05.21.09 - 8:13 pm

my life dramatically changed in 2009.

i was really enjoying it. i really am uncomfortable with whats to come. i dont fear the change; i most certainly welcome it. i fear the burdens, the sacrifices, the unpleasant results of what i expect.

im losing my job.

it will be difficult to find another one.

i may have to move.

this custody battle just cost another $1200. just for one month.

these are the biggest four burdens i face. and then the multitude of satellite burdens that will directly plague my ever increasing anxieties.

already joel has given up on the store. i come in and nothings been moved let alone enhanced. which is not entirely unexpected, but one would hope in the last sixty days of owning a business with a huge list of live stock and product still filling every aquarium and shelf that there would be some desire to make the shop sparkle. to seem inviting. to new potential owners or at least to customers willing to purchase the last remaining items. i imagine that responsibility will fall on my shoulders. im exceptionally tempted to ignore those responsibilies out of disdain, despair and laziness. im not worried about losing my job. im worried about being unable to find another one. ive looked on craigslist a handful of times and only find jobs that require specific skills i lack. or rewarding 8 to 9 dollar an hour jobs that would be unable to sustain my lifestyle. i could manage, i know this, ive done it before. but the glamor of a full time job with such a wage doesnt hold hands well with a court system im hoping will favor my value as a parent. already im hemorrhaging my grandfathers money. my inheritance money. any hope of having college debt settled in the future. im pouring money into a machine in order to get more time with my son. but now with sarah moving an additional twenty minutes farther away from me and my soon to be unemployment, i may be forced to move or take a job that turns me into the very thing im spending money to not become: a weekend dad. i dont want to have to work 9 to 5 every day too far away to be able to drop ashton off and pick him back up and then get to work on time. i want to be the one that grins to sarah and says, look, look what all this bullshit got you. instead, i fear after all the money spent, after all the work ill put into this, ill be forced to concede and lose ashton to his mother. on top of losing him, losing all the money that i could have spent on him or me or any number of things that could have been beneficial. and then my grandfather will have done all this for nothing.

i love where i live. i love living in south east portland. i dont want to have to follow around sarah. i dont want to have to move just to get more time with ashton just because sarah made it this way. its embarrassing. im prepared to do it, but only it depends on the type of job i acquire.

and the type of job i acquire will change everything. where i live. how i live. how much i drive. how much i spend on day care. how close to poverty ill live. how unsatisfying things could become.

i dont mind the change. i mind the fear.