One of the biggest pet peeves I developed over my years of life is people talking about “living life day by day.” I will tell you why that has become one of my pet peeves, which if I am going to be transparent about it. It became a trigger response as it reminded me of the people that would respond with that statement when I would talk about the big picture. Not in the way you think, where in most cases people get all self-righteous vomiting their preachy and judgmental message of “why you are making a mistake not seeing things in the same way you do.” What happens when someone avoids the extensive picture conversation reminds me of how reckless and sabotaging the YOLO lifestyle was and how those lead to a situation that an average person would throw their hands in the air and give up on life and themselves altogether.
One of the things that I did right, so I thought, was to save six months of income just in the presents of the worst-case scenario. Little did I expect that the apartment complex I moved into named 2929 Dunvale was the peripheral Trojan Horse, which, when I think about it. I should have taken his warning far more severe, but I was naive and rendered myself unstoppable at the time. Which his sign to me when I began moving in was, “I would never be the same when I moved out of that apartment. Which at the time and in my judgmental rhetoric replied with, “Whatever it is, I can overcome.” Which four months in had me admitted into a hospital facility during my work trip in Kansas City. With an illness that they couldn’t diagnose, I wanted to do a spinal tap to determine why I couldn’t keep anything down. I was getting chills, fevers, and abscesses all over my body, including a small one on my face. Which when this weird discharge began to come out of both eyes, I began to freak out. One of my friends brought to my attention that I should check to see if mold might have been present in the dwelling after doing an at-home test in April. The indication that mold was genuinely present. Which ended up having these vast and painful abscess growing on my face. Which many times had on prescription pain pills to ease the pain. After months of notifying the complex and being advised by the TAA or Texas Apartment Association to write a letter letting them know about the problem requesting that according to their advisement. That I would pay once the mold was removed from the dwelling. Little did I know that after this letter and a phone call, I hear that makes me laugh, because in that moment where everything in my shit life was hitting the fan. It would of never lead me into the writing career. That in many times seemed hopeless but ended up creating three published books and years worth of writing material, which I began to realize after going back to school to pursue a Psychology degree. It would also give me years of material for a self-help series.
After revisiting the events that occurred just at that moment, I began to see how living in the moment led to the domino effect of sabotaging behaviors on my end. The truth, after hearing the constant “stop thinking about the future and focus on the present,” I began conforming to that mentality without even knowing it. I have to say Lena Dunham’s “Girls” subconsciously got me prepared for the impeccable doom. As looking at the show post-journey, I began to see many of the naive and unrealistic idealisms I also had. Rewatching the show had me have a slight hatred towards the protagonist as she was the typical narcissist.
Seeing how these characters acted in the series made me hate my generation for the selfish and entitled mindset they had, especially when they justified the shitty behaviors, which was just plain right, condescending. It wasn’t until Episode 2 of Season six that I began to have the “ah-ha” moment. It wasn’t the hatred I had towards the characters. It was the resentment I still had about my behaviors in the past. Which, in this episode, began to show the character development that they started going through. Realizing that how Marty says, “we don’t know shit.” Which, if you think about it, becomes true to reality. Not because we are naive or stupid, but because everything we believe in many times on pure perception.
Of course, being an analytical and reflective thinker, I began to look back at my life. I began to recall the many times that my perception of things that were engaged by the advice and others’ opinions, that I convinced myself was the truth. Which, in the end, made me realize that I also didn’t know shit at the time. I was starting with people and the incident at the 2929 Dunvale apartment complex and my misjudgment. Which was something that I was beginning to learn with two incidents occurring through the situation and how Sprint, the company I was working for, with not only the discrimination I faced with the Worker’s Comp issue. But, also the sexual assault that I suffered in silence while working for that same business department in the Houston office. Velma always seemed like a rational and reasonable person who always wanted to do the right thing after reporting the mold situation and receiving the letter.
Pointing out all the problems and the apartment’s issues when I google searched the property, finding all these issues that included a pest problem that never resolved in the dwelling. If I did my research beforehand, I would have found out that this is one of many signs that the home indeed had mold. When I hear the recording, I kept the recordings, along with revisiting the video footage. Through my ring doorbell, I told her I became admitted into the hospital of an undetermined infection I was beginning to develop due to the dwelling—finding all sorts of things in labs that, after doing my research. It leads to the potential diagnosis of toxic mold syndrome. In the recording, I laugh at the uncertainty and worry I had as she, in much defense, “I don’t need any problems. You have to go!” After asking her what my fate was, that had her after refusing to correct the problem. It became determined the repairs wouldn’t occur based on the price. Digging deeper had me find some odd company changes that lead to FEMA fraud which funds from Katrina became a pocketed asset. According to a source. I said “yes” to the response about evicting me, already dealing with actions of retaliation and now confirming this through the psychology courses I am taking to work towards a psychology degree. It became established in a passive-aggressive action.
Which psychology tells us is happens when someone is not only wiping their hands clean but eliminating any guilt they can feel by avoiding contact and what we call in our current social interactions, “ghosting.” Which more than likely was the reason why my new boss Jose Estrada dismissed me the way he did. More than likely because of Greg Neilson. Which many had his suspicions of favoritism and poor leadership. Which bias was a distinctive culture for the Sprint? It seemed since Al Sunday, and Frances Shaw did to get me away in a very deceptive way, booted me out of their territory against management’s advisement that became enabled by favoritism.
If I went with my instincts, it would have saved me from these actions from the people who always seemed to rub me the wrong way. Which became the lesson that I had to learn that the truth was, “I didn’t know shit.” Which, in the end, made me realize that it was all for a bigger purpose. It’s the way I became a blogger and a published writer in the future. At the same time, I was losing it all and starting from scratch. Which after getting rid of the problem. They could never redeem themselves and the unlawful acts that occurred during these incidents. Recalling one of these individuals’ rebuttal statements telling me, “You will never amount to nothing,” in the anti-social intention and their pride. It turns out. I became of force not to be reckoned with.
It was January when I started recording every conversation, which compelled me to purchase the Ring doorbell to begin recording everything in my moment of paranoia. And who wouldn’t, after being deceived by people you once admired, which is how I got every single conversation and every single act the apartment did to cover the mold incident. After the reporting of suspected mold, the apartment began the “renovations,” the apartment used to “paint” the complex. But it taught me one of the essential things about human nature, but through life, experience-something confirmed from one of my classes. That people who don’t take accountability and make excuses for their deceptive behaviors are the ones you should be cautious of the most as these narcissistic tendencies lead to one thing that we all hold, which is internalized traumas.
I identified in the behavior patterns of destructive behaviors the trauma that haunts them the most. Which is something I still have empathy for, regardless of the way many attempted to gaslight me. Which for a while, I was beginning to blame myself for the actions that occurred. I was constantly beating myself up and calling myself stupid for not knowing better. But what I began to realize is that they too should have known better, which had me ask myself, “why should I take accountability for the actions engaged in desperation?” The truth is, we are not as innocent as those who have betrayed us. The truth is if you take accountability. You begin to realize that you have done the same thing. In the past, to someone who looked up to you at one point in your life. Which maybe it took a dose of karma to make me change my ways. Perhaps, taking accountability is why things are starting to come around for me—avoiding deceptive practices of getting ahead and putting work towards the future. Not the present future, but the future that we all reach as elderly adults.
When we are incapable of taking care of ourselves after failing to create a “nest egg” that prevents us from living off social security if it’s even offered to us in our generation, in many cases, we focus on chasing things in the now. We tend to forget about our fate when we are old and frail. Maybe, because of my taking accountability. I have found a solution for myself and others who may not have thought far enough in the future, in pure and humbled empathy.
Frieda The Writer 