through the week. Wondering if I'll have food in the kitchen to cook a meal tonight. Wondering if I'll regain my sanity soon. Wondering what will drive me further down this hole next.

I want my dad. I need my dad. Shit... at this point, I'll take any dad. But only one will do. And that man doesn't exist. He never did.

Thanks for sticking with me, faithful reader.
Until next time......

Work in Progress

Welcome back,

I went on a bit of a Twitter rant this morning. I'm not sure if it was appropriate or not but I felt that I needed to get those thoughts off my chest. And since I've been dedicating this blog to that very action, I feel it is only fair to re-post the tweets here:

(Around 8:15am)
'Was startled by some news in my dream & woke up. I didnt get the whole story. Now I'm wide awake wishing I could sleep & re-enter my dream.'
[In my dream, someone started telling me about their experience the night before and it seemed like it was leading to an 'interesting' story. I couldn't even begin to imagine what it could be. But I woke up with my heart racing and all I wanted was to go back to sleep and get back into that dream]

'I can't take complements well b/c I never thought I was that special. Still makes me feel a little awkward. May come off as false modesty.'
[Annoyed and frustrated at being wide awake, I got to thinking about the night before when I was told I have a 'brilliant mind'. I've always felt I was fairly normal and to know that I might be "better" than I thought I was - in any capacity - is something that is very humbling and at the same time depressing.]

'It's probably why I don't know how to complement others even when I think they deserve it. I'm working on it. #ivegotlotstolearn'
[I think this is true. If I don't know how to take a complement then I can't easily pass them on to others. Plus, I think too damned much and, at times, I am too passive.]

'There's no pressure becoming friends w/some1 but once I'm attracted to some1 I second guess myself. What do I possibly have to offer her?'
[Some of the "old me" creeping back, I suppose. I shoot myself in the foot before I even get started. It's quite frustrating.]

'But who am I to decide what someone else wants or needs? Ultimately, it's on them.'
[Even though I feel I understand this, I still don't have that selfish edge to go after what I want and/or need. Instead, I'm more empathetic to what I perceive to be other people's needs/wants. A classic case of self-sabotage actually.]

Perhaps writing about it (and acknowledging these ideas) would make it easier for me to reconcile what's going on inside my mind and heart. These are my preliminary thoughts to my tweets from this morning. I will come back to them when I'm not as distracted by things.

Until next time, faithful reader......

Spanglish (or Another Big Pet Peeve)

Well, this is something I've been wanting to vent about on this blog for quite some time now. I'll do my best to present my case, as I see it, and let you react to it by posting your comments below.

There are many things about the English language that I appreciate especially since it is my native language. I was born in the states, grew up here, and despite a mixed cultural heritage, English will always be my first language. At the same time, I find a lot of beauty in the Spanish language as well. There are many phrases and ways of wording statements that simply cannot be translated literally without sounding like gibberish in English (remember learning about idiomatic phrases?). It is because of my love for English and Spanish that I have begun my hate affair with Spanglish (if we can have "love affairs" we can ALSO have "hate affairs"... hmph).

Spanglish, for those of you who don't know, is a phrase coined by Salvador Tio (a Puerto Rican linguist) describing the "code switching" between English and Spanish. Essentially, a person will switch between using English and Spanish in a conversation, sentence, or any other form of dialogue. The by-product of this is, not just the confusion of both languages, but the creation of a new vocabulary that blurs the line between English and Spanish.

Here are some examples:
- When talking about a parade, Spanglish speakers will use the word 'parada' instead of 'desfile'. A 'parada' is a stop NOT a parade!!

- Hangueando/chileando: meant to indicate the person is hanging out or chillin'. It's fucking stupid!!

- 'Lonche': Seriously?!? It is really so hard to say 'ALMUERZO'?? DAMN!

- Marqueta: Now it's getting ridiculous! Did you forget the word 'mercado' or maybe 'tienda'??

- 'Carpeta': OK now we're just getting lazy, aren't we?? I grew up not actively speaking Spanish and even I know a carpet is an 'alfombra'. If this native-born gringo knows this word, why do other Spanish speakers not know this?

- 'Boila': Is this what we've come to? Why don't you ask someone what the Spanish word for 'boiler' is, PLEASE!!!!!

More incorrect uses of words based on confusion between English and Spanish words:
(1) 'Asistir' looks like the English word 'assist' so it is used in place of 'ayudar'. In Spanish, 'asistir' means to attend.
(2) 'Atender' looks like 'attend' in English so it's used instead of 'asistir'. In Spanish, 'atender' means 'to heed', 'to look after', or 'to pay attention'.

The list goes on and on. As a matter of fact, Wikipedia's Spanglish listing actually has some good examples if you want to see some more misuses of my beautiful languages. Each one is more ridiculous than the last. It's as ridiculous as English speakers adding the letter 'o' to every English word thinking that it instantly makes it a Spanish word!

In NYC, our form of Spanglish has been influenced primarily by Puerto Ricans and Dominicans. In the Southwest US, it's Chicanos that created their variety of Spanglish. For a long time, I thought Spanglish was a result of ignorance and poor education by low-skilled immigrants that came to the U.S. I know better than to assume that now. Nevertheless, Spanglish has been adopted by new generations of Latinos/Hispanics who accept it as a valid "language" even tho it's ruining the true Spanish language, the beautiful language that I adore.

Now I must say that I don't hate the interchanging of languages, per se. As a sociologist, I can accept that phenomena as by-product of the culture clash that exists when an immigrant population enters a new environment and mingles with the native population. It is the changing - bastardizing, is more like it - of the original languages (those of the native born and immigrant groups) that bothers me the most.

*sigh* I feel better now that that's off my chest. Your thoughts?

Until next time, faithful reader......

Redundancy (or I've Had Enough of This Nonsense)

Welcome to your weekend dose of RaUM goodness. The focus of this entry is something that has been on my mind for some time and, as usual, it is a topic I wanted to share it with you. Any opinions and/or feedback would be appreciated. Maybe you have a better take on it than I do.

One thing that I truly hate about our fast-paced, instant-gratification society is the need to abbreviate everything. Usually I don't mind it and in certain forums I'd prefer it (online chats, tweets, etc). Admittedly, there is some intrinsic value to shortening phrases, words, etc. More importantly, however, is the overwhelming need for abbreviating certain things for the sake of conveying messages quickly to the ever-shortening attention spans of Americans.

I accept that we live in a world of soundbites. What truly bothers me is how people blindly use abbreviations in conjunction with a word that is included in the abbreviation. To illustrate my point, here are the three best examples:

1-BMI index (Body Mass Index index)
2-PIN number (Personal Identification Number number)
3-ATM machine (Automatic Teller Machine machine)

It is the epitome of redundancy and only shows how stupid most people are for not noticing. I'd be willing to be less harsh and say people are simply victims of clever catch phrases and tag-lines. Yet when I point out the fallacy of their use of the redundancy, they simply dismiss me as if I was pestering them - like a mosquito buzzing by their ear - or they roll their eyes and tell me to stop being so analytical.

I think accepting these 'little' (and increasingly common) mistakes in the modern English language is the first step in the de-evolution of American society (have you folks seen the movie Idiocracy?).

[pause]
Let me rethink that a bit... Maybe it's not THAT terrible but it does irk me quite a bit. It's not the fact that these poorly constructed abbreviations exists but, rather, how easily we accept them into our lexicon without thinking twice about what they mean.

I'll leave you with this thought: What else are we missing out on in our lives because we accept things at face value without taking a closer look?

Until next time, faithful reader......