The Long Awaited Day!

The day is almost at had. Since I took the job with Knox County Schools, I have had to wait about 2 months before my first check. Well Tuesday marks the day that I will get the direct deposited amount of my hard work put into my checking account.

No longer will I have to lose my hair over the thought of finances. I thank anyone and anything that has helped me survive to this point. Now, I can take the chance the pay them all back, in more ways than one!

OH HAPPY DAY!

Trudging Foward

...and once again I put myself into the tyrannies of continued higher education. It is, absolutely, a bitter-sweet thought. I need, and want, the higher education to get a good job (and to prove to my father that I will not fall into his footsteps and live a life of Wal-Mart management), but I hate the crap that you have to go through to get the education. I would rather be out in the schools getting my experience. Instead I will be listening to a professor telling us their experiences and reading/writing about what I should be doing in the classroom. I get bored way too easily. Just give me something constructive to do or I will start eating my hall pass.

But all in all, I can't wait to see what these next few semesters have in store. Chaos and epiphanies are due to be in store for me. Just a year and a half and I should have my Masters degree. Pretty freakin' sweet in my opinion. Getting so much closer to that Doctoral degree. Soon you can call me "Master Swingle," then down the road you can look forward to call me "Doctor Swingle." Awesome...

It's been quite awhile

I know that it has been quite some time since I have last posted on here. From where I last left off, I was practically struggling to get by with life. Always wondering where my next meal was coming from, and if I was ever going to pull myself out of utter defeat. But thankfully through the hard times, and what seemed to be perpetual darkness, my life now is fulfilled with all sources of enjoyments! Well here is a little update on where I am at now in my life:

I have had to put my greatest friend, Chipper, to sleep. He was a Collie and Australian Shepherd mix dog that absolutely meant the world to me. Let's just say it was the hardest day in my life. I never fathomed how attached I was to that dog, until I saw the vet carry his limp and lifeless body out from the vet building to my car.

I have now moved away from Jefferson City and moved into Knoxville. I moved to Knoxville to be more centrally located for jobs. And yes, I actually have a job now!! (Thank you to all of those people that kept me in their thoughts and offered me some help). I am a substitute teacher for Knox county schools, and I am also a Masters student at Carson-Newman. I hope to graduate from there in about two years with a Master of Arts in Teaching.

I am constantly involved in with the education of the younger generation. I am now a staple in their lives as they begin to mold their future into something great. All I can say is that I am absolutely loving it. Some people can say that they will never be able to deal with the attitudes of the school aged children. Well I can say that I look past the attitude (most of the time lol) and focus on their understanding of the content and the world. Their success gives me the ultimate satisfaction and gratification. I care about those kids. Their well-being is my top priority. I would give all of my powers and wisdom to help them in any way I could.

But I am going to end this before this gets too long. I am going to try to keep this blog every day...If time allows me to do so!

Needing that outlet

I have been pretty upset through the past few days with the snowballing stress of bills and hunger with absolutely no money to mend anything. Tomorrow should be a better day once I finally get some money. For the first time in a week my dogs can finally eat and the first time since since can I have more than one meal a day.

I was trying to blame a lot things and people for my predicament, but I know it is ultimately my own fault for not taking initiative and having a safety net of finances. I sat and meditating this morning and asked for that sense of hope and peace again. Along with ravenous hunger, I actually feel like things are actually going to be otay now.

Pretty Down and Out

Well today has been one of the worst days I have had in a long time. I finally had an interview for a job after waiting for something for over a month and a half. I showered, put on a suit, brushed me teeth, and sprayed my best cologne, only to be told "sorry, we can coimpletely full and can't take on anyone new."

After a month and a half...complete devastation. And the day didn't end there. I wass supposed to get my refund from Financial Assistance early this week. It wasn't until today till someone in that office told me that I didn't have all of the necessary things completed. I was told since Friday that everything had been processed. EVERYTHING!!!

With this, I will be lucky to get my refund by monday or tuesday. I absolutely needed that money this past monday. I guess that is my luck. I'm completely out of money, with a car to fix, and no job in sight. Not only am I down to eating about a meal a day at best, but my dogs haven't eaten in almost a week. My heart sinks as I see my puppy lick the floor around his food bowl desperately searching for food. The only thing I can say is "wait one more day buddy, I will have the money to get you food."

I have been able to always look towards the future to where the gas is greener on the other side of the fence, but now I am close to losing hope for the future. I have lost a lot of motivation with things that have happened today. I am close to tears as my dogs look at me wondering why things are like this.

I know I am joining the huge amount of people that have to worry from day to day whether things will be ok. I really wish things will be ok.

World of Emotions

For some reason I have found myself getting really angry lately. I completely lose control with my anger. Thankfully it hasn't been directed towards any human being so far, but I feel that the inanimate objects around my house would be clutching in fear right now at my presence if they could.

I don't know what has set me off so bad. Maybe it is the stress of not knowing what the future holds. Maybe it is the piling bills because I am completely unable to hear back from a job. Maybe it is the seclusion that I face while everyone is "home" for summer vacation. Or maybe it is just built up rage that just has to be let out.

Whatever it may be, I do not want it to be ruling my life like it is. I only find refuge if I am not around my usual places of living. I think this is huge calling that I NEED a vacation. But then I get upset again because I have dogs to take care of, and I don't really have the finances to go right now. Win the lottery? YES PLEASE!!!!!!

More than just wondering

There is one thing that just comes to mind as I read this strip and I ready myself to surround myself in the world of adulthood. Yes, I firmly believe that westernized humans have become completely desynthizied to nature and our basic instincts. But I would like to take this a step further to get onto my soap box:

In our western culture, having a house, electricity, and plumbing are always easy to come by. I know that ther are still places of extreme and near poverty. One of my college friends had a facebook status update pointing out the fact of our societies certain sports and film/tv entertainers and their salary for the year. One of the sports entertainers made a total of 100 million dollars last year. This friend also stated would it would be like if we got paid depending on the contribution to society instead of just entertainment value.

Wanting to get my masters in teaching, I generally ask myself what the hell am I doing? I am basically setting myself up for lower, or possibly higher middle class, struggling to meet ends meet. Why can't the people who work their butt everyday, to teach the next generation's youth, to put their lives on the line for our safety, and so many other earn more than just barely above minimum wage. Those people in the entertainment industry have so much money they don't know what to do with it all. Even high paid comestic surgeons are in that category. The nurses and CNAs that do all of the grunt work get no where near the same amount as the ones that make patients wait hours on end for just 5 minutes of consultation.

Its about time for a change. I know some will agree and disagree, but that's how I feel about the situation right now...

In a completely different world

Don't you wish that sometimes there was a world that you could just escape to? That maybe you just need some time to get away from the people that don't recognize you, or the stresses of life. I'm not saying that I completely want to go away, but I am in definite need of a vacation. I am actually finding myself day dreaming of the white sand beaches and the blue waters of the ocean, wishing for a relaxing afternoon in the sun.

Some one please kazam me to the caribbean!!

On the Hunt

As I enter the real world after graduating from college, I am getting first hand experience on the ravage world of job hunting that the economy is in right now. I live in a small town, a town where the biggest thing is wal-mart and the small college campus. This small town has had to job opportunities open except for CNAs, LPNs, and RNs. Seeing that I have no license for any of those, I'm basically SOL. I have put out my resume to several places, and still I have no luck. I hope the places I applied today will swoop me up.

Creativity like a faucet

I need some help on my next composition. I have a few ideas, but I can't seem to narrow it down. Lets see how many votes I get for the choices:

1. The Four Horsemen - A band piece with a programmatic nature of the 4 horsemen of the Apocalypse
2. A choral piece with the text of a psalm (need suggestions on a psalm)
3. Another addition to my extremely successful and popular Animal Song Cycle (need suggestions on an animal, something exotic and/or random)
4. Dante's Inferno, Circle IV - a piano solo with programmatic nature of Dante's travel through his version of Hell.

So I have several things swirling around to work on, but I can't decide which one to actually start. I need some much need inspiration.

Waiting for the mood to strike me...

An understanding and submission

As I round out my last year of my undergraduate (thanks to my first advisor, I have had to take 13 credit hours on an extra summer after my graduation), I wonder if this is really what I am supposed to be doing.

At the end of July, I will receive a diploma for a Bachelor of Music in Composition, cum laude or magna cum laude, I don't know which one yet (I really haven't taken the time to find out which). What in the world am I going to do with that right now? I have been forced to fervently search for a typical blue collar job, that I will probably ultimately hate. I could continue my education (which is the plan right now) but I need a some source of income to continue my living situation and pay for school. I'm trying my hardest to not be swimming in a olympic regulated pool of the thickest vanilla flavored student loan pudding.

So Calvin gives me a huge understanding, and it does not just pertain to math. Everything you learn in your educational career have to be accepted on faith. It practically is a religion. I have seen it countless times, and have done it myself, how in the last minutes of studying we start praying to whatever "Test God" so that we might be able to survive the horrible ordeal. I'm not stated that I will, or have the luxury to, be any type of religious educational atheist. But in my last summer of being an undergraduate, I am encompassing the same feelings as Calvin. Who cares on how it happens, and a lot of times the things I learn seem to appear through some strange miracle.

I'm done with such trival things as how Jonathan Swift wrote for the Irish or how the Harlem Renaissance affects my life today. I'm done with General Education. I have been at it for 18 years. Thats plenty enough time for me. I'm ready to move onto bigger and more focused areas of training towards my professional life.

But for now, I must submit, because you really can't do much without a college education these days. So again, I wonder, is this what I am supposed to be doing? Is there some greater objective that I should be focusing on.

Only time will tell...

Welcome to the new blog. I figured I have too much thought in me just to keep it to myself. You will come to find that I love the Calvin and Hobbes cartoons. I used to read these all the time as a child. Throughout the series you can find little life lessons.

I'm always in search of the little life lessons to guide me through illusion of reality.