Elucidating Questions

People are truly a mystery

Woman brings up an item she says it’s supposed to be 30% off

It’s already 20% off in the system so I had to calculate it myself

With the calculator I put total x 0.7

And put that in the system

She goes but why does your tablet say (total)?

I explained how I did the calculation

She goes

I don’t want it

Another woman comes up with a code I don’t recognise claiming it’s a gift card

I read the fine print on the screenshot because she won’t bring up the full email “no data”

Fine print says usable ONLINE at Mind The stores

Not Ancient Maritime Fleet

I say this she says I want to speak to your manager

Okay

Manager tells me to enter the code

I’m ready to have egg on my face

Nope, it doesn’t work

Now manager reads the fine print and repeats exactly what I said to the customer

Well fine, but it worked at Mind The

No kidding

I’m just having an odd customer day

I hate saying something, having to call my manager and have them say the exact same thing before the customer will listen

All my experience means nothing in the face of Karen calling for the manager

People say Karen is a slur

I hope so, because they’ve done enough damage to me and other customer service workers they deserve to feel it hit them back

Drugs are great

The pain killers the doctor gave me worked

I was an hour into my shift when I realised

I’m not in pain

How dangerous

And when the cracks started to show

I can take two a day

But I know I shouldn’t

Isn’t it kind of twisted that I have to keep a measure of pain or else I’ll become addicted to not feeling pain?

Imagine that addicted to the feeling of not being in pain all the time

If I seek normalcy, I seek drug dependence

But I got through work

So many weird customers today

And my job is trying to make cashier’s jobs harder

Separate out all online returns (about 50-60% of returns, up to 80% some days) scan each item, sort depending on category

Also reticket everything without one

Also be on cash in one of the busiest stores in the country

Also you’re the only one on cash

I ended up with this huge pile of clothes

Did not reticket anything

Feeling the stress of having too many responsibilities

These fucking genius execs with their delegation of duties

I’d like to see one of them work a full shift in my store

As a cashier

Damages now also collect in a pile in the back

I have worked in many retail places

Anywhere that has “a pile in the back” of anything?

Grows and grows and grows until it’s a 12 hour job that some poor person, usually the person no one likes, has to deal with in 8 hours

Also usually then that unliked person gets forced to do it forever or else it will get that bad again

Working is hard and I struggle with it so much

I struggle with having to hold my tongue for customer service

Being less than other people

Being owned by someone else

I’m generally a nice person

Just, in general

I can become as cold as Pluto on the drop of a dime

Usually it means I’m anxious

Confused

Overwhelmed

But I don’t think there’s a person on this planet who knows that

And I never treat people how I feel

That meaning, even if I dislike them or something they did I will still be courteous

My main problem is, and I don’t know why this is

I struggle with tone of voice

I copy the tones people have used to me

Thinking that’s how they’re supposed to be said

And get told I have an attitude problem

I have struggled with this all my life

I didn’t know that was what I was struggling with until I learned the part about masking and mirroring that neurodivergent people do

And I try

But when I make up my own tones people look at me weird

And when I copy how other people talk to me other people get mad

I can’t tell you how many times growing up I was just trying to say something and people told me I have an attitude problem

Sent to my room sobbing because I didn’t understand what I did wrong

People then said I cried whenever I didn’t get my way when I was just absolutely bewildered about being sent to my room for talking

I don’t do it on purpose

In fact, if I were to speak how I want to speak most of it would be monotone or good natured

And not monotone as in attitude, monotone as in I don’t fucking know what tone to use so I’m using neutral

Communicating is hard

Working is hard

I’m exhausted

That math one really shook me

Because I fucking swear I have math trauma

I was good at math until teachers wouldn’t let me do the equations how I wanted

And then I was terrible at it because I couldn’t wrap my head around formulas

But I’ve started using it again

Even doing math in my head just for fun

And I really thought I had the formula for 30% off figured out

And that woman freaked out

And I showed two other co-workers my formula and they said it was right

And I’m still fucking worried it wasn’t and I’ve been doing percentages wrong this whole time

So thanks lady

It got to right around now when I realised I hadn’t posted what I wrote earlier

Trying to remember if I did write something or not

I’ve been busy messing around with things

And putting on nails and then taking them off again

Which is, essentially to say, not busy

Just puttering

There are children screaming in the night

And I’m trying to decide if someone has set up a haunted house a month early

Perhaps

Sometimes things happen which make things happening on an exact date unlikely

Or impossible

But you still want the memories

Perhaps someone among them doesn’t need to know it’s not Hallowe’en today

Nor that the veil only begins to thin

Of course I’m already seeing every manner of thing out of the corner of my eye

Not quite there

But it’s freaking me out unless I look directly at it

Feeling the seasons change

The fucking way my body feels like I’m using some terrible loaner and my real one, which is still broken but not as bad as this, is resting on a beach somewhere

Fucking thing

How am I supposed to speak nicely to my torture chamber?

Oh, yes, good, laughter

From someone who is faking a laugh because she knows the man who is currently playing stupid games with her isn’t being faithful

Someone who I really admire and really wish the best for because, girl, you don’t deserve this shit

He’s using you to help raise his kid while seeing someone else?

No

It’ll be sad to see her go

Another could have been if not for the circumstances relationship

There I wrote some stuff

My stupid self imposed responsibility to pour ink into the web has been fulfilled

Create until when now?

Such a shame to drop it

Such a chore when there’s nothing happening

And no one to write about

I’m stuck on a word

増やす

ふやす

It translates as increase

Awkwardly

Like a shoe that doesn’t fit

Multiply would be a closer word

Kind of?

It has this air of like

It just happened

Some things happened

There’s more now

But it doesn’t always work as multiply either

Multiply our companions

Sounds like you’re going to breed them or something

We’re on a journey to increase our companions

Also just has this awkward, not quite right

The shoe doesn’t fit

And, no, I’m not going to go the cheap route and add “the numbers of” or any such cop out that I’ve seen translators use

I’m stuck because it’s a good word

There’s no sense of ownership of it

It’s not like I’m giving any context, kind of vibe

They just did

Poof ふやすd

Yes that d does belong there I’m butchering languages, keep up

So many words that just don’t quite click

Then I spend hours thinking about them

It would be nice to share these evening star gazes with someone

I’ll wish on that shooting star

It’s amazing how casually something can be on fire and reaching its doom

Some billion year journey ended

There is a dog howling in the night

Someone to sit in this darkness with me

Look up and ponder

Pointing out little machines

Being disappointed when they’re planes

Coming into this place I know

Where I am

That no one knows but me

Would they see my soul blazing out into space?

Watching as the night vision fades in

And the stars multiply

When the night sky is the only thing that matters

And we wonder why we cared so much about everything else

It’s all pointless

We’re spinning around on a fancy rock in space

How could it really matter?

Why are we not frolicking in this garden?

Why do we work so hard to sustain meaningless things?

Why do we flock to humans who have more than us and fawn?

We could all have nothing in a second

Everything we worked so hard to build crumbling around us

Metaphorically or literally

Living these lives chasing after something humans made up

Instead of connection with eachother

Did that shooting star hear my wish?

So they ever?

Something making noises in the night

An owl?

Yes

I should go say goodnight to my planet

There is a second owl

Owl talk

If my body would let me I’d stay out here for hours

That’s the thing about my father

He never apologises

He just comes back in to my life

And acts like I’ve been unfairly ignoring him

And I know there are things he should apologise for

One of them being when I tried to kill myself and he replied by saying “how do you think I feel?”

There isn’t even an air of apology

He just goes back to normal

And drags me with him

He wants me to meet up with him again

I don’t want to

Every fibre of my being says no

Can I just put it off like I forgot?

I don’t want to do anything with him

I wish someone would save me from him

I thought I’d saved myself but he just walked right back in like he’s supposed to be here

There’s still a little human inside of me who remembers playing with him on the floor of my bedroom

The little human also remembers that that memory is one of the last times he did

Something none of my other siblings got to experience

They also didn’t have to experience the loss of it

I wonder sometimes if that wasn’t him trying to prove something to someone

If it wasn’t just an illusion of his making

What am I to do?

Why do all the spirits seem to tell me to just ignore him?

So what if it was a lie that I wouldn’t be a stranger?

One lie for every hundred he told me

Once again you all expect something uncharacteristic of me

I’m doing my best not to crack under the weight of this decision

Immediately

I forgot I had finished on this song

This song is still a little scary

Sometimes they feel like they’re being screamed at me

But the first one is the sign

The second is the message

At least that’s how it’s seemed

Yeah, I can see this

Mysteries

Quiet days

Even when I need them I hate them because of how many I’ve had

Am I selfish for feeling resentment?

That once a month check in

And I just laughed

I’m in the same place you left me doing the same thing you left me doing.

But I didn’t say that

Why bother checking in when you know the answer?

Still here, still starving for attention

I do want to sever

I do

Wish you’d disappear

But I can’t let go

I’m no one’s friend

Friendship rescinded

Not really

But I want to

I want to be angry but I can’t

Because everyone has more important things than me

Unimportant

Unimportant me

No, you see, the sad part is you didn’t try

No one does

No one does

Repeat repeating repeated

It’s impossible to shine alone

Why else are humans here but to see the light and recognise its owner?

ずっとずっと誰も見えずに照らして

寂しくないの？

But there must have been

An unspeakable number unseen

How lonely for them

I’d rather cultivate the stars

Be some great being that is mesmerised by them

That can’t help growing them

Am I?

Once you decide who you is

I’ll let you know my answer

Just let the sounds ring out and fall

It’s just pain

Would my companion join me again tonight?

I dread the day they don’t

Someone to talk to

I can’t even remember what we said

I’m over here collecting dream beings

It’s really the least my mind could do after almost 6 solid years of reoccurring dreams

Give me someone else to talk to

There’s a world in my head

That I wish would switch with this one

I wish I knew what name to say

For both of them

Friend being and Death being

It leaves me feeling lonely

Not that I wasn’t already

It’s a sadness I’ll never know the end of

Until someone takes a moment to see me

I don’t even know what that would take

What I’d have to be to see that

No one will accept me as imperfect

When I try to even accept the people who demand everything from me

I tripped on a dream

Maybe a nightmare

Treating others as you would want to be?

And a book

My brain’s version of the bible?

Who knows what my brain is doing

Tripping on dreams at bedtime

Trying to prove something to someone

There were lots of abandoned buildings last night

Who knows

I suppose I’ll go dive back into them now

The thing in my mind outside my mind

You can scream all you like

This is of your own making