The Plot Thickens.....

I've never been so nervous and excited all at one time. Maybe it was because deep down inside that small intense box tucked away in my brain I knew I had it in me to continue on this journey. That marked a day in history for me like no other from there on out, because had I not found "that girl" within me she wasn't going to be able to handle ANYTHING I had to face in the future! I have said before I loved my job! I got up in the morning and went into work whether I had clients to do or not. I always dressed up from day one. I approached everything with intensity that grew in me as I went. I loved getting to know people's appts were coming up whether they were my clients or not. It gave me a sense of pride and accomplishment to know I could achieve anything I set my mind to. If I could get that woman or man to come back to me BECAUSE they liked their hair, I started to dream, and dream big I did from the beginning......I knew I was going to own a salon from the moment I set foot inside the doors of beauty school. I was okay with walking the steps to success so that I truly owned it and it couldn't be taken away. Anyone who enters this industry with intentions of owning a salon wants more than just standing behind the chair. They want total control over their lives, and independence from the status quo of who stands beside them. Did I choose a salon right out of the gate who could mentor me and continue to see advancement in me beyond my wildest of dreams?! NO! Do you think this is a fairy tale??!! WAKE-UP!Put the kool-aid down...So it wasn't at the top of my dream list, but it was real. They didn't want what I wanted, that's okay, as long as you begin to understand walking into a job everyday where you wait on people hand and foot, can weigh on a person's psyche when they forgot why they got into this business anyway. I began to see the glimmer of my hopes turn into comfortable numbers and I started to settle in quite nicely. I gained clientele left and right. I felt this desire to learn more and to begin to see hair as an art form that could continually get better between my haircut and the customer learning from me on how to style her hair. I knew the ones who said all the right things to my face but had no intentions of doing a darn thing to that hair before work. Ponytail was some of these girl's middle names most Mondays through Fridays. Until that weekend hit, and they became Master Divas before going out to get bought up by the closest bidder. Things really started to fall into place, not just at work but I was also getting more comfortable with everything between Subway guy and I- we were learning more about one another. I decided the best time to go workout would be after work cause this chubby tail was going to get in shape and not be like the rest of my family. I guess now is as good a time as ever to tell you that food is an addiction in my family. GASP! It's okay, it's better to know than to hide from it. I knew that I had issues with it as well, we are getting to the part in the story where that begins to take a change. My mother and father unfortunately got married very young without truly understanding how to deal with stress so they ate. Not that I knew why back then, I just thought they should, STOP EATING THEIR BRAINS OUT AT NIGHT IN FRONT OF THE TV! As harsh as that sounds, if you were 18 once, you need to try and remember how your brain was mostly mush and intense "I am big enough" idiocy. I get it, but that kind of empathy wasn't going to help me NOT become them. This would have been fine if my over protective controlling christian on Sundays parents didn't decide to tighten the leash after high school and want me home by 10:00 pm. SAAaaaay WHhhhaat? I know right?! What am I? a baby? Well it was what it felt like at the time, only because my choices when I walked through the front door was to watch Star Trek the 19,000th generation my father was addicted to, or clean up the kitchen because my mother was in one of her "I can't handle my life" episodes again. I knew I would over eat, sit on my azz, do nothing but watch tv AANNDD my azz......over time. I had to get out, or rather just not go home. So that is exactly what I did. I just decided I was going to do the exact opposite of everything they were doing, because what ever they did to get to wherever they were was not something I was ever going to be a part of. No matter what you think of me now or then, you can't really truly connect to what I was going through unless you try to connect to her..the 18 yr. old version of me. She's not bad, but she was desperate to not destroy her life before it had begun. This will all make more sense to you when you find out some few key elements about my life that will shed light on this control subject. I had gone to counseling at the age of 16 to find out more about why I felt disconnected to my life. Oddly enough my mother sent me on the hope that this counselor would find something wrong with me and fix everything before she sent me back to the house, so she didn't have to deal with me. Ha! I was sent on the premise that things had not worked out with relationships/friendships at church for any of us really, but I seemed to be the only one interested in finding out what was plaguing our home. Everyone in my house seemed aloof that we all could not continue on this journey before we became weebles that sway from side to side but go nowhere in life. We didn't seem to want to address any communication issues we had with people. Especially if it had anything to do with people at church, we dare not say the truth out-loud or be accountable for causing as much trouble because we didn't know how to be transparent either!!!! GOSH! Say that ten times! I had no idea at the age of 16 I would be given direction to put boundaries up on toxic behavior even if it was coming from my family. I know , I know that doesn't mean disobeying the curfew, I didn't say I always executed the best of choices, but it felt good to push back against the control and manipulation my parents poured out on me. They had met their match, through their own child no less. Like I said I had begun a journey with a counselor who became my best kept secret because everyone conveniently believed that counseling meant you were broken, so no one in my house but me went. I had waited for this moment of independence for two long years, I wasn't going to go down easily. I had been given wonderful instruction how to keep my mouth shut and to try not to push my parents too much because I was in their control at this vile age of 16. Little did my parents know that visit after visit had begun to increase my chances for survival among this awkward group. I had learned my personality operates at a level 10 from the time I get out of bed til I get back in it. I desire communication above all things, words, and talking them through on every subject in the world especially those relevant to my day, or week. I was starving for that at home. At a certain point past puberty my parents couldn't relate out loud to me anymore. They would have revealed things about their own childhood, lives that were to painful and damaging that even they dare not dig at those scars. My counselor warned me not to rock the boat but to take me down a notch. I hated the idea from day one to pretend I was someone less than who God designed me to be. I was sick and tired of the leadership not LEADING THAT I COULD SPIT! Sooooooo, I guess that leads us right back to where I started with pushing back on the curfew agenda that have been so preciously bestowed upon me. To get right to the point, I just didn't go home. I found it very easy to be done with work and to just NOT drive home but rather to the gym. The whole ride there I embraced the bad azz side of me knowing full well, 10:00 pm was going to come and go. Heck, 10:30 pm was going to come and go...Most of the time I was going to see the backside of 11 before I walked through that door. I got away with it for awhile, but they caught on that they never really saw me. DUH! That was the purpose. I got better and better at being at work from sun up to sun down, and even on weekends just staying at work and then hitting up the gym. It wasn't too long that Sunday afternoons I would walk in to the house and get the cold shoulder from my mother who always thought I was up to no good. I hated how she always assumed I was getting into trouble, where the heck was she getting her information? How could I keep a full-time job and get into trouble at the same time? Who the heck was your daughter anyway and how did I become a mobster since high school? GEESH!!!! My mother suffers from the proverbial pessimism that I call "Jaded" or "Psycho". Take your pick. But back then it was just plain crazy to me to continually think someone is in trouble when there are no signs of it. It wasn't anything that 18 almost 19 yr. old's don't deal with. I wasn't drinking, smoking, boozing, sexing, or rockin' & rollin'. So I was given a warning. Don't quote me on this one, but I'm pretty sure I mouthed back or gave some kind of crass whatever answer to my parents but nothing can prepare you for the day I came home and was given the ultimatum. I can recall that day like it was yesterday. I was dreading coming home this Saturday anyway because I figured I couldn't avoid them any longer. What were the chances they would be in bed by 5 pm on a Saturday? Not a good one considering I could see their judgy eyes from the driveway. I knew I was going to get something when I walked through that door and I was going to hate it, but I wasn't going to run from it. I opened the door to the house and my family sat to the right in the dining room like their was a meeting of the local government to talk about bad apples in the bunch. That bad apple was me. I sat down as my father began to ask me question after question about why I wasn't meeting my curfew and how I was openly sinning (gosh I love those ridiculous one liners self righteous Christians use) completely disobeying and he had had enough of it. He said then and there" If you can't abide by the rules in this house, your out". I would make him live to eat those words.............this isn't over.