When I get upset and stressed out, I can tell you two things will happen: I will get a humongous migraine in the back of my head, and a zit (or two) will follow the next morning. Like clockwork, both happened in the last two days from the money problems I have been having (see previous entry).

My Ate called me just now to give me grief AGAIN abt. bouncing checks, how she has so many more bills/responsibilities than me, how I could never be on my own, and shit. She’s trying to guilt trip me. Trust me, she doesn’t have to do that. I do that enough on my own, thanks.

Anyways, I use toothpaste on zits when I sleep to get rid of them. As soon as I put it on last night, it started stinging painfully, which told me that the toothpaste was drying out the zit really well, and that this stress is really getting to me.

But my dad starts banging on my door this morning, and says, “Do you have school today?”

“Shit!” I say in my head, and fumble for my glasses and to look at the clock. 8:01AM. “Shit! Class started an hour ago!” I had already missed last Thursday because I was so tired from doing OT at work that I couldn’t get out of bed. I was like, “I can’t afford to miss another class!” I was sleeping so heavily, I didn’t even know what day it was. Have you ever gotten like that? I hate that. Plus I knew I could sleep in on Wednesday because I didn’t have to work or go to school. Since he woke me up from a deep sleep, I was so turned around, I couldn’t focus.

As he’s yelling, I have to stop and think, “Wait, yesterday was school. Today is Wednesday. You don’t have school on Wednesdays.”

“Can you take her to the bus stop?” he says from behind the closed door. He’s retired and the family chauffeur, and he usually takes the girls back and forth to the bus stop, unless something comes up. However, he makes me do it when I’m off from school and work.

“Okay,” I say, my voice thick with sleep.

Like I have a choice.

Anyways, I stumble to the bathroom and examine my face. The toothpaste had dried so well, it pulled off the top part of the zit to much incredible pain. I know; TMI, but trust me, it goes hand in hand with the rest of my story.

My dad is blundering around downstairs, as my bleary eyed self goes to collect my niece. He says that he has to wait for the cable guy to fix our satellite dish, and then he stops.

“What’s that on your face?”

“It’s a zit,” I whine. I barely slept the night before from all the drama, so excuse me if I’m just a little more than cranky.

“Who - what gives you zits?”

“Ate,” I reply. Her daughter - my niece - giggles from beside me.

My mom just called me to tell me that she wants to help shave the Ate!Bill, as I shall call it from now on. I hate that she feels the need to want to help bail me out. It’s all my Ate’s fault. Now that school is paid off for the semester, I’m going to have more money to help clean up the Ate!Bill.

However, all this stress has made me wanna channel it into something positive. I started writing a story called “The Car Thief.” It’s pretty good, actually, considering I haven’t written anything creatively in months. I’ll have to share it with you once I’m happy with it. Here’s the first paragraph…

I sometimes wonder, at every fork in the road of my life, would I be as happy as I am now? Of course, the definition of happy is all relative to where you are in your life at any one time. But I tend to over think about my decisions. If I hadn’t stopped taking piano lessons at 12, would I be a piano virtuoso now? If I had gone on that local movie audition that my theater teacher said I was a shoo-in for, would I be an actress now?

I met him twenty-four hours before I was supposed to get married to my former English professor. I met him at a very important point in my life. This is my story.

It’s gonna be a short story. Of course, as I’m writing it, I’m imagining it as a movie, as I so often do. I’ve already cast David Anders as the Car Thief, and William Fichtner as the English professor fiance. It’s pretty good in my head. Now I’ve got to get it out on paper!

?: “Do you have a lot of stress in your life?”