glass and notebooks and blood and phone calls
text messages and secret plans
broken bodies and hearts and trust and homes
fear
excitement
hope
loneliness
anxiety
love
cuddles
puzzle pieces and night clubs and couches
friends and ex-friends and everyone else
tears and music and diamond rings
hotels
voices
teddy bears and crayons and sex
466 miles, sometimes
cold pillows and puppy kisses
empty water bottles and Family Guy and journal entries
sweat and protein
wild and wonderful
buses
headaches
naps
money and time
anticipation
still fear
but still
hope.
still love.
still time.
Showing posts with label love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label love. Show all posts
Thursday, August 20, 2015
Sheets
It's the blueness of the sheets that hits me every night when I struggle to let go of the fears that keep me tied to the conscious world. That blueness seems so far away now, like those memories of visiting the ocean--letting it speak to me one last time--before driving back into the wilderness. I'd give anything to be wrapped in that coolness again, smelling all the smells that signal life is somewhere nearby. Instead I face the redness each time I walk into the room and it's like a stop sign flashing in my mind. But stop signs don't last forever. Eventually, you take your foot off the brake. You accelerate. You leave the redness behind.
I sit here idling, dreaming of the day I can see and feel and smell blueness again, once and for all and forever.
I sit here idling, dreaming of the day I can see and feel and smell blueness again, once and for all and forever.
Friday, August 14, 2015
More Changes
I haven't been able to calm down for two days. It's a restless sort of terrified feeling that is fueled by many different things. It's hard to even know where to begin, but I need to say something.
I spent a good deal of time thinking of a way to move by September, and my opportunity presented itself yesterday morning, when a sublet became available in my future city. The plan was to move on my own, start working, and wait it out until we could move to a larger place together. It wasn't a definite plan because, let's face it, nothing can be these days. But it was enough of a direction for me. I seized the opportunity. Once the guarantor paperwork is filled out and I pay the deposit next Friday, it's finalized. But I spent all day agonizing because it seems that we will be moving separately at first. I suppose it makes more sense to take it slow, and being in the same town will definitely make things easier, but it's still an impossible feeling to completely control. I want to jump back into things like before. I want everything to be right again so desperately. Except I want to do things better, which means that we can't just jump into things and expect everything to be okay. It's going to be slow at first. It's going to be a rebuilding of the trust that had been broken. It's going to be learning to love each other all over again and in new and different ways. And that is kind of exciting. But it's hard when you just want that comfortable life that you had before--the falling asleep together every night, the waking up with the one you love right beside you, the always being able to look forward to seeing his face at the end of the day. And the little things like watching TV together, reading side-by-side, talking about the future, cuddling, being cute in an almost disgusting way, having weekend adventures. I miss all of that as well.
I skipped over a lot of things, but you get the general idea. I'm moving. I'm moving to a brand new place, all on my own, and I've never done that before. At least in Annapolis, I knew my roommate. This time, I don't know the two people with whom I'll be sharing the apartment. I do have a private bathroom, and the place has amenities out the ass, but it's still terrifying. I know this is a step forward for me. But I'm so scared, and I feel like crying all the time lately. I am torn inside because I know what I want, and I can't have it, at least not yet, and I have to make this decision. I know it's the right thing to do to get ahead, and it's also the right thing to do to be able to work on our relationship, but it still feels overwhelming. I keep wondering if these feelings are normal. I'm excited, for sure. But today I've been a wreck. I couldn't sleep at all last night, and my nap earlier today didn't last nearly long enough. I want the pain in my stomach to finally go away. It started to feel like it would when I would be waiting for him. It's not like there is that much of a difference between my situation here and the one I will be moving to, with respect to the relationship. The distance will no longer be a factor. But not being able to see his face every night before bed, when he is right there in the same town--that's going to be brutal.
But ultimately, this move is about moving forward on more than one front. It may not be an ideal situation, but it is still a step in the right direction in terms of our relationship. But that's not the only important thing I'm taking care of by doing this. I'm taking the leap so I can find a job that has the potential for professional growth, which may take some time, but a humiliating/menial job in a city with people I know and closer to so many people I love is better than one in an area where I feel isolated almost all the time. Being able to control my own space, for the most part, will also be a huge relief. This is also an important step because I need to keep in the practice of taking care of my own affairs. I haven't been cooking as much here, which bothers me, because I'm usually so much better about what I put into my body, but I am trying not to be too critical of myself. It's a chance for me to start functioning in the real world again. It's terrifying. I'm afraid of failing, of course. I'm confident. I'm actually more confident than I have ever been about my own abilities. But I cannot shake the fear of the unknown and the anxiety that comes with knowing that there is still a chance that despite all my best efforts, I will fail again.
I feel like I need continual reassurance that I'm doing the right thing. I may be doing this on my own, but that doesn't mean I won't need some sort of support. I'm scared of being in a new place all on my own. I don't know who wouldn't be. I wish I weren't doing this alone. And I may not be for long. But that doesn't mean that I can't. So even when I have doubts, I have to trust that I am going to be okay, no matter what happens.
It's been over a month, and I've survived. I've overcome obstacles that used to seem insurmountable. Normally, when I don't sleep, I don't function well at all the next day. I started panicking when I knew I wasn't going to be able to fall asleep. I had been awake for nearly 24 hours and still had an 8-hour shift plus the journey home to endure. I fought with myself quite a bit. I dreaded going to work. I feared I would not last without having a meltdown. I feared that it would all just be too much. I didn't want to continue feeling like I did. I just wanted to run away by sleeping in. But I went. I somehow forced myself to deal with the situation. I had to tell myself I was doing this for a reason, no matter how miserable the job is or how shitty I feel. I have a goal, and I need the money to achieve that goal. I have a responsibility to see this through. And I did it. I worked the whole day without having any trouble, other than feeling ridiculously tired. The nap this afternoon,though short, did feel pretty amazing after that.
Also, it's been over a month, and I haven't had a meltdown. I haven't screamed. There's been a lot of crying and a lot of intense emotional pain that has caused physical pain. The anxiety is constant, unfortunately. Maybe it's more to do with the disconnect between where I want to be and where I am. I'm not sure. But I'm coping. I'm learning to live with these feelings, which are pretty intense at times. I feel like that's an understatement. But you get the point. I've had so much shit happen to me emotionally over the past month and a half, and I haven't broken down. A few months ago, just being in the same room with other people would have sent me over the edge. Being late for an appointment would have completely destroyed my entire day, and I'd spend the whole rest of the night crying in bed, unable to move. I don't know how that person ever came to be. I knew the whole time that I wasn't myself. But I couldn't stop anything from happening.
Sometimes I still have some of those same feelings, but I'm in control this time. At some point, I will write in depth about how I felt during those months. I know there are a ton of posts from that time, but being able to analyze it from the other side might offer more insight into just how debilitating my condition had become. But I'm not up for that right now.
I guess I should finally get to what made me want to write in the first place. Walking over to my desk to take some medicine, I got hit with the realization of how different everything is right now. In my mind flashed images of our old bed, followed immediately by images of this one. Blue sheets versus red sheets. Alive versus eerily quiet. Even the lighting makes the place feel different. I just look at myself and all of my things and can't believe we aren't in the place where I felt like we belonged. It really was home. And for some reason, this doesn't have that feeling anymore. It's always going to be home. It's always going to be a loving, welcoming place. But it's a different kind of feeling. It's a home that I can still be a part of, but it's not the same as the home you have helped to create. And I really don't think my new apartment is going to totally feel like home either. I'm scared of that empty feeling following me, which has a lot more to do with being alone, but you never know what can happen. I will do my best to make the place my own. I had more to say but I got lost in thought and it disappeared.
I may consider anxiety medication again. But for now, I can handle this, as unpleasant as it feels most of the time. I struggle with this because part of me feels that I shouldn't have to feel like this all the time if there is a solution. But side effects are a real problem for me, as I have learned, and I just don't know if I am ready to take that risk again, especially because your typical anxiety meds don't do anything for me. Maybe the anxiety will resolve itself when my situation improves. It's wishful thinking more than anything, but hoping won't kill me.
I will be okay. I am doing the right thing. This is a step forward on all fronts. I won't give up.
I spent a good deal of time thinking of a way to move by September, and my opportunity presented itself yesterday morning, when a sublet became available in my future city. The plan was to move on my own, start working, and wait it out until we could move to a larger place together. It wasn't a definite plan because, let's face it, nothing can be these days. But it was enough of a direction for me. I seized the opportunity. Once the guarantor paperwork is filled out and I pay the deposit next Friday, it's finalized. But I spent all day agonizing because it seems that we will be moving separately at first. I suppose it makes more sense to take it slow, and being in the same town will definitely make things easier, but it's still an impossible feeling to completely control. I want to jump back into things like before. I want everything to be right again so desperately. Except I want to do things better, which means that we can't just jump into things and expect everything to be okay. It's going to be slow at first. It's going to be a rebuilding of the trust that had been broken. It's going to be learning to love each other all over again and in new and different ways. And that is kind of exciting. But it's hard when you just want that comfortable life that you had before--the falling asleep together every night, the waking up with the one you love right beside you, the always being able to look forward to seeing his face at the end of the day. And the little things like watching TV together, reading side-by-side, talking about the future, cuddling, being cute in an almost disgusting way, having weekend adventures. I miss all of that as well.
I skipped over a lot of things, but you get the general idea. I'm moving. I'm moving to a brand new place, all on my own, and I've never done that before. At least in Annapolis, I knew my roommate. This time, I don't know the two people with whom I'll be sharing the apartment. I do have a private bathroom, and the place has amenities out the ass, but it's still terrifying. I know this is a step forward for me. But I'm so scared, and I feel like crying all the time lately. I am torn inside because I know what I want, and I can't have it, at least not yet, and I have to make this decision. I know it's the right thing to do to get ahead, and it's also the right thing to do to be able to work on our relationship, but it still feels overwhelming. I keep wondering if these feelings are normal. I'm excited, for sure. But today I've been a wreck. I couldn't sleep at all last night, and my nap earlier today didn't last nearly long enough. I want the pain in my stomach to finally go away. It started to feel like it would when I would be waiting for him. It's not like there is that much of a difference between my situation here and the one I will be moving to, with respect to the relationship. The distance will no longer be a factor. But not being able to see his face every night before bed, when he is right there in the same town--that's going to be brutal.
But ultimately, this move is about moving forward on more than one front. It may not be an ideal situation, but it is still a step in the right direction in terms of our relationship. But that's not the only important thing I'm taking care of by doing this. I'm taking the leap so I can find a job that has the potential for professional growth, which may take some time, but a humiliating/menial job in a city with people I know and closer to so many people I love is better than one in an area where I feel isolated almost all the time. Being able to control my own space, for the most part, will also be a huge relief. This is also an important step because I need to keep in the practice of taking care of my own affairs. I haven't been cooking as much here, which bothers me, because I'm usually so much better about what I put into my body, but I am trying not to be too critical of myself. It's a chance for me to start functioning in the real world again. It's terrifying. I'm afraid of failing, of course. I'm confident. I'm actually more confident than I have ever been about my own abilities. But I cannot shake the fear of the unknown and the anxiety that comes with knowing that there is still a chance that despite all my best efforts, I will fail again.
I feel like I need continual reassurance that I'm doing the right thing. I may be doing this on my own, but that doesn't mean I won't need some sort of support. I'm scared of being in a new place all on my own. I don't know who wouldn't be. I wish I weren't doing this alone. And I may not be for long. But that doesn't mean that I can't. So even when I have doubts, I have to trust that I am going to be okay, no matter what happens.
It's been over a month, and I've survived. I've overcome obstacles that used to seem insurmountable. Normally, when I don't sleep, I don't function well at all the next day. I started panicking when I knew I wasn't going to be able to fall asleep. I had been awake for nearly 24 hours and still had an 8-hour shift plus the journey home to endure. I fought with myself quite a bit. I dreaded going to work. I feared I would not last without having a meltdown. I feared that it would all just be too much. I didn't want to continue feeling like I did. I just wanted to run away by sleeping in. But I went. I somehow forced myself to deal with the situation. I had to tell myself I was doing this for a reason, no matter how miserable the job is or how shitty I feel. I have a goal, and I need the money to achieve that goal. I have a responsibility to see this through. And I did it. I worked the whole day without having any trouble, other than feeling ridiculously tired. The nap this afternoon,though short, did feel pretty amazing after that.
Also, it's been over a month, and I haven't had a meltdown. I haven't screamed. There's been a lot of crying and a lot of intense emotional pain that has caused physical pain. The anxiety is constant, unfortunately. Maybe it's more to do with the disconnect between where I want to be and where I am. I'm not sure. But I'm coping. I'm learning to live with these feelings, which are pretty intense at times. I feel like that's an understatement. But you get the point. I've had so much shit happen to me emotionally over the past month and a half, and I haven't broken down. A few months ago, just being in the same room with other people would have sent me over the edge. Being late for an appointment would have completely destroyed my entire day, and I'd spend the whole rest of the night crying in bed, unable to move. I don't know how that person ever came to be. I knew the whole time that I wasn't myself. But I couldn't stop anything from happening.
Sometimes I still have some of those same feelings, but I'm in control this time. At some point, I will write in depth about how I felt during those months. I know there are a ton of posts from that time, but being able to analyze it from the other side might offer more insight into just how debilitating my condition had become. But I'm not up for that right now.
I guess I should finally get to what made me want to write in the first place. Walking over to my desk to take some medicine, I got hit with the realization of how different everything is right now. In my mind flashed images of our old bed, followed immediately by images of this one. Blue sheets versus red sheets. Alive versus eerily quiet. Even the lighting makes the place feel different. I just look at myself and all of my things and can't believe we aren't in the place where I felt like we belonged. It really was home. And for some reason, this doesn't have that feeling anymore. It's always going to be home. It's always going to be a loving, welcoming place. But it's a different kind of feeling. It's a home that I can still be a part of, but it's not the same as the home you have helped to create. And I really don't think my new apartment is going to totally feel like home either. I'm scared of that empty feeling following me, which has a lot more to do with being alone, but you never know what can happen. I will do my best to make the place my own. I had more to say but I got lost in thought and it disappeared.
I may consider anxiety medication again. But for now, I can handle this, as unpleasant as it feels most of the time. I struggle with this because part of me feels that I shouldn't have to feel like this all the time if there is a solution. But side effects are a real problem for me, as I have learned, and I just don't know if I am ready to take that risk again, especially because your typical anxiety meds don't do anything for me. Maybe the anxiety will resolve itself when my situation improves. It's wishful thinking more than anything, but hoping won't kill me.
I will be okay. I am doing the right thing. This is a step forward on all fronts. I won't give up.
Wednesday, August 12, 2015
On Sacrifice
I want to hold you and kiss you and make everything better. Knowing that I can't fix things for you or help in any significant way--other than to offer my unconditional love and support--makes me feel like a terrible partner. But this isn't about me. I know this is my blog, and I can talk about my feelings all I want. I can say that I feel inadequate, that I wish I could give every penny I had just to make things right for you, that it hurts me so much to see you hurting that it's causing me just as much physical pain as missing you does. Maybe even more. Even if it seems selfish of me to talk about my own feelings in this situation, I know that the feelings themselves are the most unselfish kind I have ever experienced. I'm thinking so much less about myself these days, but not in a bad way. I'm making sure to have enough to cover my needs and plan a little ahead, but for the most part, all I want to do is help, comfort, soothe, and heal. This is the nature of the person that you thought had vanished a long time ago. But now that I've gotten that out of the way, for real, this isn't about me.
I promise that one day soon you will not have to worry about these things ever again. You will be able to relax--to not have to think about it every minute of every day. There are so many more things I want to promise you, if you will let me. I struggle with saying certain things here because I don't know what's appropriate and what's not, so I'm being intentionally vague.
So maybe it's better if I stick with my own situation in such a public domain. But your situation is my situation too.
The words are getting stuck. They want to force themselves out, but I am afraid. I'm not entirely sure why, but I am.
I'm afraid and nervous. I'm confused. I'm hopeful. I'm kind of excited. I don't really know how to handle all of these feelings at the same time. I am trying to focus on the positives in my life and look to the future, but the negatives still need to be addressed before that future can be fully realized.
I had a phone interview this evening that went very well, and I have an interview next Friday for a position that's actually in my field. Both opportunities are in Morgantown. I've looked into short-term/month-to-month rentals starting as early as the first week of September because I won't hesitate to move should I be offered either of these positions. Part of me wants to make the move anyway and do what I have been doing here should I fail to obtain either one: get anything in the meantime and just start saving for a better life, continuing to look for more relevant employment. I'm leaning more and more towards that. I'm feeling the urgency. I'll have enough to make the move and to be comfortable for about a month, and that should be more than enough time to get some sort of job, even if it is as miserable as the one I have now. I feel like this pain in my stomach would lessen a great deal if I could take that step towards independence. It'll be scary doing it alone, but I know that I have to, at first. I need to be the one that can provide that security of a place to stay and food to eat. It's my turn, and I don't want to fail.
I'm crying because I still want to give you everything and cannot. Sacrificing is hard, but not being able to sacrifice when you desperately want to is even harder. A lot harder.
I still have a lot to say, but I need a break. Otherwise, this is going to get even more repetitive.
I promise that one day soon you will not have to worry about these things ever again. You will be able to relax--to not have to think about it every minute of every day. There are so many more things I want to promise you, if you will let me. I struggle with saying certain things here because I don't know what's appropriate and what's not, so I'm being intentionally vague.
So maybe it's better if I stick with my own situation in such a public domain. But your situation is my situation too.
The words are getting stuck. They want to force themselves out, but I am afraid. I'm not entirely sure why, but I am.
I'm afraid and nervous. I'm confused. I'm hopeful. I'm kind of excited. I don't really know how to handle all of these feelings at the same time. I am trying to focus on the positives in my life and look to the future, but the negatives still need to be addressed before that future can be fully realized.
I had a phone interview this evening that went very well, and I have an interview next Friday for a position that's actually in my field. Both opportunities are in Morgantown. I've looked into short-term/month-to-month rentals starting as early as the first week of September because I won't hesitate to move should I be offered either of these positions. Part of me wants to make the move anyway and do what I have been doing here should I fail to obtain either one: get anything in the meantime and just start saving for a better life, continuing to look for more relevant employment. I'm leaning more and more towards that. I'm feeling the urgency. I'll have enough to make the move and to be comfortable for about a month, and that should be more than enough time to get some sort of job, even if it is as miserable as the one I have now. I feel like this pain in my stomach would lessen a great deal if I could take that step towards independence. It'll be scary doing it alone, but I know that I have to, at first. I need to be the one that can provide that security of a place to stay and food to eat. It's my turn, and I don't want to fail.
I'm crying because I still want to give you everything and cannot. Sacrificing is hard, but not being able to sacrifice when you desperately want to is even harder. A lot harder.
I still have a lot to say, but I need a break. Otherwise, this is going to get even more repetitive.
Friday, August 7, 2015
Over a Month Down
I've been writing a lot on paper lately. Some of the things I have going on in my head aren't at the point where they can be shared with the world, and I'm starting to realize that some of them are just for me, no matter how much I feel like I need to share them with others. It's been a challenge trying to hold everything in. I don't know if I would say that things have gotten easier to handle emotionally, but I keep feeling more positive every day. I have my moments, but those are the times that my skills are really being tested. I think I've done a pretty good job so far. I had a major crisis on Tuesday night, and I was able to solve that problem with a little bit of guidance. That would have completely ruined me this time last year. So much of this situation would have. So even though it's Friday night and my weekend plans have been erased already, I'm feeling okay. I had a long day at work, took a nap, figured out a little more about what's happening in my near future, and am handling the pressure of being here pretty well. I have a long weekend--a really long weekend--ahead of me to decompress from the workweek, and I should be ready to go again by Wednesday. (I also have an interview on Monday for a much better, less bullshitty job, so I'm looking forward to that as well.)
We talked longer than we have in about a week last night. I could feel the pain and the anger and the frustration, and all I wanted to do was be there to take it away, but part of me knows that I am responsible for so much of it. I know he is trying hard not to resent me, and it's one of my greatest fears that he'll never be able to get past that. But I have to let time do its work and continue to be open, receptive, and supportive. I cannot blame him for any of his feelings. The situation is complicated, and our relationship is only one part of a much larger and more complex clusterfuck, for lack of a better word. I've never felt this way before. I don't have much, and while I want to hoard what I have away so I can remove myself from this area as quickly as possible, I have a much stronger urge to use what I do have to help him. I've never been able to sacrifice like this before. Have I really been such a selfish person my entire life? And the strange part is that it makes me feel good, all things considered, to be able to give and expect nothing in return. I feel like he deserves it after all the times he has done the same for me. I know this is what I am supposed to be doing. When I go to work at this nightmarish job every day, I'm not thinking about what I can buy or what adventures I might be able to take. I'm thinking of how every little bit I make is going to help both of us into a better life. I only wish I could offer more than what I am able to right now.
That's why I decided to sell my suit. I never thought I would be willing to part with it. It was my first really outstanding creation, and it's been with me through a lot. I feel like it's an important part of me. I love being able to look at it and feel all of the experiences and memories again. But I've ultimately decided that this is more important to me than drag. There will always be other suits. And maybe this is a good way to symbolize that it's time to move forward. The suit does say "Time 4 Change", after all. And I think it is. Whatever money I do get will get me that much closer to the life I want to lead. Again, it's hard to believe that I am the person making these choices. (I've even considered selling my iPad since it is the most valuable thing I own, but I use it way too much for that to be practical.)
I've learned that being able to leave this place on my own and get a job in my future city is an extremely important part of this process. I may not be able to go through all of the steps on my own, but financing such a venture is a majority of the battle, and I already know that I am capable of that. I just have to do the work and wait for my efforts to be rewarded. Having this goal in mind has helped me refocus quite a bit because, honestly, there was a point yesterday where things were a lot more uncertain. I'm not saying that everything is completely clear, but being able to set my sights on something is important for my motivation and ability to sustain whatever it is that I am doing.
I'm learning that that's another one of those Asperger's things that I just have to work around. For as intelligent as I am, I've got pretty shitty executive functioning skills, at least when it comes to managing my own life. I don't know why I can help other people prioritize but have such a hard time doing the same thing for myself. I'm still working on ways to trick myself and get myself past the hurdles. Here are some of my major problems. It's not an exhaustive list, but it's a start:
1. I have a hard time prioritizing tasks. Everything seems equally important.
2. Numbering tasks in order of priority is sometimes helpful, but then I run into trouble if I just can't accomplish one. Then I don't seem to be able to move past it to the next one.
3. I have trouble starting on a new task when another one is in progress.
4. Even when I know exactly what I need to do, I sometimes still freeze. It's like being stuck on the edge of a swimming pool indefinitely. You know you need to jump and are going to do it but you just can't figure out why you won't.
5. If I can't see the concrete steps involved, it's significantly harder for me to get anything done.
6. Similarly, if I can't see a concrete goal at the end or concrete reassurances or reminders throughout a particularly long process--especially if it's something I don't want to be doing in the first place--I lose drive and focus.
7. Stress, feeling out of control, not having a finite endpoint--all of these things make accomplishing anything much more difficult. I can't get organized in my head enough to even begin sometimes.
I've been doing so much better with these things, but I know there is still room for improvement. The fact that I have been able to make myself go to this job that I hate more than any other job I have ever worked (a lot of that may have to do with the circumstance, but I also feel like they are asking a hell of a lot of me for eight bucks an hour) is a testament to my ability to make sacrifices and stay focused in order to get something that I really want. But I need to constantly look at apartments and jobs in the place I really do want to be. I feel like I recalculate everything on a daily basis. I have to give myself visual reminders all the time. That's why it helps when we talk or FaceTime. Seeing him is a reminder for me in a lot of ways. It reminds me of what I have to look forward to. It reminds me also of what happened in the past and how I need to put in my work to make sure it never happens again. It reminds me of the person I want to be and the future I want to have, not just for us, but really for myself. For some reason, just talking about nothing for an hour or so makes me feel like I've got this, no matter what life throws at me.
I don't want people to get the wrong impression. It's not that I am solely focused on relationship things. I'm also doing all that I can to get my educational, financial, and personal goals off the ground. But it helps me to think about everything as part of the same package. After all, the relationship goals wouldn't matter much without taking care of the other ones. So I'm working my ass off, doing my research, preparing for different situations that might arise, and all that fun stuff. I've just been a lot more vocal about my relationship, and I don't think anyone can blame me for that. It's the most fulfilling part of my life. And I feel like I am the last person that would have come to that conclusion. I always envisioned myself as that sort of career-focused person. I realize now that it's not a bad thing. I'm not in a very fulfilling career right now, but I think I have learned over the years that you are not entirely defined by what you do. Your job doesn't determine your worth as a person or the happiness you can derive from everyday life. I don't know if I would have learned these lessons had I taken the traditional route through life. I feel like this post is headed in a very different direction now.
I never would have learned the value of money had I not experienced what it is like to be exceptionally poor. I never would have learned anything about how the real world works--how people are sometimes trapped in roles they don't want. I never would have learned that there is a hell of a lot more to being successful and mobile than just hard work. I never would have seen the corruption, the disparities, the injustices that so many people who grew up in upper middle-class households never have to think about. Along the way, I have lost so many different kinds of privilege, and I'm proud to have learned all the lessons I have. I've learned never to judge people based on one aspect of their lives. What would people say about me knowing that I essentially pack boxes for a living? That I have been in and out of work for the past several years? Would people expect to meet someone with my education, my experience, or my intelligence walking by me as I'm covered in dirt dragging around a pallet full of lawn chairs? Do you know how differently people treat me when I walk around in a suit as compared to when I walk around at work? As much as I can appreciate all that I have learned, it's still incredibly depressing to go from being a researcher with a promising career ahead of him to unloading trucks for next-to-nothing. How many other people have ended up just like this? I know I am not the only one. But I also know that this is not the end for me, so as depressing as it may seem now, I'm just working my way through Right Now, getting ready for What Comes Next. If I could be there tomorrow, I wouldn't hesitate for an instant. But time doesn't work that way, does it?
Another interesting thing happened tonight. My best friend from Kindergarten/early elementary school found me on Facebook. She still lives in the area and wants to do something one of these days. I have so many feelings that I don't even know how to deal with them all. I'm overwhelmingly happy that she did find me and took the time to tell me that she still thinks about those times and how great they were. How she will always be grateful for those years we shared. And that really means a lot to me. I feel the same way. And sometimes I wish I could go back to those days, as I'm sure we all do, because the worst thing that could happen on most days was that you ran out of graham crackers or it got too dark to keep playing outside.
I'm incredibly impatient with my current situation, and that's really helping me work on my impulse control. The hardest part of impulse control for me is delaying gratification or enduring something undesirable to achieve a better outcome. So obviously you can see how this situation is a little torturous at times. But every day that I make it is another win for me. Every situation I endure--every time I stop myself from engaging in self-pity, bitching, obsessing, etc.--I get stronger. Everything I do and endure here has a purpose. If I didn't believe that, I probably wouldn't have even lasted this long.
So tonight, I'm a little sad and lost with what to do with myself, but I'm actually alright. I think I'll relax and watch some Family Guy. I will try not to think about tomorrow or the next day or the next month. I will just focus on what I can do right now to make myself a little happier than before.
Still not giving up.
We talked longer than we have in about a week last night. I could feel the pain and the anger and the frustration, and all I wanted to do was be there to take it away, but part of me knows that I am responsible for so much of it. I know he is trying hard not to resent me, and it's one of my greatest fears that he'll never be able to get past that. But I have to let time do its work and continue to be open, receptive, and supportive. I cannot blame him for any of his feelings. The situation is complicated, and our relationship is only one part of a much larger and more complex clusterfuck, for lack of a better word. I've never felt this way before. I don't have much, and while I want to hoard what I have away so I can remove myself from this area as quickly as possible, I have a much stronger urge to use what I do have to help him. I've never been able to sacrifice like this before. Have I really been such a selfish person my entire life? And the strange part is that it makes me feel good, all things considered, to be able to give and expect nothing in return. I feel like he deserves it after all the times he has done the same for me. I know this is what I am supposed to be doing. When I go to work at this nightmarish job every day, I'm not thinking about what I can buy or what adventures I might be able to take. I'm thinking of how every little bit I make is going to help both of us into a better life. I only wish I could offer more than what I am able to right now.
That's why I decided to sell my suit. I never thought I would be willing to part with it. It was my first really outstanding creation, and it's been with me through a lot. I feel like it's an important part of me. I love being able to look at it and feel all of the experiences and memories again. But I've ultimately decided that this is more important to me than drag. There will always be other suits. And maybe this is a good way to symbolize that it's time to move forward. The suit does say "Time 4 Change", after all. And I think it is. Whatever money I do get will get me that much closer to the life I want to lead. Again, it's hard to believe that I am the person making these choices. (I've even considered selling my iPad since it is the most valuable thing I own, but I use it way too much for that to be practical.)
I've learned that being able to leave this place on my own and get a job in my future city is an extremely important part of this process. I may not be able to go through all of the steps on my own, but financing such a venture is a majority of the battle, and I already know that I am capable of that. I just have to do the work and wait for my efforts to be rewarded. Having this goal in mind has helped me refocus quite a bit because, honestly, there was a point yesterday where things were a lot more uncertain. I'm not saying that everything is completely clear, but being able to set my sights on something is important for my motivation and ability to sustain whatever it is that I am doing.
I'm learning that that's another one of those Asperger's things that I just have to work around. For as intelligent as I am, I've got pretty shitty executive functioning skills, at least when it comes to managing my own life. I don't know why I can help other people prioritize but have such a hard time doing the same thing for myself. I'm still working on ways to trick myself and get myself past the hurdles. Here are some of my major problems. It's not an exhaustive list, but it's a start:
1. I have a hard time prioritizing tasks. Everything seems equally important.
2. Numbering tasks in order of priority is sometimes helpful, but then I run into trouble if I just can't accomplish one. Then I don't seem to be able to move past it to the next one.
3. I have trouble starting on a new task when another one is in progress.
4. Even when I know exactly what I need to do, I sometimes still freeze. It's like being stuck on the edge of a swimming pool indefinitely. You know you need to jump and are going to do it but you just can't figure out why you won't.
5. If I can't see the concrete steps involved, it's significantly harder for me to get anything done.
6. Similarly, if I can't see a concrete goal at the end or concrete reassurances or reminders throughout a particularly long process--especially if it's something I don't want to be doing in the first place--I lose drive and focus.
7. Stress, feeling out of control, not having a finite endpoint--all of these things make accomplishing anything much more difficult. I can't get organized in my head enough to even begin sometimes.
I've been doing so much better with these things, but I know there is still room for improvement. The fact that I have been able to make myself go to this job that I hate more than any other job I have ever worked (a lot of that may have to do with the circumstance, but I also feel like they are asking a hell of a lot of me for eight bucks an hour) is a testament to my ability to make sacrifices and stay focused in order to get something that I really want. But I need to constantly look at apartments and jobs in the place I really do want to be. I feel like I recalculate everything on a daily basis. I have to give myself visual reminders all the time. That's why it helps when we talk or FaceTime. Seeing him is a reminder for me in a lot of ways. It reminds me of what I have to look forward to. It reminds me also of what happened in the past and how I need to put in my work to make sure it never happens again. It reminds me of the person I want to be and the future I want to have, not just for us, but really for myself. For some reason, just talking about nothing for an hour or so makes me feel like I've got this, no matter what life throws at me.
I don't want people to get the wrong impression. It's not that I am solely focused on relationship things. I'm also doing all that I can to get my educational, financial, and personal goals off the ground. But it helps me to think about everything as part of the same package. After all, the relationship goals wouldn't matter much without taking care of the other ones. So I'm working my ass off, doing my research, preparing for different situations that might arise, and all that fun stuff. I've just been a lot more vocal about my relationship, and I don't think anyone can blame me for that. It's the most fulfilling part of my life. And I feel like I am the last person that would have come to that conclusion. I always envisioned myself as that sort of career-focused person. I realize now that it's not a bad thing. I'm not in a very fulfilling career right now, but I think I have learned over the years that you are not entirely defined by what you do. Your job doesn't determine your worth as a person or the happiness you can derive from everyday life. I don't know if I would have learned these lessons had I taken the traditional route through life. I feel like this post is headed in a very different direction now.
I never would have learned the value of money had I not experienced what it is like to be exceptionally poor. I never would have learned anything about how the real world works--how people are sometimes trapped in roles they don't want. I never would have learned that there is a hell of a lot more to being successful and mobile than just hard work. I never would have seen the corruption, the disparities, the injustices that so many people who grew up in upper middle-class households never have to think about. Along the way, I have lost so many different kinds of privilege, and I'm proud to have learned all the lessons I have. I've learned never to judge people based on one aspect of their lives. What would people say about me knowing that I essentially pack boxes for a living? That I have been in and out of work for the past several years? Would people expect to meet someone with my education, my experience, or my intelligence walking by me as I'm covered in dirt dragging around a pallet full of lawn chairs? Do you know how differently people treat me when I walk around in a suit as compared to when I walk around at work? As much as I can appreciate all that I have learned, it's still incredibly depressing to go from being a researcher with a promising career ahead of him to unloading trucks for next-to-nothing. How many other people have ended up just like this? I know I am not the only one. But I also know that this is not the end for me, so as depressing as it may seem now, I'm just working my way through Right Now, getting ready for What Comes Next. If I could be there tomorrow, I wouldn't hesitate for an instant. But time doesn't work that way, does it?
Another interesting thing happened tonight. My best friend from Kindergarten/early elementary school found me on Facebook. She still lives in the area and wants to do something one of these days. I have so many feelings that I don't even know how to deal with them all. I'm overwhelmingly happy that she did find me and took the time to tell me that she still thinks about those times and how great they were. How she will always be grateful for those years we shared. And that really means a lot to me. I feel the same way. And sometimes I wish I could go back to those days, as I'm sure we all do, because the worst thing that could happen on most days was that you ran out of graham crackers or it got too dark to keep playing outside.
I'm incredibly impatient with my current situation, and that's really helping me work on my impulse control. The hardest part of impulse control for me is delaying gratification or enduring something undesirable to achieve a better outcome. So obviously you can see how this situation is a little torturous at times. But every day that I make it is another win for me. Every situation I endure--every time I stop myself from engaging in self-pity, bitching, obsessing, etc.--I get stronger. Everything I do and endure here has a purpose. If I didn't believe that, I probably wouldn't have even lasted this long.
So tonight, I'm a little sad and lost with what to do with myself, but I'm actually alright. I think I'll relax and watch some Family Guy. I will try not to think about tomorrow or the next day or the next month. I will just focus on what I can do right now to make myself a little happier than before.
Still not giving up.
Sunday, July 19, 2015
THIS IS FICTION, AGAIN. NO TITLE YET
***NOTE***
This is a work of FICTION, though it is based on some events that happened in real life. I wanted to play with the scenario in a creative way. Some of these things happened. Some did not. Please do not make assumptions about which ones are which. Treat this ENTIRELY as a work of FICTION, and try to appreciate it as such. Thank you. Also, I get that it's corny and hastily written. That wasn't the point of the exercise. So back off. :P
***********
He sat with a fistful of shattered glass and broken promises, smoking the last of a pack of cigarettes he found a few hours before realizing he had no choice but to question his own sanity over the last several months and possibly years. He still considered himself a scientist, even though he hadn't seen the inside of a lab in about as long as he had ever worked in one. But he never mentioned this. When people asked him what he did for a living, he usually avoided eye contact and tried to delay responding with "nothing" for as long as he could. And every time he had to answer the question, another piece of him plummeted to the Earth, like a meteorite or confetti or that dead body in the movie Con-Air.
He wondered now whether that had anything to do with his current situation, but for all he knew, the broken glass he left behind could have been the work of a would-be burglar he had caught in the act, and the inevitable struggle would have rendered him a hero instead of the mental patient he learned to define himself as. If only he could remember how or why it started, he might be able to convince himself that his mind had a perfectly rational and reasonable explanation for choosing to abandon him on the most important night of his life. As he choked on the toxins making their way into his respiratory system, he glanced down at the white bracelet on his wrist. Some part of him believed that he would never be able to remove his ivory letter--not until he solved the mystery of what happened on the 5th of July.
The police told Benjamin that his husband found him lying in a pile of the collected remains of every glass surface in the apartment--from the TV to the coffee table to the vase that held the flame-colored roses meant to cheer him up on a particularly lousy summer afternoon. He didn't remember much of that conversation, or the one where his husband threw him out of the house for good without so much as a pair of shoes or a can of soup. Ben couldn't blame him. He cooperated as much as anyone could have with police officers with an apparent moral obligation to contribute to the degeneration of what little sanity or emotional stability he still had tucked away inside of him. He didn't know there were so many ways to call someone worthless in such a short amount of time. They must have a training on that at the academy, he thought. However, he refrained from making any comment at all because he, quite wisely, assumed that a mental institution was a far better place than prison for someone like him.
He survived his stay in the psych ward by writing letters to his husband--letters he could never send thanks to a hastily-filed restraining order that prevented him from making any contact whatsoever or calling 67 Hadley Street his home ever again. He wrote the letters mostly as a way to process his own feelings. The confinement drove him crazy, which sounds a little ironic considering the nature of the facility, but Ben wasn't the kind of man that liked to sit still. He was an avid runner, cyclist, weightlifter, and recreational athlete that had once had quite a promising future in athletics, until he decided to stop pretending to be a woman some years beforehand.
So he kept his pen moving when his body could not. He wrote until the cuts on his hands would start to bleed. And then he just kept writing, not seeing the use in clearing away the blood running down his fingers and pooling at the very point where pen met paper. Every word was still visible behind its rust-colored pond. The darkest ones seemed to be the most real.
You'd think that there would be more to Ben's story in the hospital, but in truth, he was tired of being on medication for problems he wasn't even sure were real anymore. He had begun to question his own reality in the weeks prior to the incident. He felt less and less like himself until his mind must have just let go completely. This was the best explanation he could come up with, and eventually, the doctors stopped trying to force the pills down his throat, and after some more time, they stopped coming to his room altogether. He was on his own, and he had realized that from the beginning. When he was no longer afraid of the withdrawal symptoms and could stop replaying his fantasy of blowing his brain matter into a Rorschach mural on the bathroom wall, he signed himself out of the hospital.
Two hours later, he stood 51 feet away from the very bottom step of house number 67, where he could still hear his 3-month-old puppy crying from behind the red brick walls. He knew he should have walked away at that point, but the thought of living without his dog--even on the streets of East Cleveland with winter approaching--was another razor-sharp shard of broken plasma TV resting ever so gently on his brainstem, having already pierced the skin, just waiting for the right moment, perhaps a twitch of panic, to make contact with the place that made him breathe. These were his thoughts, not mine, by the way. That's just the way he was. Everything was either dramatic or non-existent. No wonder.
At 33 feet, he saw his husband's car--or ex-husband's, maybe, since he wasn't really sure what the situation meant, though he probably should have been smart enough to figure that out, being a brilliant biologist and all. It was too late to run. He had already been seen, and fear of getting flattened by an F-350 with the redneck pride flag printed across its back window urged him to move even closer to the man who was more likely to have him arrested with each additional foot he advanced.
"You shouldn't be here."
"I live here..."
"Not anymore you don't."
"I just need some things."
"You can have your shoes. But you can't come inside."
"I...I can't leave. Please talk to me."
"I have nothing to say to you. Ever again."
"I just...Baby, please. I can't. Please talk to me. I can't do this."
"I don't care where you go. That's up to you. But you cannot stay here."
He didn't know what else to say. His mind was stuck in an infinite loop of can't-won't-scream-cry-panic. His knees forgot what they were designed to do, and he hit the ground hard, catching himself on more fractured glass than pavement, reopening wounds he thought were well on their way to healing. He lifted his hand to see that he had tiny pieces of mirror embedded in his palm, and at that moment more than any other, as his husband walked past him into the house without another syllable, he felt like eating his own reflection. One shard at a time.
He sat and allowed himself to bleed and cry until his body had had enough of these things, and around the same time, the screen-door skin of the house seemed to rupture, spewing out crimson bags of shoes, medicines, clothes, and the inevitable glitter-glass that covered everything on the property, inside and out.
Blood-red hands, blood-red bags, and blood-red eyes walked up the street, attached to a man whose body and mind should have stopped betraying him years before, if life were to be fair in any fucking way. (Again, his words. Not mine. Maybe he should've written this instead.) He didn't know what to do, where to go, or when he would ever find a place to call home again. But, for whatever reason, he walked. It might have been pure instinct at that point, his neocortex having shut down almost completely for the second time in an all-too-brief-yet-never-ending span of time. But had he not taken those first zombie-like shuffles away from his past, he would have never tripped over the chance to find his future.
Benjamin continued to bleed for a long time after that. I'm told that he and his husband are back together again and that they have a 3-year-old daughter named Annabelle. Ben's hands are permanently scarred, not only because of the initial disaster and the subsequent reinjury, but because, for a long time, Ben picked at his wounds until they bled just as fiercely as they did that very first night. He did this every day for quite some time, often without realizing it. And the day he stopped ripping away scab after scab was the day his husband finally called.
Tears fell to the pages of Ben's tattered journal as he listened to the song to which they danced on the night of their wedding, and before he hung up the phone--on what would be the anniversary of the death of their old life together--his husband didn't ask Ben to come home. He said that it was time for both of them to go home.
Sixty-seven minutes later, you could hear the makeup sex two blocks over. (What's another few dozen kids in therapy, right?) It was hot and sweaty and filled with all the best kinds of screaming and way too many different kinds of crying. And that's being discreet. I could have also told you about the biting and the scratching and the broken headboard and the various bodily fluids that ended up defying gravity in the end.
Marcus looked at the scars all over his partner's hands (and body), following the trail from one to the next with his lips, like he was sucking the venom out of a lethal snake bite.
"Your scars make you so much more beautiful," he said to Ben.
Ben smiled with tears forming in the corners of eyes that seemed to have aged a dozen years since the last time they shared a bed together. He spoke softly but with more conviction than he could ever remember: "So do yours. I'm just sorry that I had to be the one to give them to you."
"You never have to be sorry, Ben. I don't blame you for what happened. And it's like we said: We're both more beautiful for having these marks, whether they have formed on the body or the soul. I wouldn't trade these scars for anything." As he said these last words, he moved his hand right towards his partner's heart, just above the place where a new scar would one day form. And he knew he would love that one too.
"Do you really mean that? I mean, you know my mind wasn't in the right place when it happened, but that doesn't mean I am not responsible for so, so much pain in your life...And I can't promise that I won't cause you more pain."
Marcus paused for a long time after that. He breathed slowly, never breaking eye contact with the man whose stormy seas had made him such a well-conditioned sailor. "I never expected you not to cause me pain. That's kind of a given with marriage. But you were gone for a long time--long before your episode or whatever we want to call it now. I lost the man I married, for whatever reason, to a shell of a person that needed life support in a way that I just couldn't provide. It was killing me too, and saying goodbye felt like they pulled the plug on me instead. I felt like I said goodbye over and over again every single night when I had to crawl into this bed with nothing but an empty space next to me...It never stopped smelling like you."
"What made it stop?"
"What do you mean, Ben?"
"I mean, like, how did you know when you stopped having to say goodbye? How did you--"
"How did I know the man I married had finally come back to me?"
"Well...yeah."
"You found it again."
"Found what?"
"Your smile."
This is a work of FICTION, though it is based on some events that happened in real life. I wanted to play with the scenario in a creative way. Some of these things happened. Some did not. Please do not make assumptions about which ones are which. Treat this ENTIRELY as a work of FICTION, and try to appreciate it as such. Thank you. Also, I get that it's corny and hastily written. That wasn't the point of the exercise. So back off. :P
***********
He sat with a fistful of shattered glass and broken promises, smoking the last of a pack of cigarettes he found a few hours before realizing he had no choice but to question his own sanity over the last several months and possibly years. He still considered himself a scientist, even though he hadn't seen the inside of a lab in about as long as he had ever worked in one. But he never mentioned this. When people asked him what he did for a living, he usually avoided eye contact and tried to delay responding with "nothing" for as long as he could. And every time he had to answer the question, another piece of him plummeted to the Earth, like a meteorite or confetti or that dead body in the movie Con-Air.
He wondered now whether that had anything to do with his current situation, but for all he knew, the broken glass he left behind could have been the work of a would-be burglar he had caught in the act, and the inevitable struggle would have rendered him a hero instead of the mental patient he learned to define himself as. If only he could remember how or why it started, he might be able to convince himself that his mind had a perfectly rational and reasonable explanation for choosing to abandon him on the most important night of his life. As he choked on the toxins making their way into his respiratory system, he glanced down at the white bracelet on his wrist. Some part of him believed that he would never be able to remove his ivory letter--not until he solved the mystery of what happened on the 5th of July.
The police told Benjamin that his husband found him lying in a pile of the collected remains of every glass surface in the apartment--from the TV to the coffee table to the vase that held the flame-colored roses meant to cheer him up on a particularly lousy summer afternoon. He didn't remember much of that conversation, or the one where his husband threw him out of the house for good without so much as a pair of shoes or a can of soup. Ben couldn't blame him. He cooperated as much as anyone could have with police officers with an apparent moral obligation to contribute to the degeneration of what little sanity or emotional stability he still had tucked away inside of him. He didn't know there were so many ways to call someone worthless in such a short amount of time. They must have a training on that at the academy, he thought. However, he refrained from making any comment at all because he, quite wisely, assumed that a mental institution was a far better place than prison for someone like him.
He survived his stay in the psych ward by writing letters to his husband--letters he could never send thanks to a hastily-filed restraining order that prevented him from making any contact whatsoever or calling 67 Hadley Street his home ever again. He wrote the letters mostly as a way to process his own feelings. The confinement drove him crazy, which sounds a little ironic considering the nature of the facility, but Ben wasn't the kind of man that liked to sit still. He was an avid runner, cyclist, weightlifter, and recreational athlete that had once had quite a promising future in athletics, until he decided to stop pretending to be a woman some years beforehand.
So he kept his pen moving when his body could not. He wrote until the cuts on his hands would start to bleed. And then he just kept writing, not seeing the use in clearing away the blood running down his fingers and pooling at the very point where pen met paper. Every word was still visible behind its rust-colored pond. The darkest ones seemed to be the most real.
You'd think that there would be more to Ben's story in the hospital, but in truth, he was tired of being on medication for problems he wasn't even sure were real anymore. He had begun to question his own reality in the weeks prior to the incident. He felt less and less like himself until his mind must have just let go completely. This was the best explanation he could come up with, and eventually, the doctors stopped trying to force the pills down his throat, and after some more time, they stopped coming to his room altogether. He was on his own, and he had realized that from the beginning. When he was no longer afraid of the withdrawal symptoms and could stop replaying his fantasy of blowing his brain matter into a Rorschach mural on the bathroom wall, he signed himself out of the hospital.
Two hours later, he stood 51 feet away from the very bottom step of house number 67, where he could still hear his 3-month-old puppy crying from behind the red brick walls. He knew he should have walked away at that point, but the thought of living without his dog--even on the streets of East Cleveland with winter approaching--was another razor-sharp shard of broken plasma TV resting ever so gently on his brainstem, having already pierced the skin, just waiting for the right moment, perhaps a twitch of panic, to make contact with the place that made him breathe. These were his thoughts, not mine, by the way. That's just the way he was. Everything was either dramatic or non-existent. No wonder.
At 33 feet, he saw his husband's car--or ex-husband's, maybe, since he wasn't really sure what the situation meant, though he probably should have been smart enough to figure that out, being a brilliant biologist and all. It was too late to run. He had already been seen, and fear of getting flattened by an F-350 with the redneck pride flag printed across its back window urged him to move even closer to the man who was more likely to have him arrested with each additional foot he advanced.
"You shouldn't be here."
"I live here..."
"Not anymore you don't."
"I just need some things."
"You can have your shoes. But you can't come inside."
"I...I can't leave. Please talk to me."
"I have nothing to say to you. Ever again."
"I just...Baby, please. I can't. Please talk to me. I can't do this."
"I don't care where you go. That's up to you. But you cannot stay here."
He didn't know what else to say. His mind was stuck in an infinite loop of can't-won't-scream-cry-panic. His knees forgot what they were designed to do, and he hit the ground hard, catching himself on more fractured glass than pavement, reopening wounds he thought were well on their way to healing. He lifted his hand to see that he had tiny pieces of mirror embedded in his palm, and at that moment more than any other, as his husband walked past him into the house without another syllable, he felt like eating his own reflection. One shard at a time.
He sat and allowed himself to bleed and cry until his body had had enough of these things, and around the same time, the screen-door skin of the house seemed to rupture, spewing out crimson bags of shoes, medicines, clothes, and the inevitable glitter-glass that covered everything on the property, inside and out.
Blood-red hands, blood-red bags, and blood-red eyes walked up the street, attached to a man whose body and mind should have stopped betraying him years before, if life were to be fair in any fucking way. (Again, his words. Not mine. Maybe he should've written this instead.) He didn't know what to do, where to go, or when he would ever find a place to call home again. But, for whatever reason, he walked. It might have been pure instinct at that point, his neocortex having shut down almost completely for the second time in an all-too-brief-yet-never-ending span of time. But had he not taken those first zombie-like shuffles away from his past, he would have never tripped over the chance to find his future.
Benjamin continued to bleed for a long time after that. I'm told that he and his husband are back together again and that they have a 3-year-old daughter named Annabelle. Ben's hands are permanently scarred, not only because of the initial disaster and the subsequent reinjury, but because, for a long time, Ben picked at his wounds until they bled just as fiercely as they did that very first night. He did this every day for quite some time, often without realizing it. And the day he stopped ripping away scab after scab was the day his husband finally called.
Tears fell to the pages of Ben's tattered journal as he listened to the song to which they danced on the night of their wedding, and before he hung up the phone--on what would be the anniversary of the death of their old life together--his husband didn't ask Ben to come home. He said that it was time for both of them to go home.
Sixty-seven minutes later, you could hear the makeup sex two blocks over. (What's another few dozen kids in therapy, right?) It was hot and sweaty and filled with all the best kinds of screaming and way too many different kinds of crying. And that's being discreet. I could have also told you about the biting and the scratching and the broken headboard and the various bodily fluids that ended up defying gravity in the end.
Marcus looked at the scars all over his partner's hands (and body), following the trail from one to the next with his lips, like he was sucking the venom out of a lethal snake bite.
"Your scars make you so much more beautiful," he said to Ben.
Ben smiled with tears forming in the corners of eyes that seemed to have aged a dozen years since the last time they shared a bed together. He spoke softly but with more conviction than he could ever remember: "So do yours. I'm just sorry that I had to be the one to give them to you."
"You never have to be sorry, Ben. I don't blame you for what happened. And it's like we said: We're both more beautiful for having these marks, whether they have formed on the body or the soul. I wouldn't trade these scars for anything." As he said these last words, he moved his hand right towards his partner's heart, just above the place where a new scar would one day form. And he knew he would love that one too.
"Do you really mean that? I mean, you know my mind wasn't in the right place when it happened, but that doesn't mean I am not responsible for so, so much pain in your life...And I can't promise that I won't cause you more pain."
Marcus paused for a long time after that. He breathed slowly, never breaking eye contact with the man whose stormy seas had made him such a well-conditioned sailor. "I never expected you not to cause me pain. That's kind of a given with marriage. But you were gone for a long time--long before your episode or whatever we want to call it now. I lost the man I married, for whatever reason, to a shell of a person that needed life support in a way that I just couldn't provide. It was killing me too, and saying goodbye felt like they pulled the plug on me instead. I felt like I said goodbye over and over again every single night when I had to crawl into this bed with nothing but an empty space next to me...It never stopped smelling like you."
"What made it stop?"
"What do you mean, Ben?"
"I mean, like, how did you know when you stopped having to say goodbye? How did you--"
"How did I know the man I married had finally come back to me?"
"Well...yeah."
"You found it again."
"Found what?"
"Your smile."
Admission
Today, I recognized that I have started to feel more than one emotion, which I know is one of those really healthy things. I'm still extraordinarily optimistic about where things are going with my mental health and my life, more generally. But at the same time, I am sad about having to be so far away from the person I love. I'm also really stressed out because the psych hospital stole my T, the Food Stamps office messed up AGAIN, my back has been getting worse again, I'm lonely as all hell, and I'm still looking for things with which to occupy most of my time.
I finally told him that I didn't think this was working the way we intended it to. We're both miserable as hell being away from one another. If the point was to learn whether or not we were able to focus more on improving ourselves as individuals by being apart from one another, I think we've learned that, rather than helping us, this is a major distraction and contributing factor to our respective levels of unhappiness. There are a host of reasons why I think we'd be better off working this out in the context of the relationship. One of the major ones I've been dwelling on the last few days is that I think now we both know what happens when we become codependent. We know what it feels like to lose ourselves completely. And we know what happens when we both aren't dealing with our problems effectively. In addition, I think we have more than gotten the point when it comes to appreciating what you have before it's gone. I still wonder how much longer we will have to put ourselves through this. I think I've gained the perspective I need to accomplish what I need to. I think I have regained it more than anything. I've come so far to the other side, in fact, that I think being here is going to set me back more than help me. I am happy that I am mostly resistant to people making sure every little need I have is met. But it's hard to keep that up without feeling guilty. It seems the only way parents know how to show love is by doing things for you or trying to take care of you. But that's just not what I need right now. I need to work on my life in more of a real-life situation. This seems more like a time-out from real life to me. And I really don't believe I need that anymore. I'm strong enough to just get on with it already. And I'm the kind of person who believes you never know until you try.
I was much more into this option of staying in Wilkes-Barre when I was afraid I wouldn't be able to survive on my own in Pittsburgh. I thought that this is what I needed. And maybe I did need it for a few days. But I've always been a fast learner. I've always been able to pick up my own pieces, sometimes a little more quickly than others, and I usually know when it's time for me to move forward. This time in particular, I've felt more capable than ever before. I feel like my mind came back to me. I've always known how to be this person. All those other times when my life turned into complete chaos have finally proven their worth. Every time it happens, it gets easier and easier to handle. I know more of what to do each time.
I don't exactly know how I snapped out of things so quickly. Was it largely the medication? Was it the situation that caused me to finally wake up from the fog I had been living in? Was it that time in the hospital spent doing nothing but thinking and writing and forcing myself to practice CBT like I never have before? Was it the culminating event of months worth of effort and practice and failure? Maybe it was a little bit of everything. I am grateful, regardless. I will never let myself believe I am broken again. I refuse to be a victim. I choose to live. And really live, not just float through life passively.
This disability stuff is about to come to an end. I still have a nine-month trial work period, which will be helpful in the beginning, but I would rather get a job in Pittsburgh, truthfully. I would rather do this in a scenario close to the one I desire. I am perfectly capable of doing it in these less-than-desirable circumstances, but why the hell would I want to if I know it could be done a different, less painful way?
I've come up with some alternative solutions in my head, some of which require more time here than others. As much as I know what I want, I am willing to do whatever it takes. If that means staying here indefinitely, I can handle it. It's going to suck if it has to be that way, but sometimes that's just the way things are. Most people know this without having to be told. For some reason, I always have to remind myself of the simplest things. My brain's a little weird. But I like it, most of the time.
For some reason, this thought came to my head just now: "I will never hide my body from you again." And I know it's true.
I'll probably have more to say soon, but I want to move on to something else for a little while. I don't want to get caught up in a loop. The fact that I am even able to say that and stop myself is pretty fucking awesome. Just saying.
I finally told him that I didn't think this was working the way we intended it to. We're both miserable as hell being away from one another. If the point was to learn whether or not we were able to focus more on improving ourselves as individuals by being apart from one another, I think we've learned that, rather than helping us, this is a major distraction and contributing factor to our respective levels of unhappiness. There are a host of reasons why I think we'd be better off working this out in the context of the relationship. One of the major ones I've been dwelling on the last few days is that I think now we both know what happens when we become codependent. We know what it feels like to lose ourselves completely. And we know what happens when we both aren't dealing with our problems effectively. In addition, I think we have more than gotten the point when it comes to appreciating what you have before it's gone. I still wonder how much longer we will have to put ourselves through this. I think I've gained the perspective I need to accomplish what I need to. I think I have regained it more than anything. I've come so far to the other side, in fact, that I think being here is going to set me back more than help me. I am happy that I am mostly resistant to people making sure every little need I have is met. But it's hard to keep that up without feeling guilty. It seems the only way parents know how to show love is by doing things for you or trying to take care of you. But that's just not what I need right now. I need to work on my life in more of a real-life situation. This seems more like a time-out from real life to me. And I really don't believe I need that anymore. I'm strong enough to just get on with it already. And I'm the kind of person who believes you never know until you try.
I was much more into this option of staying in Wilkes-Barre when I was afraid I wouldn't be able to survive on my own in Pittsburgh. I thought that this is what I needed. And maybe I did need it for a few days. But I've always been a fast learner. I've always been able to pick up my own pieces, sometimes a little more quickly than others, and I usually know when it's time for me to move forward. This time in particular, I've felt more capable than ever before. I feel like my mind came back to me. I've always known how to be this person. All those other times when my life turned into complete chaos have finally proven their worth. Every time it happens, it gets easier and easier to handle. I know more of what to do each time.
I don't exactly know how I snapped out of things so quickly. Was it largely the medication? Was it the situation that caused me to finally wake up from the fog I had been living in? Was it that time in the hospital spent doing nothing but thinking and writing and forcing myself to practice CBT like I never have before? Was it the culminating event of months worth of effort and practice and failure? Maybe it was a little bit of everything. I am grateful, regardless. I will never let myself believe I am broken again. I refuse to be a victim. I choose to live. And really live, not just float through life passively.
This disability stuff is about to come to an end. I still have a nine-month trial work period, which will be helpful in the beginning, but I would rather get a job in Pittsburgh, truthfully. I would rather do this in a scenario close to the one I desire. I am perfectly capable of doing it in these less-than-desirable circumstances, but why the hell would I want to if I know it could be done a different, less painful way?
I've come up with some alternative solutions in my head, some of which require more time here than others. As much as I know what I want, I am willing to do whatever it takes. If that means staying here indefinitely, I can handle it. It's going to suck if it has to be that way, but sometimes that's just the way things are. Most people know this without having to be told. For some reason, I always have to remind myself of the simplest things. My brain's a little weird. But I like it, most of the time.
For some reason, this thought came to my head just now: "I will never hide my body from you again." And I know it's true.
I'll probably have more to say soon, but I want to move on to something else for a little while. I don't want to get caught up in a loop. The fact that I am even able to say that and stop myself is pretty fucking awesome. Just saying.
Friday, July 17, 2015
Weekend Reflections
My head is buzzing, and I feel really distracted right now. I am attempting to focus on doing what I need to do, both long term and in the moment, but ever since the middle of the day yesterday, I've been having a lot of trouble. I keep thinking that this isn't the place for me to do what I need to do, and it seems like a lot of things are trying to convince me of that, even when I try to force myself to forge ahead and believe otherwise.
It is lonely here, and most of the friends I had are alcoholics. And the others...Well, let's just say that I have been trying to contact people since the first night I got back here. I'm definitely making an effort to be more social. It just hasn't been working out, which is actually a lot more discouraging than I thought it would be. I thought it would be easy to just focus 100% on myself and what I need to do to get to a place where I am completely comfortable, at least a good portion of the time. But it's actually much more difficult to remain focused when I feel this isolated.
As much as I love my family, they really aren't about the same lifestyle I am, and that's really hard. I have to go out of my way mentally just to make sure I don't give in. We just have different priorities, and that's completely okay. It's just not very helpful right now. I feel like I am at a point where I need a certain kind of support, and instead of being able to get what I need, I have to fight off the kinds of support I don't need.
I don't want it to be a chore to stay at a baseline level of independence and comfort. I just want that to be a fact of life. My brain is starting to feel more cluttered here every day, and perhaps that is because I haven't been able to talk to people as much as I did when things first happened. I feel much more disconnected from my support network.
I'm starting to see that the purpose of coming here is pretty limited in scope. I need to learn how to function independently, and though that has been pretty taxing due to outside influences, I've been doing a pretty good job at managing my own affairs. I need to save money so that I can put myself in a better position with regard to student loans. I am also realizing that I need to save money to leave when the time is right. I know for a fact that it will be incredibly difficult--if not impossible--for me to figure out any very long-term plans while I am here. As much as I fight it, the feeling of being stuck is hard to escape. It's not bringing me down or preventing me from doing anything, but it is a weight on my shoulders I with which I wish I did not have to contend.
I feel that the biggest detriment to my well-being at this point is my seemingly complete disconnection from my social support network. I will do the best I can to resist the negative thoughts, but I do fear that they will eventually become too much if I don't find a way to remedy the situation. I am definitely starting to have my doubts about the relative pros and cons of being in this place. However, this might be the only way for things to really improve between us. I don't know if we would both be strong enough to not see each other every day if I were closer. Part of me wonders what is so horrible about that, if we are both committed to working on ourselves. But I also realize that time is an important factor in all of this. I know more healing needs to take place, and we need time for the changes we have implemented to play themselves out.
I don't blame anyone for this, but I do feel angry about how unfair it is that I am the one losing contact with friends, losing my home, etc. It seems like things are pretty well stacked against me. I know I can take it, but it is so draining. I keep wondering how much longer I will have to be this strong. This is the third time I have had to come back here, and while I want to stress again how much I love my family and will never fully be able to repay them for all the support they have given me--even when I haven't always deserved it--I do lose a lot of myself being here. And that's another thing I am fighting. Again, I can take it. But it's hard. And it's exhausting. I guess maybe I just want SOMETHING to feel comfortable about this.
I'd give anything to be out with the people I care about tonight. It's been so long since I've been genuinely excited to do something without being terrified of being in a social setting. And now that I finally have those feelings back, I can't take action. It seems kind of cruel.
I started crying a lot earlier. I had to listen to the same two or three songs that have been helping me through this. I desperately want to talk to someone in person. As much as all of this hurts, I know why I am here. I know what I need to do. This is only a small part of my life. Everything will be okay. I won't give up. I will not let any of this bring me down. I have so many reasons to work for the things I want. I am learning what really being strong for yourself and the person you love means. I'm definitely not in an ideal situation, but I need to make the best of where I am and try to achieve my goals. If I can get closer to them here, than I know I can make it anywhere. I won't be broken this easily. This will all be worth it soon enough. Love is so much more powerful and motivating than I ever thought it could be, in all of its forms. I need to remind myself of this constantly.
I won't give up.
It is lonely here, and most of the friends I had are alcoholics. And the others...Well, let's just say that I have been trying to contact people since the first night I got back here. I'm definitely making an effort to be more social. It just hasn't been working out, which is actually a lot more discouraging than I thought it would be. I thought it would be easy to just focus 100% on myself and what I need to do to get to a place where I am completely comfortable, at least a good portion of the time. But it's actually much more difficult to remain focused when I feel this isolated.
As much as I love my family, they really aren't about the same lifestyle I am, and that's really hard. I have to go out of my way mentally just to make sure I don't give in. We just have different priorities, and that's completely okay. It's just not very helpful right now. I feel like I am at a point where I need a certain kind of support, and instead of being able to get what I need, I have to fight off the kinds of support I don't need.
I don't want it to be a chore to stay at a baseline level of independence and comfort. I just want that to be a fact of life. My brain is starting to feel more cluttered here every day, and perhaps that is because I haven't been able to talk to people as much as I did when things first happened. I feel much more disconnected from my support network.
I'm starting to see that the purpose of coming here is pretty limited in scope. I need to learn how to function independently, and though that has been pretty taxing due to outside influences, I've been doing a pretty good job at managing my own affairs. I need to save money so that I can put myself in a better position with regard to student loans. I am also realizing that I need to save money to leave when the time is right. I know for a fact that it will be incredibly difficult--if not impossible--for me to figure out any very long-term plans while I am here. As much as I fight it, the feeling of being stuck is hard to escape. It's not bringing me down or preventing me from doing anything, but it is a weight on my shoulders I with which I wish I did not have to contend.
I feel that the biggest detriment to my well-being at this point is my seemingly complete disconnection from my social support network. I will do the best I can to resist the negative thoughts, but I do fear that they will eventually become too much if I don't find a way to remedy the situation. I am definitely starting to have my doubts about the relative pros and cons of being in this place. However, this might be the only way for things to really improve between us. I don't know if we would both be strong enough to not see each other every day if I were closer. Part of me wonders what is so horrible about that, if we are both committed to working on ourselves. But I also realize that time is an important factor in all of this. I know more healing needs to take place, and we need time for the changes we have implemented to play themselves out.
I don't blame anyone for this, but I do feel angry about how unfair it is that I am the one losing contact with friends, losing my home, etc. It seems like things are pretty well stacked against me. I know I can take it, but it is so draining. I keep wondering how much longer I will have to be this strong. This is the third time I have had to come back here, and while I want to stress again how much I love my family and will never fully be able to repay them for all the support they have given me--even when I haven't always deserved it--I do lose a lot of myself being here. And that's another thing I am fighting. Again, I can take it. But it's hard. And it's exhausting. I guess maybe I just want SOMETHING to feel comfortable about this.
I'd give anything to be out with the people I care about tonight. It's been so long since I've been genuinely excited to do something without being terrified of being in a social setting. And now that I finally have those feelings back, I can't take action. It seems kind of cruel.
I started crying a lot earlier. I had to listen to the same two or three songs that have been helping me through this. I desperately want to talk to someone in person. As much as all of this hurts, I know why I am here. I know what I need to do. This is only a small part of my life. Everything will be okay. I won't give up. I will not let any of this bring me down. I have so many reasons to work for the things I want. I am learning what really being strong for yourself and the person you love means. I'm definitely not in an ideal situation, but I need to make the best of where I am and try to achieve my goals. If I can get closer to them here, than I know I can make it anywhere. I won't be broken this easily. This will all be worth it soon enough. Love is so much more powerful and motivating than I ever thought it could be, in all of its forms. I need to remind myself of this constantly.
I won't give up.
Thursday, July 16, 2015
Time Dilation
I smiled about us more than I cried today. Even so, it feels like I have been here for a month already, though it's really been four days. It's hard not to feel lonely here when pretty much all of my friends are back in Pittsburgh. I see pictures and posts every day that help me feel a little more connected to them in some ways, but in other ways, they make me feel even further away.
I applied to probably sixty or seventy more jobs today just in case the home healthcare agency doesn't call me back for a second interview next week. I'm not particularly concerned with what the job is at this point. I just need something to keep myself occupied and start bringing in money to get life crap sorted out.
I didn't do much else today except work out. I was thinking of going back to the gym for a leg workout tonight, but I think my back still needs a little TLC. It's frustrating to me, but I would rather not experience what I did a few months ago. If this doesn't get better by Monday, though, it's back to the doctor for me. I'm trying to avoid surgery at all costs.
It's still hard to be alone at night, when you want to be cuddled up close to the person you love. I think I might not make it very much longer without crying, but that's okay. The crying means I still care enough to be hurt. Fortunately, I still care enough to make the effort too.
I guess I really didn't have much to say after all. Some nights aren't that great for words.
It's still way too quiet here.
I applied to probably sixty or seventy more jobs today just in case the home healthcare agency doesn't call me back for a second interview next week. I'm not particularly concerned with what the job is at this point. I just need something to keep myself occupied and start bringing in money to get life crap sorted out.
I didn't do much else today except work out. I was thinking of going back to the gym for a leg workout tonight, but I think my back still needs a little TLC. It's frustrating to me, but I would rather not experience what I did a few months ago. If this doesn't get better by Monday, though, it's back to the doctor for me. I'm trying to avoid surgery at all costs.
It's still hard to be alone at night, when you want to be cuddled up close to the person you love. I think I might not make it very much longer without crying, but that's okay. The crying means I still care enough to be hurt. Fortunately, I still care enough to make the effort too.
I guess I really didn't have much to say after all. Some nights aren't that great for words.
It's still way too quiet here.
Monday, August 25, 2014
Connected
You are the most amazing person to have ever come into my life, and I never want to let you go. This time, I know for sure. But you were right, as you often are. It's one of the things I love about you the most. You are intelligent, and you are more like me than you ever realized before. I did think those things, briefly. I allowed them to play out in my head, over and over again, because I knew that resisting those thoughts and feelings would only make it more difficult for me to understand what I needed to do. I have learned to mostly allow myself to experience without analyzing--without passing judgment. That has been the most helpful skill in controlling my anxiety and meltdowns. But it is not always easy. There will always be days like today.
However, in allowing myself to experience that world in my mind, I came back to the same conclusion I had reached numerous times before. Of course I still felt things. But those feelings are for a person from a different time, and they come from a person from a different time. I have made the decision to love truly and completely the one person that is right for the me that exists in the here and now, not the past.
I want to believe that I have grown into more of the kind of partner I want to be--that I have learned from my mistakes.
I don't want this to end like all the others, and I know that it comes down to my actions in the end. I must choose to better myself. I must choose to fight all the time. I can't let myself fall into the same patterns as before. I'm learning how not to do that, and I am only succeeding part of the time.
But you are patient. And I can hear everything I need to in the tone of your voice. And I don't get that with everyone. It's almost as if the actual words don't matter when I get that way.
I'm waiting for you to come upstairs, still feeling so connected to you after you read my cards tonight. I know this was difficult for you, and I am sorry I wasn't completely honest with you that night on the couch. I was (and still am) so afraid of losing the person I want to spend the rest of my life with.
Sunday, August 17, 2014
Three months
I really just want to be a better person.
He makes me want to do that.
The person I have to fight the most is myself. I don't mean to be ignorant or selfish. Sometimes I just don't know.
I can only hope that patience will serve both of us well. So far it has, and that makes me so happy.
Friday, February 28, 2014
Revisiting Previously Incoherent/Incomplete Thoughts
Having just come back from the gym, I can feel the difference in the way I experience myself and everything around me. Before coming to write, I did a little research to prove to myself that my perception has some basis in reality, finding a few articles pertaining to how exercise benefits people with autism spectrum disorders. Though I was unable to access the full articles, the abstracts alone confirmed some of the notions I have long held about how such activities can lead to improved executive functioning, as well as increased bodily awareness and sensory integration. Let me put that into a more personal perspective.
I try to go to the gym at times when there aren't too many people around. I'm not as focused when I am working out around people I don't know that well, and I feel that a good deal of my mental energy is taken up trying to deal with their presence. When I am nearly alone or around people who don't set off my internal alarms, I can concentrate on the movement of my own body parts, the way it feels to have the blood rush to the active muscles, the feedback I am receiving from each and every moving part of the artfully crafted machine that I call myself. In these moments, without entirely realizing it, I am learning to separate the internal world from the external. Perhaps it is more about making these distinctions than "losing oneself" in the workout. It is as if I am truly finding myself as my brain integrates sensory information in an endorphin-saturated physiological environment. Self and other become more clear following a workout. Since so much less energy needs to be devoted to negotiating the space between me and the rest of the world, the necessary energy can be routed to the parts of my brain that deal with planning, organization, and just getting shit done in general and living my life the way I intend to live it.
This brought me to thinking about choice. Ordinarily, I don't think I have the ability to relinquish choice. Every response is a decision to fight against instinct, however automatic that response may have become over time. Routine is an escape from the never-ending responsibility to live a calculated life.
And since my brain has a funny way of connecting everything to everything else, routine became connected with change, as one might expect, but change got me thinking about time. And my body. And learning to be okay with age. I am certainly beginning to show signs of age in my face, and my hair is looking pretty pathetic these days, and while I sometimes stare at what has happened to me for embarrassingly long periods of time when confronted with the mirror outside my bedroom door, I am learning to love the look of having known the world.
And through this thought I have reached the topic of love. These are the most intangible of the words to me, slipping down through the ever-deepening cracks between my fingers and falling gently to the ground. And as I have learned to accept that I am falling with them, I appreciate the significance of these words, however trite they have come to be in modern usage: Love, actively and unconditionally. It is not so much a process of learning for me as it is a processing of letting go--of unlearning the bitterness with which we are taught to respond to anger, pain, and mistakes. It is at the same time the biggest and smallest thing in the entire world.
And as I begin to relax for the night, the thoughts begin to swirl again--a clear display of my brain trying to fight against the abominable notion of relaxation, of doing anything other than trying to solve every known (and unknown) problem in the universe. The concepts start to merge, and I think about falling in a whole new way like falling into your gender as if you stumbled over it in the middle of the street and maybe it looked so miraculous and revolutionary that you just had to stay down there on the ground and take it all in.
And I think of the conflicting emotions. Feeling connected and alone at the same time. Loved but terribly hopeless. Wanting to cry and boiling inside.
Ready to fly.
But I want you there.
Always.
I try to go to the gym at times when there aren't too many people around. I'm not as focused when I am working out around people I don't know that well, and I feel that a good deal of my mental energy is taken up trying to deal with their presence. When I am nearly alone or around people who don't set off my internal alarms, I can concentrate on the movement of my own body parts, the way it feels to have the blood rush to the active muscles, the feedback I am receiving from each and every moving part of the artfully crafted machine that I call myself. In these moments, without entirely realizing it, I am learning to separate the internal world from the external. Perhaps it is more about making these distinctions than "losing oneself" in the workout. It is as if I am truly finding myself as my brain integrates sensory information in an endorphin-saturated physiological environment. Self and other become more clear following a workout. Since so much less energy needs to be devoted to negotiating the space between me and the rest of the world, the necessary energy can be routed to the parts of my brain that deal with planning, organization, and just getting shit done in general and living my life the way I intend to live it.
This brought me to thinking about choice. Ordinarily, I don't think I have the ability to relinquish choice. Every response is a decision to fight against instinct, however automatic that response may have become over time. Routine is an escape from the never-ending responsibility to live a calculated life.
And since my brain has a funny way of connecting everything to everything else, routine became connected with change, as one might expect, but change got me thinking about time. And my body. And learning to be okay with age. I am certainly beginning to show signs of age in my face, and my hair is looking pretty pathetic these days, and while I sometimes stare at what has happened to me for embarrassingly long periods of time when confronted with the mirror outside my bedroom door, I am learning to love the look of having known the world.
And through this thought I have reached the topic of love. These are the most intangible of the words to me, slipping down through the ever-deepening cracks between my fingers and falling gently to the ground. And as I have learned to accept that I am falling with them, I appreciate the significance of these words, however trite they have come to be in modern usage: Love, actively and unconditionally. It is not so much a process of learning for me as it is a processing of letting go--of unlearning the bitterness with which we are taught to respond to anger, pain, and mistakes. It is at the same time the biggest and smallest thing in the entire world.
And as I begin to relax for the night, the thoughts begin to swirl again--a clear display of my brain trying to fight against the abominable notion of relaxation, of doing anything other than trying to solve every known (and unknown) problem in the universe. The concepts start to merge, and I think about falling in a whole new way like falling into your gender as if you stumbled over it in the middle of the street and maybe it looked so miraculous and revolutionary that you just had to stay down there on the ground and take it all in.
And I think of the conflicting emotions. Feeling connected and alone at the same time. Loved but terribly hopeless. Wanting to cry and boiling inside.
Ready to fly.
But I want you there.
Always.
Sunday, November 17, 2013
the earthquake
Let there be enough stillness around me for me to recognize
just how I exactly I am supposed to move because right now it feels like I am
skateboarding in an earthquake
Upside-down and with my hands tied behind my back like harry
Houdini in that big glass fish tank with thousands of people just waiting
Hoping
To watch him die
Let me grasp at the straws of juice boxes
To drink from
Not to breathe from.
If you’ve ever set foot inside this room, then you've seen the things that no longer speak to me or about me but just sit there
like the walls
watching me bleed to the beat of my own drum
and I almost think each downward stroke will shoot this pain from my system shoot this life from system shuddering
swimming
shimmering
splendid.
i used to hear the voices of my past just like when she'd sit by my side on the couch
all curled up
in my world
and whisper in my ear that she'd never leave that this time it would be different that she would be different and that we would be the same
forever.
now the voices are corpses piling up inside.
and i'm watching them rot.
but somehow i'd sooner throw away
this computer these jeans this phone these games that letter on the wall that green box under the bed with everything in it and that book and this crown and i'd stand naked in a crowd
if it would all mean that i could hold on
to that voice
and not have to throw it away with every other lifeless piece of shit
with which i am surrounded.
i'm going into that place now where i see every letter on every label like a disco ball reflecting the sun,
where keystrokes shoot like lightning i can trace
across the vascular highway that leads to the place
that makes this all possible.
the good and the bad.
the place that makes me a better friend to words than people and the place
that knows that normal people don't feel the different personalities of the words
"pleasant" and "peppy"
and that maybe they don't see pleasant as green and peppy as red and that maybe the reason i see pleasant as green has to do with how it reminds me of forests or maybe because i've been staring way too long at this stupid green jug on my desk that's supposed to hold money or pens or something but is completely useless because i already have a container for money and two for pens and three times as much shit as is comfortable in this place because well
you never know.
but this place.
this crazy place.
inside my head
where the earthquake never stops
is where i still have you
and him
and me
through the years.
this crazy place inside my head where the earthquake never stops
is where it all starts
when i have those days
where i just feel
that there is something inside
that is made
of
true
magic.
Tuesday, June 18, 2013
Progress
I've said before that it may be time to retire this particular blog, or rename it, or do something to change how it appears since it doesn't quite carry the same meaning it used to. But for now, when I need a place to write, and I need to be quick about it, this seems to be the best I can do. I am not really the same person I was when I started. This weekend helped me to realize just how much has changed about my circumstances, about my friends, and about me.
I feel duller somehow than I used to. I used to feel that there was something magical about my life, walking around with confidence that may or may not have had any basis in reality. These days, I still have confidence, but it's based on what I have done, not what I am. I'm not sure how I feel about this.
I've started to feel older. I am not as interested in the craziness, and I am definitely not able to mentally or physically deal with the constant drinking and partying anymore. The kind of companionship I desire is different, and I'm not always looking for that next big chance for me to get wasted and make an ass of myself. It's not that I don't like to enjoy myself--just that what I find enjoyable has changed.
I can't see the complete picture yet. I am doing what I need to do to get to a next step in my life that is in itself uncertain. I would like to be at a place where I no longer have to play catch up. I would like to start building my future from a comfortable spot, but I do not know if I will ever have that chance. I may be feeling regret because I did pass up the opportunity to live that comfortable life. I hope I will create a better opportunity that will not leave me feeling as drained, but I will never know. I would like to be able to stop thinking about every hypothetical that comes to mind. I need a better mental filter, or at the very least, a better coping mechanism.
Saturday was hard for me in so many ways, some of which are more difficult to articulate than others. In addition to the obvious, it was the first wedding of a friend I have been to, and while I do hope it won't be the last, it too reminded me of things that no longer exists. Still, seeing so many old friends in the same place, and being able to dance with them all again...It made me feel like I was in the company of family again. I feel like the kid in Stand By Me who finally recognizes that he will never have friends like the ones he did when he was twelve. I may never have friends like the ones I did in Pittsburgh. While I have met some exceptional people down here, I am not quite able to open myself up, and I don't know when I'll be able to. I don't know if it is even possible anymore.
I feel loved and accepted. I am in the company of friends and family. I have the chance at making real money and fixing my financial situation, and I have solid plans about going to graduate school. Yet, something is still missing. And it was the same thing that was missing in Wilkes-Barre. I want to be able to share myself with someone again. I want to feel love. I feel like I am a better person because whenever I have been in a successful relationship, the other person and I have been able to connect in a way that makes me feel connected to the rest of the world too. I feel like I am more a part of the same experience as everyone else when I am with someone I love. But I don't exactly know how to go about finding love. I'm not desperate. I'm not in dire need of saving. I don't have any need to open up to anyone about problems I have been having, and even if I did, I can't get myself to do it. The person who can bring down this wall will be the one. Some people have managed to create cracks here and there, but they quickly seal themselves. My soul will know, but it is a painful game to play, and I do not know if I should be patient and let something fall into place or if I should be actively seeking this person with whom I want to spend the rest of my life. I'm leaning away from the latter because I have never been able to make that work.
I've also come to realize something else. I am attracted to men, and women, and all sorts of differently-gendered people. But when I really think about what would make me feel happy and fulfilled, I see myself with a woman--a woman who can float between femme and butch with grace. A tomboy with an effeminate side who can just as easily turn heads in Dockers as in a dress. Someone who can make each and every part of me feel like it is loved and cared for, and someone for whom I am more than a charity case who needs the collective pity of society.
When I find you, I will love you in ways you have never known possible. I will give myself to you after years of hiding that self behind a wall built from the fear of loneliness, helplessness, and depression. I will be able to give myself to you fully, as I haven't been able to do in so many years that I barely remember what it feels like to be human. Love is not safe. And maybe this is why I have not made progress.
I want nothing more than to be able to share myself with those closest to me. And with the rest of the world. I do not know what can help me reach this goal.
I have spent so much more time these days focusing on the kind of partner I want to be than on the kind of partner I want for myself. The right person will help bring out this person in me. Maybe I'm a little late in figuring this one out.
I may not feel better after writing this, but I feel that I have at least learned something. And that is progress.
I feel duller somehow than I used to. I used to feel that there was something magical about my life, walking around with confidence that may or may not have had any basis in reality. These days, I still have confidence, but it's based on what I have done, not what I am. I'm not sure how I feel about this.
I've started to feel older. I am not as interested in the craziness, and I am definitely not able to mentally or physically deal with the constant drinking and partying anymore. The kind of companionship I desire is different, and I'm not always looking for that next big chance for me to get wasted and make an ass of myself. It's not that I don't like to enjoy myself--just that what I find enjoyable has changed.
I can't see the complete picture yet. I am doing what I need to do to get to a next step in my life that is in itself uncertain. I would like to be at a place where I no longer have to play catch up. I would like to start building my future from a comfortable spot, but I do not know if I will ever have that chance. I may be feeling regret because I did pass up the opportunity to live that comfortable life. I hope I will create a better opportunity that will not leave me feeling as drained, but I will never know. I would like to be able to stop thinking about every hypothetical that comes to mind. I need a better mental filter, or at the very least, a better coping mechanism.
Saturday was hard for me in so many ways, some of which are more difficult to articulate than others. In addition to the obvious, it was the first wedding of a friend I have been to, and while I do hope it won't be the last, it too reminded me of things that no longer exists. Still, seeing so many old friends in the same place, and being able to dance with them all again...It made me feel like I was in the company of family again. I feel like the kid in Stand By Me who finally recognizes that he will never have friends like the ones he did when he was twelve. I may never have friends like the ones I did in Pittsburgh. While I have met some exceptional people down here, I am not quite able to open myself up, and I don't know when I'll be able to. I don't know if it is even possible anymore.
I feel loved and accepted. I am in the company of friends and family. I have the chance at making real money and fixing my financial situation, and I have solid plans about going to graduate school. Yet, something is still missing. And it was the same thing that was missing in Wilkes-Barre. I want to be able to share myself with someone again. I want to feel love. I feel like I am a better person because whenever I have been in a successful relationship, the other person and I have been able to connect in a way that makes me feel connected to the rest of the world too. I feel like I am more a part of the same experience as everyone else when I am with someone I love. But I don't exactly know how to go about finding love. I'm not desperate. I'm not in dire need of saving. I don't have any need to open up to anyone about problems I have been having, and even if I did, I can't get myself to do it. The person who can bring down this wall will be the one. Some people have managed to create cracks here and there, but they quickly seal themselves. My soul will know, but it is a painful game to play, and I do not know if I should be patient and let something fall into place or if I should be actively seeking this person with whom I want to spend the rest of my life. I'm leaning away from the latter because I have never been able to make that work.
I've also come to realize something else. I am attracted to men, and women, and all sorts of differently-gendered people. But when I really think about what would make me feel happy and fulfilled, I see myself with a woman--a woman who can float between femme and butch with grace. A tomboy with an effeminate side who can just as easily turn heads in Dockers as in a dress. Someone who can make each and every part of me feel like it is loved and cared for, and someone for whom I am more than a charity case who needs the collective pity of society.
When I find you, I will love you in ways you have never known possible. I will give myself to you after years of hiding that self behind a wall built from the fear of loneliness, helplessness, and depression. I will be able to give myself to you fully, as I haven't been able to do in so many years that I barely remember what it feels like to be human. Love is not safe. And maybe this is why I have not made progress.
I want nothing more than to be able to share myself with those closest to me. And with the rest of the world. I do not know what can help me reach this goal.
I have spent so much more time these days focusing on the kind of partner I want to be than on the kind of partner I want for myself. The right person will help bring out this person in me. Maybe I'm a little late in figuring this one out.
I may not feel better after writing this, but I feel that I have at least learned something. And that is progress.
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Being Okay
I came home seven months ago against my will, without knowing anyone here other than my parents. I suppose you could count the people I used to know in high school, but I'm sure none of them really exist anymore either. I even got to know a few of them all over again. In so many ways, this part of my life is the low-budget sequel to my high school experience. I make just about the same amount of money, spend a lot of time wondering about the future all by myself, and I live in the same room. Best Buy is like a giant high school (many, many of them actually went to my actual high school) as well, complete with relationship drama, cliques, and house parties. And because of those house parties, I actually have friends I trust enough to randomly text or maybe even call (gasp) whenever I need something.
I find it interesting that I make friends with military guys so easily. I'm sure that says something about my personality, perhaps about my general lack of concern for holding my tongue when it would otherwise be appropriate. Also pretty sure the obsession with physical fitness has something to do with it. But it's not just that I can chat with them or find common ground. There really is some sort of deeper connection I can't quite figure out, like they would be the kind of friend that I try to be, because when it comes to putting your ass on the line for your fellow man, they've pretty much done that for a living.
I read something that made me angry the other day, but it made me happy as well. And regardless of which emotion I ended up feeling throughout the night, I cried. I wanted to be angry at her, but I was really angry with myself for being so hurt by something that has nothing to do with me. That might actually be why it hurts. I am not ashamed to admit that I am envious of your life. But I am not upset. I am happy, and I am thankful that you understand how unique your position is and how many lives you have the ability to affect from it. And I hope those lives are affected in positive ways, and instead of harboring this negative energy and having it seep out into the real world, I have no choice but to let it go. I'm on my way to being happy. And you are already happy. And we had nothing to do with each other's happiness. And I am learning to be okay with that. I'm learning not to be sad. It's hard to forget about the moments of the two of us that I can still see in full color--about how you were part of what changed the course of my entire life. But I understand that I do not have to, and the beauty of my life is that I don't have to play by the rule that says I need to be the jealous ex-boyfriend. I can just be an old friend. And maybe a new one, one of these days, if our paths ever cross again. Awkwardness is just going to be part of this whole experience, but we don't have to try to force it out of the way. Let the awkwardness come and go as it pleases, and it'll probably depart sooner rather than later.
I was so worried about never finding another soul that fit quite as nicely as yours, but then I did, in the most unexpected of places. And now I feel the same way about him. I can only assume that the same thing may very well happen again. But I am still young, and patience is a thing that is relegated to certain scattered aspects of my life. The pressure is on to settle down and start having babies, as every day I see new notifications about who is engaged, married, or pregnant. I see their wedding pictures. They're looking into each other's eyes like the world could be burning down around them and they wouldn't care. The power of the camera to capture the aura of two souls wrapped around each other--two spirits blending together and radiating love--is something I have always respected. Their pictures more than anything make me feel exactly what it is that I do not have in my life. And then the pain becomes very real.
I do wonder if I will ever feel such an intense love again. I wonder if I will ever be able to look into another person's eyes and truly believe that I'll be doing the exact same thing thirty or forty or fifty years down the road. I wonder if someone will ever see past the broken parts of me or maybe even love them just as much. I wonder if the person I may find will be able to take me at my worst, which is something that no one else has been able to do. And I wonder if it will be my fault if they can't.
I'm scared of losing things. I'm very scared about life right now because I may be at a point of no return, if such a thing exists. I'm still scared of making the wrong choice, even though I know that there isn't one. I may have made the wrong choice a few years ago when I decided to pass on medical school, but it was something that I had to do, and the only reason I would even argue that it could have been wrong is based on information I obtained after the fact. I was going to say something about having learned some very important things in the past two years, but that is actually just as meaningless. I am here now. It is so easy to forget that this is my present experience. That it matters too. That I need to make it matter by continuing to do things that matter. I may not be where I want to be, but I do have at least some ability to make this more like the place in my life I DO want to be.
Where am I? I am in my old bedroom, but it is not the same. I changed it shortly after moving back home. I repainted the walls, removed the old posters, eliminated boxes and boxes of useless junk and filed the rest of it away under "memories". It looks very modern, organized. Everything matches in here, as opposed to the chaotic assortment of patterns and colors I amassed between moving into this room for the first time and moving away for college. I still do not feel like there is enough of me in this room to make it more than a comfortably decorated room in which I am staying. I'm a guest in many ways. I'm trying to make this place feel like it belongs to me, but it does not. I am in my parent's house, not mine. Nothing can change this back to what it used to be. And I'm not just talking about the room.
My favorite holiday was his favorite holiday too. I watched him get excited about decorating the house and scaring away little children. It looked spectacular, and I remember getting off work and trudging through the cold and the light misty rain after getting off the bus just to make it back in time to see the last of the trick-or-treaters heading home. I remember playing with the puppy in the yard and watching her grow enough to be able to climb the stairs without being terrified. When I went back to get my things last month, she was even bigger and now more fearless. And when he hugged me goodbye, I didn't want to let go. I never want to let go, and that's my problem. I could keep going further and further back into the past, getting caught in memories of getting caught in moments with people who aren't just blips on the radar. I'm so scared that I have lost the ability to feel the extremes of felicity, perhaps because of my frequent mental excursions into the past.
It may not seem like I'm ready to deal with my life yet, but I feel that I am getting closer. And it all started by taking the risk of going over someone's house a few weeks ago. I get more confident each time, yet I am still fearful of making mistakes. I am probably going to be okay. I might even be more than okay, but right now, I've got a space heater, a brand new computer, fifteen pounds of muscle I didn't have 6 months ago, and football drinking buddies. I'd say that constitutes a little bit more than being okay.
I find it interesting that I make friends with military guys so easily. I'm sure that says something about my personality, perhaps about my general lack of concern for holding my tongue when it would otherwise be appropriate. Also pretty sure the obsession with physical fitness has something to do with it. But it's not just that I can chat with them or find common ground. There really is some sort of deeper connection I can't quite figure out, like they would be the kind of friend that I try to be, because when it comes to putting your ass on the line for your fellow man, they've pretty much done that for a living.
I read something that made me angry the other day, but it made me happy as well. And regardless of which emotion I ended up feeling throughout the night, I cried. I wanted to be angry at her, but I was really angry with myself for being so hurt by something that has nothing to do with me. That might actually be why it hurts. I am not ashamed to admit that I am envious of your life. But I am not upset. I am happy, and I am thankful that you understand how unique your position is and how many lives you have the ability to affect from it. And I hope those lives are affected in positive ways, and instead of harboring this negative energy and having it seep out into the real world, I have no choice but to let it go. I'm on my way to being happy. And you are already happy. And we had nothing to do with each other's happiness. And I am learning to be okay with that. I'm learning not to be sad. It's hard to forget about the moments of the two of us that I can still see in full color--about how you were part of what changed the course of my entire life. But I understand that I do not have to, and the beauty of my life is that I don't have to play by the rule that says I need to be the jealous ex-boyfriend. I can just be an old friend. And maybe a new one, one of these days, if our paths ever cross again. Awkwardness is just going to be part of this whole experience, but we don't have to try to force it out of the way. Let the awkwardness come and go as it pleases, and it'll probably depart sooner rather than later.
I was so worried about never finding another soul that fit quite as nicely as yours, but then I did, in the most unexpected of places. And now I feel the same way about him. I can only assume that the same thing may very well happen again. But I am still young, and patience is a thing that is relegated to certain scattered aspects of my life. The pressure is on to settle down and start having babies, as every day I see new notifications about who is engaged, married, or pregnant. I see their wedding pictures. They're looking into each other's eyes like the world could be burning down around them and they wouldn't care. The power of the camera to capture the aura of two souls wrapped around each other--two spirits blending together and radiating love--is something I have always respected. Their pictures more than anything make me feel exactly what it is that I do not have in my life. And then the pain becomes very real.
I do wonder if I will ever feel such an intense love again. I wonder if I will ever be able to look into another person's eyes and truly believe that I'll be doing the exact same thing thirty or forty or fifty years down the road. I wonder if someone will ever see past the broken parts of me or maybe even love them just as much. I wonder if the person I may find will be able to take me at my worst, which is something that no one else has been able to do. And I wonder if it will be my fault if they can't.
I'm scared of losing things. I'm very scared about life right now because I may be at a point of no return, if such a thing exists. I'm still scared of making the wrong choice, even though I know that there isn't one. I may have made the wrong choice a few years ago when I decided to pass on medical school, but it was something that I had to do, and the only reason I would even argue that it could have been wrong is based on information I obtained after the fact. I was going to say something about having learned some very important things in the past two years, but that is actually just as meaningless. I am here now. It is so easy to forget that this is my present experience. That it matters too. That I need to make it matter by continuing to do things that matter. I may not be where I want to be, but I do have at least some ability to make this more like the place in my life I DO want to be.
Where am I? I am in my old bedroom, but it is not the same. I changed it shortly after moving back home. I repainted the walls, removed the old posters, eliminated boxes and boxes of useless junk and filed the rest of it away under "memories". It looks very modern, organized. Everything matches in here, as opposed to the chaotic assortment of patterns and colors I amassed between moving into this room for the first time and moving away for college. I still do not feel like there is enough of me in this room to make it more than a comfortably decorated room in which I am staying. I'm a guest in many ways. I'm trying to make this place feel like it belongs to me, but it does not. I am in my parent's house, not mine. Nothing can change this back to what it used to be. And I'm not just talking about the room.
My favorite holiday was his favorite holiday too. I watched him get excited about decorating the house and scaring away little children. It looked spectacular, and I remember getting off work and trudging through the cold and the light misty rain after getting off the bus just to make it back in time to see the last of the trick-or-treaters heading home. I remember playing with the puppy in the yard and watching her grow enough to be able to climb the stairs without being terrified. When I went back to get my things last month, she was even bigger and now more fearless. And when he hugged me goodbye, I didn't want to let go. I never want to let go, and that's my problem. I could keep going further and further back into the past, getting caught in memories of getting caught in moments with people who aren't just blips on the radar. I'm so scared that I have lost the ability to feel the extremes of felicity, perhaps because of my frequent mental excursions into the past.
It may not seem like I'm ready to deal with my life yet, but I feel that I am getting closer. And it all started by taking the risk of going over someone's house a few weeks ago. I get more confident each time, yet I am still fearful of making mistakes. I am probably going to be okay. I might even be more than okay, but right now, I've got a space heater, a brand new computer, fifteen pounds of muscle I didn't have 6 months ago, and football drinking buddies. I'd say that constitutes a little bit more than being okay.
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Return to South Oakland
Quite frequently, I get the urge to do something really nice and thoughtful for someone who absolutely doesn't deserve it. This happens with people I don't even really like all that much, but I am reminded of better times and of something that would make them smile, something that would be important to them. And I always want to be able to give that to people. I feel like this says way more about my personality than it should, and I'm not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing.
I'm staying with friends in Pittsburgh, and I do not feel pressured to party or be crazy or do anything I don't actually feel like doing this weekend. I feel like a guest coming in for a visit, not a freeloader or someone who just needs a place to sleep. I'm going grocery shopping with her tomorrow and helping out a little, not in return for her letting me stay here but because that's just simply the right thing to do.
It's strange how college apartments can feel like real homes. And then how some real homes will never be anything close to that.
I want to have the kind of home where my friends will always feel welcome. I want to be that safe haven for someone who really needs it. I want to just sit and be in the company of people who can live together as a family, who can be with each other in a room and not be strangers. I want to have the ability to control that about my place--the ability to open up my home to the people that matter to me.
The little things about people's places get to me. Seeing silly things like certain dishes or a Brita picther or even just movies on the rack instead of in some garbage bag three hundred miles away or shoved in a bin somewhere. Things have their place in a home. But I almost feel like I don't have one in mine. I think a lot of that has to do with my fears about January and my fears about my father. There are times I do want to just go upstairs and hang out with my mother, but I just don't want to be in the same room with him. I keep trying but it's so hard to get myself past what he's done and will inevitably do again. I don't know how to deal with this at all. I am learning a little more about how to deal with the good and bad sides of people (and that everyone does indeed have both), but what happens when the bad seems to outweigh the good so much? Is there a logical answer to this, and why the hell am I even trying to quantify good and evil in the first place?
More people getting married. Having babies and real jobs. And here I am. A wanderer with no sense of home or purpose. I wouldn't mind if I didn't feel like I were actually lost. I'm scared of not knowing. And I know I've said that too many times already.
I'm happy that I am right here, right now. As far as this present moment is concerned, there is no other place I would rather be. And I feel like I really will be able to fall asleep like a normal person tonight. I enjoy hearing laughter upstairs rather than crying or screaming.
I want my house to feel like home. And it doesn't NOT feel like home, entirely. There is just something missing, and maybe I just feel out of place. I feel like I don't really belong there. I don't even have a door to my room. I know that it is because I am still having trouble seeing this part of my life as anything other than a stepping stone to the next part, which may mean that I am afraid to make the place feel like home again. You can't miss home if you don't have one. I'm not sure which of those feelings is worse. I want to be able to feel the emotions I need to again.
Love. And the feeling of real friendship. Just having the touch of a human being mean something more than an accident or something that I have to do because it would be rude not to.
I don't think I have a calling. I don't think I am supposed to be doing anything. I'm not one of the lucky ones who has it all figured out, and I really thought I was. So what does that mean? Do I just decide to do something and see where it takes me? It's obvious that something will have to be left behind in order for me to do anything more with my life, but what will make me the happiest? There's no way to collect data on this one. There's no way to do an accurate calculation. I hate taking chances. I don't even buy lottery tickets.
I remember when I got lottery tickets on my 18th birthday, like it meant something. Now birthdays don't mean anything. How do I make this meaningful, this getting older thing? I don't want to be okay with the idea that I'll be alone for the rest of my life, but what if that is what I need to do in order to get out of the head space I'm in now?
I just feel surrounded by so much hate most of the time, and it's nice to be in a place where that isn't the case, if only for a few days. But I will probably feel that way on Saturday too. I don't even know what to expect. I guess I'll be crying either way.
Why is it so easy to be calm in South Oakland? Very odd.
I'm staying with friends in Pittsburgh, and I do not feel pressured to party or be crazy or do anything I don't actually feel like doing this weekend. I feel like a guest coming in for a visit, not a freeloader or someone who just needs a place to sleep. I'm going grocery shopping with her tomorrow and helping out a little, not in return for her letting me stay here but because that's just simply the right thing to do.
It's strange how college apartments can feel like real homes. And then how some real homes will never be anything close to that.
I want to have the kind of home where my friends will always feel welcome. I want to be that safe haven for someone who really needs it. I want to just sit and be in the company of people who can live together as a family, who can be with each other in a room and not be strangers. I want to have the ability to control that about my place--the ability to open up my home to the people that matter to me.
The little things about people's places get to me. Seeing silly things like certain dishes or a Brita picther or even just movies on the rack instead of in some garbage bag three hundred miles away or shoved in a bin somewhere. Things have their place in a home. But I almost feel like I don't have one in mine. I think a lot of that has to do with my fears about January and my fears about my father. There are times I do want to just go upstairs and hang out with my mother, but I just don't want to be in the same room with him. I keep trying but it's so hard to get myself past what he's done and will inevitably do again. I don't know how to deal with this at all. I am learning a little more about how to deal with the good and bad sides of people (and that everyone does indeed have both), but what happens when the bad seems to outweigh the good so much? Is there a logical answer to this, and why the hell am I even trying to quantify good and evil in the first place?
More people getting married. Having babies and real jobs. And here I am. A wanderer with no sense of home or purpose. I wouldn't mind if I didn't feel like I were actually lost. I'm scared of not knowing. And I know I've said that too many times already.
I'm happy that I am right here, right now. As far as this present moment is concerned, there is no other place I would rather be. And I feel like I really will be able to fall asleep like a normal person tonight. I enjoy hearing laughter upstairs rather than crying or screaming.
I want my house to feel like home. And it doesn't NOT feel like home, entirely. There is just something missing, and maybe I just feel out of place. I feel like I don't really belong there. I don't even have a door to my room. I know that it is because I am still having trouble seeing this part of my life as anything other than a stepping stone to the next part, which may mean that I am afraid to make the place feel like home again. You can't miss home if you don't have one. I'm not sure which of those feelings is worse. I want to be able to feel the emotions I need to again.
Love. And the feeling of real friendship. Just having the touch of a human being mean something more than an accident or something that I have to do because it would be rude not to.
I don't think I have a calling. I don't think I am supposed to be doing anything. I'm not one of the lucky ones who has it all figured out, and I really thought I was. So what does that mean? Do I just decide to do something and see where it takes me? It's obvious that something will have to be left behind in order for me to do anything more with my life, but what will make me the happiest? There's no way to collect data on this one. There's no way to do an accurate calculation. I hate taking chances. I don't even buy lottery tickets.
I remember when I got lottery tickets on my 18th birthday, like it meant something. Now birthdays don't mean anything. How do I make this meaningful, this getting older thing? I don't want to be okay with the idea that I'll be alone for the rest of my life, but what if that is what I need to do in order to get out of the head space I'm in now?
I just feel surrounded by so much hate most of the time, and it's nice to be in a place where that isn't the case, if only for a few days. But I will probably feel that way on Saturday too. I don't even know what to expect. I guess I'll be crying either way.
Why is it so easy to be calm in South Oakland? Very odd.
Friday, August 31, 2012
Pouring Out My Brain
Today is a heavy sigh kind of day. It's Friday night, and I'm a little worn out from a double session at the gym today, preceded immediately by 6 hours of torturous work in a retail environment. I'm not in the mood to go out, but I wouldn't really be opposed if I were to get invited tonight. But that call will never come. I have a few things that need to be done, but it seems so late already that I'm afraid to actually start anything. And maybe I'd just like to relax and enjoy some time to myself, though not really to myself since my parents are upstairs, and I don't have a door, meaning I can hear everything that's going on up there anyway. I don't think I get a chance to really be alone very often, and maybe that would help me to feel less lonely. It sounds strange, but being by myself gives me time to recharge and to process what has happened. I feel like I can't keep up with my life when I don't have this opportunity. There are other things that interfere as well, but this might be the most troubling one. I seemed to be doing a lot better when I had my own place and could make my own rules about my living situation. And I didn't have to worry about someone being there when I didn't want them to be. I could know what to expect when I got home, recharge for even a few minutes or an hour, and be ready to go about my evening. Public transportation here is almost non-existent, so I literally always have to get a ride to go anywhere other than the shopping plaza near my house, which is still probably a little over a mile away.
There is no sense of community here either, not in the way that I need it. It's weird not having any trans or queer friends. I have what I would consider gay friends and acquaintances, but they don't quite get the concept of queer. As far as I can tell, I might be one of the only people in the county who does. Probably multiple counties. I miss being able to talk about queer things and am just bored by conversations and jokes that rely on stereotypes about men and women. And yet I am sometimes forced to use this same stereotypes to make connections with customers when I could honestly care less.
I think I lied. I forgot to mention something, so I didn't do it on purpose. The other day, a transwoman came into the store. I needed to use her ID to look up her credit card and complete the purchase. The ID was still in her birth name, and I treated her just like I would have any other woman coming through the line. I know she may not have noticed. She might have prayed for things to go smoothly, to not get any weird looks, to just be able to get in and get out without having someone questioning her identity or mocking her as she walked away. I know the look that someone gets in these situations. I wish I could have told her that I understand. I wanted to have some way of sharing with her that I got it and that there was someone else in this fucking shithole town who deals with the same thing on an almost daily basis. But I didn't want to draw attention to her. And I don't think she would have wanted me to do that either, but it still might have been nice for both of us. This is what I meant about losing my queer visibility. Not being able to make that instant connection. Not being able to look at another short-haired, obviously female-bodied person and exchange stories without saying a word. Just blending in and exchanging glances with people whose eyes have no stories to tell, who don't want their eyes to have a story to tell.
Without a whole community of transmen and people who get them, I find myself very lost up here. I'm all about education, but I don't want every interaction I have to be a lecture on gender theory. Sometimes I just want to be in a room full of people who get it. It's like trying to play a game of basketball but stopping all the time because your teammates don't really know the rules. There's no flow. No rhythm. And it's awkward.
It's not even ten o'clock. If I were in Pittsburgh, I'd be with my trans friends, most likely, or sitting next to the boy who wouldn't have broken up with me because I moved away. Because I wouldn't have moved away. I hate doing this to myself. If. It doesn't exist, so there isn't much point indulging in fantasies about a life that doesn't exist, at least not anymore. I would probably be having an easier time if I had been ready to leave. But there was so much that I didn't get to do. I was in the middle of so many important things. And I got blindsided. I had to leave against my will and with virtually no time to get my shit together. Maybe leaving home for college was so easy because I had all that time to get ready. Maybe planning to leave was easy because I would have been ready. I would have found a way to become ready. That never happened, and I still don't know how to handle it. I don't know how to get past what I assume is the feeling of regret/loss. I have a hard time letting things go. And an even harder time letting people go. I don't want this to be the end of things. But it just has to be. And it hurts every single day. I keep seeing and thinking about things that remind me of my friends and my old life. And I don't even feel like I could possibly be the same person, with the life that I am living now. I get tastes every now and then when I visit. It feels like the city is calling me back and telling me that everything is waiting for me to pick up right where I left off. It feels like everything will be the same. The comfort of a warm blanket and the arms of people who know you intimately, who can know you when you are unable to know yourself. I wonder if I will ever have that again, but more importantly, I mourn over the fact that I will never have anything like it ever again. Because each hug is different and each person radiates something different into my life. I can still feel the ripples, but they are fading, and I fear that I won't remember how beautiful it is to be loved.
I am losing my understanding of the experiences of love/intimacy because I live without them. I'm afraid that I will be so damaged by the experiences of the last few months (and years) that I'll never be able to fix myself, meaning that moving to a new city will leave me feeling exactly the same.
I'm still toying with the idea of going out tonight. But I'm leaning towards no because if I were to go, I'd really like to be able to do it myself. Maybe this thought kept coming back to me because my brain is trying to tell me what I need to do. But not all of my brain is telling me this. Other parts are afraid of going out. Am I afraid of going out because I have no connection or because I don't want to have a connection to this place? Will not having one make it easier to leave? It's ironic that misery can be comfortable. Or at least more comfortable than some things, like the unknown.
I just want to have a real conversation with someone again. To feel like we are really communicating something to one another instead of exchanging pleasantries and talking about things because we are afraid to be silent around one another. I won't go out tonight. Maybe I will next time, but I think I always say that. I don't want to have to pretend when I go out. Maybe I don't have to. But I'm always worried that a problem will arise, and I won't be able to get out of it, and no one else will know what to do. Or maybe I'm just fishing for excuses now. That last part sounds like something my brother would say.
I'm worried about stopping the writing again. Silence. Nothingness. Moving on to doing nothing. At least this might serve some purpose. I can't even tell if I am more or less agitated by doing this, writing when I can't stop thinking and/or when there is nothing else to do.
"do" is a word that made the list of jobs/career paths I've considered in the past year and a half flash in front of my eyes. PA, teacher, pharmacist, doctor, researcher (in different fields), personal trainer, businessman, entertainer. over and over again. i'm pretty sure art school was in there somewhere too. Social work. You name it. I have probably considered it. I don't know what the fuck to do. I wonder if I am any closer. I need to do something soon. If I don't, I may never do anything, and I would like to believe that doing something is better than doing nothing. Something queer. That always comes up as well. I wish I knew what made the most sense. I wish this were a decision based on logic or some magical equation. But life just doesn't work that way, or maybe it does and I don't know the equation. I suppose most people factor in money. And maybe time. But then everything kind of ends up the same when I think about it. I need to stop thinking about everything, all the time. There's no time to live with all of this thinking.
There's no time to live with all of this thinking. Interesting.
I'm terrified about having to take the bus tomorrow because I think I will miss it. And I don't know which route it takes or how early I need to be there. What will most likely happen is that I will leave ridiculously early and still be paranoid. And then I'll be too stressed out from the ride to handle a 5-hour shift on a Saturday night. I wish I weren't able to predict this. At least buses here are cheap, even if they only run until 4 PM tomorrow. I don't exactly hate this place. I just hate the way it works. And how people are morons. There seem to be way more of them here than anywhere else I've ever been. I'm honestly not surprised, but I wish I didn't have to deal with them every day. Morons with a lot of money, talking down to me. At least I treat them with respect. Even in real life, I treat idiots with respect. Idiots can still be nice people. (Please see the sarcasm here. I'm not really this much of a jerk.) I think I only use these terms when the combination is mean AND stupid. I suppose I get upset when people yell at me because of THEIR OWN dumb mistakes. It's fine if you yell about mine. Well, no it isn't, but at least I can understand that.
I have that feeling in my chest again. I think it has been there all day. But it's like something is sitting on my chest or compressing my insides. All the fucking time. And I know this isn't normal because I have a fading memory of the few weeks where I didn't feel like this. There were probably other times years ago, but those are difficult to recall.
I don't understand my own feelings all the time. I spend a lot of time trying to figure them out, and I get worried that this means I don't really know who I am. Then I think to myself, who does? This is really all over the place, isn't it? Makes sense to me.
I might not even be done tonight, but I think I am for now. Maybe I'll find something else to write about when I can't fall asleep later. When. Not if.
There is no sense of community here either, not in the way that I need it. It's weird not having any trans or queer friends. I have what I would consider gay friends and acquaintances, but they don't quite get the concept of queer. As far as I can tell, I might be one of the only people in the county who does. Probably multiple counties. I miss being able to talk about queer things and am just bored by conversations and jokes that rely on stereotypes about men and women. And yet I am sometimes forced to use this same stereotypes to make connections with customers when I could honestly care less.
I think I lied. I forgot to mention something, so I didn't do it on purpose. The other day, a transwoman came into the store. I needed to use her ID to look up her credit card and complete the purchase. The ID was still in her birth name, and I treated her just like I would have any other woman coming through the line. I know she may not have noticed. She might have prayed for things to go smoothly, to not get any weird looks, to just be able to get in and get out without having someone questioning her identity or mocking her as she walked away. I know the look that someone gets in these situations. I wish I could have told her that I understand. I wanted to have some way of sharing with her that I got it and that there was someone else in this fucking shithole town who deals with the same thing on an almost daily basis. But I didn't want to draw attention to her. And I don't think she would have wanted me to do that either, but it still might have been nice for both of us. This is what I meant about losing my queer visibility. Not being able to make that instant connection. Not being able to look at another short-haired, obviously female-bodied person and exchange stories without saying a word. Just blending in and exchanging glances with people whose eyes have no stories to tell, who don't want their eyes to have a story to tell.
Without a whole community of transmen and people who get them, I find myself very lost up here. I'm all about education, but I don't want every interaction I have to be a lecture on gender theory. Sometimes I just want to be in a room full of people who get it. It's like trying to play a game of basketball but stopping all the time because your teammates don't really know the rules. There's no flow. No rhythm. And it's awkward.
It's not even ten o'clock. If I were in Pittsburgh, I'd be with my trans friends, most likely, or sitting next to the boy who wouldn't have broken up with me because I moved away. Because I wouldn't have moved away. I hate doing this to myself. If. It doesn't exist, so there isn't much point indulging in fantasies about a life that doesn't exist, at least not anymore. I would probably be having an easier time if I had been ready to leave. But there was so much that I didn't get to do. I was in the middle of so many important things. And I got blindsided. I had to leave against my will and with virtually no time to get my shit together. Maybe leaving home for college was so easy because I had all that time to get ready. Maybe planning to leave was easy because I would have been ready. I would have found a way to become ready. That never happened, and I still don't know how to handle it. I don't know how to get past what I assume is the feeling of regret/loss. I have a hard time letting things go. And an even harder time letting people go. I don't want this to be the end of things. But it just has to be. And it hurts every single day. I keep seeing and thinking about things that remind me of my friends and my old life. And I don't even feel like I could possibly be the same person, with the life that I am living now. I get tastes every now and then when I visit. It feels like the city is calling me back and telling me that everything is waiting for me to pick up right where I left off. It feels like everything will be the same. The comfort of a warm blanket and the arms of people who know you intimately, who can know you when you are unable to know yourself. I wonder if I will ever have that again, but more importantly, I mourn over the fact that I will never have anything like it ever again. Because each hug is different and each person radiates something different into my life. I can still feel the ripples, but they are fading, and I fear that I won't remember how beautiful it is to be loved.
I am losing my understanding of the experiences of love/intimacy because I live without them. I'm afraid that I will be so damaged by the experiences of the last few months (and years) that I'll never be able to fix myself, meaning that moving to a new city will leave me feeling exactly the same.
I'm still toying with the idea of going out tonight. But I'm leaning towards no because if I were to go, I'd really like to be able to do it myself. Maybe this thought kept coming back to me because my brain is trying to tell me what I need to do. But not all of my brain is telling me this. Other parts are afraid of going out. Am I afraid of going out because I have no connection or because I don't want to have a connection to this place? Will not having one make it easier to leave? It's ironic that misery can be comfortable. Or at least more comfortable than some things, like the unknown.
I just want to have a real conversation with someone again. To feel like we are really communicating something to one another instead of exchanging pleasantries and talking about things because we are afraid to be silent around one another. I won't go out tonight. Maybe I will next time, but I think I always say that. I don't want to have to pretend when I go out. Maybe I don't have to. But I'm always worried that a problem will arise, and I won't be able to get out of it, and no one else will know what to do. Or maybe I'm just fishing for excuses now. That last part sounds like something my brother would say.
I'm worried about stopping the writing again. Silence. Nothingness. Moving on to doing nothing. At least this might serve some purpose. I can't even tell if I am more or less agitated by doing this, writing when I can't stop thinking and/or when there is nothing else to do.
"do" is a word that made the list of jobs/career paths I've considered in the past year and a half flash in front of my eyes. PA, teacher, pharmacist, doctor, researcher (in different fields), personal trainer, businessman, entertainer. over and over again. i'm pretty sure art school was in there somewhere too. Social work. You name it. I have probably considered it. I don't know what the fuck to do. I wonder if I am any closer. I need to do something soon. If I don't, I may never do anything, and I would like to believe that doing something is better than doing nothing. Something queer. That always comes up as well. I wish I knew what made the most sense. I wish this were a decision based on logic or some magical equation. But life just doesn't work that way, or maybe it does and I don't know the equation. I suppose most people factor in money. And maybe time. But then everything kind of ends up the same when I think about it. I need to stop thinking about everything, all the time. There's no time to live with all of this thinking.
There's no time to live with all of this thinking. Interesting.
I'm terrified about having to take the bus tomorrow because I think I will miss it. And I don't know which route it takes or how early I need to be there. What will most likely happen is that I will leave ridiculously early and still be paranoid. And then I'll be too stressed out from the ride to handle a 5-hour shift on a Saturday night. I wish I weren't able to predict this. At least buses here are cheap, even if they only run until 4 PM tomorrow. I don't exactly hate this place. I just hate the way it works. And how people are morons. There seem to be way more of them here than anywhere else I've ever been. I'm honestly not surprised, but I wish I didn't have to deal with them every day. Morons with a lot of money, talking down to me. At least I treat them with respect. Even in real life, I treat idiots with respect. Idiots can still be nice people. (Please see the sarcasm here. I'm not really this much of a jerk.) I think I only use these terms when the combination is mean AND stupid. I suppose I get upset when people yell at me because of THEIR OWN dumb mistakes. It's fine if you yell about mine. Well, no it isn't, but at least I can understand that.
I have that feeling in my chest again. I think it has been there all day. But it's like something is sitting on my chest or compressing my insides. All the fucking time. And I know this isn't normal because I have a fading memory of the few weeks where I didn't feel like this. There were probably other times years ago, but those are difficult to recall.
I don't understand my own feelings all the time. I spend a lot of time trying to figure them out, and I get worried that this means I don't really know who I am. Then I think to myself, who does? This is really all over the place, isn't it? Makes sense to me.
I might not even be done tonight, but I think I am for now. Maybe I'll find something else to write about when I can't fall asleep later. When. Not if.
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Letting my thoughts drift
At the core, I am the same person I have always been. Whatever happens outside of me, physically, experientially, or whatever, is separate from the core energy I possess. What is so different now? I suppose it is that I can no longer pretend to be innocent. I am no longer another person's escape from the world. I am not new and exciting but a part of something established, known enough to be known by my faults.
I want to be caught in the rain again without having to care about what comes next, without exception or expectation.
Sometimes our perceptions change because we want things to fit into the present. Even if nothing changes, everything can change. Sometimes we need it to because we wouldn't be able to move forward if it didnt.
What do I need to do? Realize that it's okay to let yourself get wet. The innocence is probably still there, but I've had my guard up for way too long. I don't know what it feels like to just be open and honest, to let myself fall apart or be crazy when I need to, to feel like everyone will understand if I do. I wish I had someone to remind me.
I've come to realize that moving back to Pittsburgh would mean moving back to a place where I am surrounded by people trying to remind me of my incapabilities. I can not live in a place that sees me as helpless and hopeless. That is not the energy I need, and maybe I should have realized that sooner. But if I had, I wouldn't have known where I need to go next.
The song "Closing Time" just started playing in my head, and for some reason that reminded me of the big, black binder of CDs you brought from high school. And then of driving to Cleveland. Nostalgia is a very interesting phenomenon. Then again, so is my brain. Or anyone's.
I don't try to stop myself anymore, if there's anything I have learned
From the mindfulness literature, it's that trying to stop yourself from feeling something is unlikely to be effective. It is just extraordinarily difficult to maintain the belief that it is okay to feel everything that I do--that everything is the way it needs to be at this moment. Even the fear and the rage and the doubt.
This present moment. 530 in the morning. Typing this blog entry on my phone. It is summer. And I am thinking about how no one I meet will ever know what came before, not really.
You and I were the only ones that new my body as it was changing. There was one other, but he was too afraid to understand. And I think about how remarkable that experience must really have been. I hadn't really stopped to think about those things until recently. I was afraid of getting myself into a trap, worried about where my thoughts might take me. I'm not so worried about those things anymore, and I am learning that it is okay to remember.
I am not the story of my pain, nor of my past. Those things may be a part of that story, but I'm learning something new. I used to believe in the power of the story more than anything. Everyone has and is a story. And it would be great to learn all of them or at least try. But that isn't the most important thing. Your video clip reminded me of something. Human brings are energy. Kinetic and potential. Energy is a concept that only makes sense in the present.
I have stored up enough of this energy. I can feel it and I recognize my personal need to be in motion at this time in my life, and that need is most likely connected to the need to interact with different energies. The story is irrelevant. I don't need stories right now. I need energy. I need interaction and violent chemical explosions. If I am hydrogen, I need to find my oxygen. Insert nerdy joke about a threesome.
there is no other side on which to emerge. The hard part of life is not something you get through. Real life success stories don't stop at the happy ending. Good things can start happening, but that doesn't mean it won't be hard or that bad things will stop. Fairy tales are attractive because we want to believe that everything will be...euphoric when we get through whatever we are dealing with. The hardest thing I have had to learn is this concept that life will never be like that. I'll never be able to stand on the other side of my painful experiences and look on with objectivity. Because there is no other side. I wonder if this is true for everyone.
My thumbs hurt because this app only works when the phone is vertical. That seems like a major flaw to me.
I want to be caught in the rain again without having to care about what comes next, without exception or expectation.
Sometimes our perceptions change because we want things to fit into the present. Even if nothing changes, everything can change. Sometimes we need it to because we wouldn't be able to move forward if it didnt.
What do I need to do? Realize that it's okay to let yourself get wet. The innocence is probably still there, but I've had my guard up for way too long. I don't know what it feels like to just be open and honest, to let myself fall apart or be crazy when I need to, to feel like everyone will understand if I do. I wish I had someone to remind me.
I've come to realize that moving back to Pittsburgh would mean moving back to a place where I am surrounded by people trying to remind me of my incapabilities. I can not live in a place that sees me as helpless and hopeless. That is not the energy I need, and maybe I should have realized that sooner. But if I had, I wouldn't have known where I need to go next.
The song "Closing Time" just started playing in my head, and for some reason that reminded me of the big, black binder of CDs you brought from high school. And then of driving to Cleveland. Nostalgia is a very interesting phenomenon. Then again, so is my brain. Or anyone's.
I don't try to stop myself anymore, if there's anything I have learned
From the mindfulness literature, it's that trying to stop yourself from feeling something is unlikely to be effective. It is just extraordinarily difficult to maintain the belief that it is okay to feel everything that I do--that everything is the way it needs to be at this moment. Even the fear and the rage and the doubt.
This present moment. 530 in the morning. Typing this blog entry on my phone. It is summer. And I am thinking about how no one I meet will ever know what came before, not really.
You and I were the only ones that new my body as it was changing. There was one other, but he was too afraid to understand. And I think about how remarkable that experience must really have been. I hadn't really stopped to think about those things until recently. I was afraid of getting myself into a trap, worried about where my thoughts might take me. I'm not so worried about those things anymore, and I am learning that it is okay to remember.
I am not the story of my pain, nor of my past. Those things may be a part of that story, but I'm learning something new. I used to believe in the power of the story more than anything. Everyone has and is a story. And it would be great to learn all of them or at least try. But that isn't the most important thing. Your video clip reminded me of something. Human brings are energy. Kinetic and potential. Energy is a concept that only makes sense in the present.
I have stored up enough of this energy. I can feel it and I recognize my personal need to be in motion at this time in my life, and that need is most likely connected to the need to interact with different energies. The story is irrelevant. I don't need stories right now. I need energy. I need interaction and violent chemical explosions. If I am hydrogen, I need to find my oxygen. Insert nerdy joke about a threesome.
there is no other side on which to emerge. The hard part of life is not something you get through. Real life success stories don't stop at the happy ending. Good things can start happening, but that doesn't mean it won't be hard or that bad things will stop. Fairy tales are attractive because we want to believe that everything will be...euphoric when we get through whatever we are dealing with. The hardest thing I have had to learn is this concept that life will never be like that. I'll never be able to stand on the other side of my painful experiences and look on with objectivity. Because there is no other side. I wonder if this is true for everyone.
My thumbs hurt because this app only works when the phone is vertical. That seems like a major flaw to me.
Friday, July 13, 2012
Necessary Nonsense
My brain is my illusion. My body is yours. I am an action potential whose potential lies in potential actions in parallel systems. Mirror neurons, me and you. My every cell jumping along with you before I can tell myself no. You are all in control of everything within me. And I you. This tug of war between forces we cannot see. Horizontal gravity.
And the white hot fork in the eye that changed my life forever. Changed me forever. I lost the connections that made this all make sense. I fill the blind spots of my consciousness with facts and figures, books and games, endless things because you can’t fill can’t possibly fill a space that doesn’t exist.
Visceral. Say it again. Visceral. A word that slithers along. Entrails.
Yes. Just like that. Cauterize me. Make it white hot and blinding. Erase everything. The facts and figures toys and books and games and names I understood. I won’t feel a thing. The gate is closed.
And the white hot fork in the eye that changed my life forever. Changed me forever. I lost the connections that made this all make sense. I fill the blind spots of my consciousness with facts and figures, books and games, endless things because you can’t fill can’t possibly fill a space that doesn’t exist.
Visceral. Say it again. Visceral. A word that slithers along. Entrails.
Yes. Just like that. Cauterize me. Make it white hot and blinding. Erase everything. The facts and figures toys and books and games and names I understood. I won’t feel a thing. The gate is closed.
Names
Shot in the soul by a pointed word
the arrows of your curvatures
each little letter alphabetical icicles melt me freeze me in place freeze me in time in a time when that word was meant for me and I
see my blood and yours all tangled up in liquid knots
and solid, coagulated, dead, dried, useless, old, dead nots.
My tears
and body just as wet as the day we met
The humidity of humanity.
The urge to breathe.
To fight the suffocation and just keep pushing keep pumping keep bleeding on the inside.
The effects of gaseous reason cannot be seen. Cannot be smelled, felt, tasted. Only the dead benefit from reason.
And it is rage. It is sadness. And they are the same.
the arrows of your curvatures
each little letter alphabetical icicles melt me freeze me in place freeze me in time in a time when that word was meant for me and I
see my blood and yours all tangled up in liquid knots
and solid, coagulated, dead, dried, useless, old, dead nots.
My tears
and body just as wet as the day we met
The humidity of humanity.
The urge to breathe.
To fight the suffocation and just keep pushing keep pumping keep bleeding on the inside.
The effects of gaseous reason cannot be seen. Cannot be smelled, felt, tasted. Only the dead benefit from reason.
And it is rage. It is sadness. And they are the same.
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