Swamped

Today: I am swamped with stuff to sell from my 2 clients and myself. The basement is loaded with sports action figures, music cd's, wreastling memrobilia, doll house furniture and lots of other stuff. I painted the upstairs bathroom last night because Scott tried to do it and then had to leave for his show. I can't stand anything like that unfinished.

I go into full swing rehearsals starting tomorrow. The first audience will be on 7-9-09 at Vpstart Crow in Manassas. I get so stressed by my lines to memorize.

My Life: I had to talk to Ken about the "I love you". I had to figure out where Stryker and I were going to go. Ken pretty much told me that he was very in love with me and that I could move in with him. He lived in an apartment complext that didn't allow dogs. I told him I would NOT live anywhere that wasn't animal friendly. He told me that it would be temporary and that we could get a place together to rent. It was beginning to sound like it might work.

I had another court date with the disabilty hearing and when it came to my turn to testify I totally broke down crying. Bad stress always makes the pain more intense and I just balled my eyes out when the judge asked me about my diagnosis with HIV and neuropothy. He approved my SSDI. That meant medical coverage to get treatment! YES!!!!

That same week, I moved in with Ken. I loaded all my stuff up by myself and moved. No one helped me, not Jim or anyone. We had to find a place soon because the complex was going to find out about Stryker since I had to walk him a few times a day to go potty. Plus there were lots of kids that liked to play outside near us.

Ken and I looked for a place quickly and found one in South Arlington. It was a 2 Bedroom home with 2 flights and a basement. I could set up my eBay in the business and Ken could keep his living quarters clutter free. (Did I mention that Ken was a clean freak). There was a big enough yard for my baby to run outside and pee. It was an ideal home and the rent was cheap. The owner was gay and just wanted the mortgage covered so he didn't charge much more than that.

Ken had a lot of beautiful furniture and collectibles. The house was beautiful once he had it decorated. Now we had to make a little more money to afford the electric, water, gas and all to run a house. Ken was dealing cocaine and I was on SSDI. I supplemented our income with eBay to pay for food. SSDI is not enough for anyone to live on. I also did a lot of Ken's cocaine to ease the pain.

That October I was turning 42. We decide to have a house warming, birthday party and halloween party all in one. I don't remember a lot of the part since I got so wasted I blacked out. I dressed as a zombie who woke up in the morgue. I ended up as a living zombie passed out in bed.

My doctor had given me all kinds of pain killers but none of them seemed to work very well. I know now that many medications do not work if you drink alcohol. And I drank! I started buying vodka by the case again. That way, I wouldn't have to leave the house for a week at a time. I would get up and start eBaying and drinking with a hit of coke here and there. Ken would clean house and pack up anything that needed to be shipped out.

We weren't making enough money and we had to find better products to sell. We would go to the mall and look for closeout sales. One day we stopped in Spencer Gifts and met the manager. She looked just like Helen Hunt. Ken was a charmer when it came to speaking to people. he could get anyone to like him. Spencer Gifts always had sales and Ken got the manager to give him even bigger discounts on their closeout items by purchasing in bulk. She would call us anytime something was marked down and we would have first shot at it. Ken put it all on his credit card.

The money from the cocaine would go back into buying more cocaine. The money from my SSDI and eBay would go into the home and food. What I didn't know was Ken was only paying the minimum on the credit card and the debt was getting bigger every month.

I sat in front of the computer, in pain, up to eight hours a day. I did it for us. We would get calls from eBay saying that we were one of the most valuable sellers they had. We were the Spencer store on line and people bought most everything. This was before eBay became a mega business. We were even invited to their first conference in DC and they paid for our tickets.

We took our first vacation that next year and went to DisneyLand in Florida. We went to Universal Studios and Sea World. Stayed for a week and had a blasT. We vowed we would go on vacation once a year. Our next stop was going to be Vegas.

Back at home, we decided to go play bingo one night. We found a place in Annandale, VA and went. They had these tickets called rip offs, pulloffs that were had many instant winners. Ken hit 500.00 that first time and we were hooked from there on out. He loved to play and I loved it too. We started to meet some of the regulars and it soon became our only social night out.

One night just before bingo, my stomach was hurting really bad. I felt cramped and bloated and was in major pain. Ken kept bugging me to go to bingo. I kept telling him I was in pain. He said he would take me to the hospital. He took me to the mergency room and dropped me off at the door. Told me was going to go play bingo and to call him when I was done.

I waited in the emrgency room for over an hour and no one would see me. When they finally gave me a bed to lie down, my appendix burst...

Love & Peace,
Clayton