Block, Bitches

One thing about facebook is you get some of the best and worst friend suggestions. Today was one of those days. I got a friend suggestion of someone who can never safely be in my life again. I just wanted to send facebook a memo, "You fucked up, facebook!"

Seeing this person made me ill. I don't get upset anymore, just ill. They did a lot of terrible things to me. Time and time again, I assured myself they were unsafe because they were back on the drugs. Maybe they were unsafe because they didn't get the proper help for their other psych related issues. I also told myself maybe they had changed. Although in the past year the reports I have heard have suggested otherwise.

The last time this person sent me a text, I was watching Live PD with a friend. I saw it and screamed, "MUTHERFUCKER!!"

Needless to say I tried to throw my phone. My friend instead suggested blocking this person's number. Let's just say, when the number was blocked, his dog ran over to me and jumped on my lap. When there is a cute dog sitting on your lap, you can't be angry. It's a sin. Plain and simple.

A few minutes later, I was playing fetch with a terrier like nothing ever happened.

I thought of that and blocked this idiot again. It felt good. My friend is in another state and so is his dog. But I already feel better. There are birds chirping outside my window, I just had a late lunch, and am getting ready to do an assignment for graduate school. I am also getting ready to reapply my lipstick, a new shade matter of fact.

Like nothing ever happened.

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10 Pieces of Advice For Dealing With Negative People

Yes, negative people. We all know them. The energy sucks and drains that try to snatch our spirit and steal whatever other sunlight we have in our souls. They are just awful in every way, and have no redeeming qualities. Often, we leave feeling depleted of any vitamins and minerals, and wonder why we want to punch a wall.

Here are ten ways we can fight back:

1. Wear A Watch- Yeah, here is that energy suck trying to engage you in conversation yet again. However, now you can take control of the situation. Look at your watch, apologize, and tell them you have an appointment. Yeah, it's a lie. But any destination is better than listening to the garbage these folks spew on the reg.

2. Fight Fire With Water- When dealing with a negative person you can't quite extricate yourself from, turn the diss or gossip session into something positive. For example, when they rip Sally Jones apart, say Sally has always been nice to you, or point out a strength she has. That kills the virus right quick.

3. Don't Feed In- Sometimes a negative individual will go out of there way to start conflict and needle you. Don't make a snide remark, although it is tempting. Instead, don't feed in. The opposite of love is not hate, but rather apathy. If you don't care, they will find a new target.

4. Keep Your Side of the Street Clean- Sometimes, a negative person is so problematic they make you crazy. It's them and not you. However, you have control over how you act. They do not pull your strings. Remember that while it is them, it's on you to behave like the bigger, better person.

5. Use The Block Button- The internet is the home for any and all negative people, and it gives their moron muscle balls of steel. It's easy to get sucked in. Knowing this, if they step over the line use the block button. It kills any and all conflict in your path, and also the chaos continues. They can say whatever they want afterwards, but it only makes them look worse and you look better.

6. Maintain A Bottom Line- These individuals are disconcerting, and more often than not are bullies. When dealing with them, set up a firm boundary about what makes you comfortable and what doesn't. If they step over the line, kindly let them know. If they see they cannot push you around, they will stop and find someone new to make their punching  bag.

7. Remove Yourself- Sometimes a negative person pushes you so hard you do want to physically retaliate. That is when you need to either fake a stomach ache and leave, or go to the bathroom and splash water on your face. This will help you get some peace, quiet, and return to sanity.

8. Know You Aren't Alone-When someone is overwhelmingly negative, their Mr. Yuck is almost always universal. Where there is smoke, there is fire. So know while they are mean and nasty, it's not just to you, it's everyone. That won't make it so personal.

9. Get Legal If Need Be- Sometimes, a person can be so problematic you have to get the law involved, and that is the only boundary they understand. If their harassment and terrible behavior are disrupting your peace of mind and safety, go to the police. It is what they are there for.

10. Have Compassion-Some people are harder to love than others. A negative person might be one who is easy to murder in your mind. But know that unfortunately, people are the way they are for a reason, good or bad. Also, maybe this person has mental health issues and isn't getting the proper medication or treatment. Hope the universe in whatever fashion sends them peace and guides them towards happiness, because while they disrupt you, ultimately they do the most harm to themselves.

Hope I helped someone

xoxox
www.aprilbrucker.com

Ms. Fairweather

Lately things have been interesting. I have a lot of things on the burner, one being my impending DVD taping at the Metropolitan Room and then a headlining theatre gig in Long Island amongst other things. These are two things I have always dreamed of doing since I graced the stage. Yeah, it took me some time to do it. But the truth is, sometimes things don't happen in my time. Things cannot happen before their time. Does it make me happy? No, but it's the nature of the beast.

When life gets full, things get a little stressful. Sunday I was having a meltdown. Yes, an April being April moment. A cry my eyes out and pull my hair kind of day. It's ugly when it happens. I am the type of person that will worry you to the ground. Seriously, I will. Anyway, I ended up calling an old friend whom I will call Cassidy. The day before I had been having the same kind of meltdown and Cassidy kind of talked me off the ledge, kinda. Still, she can be kind of a know it all. She's one of those people who tells you how to drive the bus but doesn't have a license. When I say she kinda talked me off the ledge she said some things that made me believe life was worth living but made me think a leap might be a better idea tomorrow when the weather was better for suicide. Well I wasn't suicidal but one of those "feel like I am gonna die oh shit" meltdowns.

To let you know she kept asking me about my financial situation and if I had my rent paid. In my mind of course I am already evicted and on the sidewalk. Nevermind I have two weeks to make the money materialize. She kept asking if I would starve. No bitch. I am having some money and career angst and feel overwhelmed but I am not starvin like Marvin. After that she tells me she lost her job and is living on unemployment. And you have the nerve to ask if I have my shit together. I told her my fear is always being homeless. Cassidy said, "I have been in that spot many times and don't feel sorry for you." Didn't ask you to.

The next day we spoke again because she knew an old friend of mine. Anyway, she proceeds to tear down a  lot of the things I am doing with my life. She mentions xyz, things I am looking forward to, might not happen. No shit Sherlock. I think of this daily. If I wanted that anti-reassurance and to feel deep pains in the pit of my stomach I have several family members I could call that would tell me the same thing. Then she proceeded to tell me how to proceed with a certain thing. As I was listening to her I was thinking, "You have no idea what you are talking about, bitch." I began telling her about something and she hung up on me. WTF!?!?! Either I was crazy when she was my friend or she was crazier than I remembered. Perhaps she had gotten crazier over time. Still, it left me feeling hurt. I needed a friend to tell me it was okay. Instead, she left me feeling like I wanted to jump in the damn Hudson. The only thing stopping me was it was cold. Oh and I am not suicidal. I just had my brain sucked out.

I wondered what happened to my old friend. Cassidy was hippy dippy but positive. Once upon a time she had really been there for me through some tough shit. Granted, she has always been on the edge of indigent. Still, Cassidy went to the crystal store and stuff. The whole encounter left me drained. She had been crazy in the past but she was never negative.

I felt crappy and went to see some friends. Instead of making me feel all doomy and gloomy they listened and told me it was going to be okay. They told me it would pass. They asked why I didn't call them instead. I laughed and started to feel better about everything. I called a woman who's like my mom and she lovingly suggested my nut ball friend might have totally lost her mind and might have deep seeded psych issues. And she too suggested no longer calling Cassidy.

Second Mother also suggested that now I was getting to see Cassidy the way a lot of other people did. Cassidy has been kicked out of everywhere she has lived. Additionally, she has gotten herself in other jams. On top of that, her know it all has come out at the wrong time and people have flown off the handle at her.

Later I went and hung out with a buddy breaking up with her girlfriend. Yes, it's a lesbian breakup. She joked, "My ex girlfriend is like winter. She won't go away." I told her everything and this friend not only made me feel better, but she made me feel excited about everything I was doing. Bonus, she said these were good things and good problems I had. Yeah, I am scared and don't know what is next but I am also excited.

We went to a bar to see a friend perform Marilyn Monroe, and our friend killed it. I also made some new friends and danced the night away. I heard all my favorite 80s songs, which was God's way of telling me it was going to be alright. In between being around good people, laughing until my sides hurt, and dancing the night away, I felt better. Oh and a creepy guy kept pursuing me which kinda made me feel pretty in a sick way. LOL.

This morning I went kickboxing. I woke up early but it was awesome. My running buddy aka The Mexican was there in full force. We trained hard and then went to Dunkin Donuts and talked about karate, street fighting, and ways to kill people. We ended up striking a convo with a former hockey player turned lawyer about the best way to cripple someone in  a street fight.

Then I hit an open mic and tried out a new tag a friend had given me for a joke. Not only was I excited for my new tag, but the new tag killed.

A musician friend joked, "Yeah, if you call her, you will jump. Better not let her work for the suicide hotline."

Translated, I have a lot of love around me. I only need people to bring me up, not drag me down. Spring cleaning means cleaning out my closet and cleaning out my refrigerator. But it also means cleaning out negative people from my life.


Love
April
I Came, I Saw, I Sang: Memoirs of a Singing Telegram Delivery Girl
www.aprilbrucker.com

Come see me for my DVD taping
April 22nd at 7pm
Metropolitan Room
34 w. 22nd st

Helena (The Misfits)

The Native Americans used to have a term for negative people. They called them spirit snatchers. Essentially, when dealing with this person they sucked your spirit and for the rest of the day you were angry or annoyed for no reason. Answer these people took your energy. We all know a spirit snatcher. We have crossed paths with them. We have all fallen victim. It's like the day is sunny and then all of a sudden there is the black cloud and that person appears. No responsibility or accountability, just it's everyone else's fault. Always some crisis. You know what I'm saying.

A few years ago there was a woman I performed with. Her hair was dyed this terrible pineapple color and she always had some crisis. Usually these involved sleeping with older, male headliners for stage time. She always had some sob story and as a bi-product got stage time from these guys. I saw through the sob story right away. In addition, this woman also had a story about how her father molested her in some fashion and went so far as to carry around the incest literature, reading it at the bar. While incest is a real thing and it is terrible, this chick was really playing the Lifetime violin hard. We did a show and while I was in the same room she stole my joke. Sure the joke wasn't that special but she had done shows with me before. She knew that was mine. I said something to a friend and he said, "Go easy, her dad touched her." Oops so that gives her the right to be an asshole. This was back in the days when Jack Daniels and I were besties and usually I had to fortify myself before tolerating this mess. Needless to say eighteen months later, she totally recanted her tales of her dad molesting her saying he was the greatest guy in the world. That is also around the time Jack Daniels and I ended our love affair. She became harder to deal with and now when I see her I don't talk to her. I just can't. It's always some manipulative tale of lies and deception for self-gain. Not to mention she just pisses me off. Oh and she twists it around to anyone that will listen about how I don't like her and says it is for no reason. Yes Bitch, I don't like you. But we both know why. Anyone with a brain doesn't.

Of course another person I have met in my travels is some woman who claims to be a relation to someone famous and that is all I will say. Supposedly, she grew up poor but lived in a swanky section of Florida in a condo. I don't know. Anyway, she is one of those people who is your friend to your face but behind your back will stab you when you aren't looking. Not to mention she just likes to start things between people. Another friend of mine got divorced and had a fling with this thing before meeting his current gal pal of three years. So when this thing meets his girlfriend she tells him about this sexual tryst they had. How is this appropriate? Anyway, I had a few run ins with this thing. On not one but several occasions she has come into a hang out drunk off of her mind and tried to start crap with me by calling me a slut and such. Meanwhile, her legs open and close more frequently than a pair of scissors. I usually avoid her because my first impulse is to punch her and she isn't worth a felony charge. But I came close a few months ago when a girl who was a roomie of a friend of ours unknowingly slept with a total ladies man and got her heart broken. This nut told everyone in the bar. As someone who had an absentee father who disses her you think she would have been sympathetic to someone having a bad day? No, once a manipulative shunt always a manipulative shunt. So I avoid her as well. Plus some of her closest besties have dissed me rather publically on gossip sites. Not good for the mental health of the AB. Why go there when you can have peace and serenity?

Spirit snatchers aren't always nasty people. Sometimes they are just a mess of McDrama that keeps growing. One in particular was an old friend of mine who had a husband that she was unhappy with. So instead of telling him how she felt she started having an affair with another dude. I was her friend through this Tom Foolery and we often had girl's nights out where she told me about both men. And then it got worse. The dude she was having an affair with started calling me to tell me about the affair because I knew him, and he started to make a play for me. The sob story he concocted was that his wife had no vagina therefore he couldn't have sex with her. I knew this was bullshit but my buddy bought it hook, line, and sinker. Well the end came when her husband and I crossed paths and he started giving me info too. Dealing with these three freakshows was making me a homicidal maniac. Woman who is married to one man but in love with the other but won't leave. Then there was creepo who lies about his wife having no vagine. And add in idiot husband who keeps taking her back. Oh and she was also being evicted. Maybe if she would have started charging the other guy.....But still, eventually I had to end this crap. I wanted to murder all three of them. If they put the energy they did into their careers as they did into their lives they would all be stars. This friend and I have reconnected and she and her husband have worked through their issues and the other guy is no more. However, it is on a limited basis. Once you see that side of someone there is no going back.

And then in the spirit snatcher category there is just the other category of entitled. A few years ago I was friends with this guy on an online site for comedians. He was pretty supportive and nice. Then he got into a relationship, moved cross country, and got dumped. When he returned to the city he expected things to start happening for him again and they didn't. Things had changed and people had moved on. He was no longer the great "I am." Anyway, during this time I got some momentum with my career and was getting better gigs, gigs he felt entitled to. So any chance he got he would start things with me online. Sometimes he would correct my grammar, sometimes he would slam a job I got, and he would call me names for the way I promoted myself. In addition, he took cheap shots at my puppetry skills, etc. Well, I got a TV show and guess who was on the message board dissing me front and center? Yeah....So basically after that I blocked him online and said I was done with his ass. A few months later some people who saw him live wrote me and said they saw my videos, and he sucked so bad they wished they would have had me there instead. Just proof God hates the same things I do. This goes to show you that it is a pleasant lesson that life owes doesn't owe anyone anything. Clarence Darrow may have won The Scopes Monkey Trial, but that didn't mean his next case was handed to him. I always see this dude walking through my hood with an angry look on his face and his fists clenched. Maybe if he stopped blaming everyone else for his problems he just might have his career back.

Of course there is the dream killer. I once worked under this guy at a club who was a failed actor turned comedy club manager. My goal was to do the gig a bit and then move on once I got headliner spots or something better. It was a place to park my feet and work out my stuff. This dude I worked under would always tell me about how he wanted to be an actor but couldn't do it and how he was going to die alone. Oh and then he would force me to lie to the comedians walking in the door and say industry would be at the new talent shows when it in fact would not. He would always talk about how unfair the industry had been to him and such. This was not an easy gig. Most of the time this dude was always trying to get me to stay. When I would try to advance my career he would tell me it wasn't happening and how he used to have the same dreams and just to give them up. Our last convo was when I was finally getting ready to leave for real. I had just gotten a ton of national TV time-and they did too through me-and I was still being worked like a dog. This dude said, "Sometimes in life we just have to settle. Your career isn't going to be what you want it to be." I was like, you are old. You can settle. I was going to quit but they fired me instead which was a fucking relief. Needless to say not only did I decide not to settle, but I have never regretted the outcome.

In that category add unhealthy relationships. When I was twenty one I found myself embroiled with someone who was emotionally, mentally, and sometimes even physically abusive. This dude would tell me he loved me one minute and then the next be telling me how much something I did sucked. Sometimes he hated the way I wore my hair. Sometimes he hated my cooking. Oh and he would tell me how weird his friends thought I was and how they didn't like me. But the next minute he would be cleaning my room or writing me a poem so I was always sucked back in. There were times this dude would insult me in public in front of his friends whether he was telling me I needed breast implants or that my puppets were just weird and no one liked them. And then of course according to him, because he helped me with three jokes, he wrote my entire standup act. The second I would try to do anything without him he would convince me that I couldn't do it. In between the constant putting me down and everything else I began to lose my self-worth. When I would try to leave he would threaten suicide and even attempted it twice in front of me. I was so consumed that I was too tired to live the rest of my life. Oh and he never had any money therefore I had to front the bill everytime. When I decided to leave he started stalking me and I had to get a different mailing address. I am glad I left though. Not only did I get my confidence in myself back, but I got my puppets back too. My mom told me that when I was with him I was angry all the time and when I left him she got her daughter back so to speak. I am grateful there was still a part of my spirit that wasnt taken that just decided enough was enough. Since that time I have never let a man bully me, and I also took a look at my part in things about why I decided to stay as long as I did. And I am happy to say I never did it again.

More generally, I have experience the spirit snatching through comedian road trips. It always starts off as someone bringing up someone and then everyone starts dissing everyone. Some regard it is as past time. I regard it as a waste of breath. Often times that person is someone doing well and on track. These gossipers often cry, "Not fair." I have met the subject of the gossip from time to time and not only found what was being said not true, but actually found myself liking the butt of the bullying by words much more than my riding companions. Some of these subjects of idle gossip have stepped up to defend me when I was being torn to shreds by others. I have always wanted to say to these morons, maybe if you concentrated on your own game you would be successful too. Maybe if you stopped buying into the excuseolgy and victimology then you would be doing well. We make our own luck in this world. We are all responsible for our own happiness.

If you find yourself in constant contact with spirit snatchers it is time to ask yourself why you are letting these people in your life. I remember I went through a phase where it seemed I was being jumped by them at every corner. That is when I decided it was boundary time.

Here are some suggestions I got to combat these spirit snatching sons/daughters of bitches who taught them no better:
1. Wear a watch. That way when they begin to snatch your spirit with their bullshit you can say you have somewhere to go. Even if it is just the Toot 'n' Scoot. You don't have to specify. Your goal is not to spare their feelings but to save your sanity. They won't take it personally, in a minute they will find a new target.

2. Change the subject. If you are trapped in a car or a space with this person it can be harder. But if you change the subject to something general like sports the gossip or hate speech can stop.

3. Say, "I don't want to know." When they start telling you about their McDrama and you feel your brain leaking, you are welcome to say you don't want to know. Keep repeating it until they get it. Again, they will find someone else and you will get to keep your sanity.

4. Make the excuse that you need to go out and smoke. Even if you aren't a smoker, it gets you away from the entity temporary sucking your soul and you can take a few breaths and get your sanity back.

5. Cut them out completely. If you have the option this works best. Don't pick up the phone when they call. When you see them on the street run the other way. Even if you aren't having a bad day, after seeing them you will

Also, surround yourself with positive people doing positive things. Stick with the winners, they people who have what you want. Make friends and take lovers that while they will tell you when you are being a jerkoff and give you honest feedback, also will make you feel good about yourself and value you as a person.

Sigh....I know this is long but I had words to say, yo

Love

April

I Came, I Saw, I Sang: Memoirs of a Singing Telegram Delivery Girl
Paperback available on Amazon and 877-Buy-Book
E-Book available on Kindle and Nook
Audiobook available on itunes and Audible this Spring
www.youtube.com/aprilthestarr
Portion of proceeds go to Greenpeace