First step to happiness

Trust is tricky because you can't really love without trust. Even after my mother catches me lying to her, the next day she still takes my word for where I'm going that night (though with more suspicion) because she loves me unconditionally. A love without trust is tainted, and an honest relationship of any kind is impossible.

I rarely believe in successful relationships after one of the partners has cheated. The other tries to overcome the past because "I'm still in love", but except in rare cases where the trust is fully regained after a certain period of time, there will always be a slight sense of discomfort regardless of how benevolent both people's intentions are. I'm not criticizing - I've been cheated on in the past, and though I broke it off, I always gave another chance. But I'm also not denying that it won't be the same. Every time I see him messaging a girl he's messed with in the past, I flinch. Every time he stays out past midnight, it takes a big effort to drive away the slight paranoia that won't let me fall asleep. Why bother, if it's such a big stress case? Because "I'm still in love". But after weeks of the same scenario I can honestly say that it sucks.

A relationship is successful if it continues to make you happy, and true happiness is a long-term sort of contentness. An emotional roller coaster of tears and ecstasy is all fun when you're, like, 15, but after a while you want something that brings you security. What I'm doing is about as antonymic of security as milk and Campari, and yet I stay. And here's a fun fact: I've been crying every night for the past week. Every damn night - about moving away, my parents' scandals, getting yelled at at the post office (yeah... seriously), being the emotional baggage girl in college, and how I'm losing this fight. I feel like I'm shooting myself in the foot when I tell him my insecurities, but that's wrong, because someone who truly cares about you won't love you less for your insecurities. Those nights, I feel helpless and can't think of a single step to take in the positive direction.

Then there are times like now, when I think I know what that step has to be. It is to trust, no matter how badly you want to keep your guard up. Either trust, or leave. I don't have much experience in love, but I think in the long term, it's better to be the person who puts themselves out there and gets hurt rather than the one who always lives in suspicion. Because pretending to be happy is about as helpful to you as knowing that tulips come from Turkey.
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Poor little piggies get no love

I'm rotting in bed under thick wool covers while the sun is outside having a life. I'm not allowed to shower or wash my hair in case the temperature catapults, my mom's cell died so she took mine and ran off for the day, and I'm missing the last days of spirit week. And the inside of my throat resembles a Georgia O'Keeffe painting.

Every time I swallow, it feels like I'm gargling razor blades. The hospital is absolutely booked because everyone in the entire Bay Area who has sneezed in the past two days decided they have the swine flu, and are now desperately trying to get on the phone with one of the nurses to bitch about their symptoms. My temperature's stable, so that rules out the flu and strep throat. Then what the hell is making it impossible for me to swallow my own spit?

There's a lot to think about, I guess, to kill time. But I think the swelling in my neck is seeping into my brain and my eyes are closing and I want to think about nothing at all. At least when I'm sleeping, my throat rests. When will my mind learn to do the same?



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Too fast and too much

And so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
-Fitzgerald


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When love is just short of enough

I will warn you from the very beginning that this post will probably end up sappy, unnecessarily dramatic, emotional, and reek of unhappy.

I'm sitting in Starbucks designing the header for my new blog for journalism class. It will be news-oriented with a weekly fictional story, but whatever about that. I'm sitting here, still shaken from last night. I can't say what happened because I'm afraid that no words in this language can accurately depict what took place. I'm afraid of wrong words. Truth is, I wish I could find the right way to express the situation at least to myself, but the part of my mind that's devoted to (over)thinking is a big fat clouded mess.

It's times like these when I wish I left the country next day. Like a one night stand, I want to keep the memory of what happened exactly the way it is without the morning-after crap. I want to sit on a plane and savor the details, mentally storing it into the favorite-moments bin, and many years later recall it with a few girlfriends over a bottle of wine. What I don't want is to be sitting in Starbucks trying to decide how to deal with the consequences, where to go from here, and whether I should keep waiting for something that kinda really won't happen.

Last night was the release. We were balancing on the tip of a dagger, and last night we fell. It was absolutely bound to happen, but then again, so was this the next day. I don't know why we drive ourselves into the same cycle. I swear, we are self-destructive. Or maybe it's just the way humans are built; maybe once we get it all, there's nothing to want anymore. If last night was so good, why is running far away all I can think about? Because I know it can only go downhill from here. This has happened too many times; I know the pattern too well.

There's something missing. I can't drive the feeling away that this is not how things should go - that if you want to be with someone, you wouldn't get tired of their company. And it's not only him. As much as I listen for the text-message beep on my phone, I want solitude. It's hard to want everything and nothing at the same time.

And then there's that feeling of the inevitable: we should just give it up because it's not going to work. We're not right. We don't fit like puzzle pieces, don't complete each other's half-empty glasses. We both know damn well that we're going on completely different paths in life, and it's only a matter of three or so months before those paths divide forever. Then why bother? Why make goodbye harder?

I can't do this to myself, again. I just can't.

"You know something?"

"Hmm?"

"Every time we're at this point, when things are this good, we think - nothing could go wrong. But it always does."

"I know. I forgot how good it felt to just lie here."

"But why? Why do things always have to go wrong?"

"I think it's because we say it every time. We say, what could possibly go wrong from here? We're jinxing it."

"Mmm."

"It's a vicious cycle."

"But you know what? Screw it. Even if it gets worse, I don't mind as long as we end up back here eventually."

"Yeah. Me neither."

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Overthinking is bad with a capital B

I am so behind on posting funny interesting stuff that makes you guys laugh, I know.

Everything's moving so fast. Deadlines are coming up for everything - financial aid applications for college, yearbook, josten's design contest, the spanish newspaper, my Anna Karenina essay - I barely have time to sit down for a breather and think about making a To-Do list and realize that list will be so large and tedious that making it requires a slot of its own. Sometimes I completely forget to look at my National Singles Awesomeness month calendar for the daily theme. I'm behind on my favorite TV shows, haven't even started Othello (which we were supposed to finish reading for English by friday, I think), and I haven't had a Milky Way in over a week. A week!! But that's partly due to the insane amount of food the yearbook room has generously been feeding us with lately.

With everything so hectic, some things are being overlooked. Like, um, school. Somehow I managed to get a 97% on my spanish inclass essay - thank heavens for those naturally gifted brain lobes of mine - and a 90 on the psych Quest that I studied for in the 5 minutes after school meeting.

Other things are being looked at too much. There are two people who are not concretely defined in my life, and for the sake of order and sanity, I don't want to "go with the flow" and see where it leads me. So far, it has led me knee-deep into doodie. All I wanted was a friendship in each case; now I have to accept less than that from one and more from the other. What I really want is to prioritize better, like get a job. Which I am so in the process of (more on this soon).

I just want some balance!
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Clinically depressed with a side of stupid

I was originally going to write this post about a conversation I had today with a few friends about the happiest memories of our lives, a specific moment which we wouldn't mind being stuck in for the rest of ever, but that kind of writing just reeks of sappiness and optimism. I'm more of a sarcastic bitch that shoots spitballs at googly-eyed couples in grocery stores and makes illegal U-turns. A lot of people have tried to convince me that I won't reach a more permanent level of happy with all these inborn feelings of irony at the world, and maybe that's true, but I really don't think I can change who I am. Nor do I want to. So screw it.

At the same time, there is a part of me I want to change. I have a tendency to personally sabotage situations that I'm afraid will take a bad turn. It's sort of like shooting myself in the foot, only much worse - it's almost like I want to exacerbate the problem for dramatic effect, and then afterwards chew my nails and sit on my couch thinking how in hell things ended up like this.

In conversations, I drive us into the same rut of having absolutely nothing to say to make it better. No apologies, no secret confessions, no light sarcastic comment - nothing to save the day. The first time this happened, I fully blamed the other person. The second time, because the people were so different, I started wondering if it had something to do with me. The third time put me over the top. And you'd think, what in the world did I have to say and do to close every possible door of reconciliation? Well, it's a fucking talent.

After the waves of adrenaline from the scripted lines and the loud empty words die down, I'm left alone on the couch. Sometimes I'm on the floor, but chances are I'll be inside the apartment. And then all I have left is memories of the fight and all my feelings of resentment within these four walls because my mother's never home and dammit it's lonely. I always say that having regrets means not letting go of the past, but how can I not regret some of the terrible, life-altering things I've done? How can I not hate myself?

To all reading this post who understand what I'm talking about, I'm so sorry. I've said it a bajillion times but it fails to make things better, and I suppose it shouldn't anyway. But I will try my hardest to be accepting and let go of what can't be reversed. The next step is to get rid of this self-destructive talent; a lot of people tell me they wish they had at least some of the excitement of my movie-like life, but guess what, sweetcakes? Real life is not a movie. It's boring and anticlimactic and sometimes safe, but that sure as hell beats having people tell you "Oh my God you should totally write a book about your crazy experiences and I'll be the first to read it". I'm exhausted. I want safe.

When I began writing this, I didn't know how honest I would be with myself. It turned into one of the most personal things I've ever written. I really want to go hide under my blankie hugging Foofie, my huge white stuffed bear from 5th grade (and the only one that made it through the years), and swear that I was intoxicated while writing this, but the post wrote itself. And if it can't help anything I've already messed up, maybe it'll be a small aid in preventing this from ever happening again. Continue reading >>

The seaweed is always greener

I know, I rant about Disney and then spent an hour doing this. I'm a hypocrite.

I can't believe it's her, of all people. You're ridiculous.

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