What’s really bothering you? She says. Let’s get to the core of it. Says my therapist.
It’s never what I think it is. The first thought I have is always what is bothering me like an itchy patch of skin. Surface annoyance. Minor details. Little things. Sometimes it actually is just itchy skin.
Except for me I scratch at any patch of skin with any tiny annoyance. I don’t like to be minorly annoyed. I can handle a really big major core annoyance. My core is made of them. That’s why my core is so strong. But my skin is as thin, as skin.
This morning it’s taxes. It’s always and forever going to be taxes unless I move to somewhere with no taxes. Even then I would probably question why some do and some don’t tax. I’m always minorly annoyed by taxes. Taxes cause itchy skin.
It’s not the taxes so much as the communication of this stimulus payment they claim to be sending out. Or just the entire process in general. I do my own taxes and prefer a paper check sent to me. Per my taxing story it was deemed undeliverable by a confused brand new mailman. Whom I’ve learned isn’t one anymore. It is sitting in the IRS laying on someone’s desk with a big stamp saying she moved. Except I didn’t and my address isn’t wrong enough to make it seem that way. No one moves from apartment 1G to capital letter iG its was an accident that looks so correct that it’s not even the reason for the check being sent back. I looked too hard for a reason. Since this desk is vacant of an employee who might get a deadly virus from one of the other tax people it sits. And is waiting for me.
Is this the reason my stimulus didn’t come? My check my stimulus says I am eligible and it will be entered into the said account that I entered on the day they allowed people who are afraid of direct deposit to enter direct deposit information to receive a stimulus quicker. I did it on the first day the portal opened. What I think happened is the portal was overwhelmed with people using it and had too many glitches from being a portal so new that my info is in new portal world with glitches. It says I am eligible and that I did the update successfully. I was shocked and immediately suspicious of the success. That’s not how things work for me. It’s only successful on the surface. Under it all is lots of unsuccessfulness. I wasn’t worried about getting this stimulus quicker, I was worried about who was delivering it. I am still afraid of direct deposit. Probably even more so now.
I don’t need it, I want it. I want to stimulate. I am paying bills and doing ok. Just ok. But I like just ok. Anything more makes me nervous. I am just owed it per the government for the pain and suffering we all are going through. I had to keep growing plants so I kept working. I was safe and employed and figured it all out. But now I want to stimulate the economy. Do my part. Buy something I don’t need from somewhere that was closed locally who is struggling for real. I like a little struggle, it’s just more comfortable to me. The minute I’m not is when I am surprised with a check I forgot to balance or a single letter for a number for proper mailing. I have to be on point always. Like a good on point hunting dog. Aware and ready. That’s doesn’t sound like struggling once I say it. Write it. It sounds certain more than struggling. I am used to struggling. It’s evolving into more certainty, less struggle.
The stimulus portal is super sensitive. You can’t make a single error more than 3 times. And they don’t give you many clues about how to énter things. It locks you out saying it doesn’t match what they have on file. I did it one night after a glass of wine and forgot to put my entire address. Just skipped the entire line. Three time. I was punished by waiting. I don’t wait well. I checked again too soon correctly and it still didn’t work/ this doesn’t make sense to me. How do they know who I was trying to look for the first three times? Is it detecting my device or my attempts? Does each address have someone decide various ways someone might look to check to make it match as a way to keep others from checking?
I can’t over think this if I tried. It’s such an annoying problem I don’t even care if I get a check anymore. Surprise me. Work it all out or make me have to remember to enter something on my taxes next year to receive it. How hard can it be to do this for millions of people? It’s hard because they are doing it from home in pajamas with red wine and Netflix in the background. I need the tax people back on point in their offices looking for everything. So I can stimulate the economy. I should tweet the pres. No. I should not. People tweet from the potty. And while driving. And while not watching sunsets.
Once to mess with the portal, I entered my address without my apartment letters and numbers at all, just the street and numbers in front and received the same answer of eligibility and identification. They know who I am without those letters and numbers so why is my check sitting there. Maybe they will sort it all neatly for me? Someone will put all the clues together and find my check and figure it out that it goes to me in the same account as the stimulus. It could be a grand mystery in the office. Except no one is in the office. No one knows who the two are individually. Can’t blame them I barely know who I am myself.
My core problem under the itchy skin:
I know who I am not. I am not selfish. I was made to feel this way for thinking of myself instead of someone else. That me first was selfish. I need so little from someone that it seems I need so little from someone. Is it a damaged part of me? I’m finding this answer to be no and yes. It could seem that way but I refuse to let anyone tell me that my lack of engagement with others is damaging. Have you seen the damage others have done to some? To me? No. I don’t talk about it. It’s too damaging. Should I? Yes. To others. No.
I am not a loner or even an introvert or extrovert by nature. In fact I am a delicate balance of both with the right energy, locations, and situations. It’s situational. Like knowing what kind of wine you would like. It depends on too many things to be answered with out thought. It’s a mood. It’s timing. It’s environmental. Am I in Paris or Greece? What kind of wine should someone drink in each place? Am I having chicken or beef? Or just desert? It’s too many things. I am often too many things. Too many things for someone else. I’m both too much and not enough. It’s both yes and no.
I have to be told I am needed. I do one of two things. Suffocate or isolate. I don’t know a medium ground yet. I may never be able to get to this. I find confusion and paranoia in people asking me questions, yet drill others like an amateur detective or a toddler. I don’t like to answer questions. Unless it’s with a question. It turns the whole thing off of me. Back to them.
Yes, I am damaged. Was? It just doesn’t change my worth. Knowing this is me not damaged. I know I have suffered physical, emotional and mental abuse, neglect, isolation, loss so great that it will always be the core annoyance. The major annoyance. Once the skin is scratched until it bleeds it’s what lies under the surface. But I am not damaged goods. I’ve been through hell caused by someone I once thought would walk through any hell presented with me. I am guarded by my thin itchy skin with minor annoyances to cover that I have major ones. I just have itchy skin.
Side minor annoyance. I can never get my blue blinking cursor to go where I want it to to make a correction. It wants to always go to somewhere my finger seems to have touched. My fingers aren’t that fat. I don’t use a pointer pen looking thing. Stylus. It’s called a stylus. It’s just annoying. I just got a new phone so it’s not the broken screen. I thought it was. I have the same glass protector. Maybe it’s that? Maybe it’s just me. I’m just a little annoyed today.
Aspenleaf 