I am so proud to announce that I passed my ITIL exam. As I said on Facebook, I just went from good to invaluable in IT interviews, because ITIL is now all the rage for help desks, and even people who work on the back end (heehee- that joke will never get old)… particularly in places like universities, which is my ultimate goal. It would not suck to get a job in a place with tuition waivers. That will mean my money can go toward the important things, like college sweatshirts.
There’s no one I want to call more than my mom. However, in the classical version of Christianity, she already knows. It’s not scientific, but a comforting thought nonetheless. This has been a garbage dump of a month, and to have something to brag about is completely invaluable. As a geek with no college degree, I have a certificate that says I know my shit, as opposed to having to prove it in interviews which I may or may not get depending on how companies view not having a Bachelor’s. Most companies are okay with it. Some are not. It’s time to blow a little money on celebrating. Not much, just enough to make dinner memorable. I need a dirty Martini. NEED. Although my version of a Martini is different than Eggsy’s, I feel like I should include this quote:
With gin of course. Stirred for 10 seconds while glancing at an unopened bottle of vermouth.
I agree with the gin part, but I like my cocktails to be perfect in the classic definition of it. I always want the recipe to be balanced in exactly the way it was meant. Measurements exact, shaken cold until there are ice chips on top. The only exception I will make is extra olive brine.
The first Martini I ever had was given to me by one of the best poets in the country, Scott Chalupa. Of course I am biased because we’ve been friends since Jesus was a boy, but not entirely. If you read his collection, you’d probably agree with me. I didn’t know I loved Martinis until I just wanted to have what he was having, and thus began a long love affair. It’s real and it’s deep.
It’s good that I like Martinis, because I’m meeting Bond for drinks in order to establish a real life friendship. No, seriously. Of course I can’t tell you more than that, because not to protect her is not in my nature. I don’t know what will come of an empath meeting intel, but it would be silly not to try. If you had a chance to meet a real life Bond, wouldn’t you at least show up? I need to look up whether a drink will make my head hurt more. My celebratory drink may have to be a Diet Coke with bitters (don’t knock it til you’ve tried it).
If I am honest with myself, the reason I moved here was to run in circles of high intelligence, because I don’t think of myself as that smart. I think that being around smart people raises your own game. It has certainly served me well in music. Being around singers and trumpet players WAY better than me has shown me the path to Enlightenment.
They keep me honest and humble. What I have found is that since my mother died, I can’t read music for shit. My mind just wanders off and I stop counting, to my detriment and to others, because my voice is big enough that I can throw off everyone in my section. It’s a gift.
I stop following the metronome in my head, the thing that is supposed to guide me. I get back on track by tapping my foot or pulsing my toes, occasionally. Grief is too big not to let my mind wander aimlessly through the desert, my own 40 days and 40 nights.
However, I do have so many things to look forward to in my future. Nailing my exam is just the first step toward greatness, because it may lead to free college and grad school. I just want to make my mother proud, as much as I wish I could have done it while she was alive. This is not to say that she wasn’t already ridiculously proud of me, I just wanted to put the cherry on top of the already huge sundae with a brownie in the middle.
Finally, it happened to me. Things that are wonderful in the face of a garbage dump of a situation. I cannot help but think that this web site is responsible, because the more I process, the more I change. And in this case, change is good, with no reason to be afraid.
I go back to a quote that I read on Buzzfeed (probably the only memorable thing I’ve read there):
My therapist told me that if I could actually see the future, I would have no worries about how to get there. I’d just have to trust her that it was worth it.
Amen.
#prayingonthespaces
Stories That Are All True 
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