That doesn’t make any sense.

I know.

So you shot this guy down, over and over, for–what, a year?

Something like that.

And then he finally moves on and gets together with a girl that likes and wants to be with him–just like you told him to.

Right.

At which point you are completely crushed and heartbroken, and remain so for what is now the better part of three years?

Yes.

You’re fucked, you know that?  Completely fucked.  Totally masochistic.

I know.

Not to mention self-centered.  You have run a website devoted to yourself since 1996.  Don’t you worry what that says about you?

Well it was only one of those free Angelfire sites to start with.  I didn’t own my own domain until 2000.  And it was a gift!

Whatever. You create and maintain websites that are shrines to you.  YOUR poems and stories and pictures.  I mean, your relationship with your blog has lasted longer than any man I’ve ever seen you with.

First off, everyone has those sites.  I’m not the only person on Flickr or Myspace Facebook, ok?  And second, my “relationship” with the site has lasted this long because I can ignore the blog for, like, months at a time and come back whenever I feel like it.  You couldn’t do that with a man.  And even if you could, is that the kind of man you’d want to be with in the first place?

That’s exactly what I mean.  You know things would have never worked out with this guy.  Even if he DID take you back after all that bullshit, you would have no respect for him whatsoever.

Maybe.  I don’t know.  I like to think that I’ve learned a lesson, that I’m different now.

But you haven’t.  You’re not.  Do you even read your shitty blog?  You’ve been complaining about the same crap for like six years.

I’m not complaining.  I’m connecting.

Oh my god.  You can’t be serious.

I am!  Lots of people come to the site and relate to what they read there, and then it’s like we’re–

–mutually masturbating?

Fuck you.  It’s a meaningful connection.  It makes us both feel better.

Sounds like mutual masturbation to me.

Whatever.

Listen, all I’m trying to tell you is that you have to stop being such a victim.  Stop feeling sorry for yourself and pining over your great goddamn lost love (that wasn’t even lost, by the way, you totally pitched it into the garbage) and acting like you haven’t had the opportunity for a meaningful relationship since then.  You just blow it every time so you can put on your silk robe and drape yourself over the side of your fainting couch and write shitty poetry that will get other people to feel sorry for you too.

That’s really unnecessary.  A fainting couch?  Could you give me a little credit, please?

You may not have a fainting couch, but I’ve seen that robe.  AND those ridiculous slippers with the little poufy bit on the front.

Those are feathers.  And they’re called Marabou.  Marabou slippers.

Ok, Blanche, anything you say.  I just have to tell you, as a friend, that you are getting too old for this shit.  People are getting married.  They’re having babies.  What are you doing?  Spending weeknights at dive bars?  Well that’s a great way to meet the Man of your Dreams.

Why does it have to be about meeting the Man of my Dreams?

Because that’s all you ever talk about.  You are a broken record.  It DOESN’T have to be about the man of your dreams, but you make it about that.  Why can’t you just focus on doing things that make you happy, and see what happens then?

But nothing makes me happy.

Oh, cry me a fucking river.  You can’t be for real.

It’s true.

And whose fault is that?  Don’t you think that there are people who would betray their own country to have what you do?  Do you realize how lucky you are, that you have the luxury of sitting around and bitching to the internet about how lonely and misunderstood you are?  You know what your problem is?  Too much free time.  That’s what.  They probably haven’t even heard of Facebook in Cuba, ok?

God, you sound like my mother.

We kind of are.

I know.

All I’m saying–

I get it.  Man.

Let me finish.  All I’m saying is that you don’t have to feel like this.  You don’t have to be an irrational slave to your emotions.  You don’t have to be so insecure, so worried about what you’re supposed to be doing and where you’re supposed to be.  But don’t say you’re going to try and then not try.  We’ve had this talk before and you get all fucking gung-ho for like a week, then you date some jerk and totally forget about all the things I just said.  Just try something different.  Try not dating a jerk.

I’ll try.

Promise?

No.

Well then at least stop whining so much.

Maybe.

At least stop whining so much to the internet.

Fine.  But not today.

Starting tomorrow.

Starting tomorrow.

It is never a good idea to give your phone number to someone you meet in the waiting room of a psychiatric facility.

(Present company excluded)

(No, included)

That is all.

Mixed signals. You know what it’s like. It’s on, it’s off, it’s on, it’s off. I normally agonize over these things, dissecting every word, every action, leaving each encounter like an unfortunate, disemboweled frog. Most of the time, though, the only ones that ever know how much anguish I’m putting myself through are my good friends. And, well, you guys. But usually I don’t even mention it to you because whoever HE is, there’s a chance he might swing by the blog and see what I’m thinking and totally FREAK THE FUCK OUT. Who wouldn’t? I’m totally nuts. But in this case, I think it’s safe to say that is a moot point.

So here I come to the non-moot point. I’m not going to fight these things anymore. I’m not going to struggle to understand why, when something seemed to be getting warmed up, it suddenly turned clammy. I’m not going to ask myself questions. I’m not going to wonder what I did wrong. Because the truth is I didn’t do anything wrong. People click, or they don’t. And if they don’t, what good comes from analyzing the whole ordeal? Just move on.

This is hard for a person like me, who has to understand everything that people are feeling, all the time. I need to see inside them. You ever know someone who takes things apart just to see how they work, then puts them back together again? Even those people will tell you that sometimes they end up with a spare nut or two. And emotions are much more complicated than transistor radios, so I probably need to just learn how to let them be.

(No, this does not mean there won’t be a poem today. I’m keeping my promises for once with this blog thing! I was just navel-gazing and thought I’d share the resulting lint-discovery with you)

I’m a brat sometimes. Well…usually sometimes. Sometimes always. It’s worse when someone indulges me. I get what I want, and then I want more! Typically, it’s more of their time, attention, affection. And whatever interferes with that (even an inanimate object like a Playstation, or a job) becomes my sworn enemy. I remember hating, hating my ex’s computer with a passion. What can I say? I’m just a very jealous girl who wants things (and people) to herself because, in the past, I’ve had to share when I didn’t want to.

But I’ve come to realize that monopolizing someone’s time and attention won’t make me feel any better about that part of my life, and it certainly doesn’t bring me any closer to those people I value (read: hoard). Usually it causes exactly the opposite; lack of personal time and space is just a freaked-out-claustrophobic-flight-response waiting to happen. At least, that’s how I feel when people do it to me.

It’s embarrassing to admit that I am guilty of this, because I consider it one of my greatest weaknesses; one that only emerges when someone begins to inerest me, and usually ends up driving them away. It’s borne of insecurity, the least attractive personality trait in anyone’s esteem (including my own).

But I think recognizing it and understanding it will help me stop, and grow up a little. I’ve ruined so many things trying to make them perfect, trying to find in them exactly what I want, trying to keep them all to myself. Each time, I learn something new. Mainly that I just have to try and remember, other people want to be treated the same way I do. What feels stifling from others will feel the same way from me.

I dated a Buddhist for a little while (his serenity drove me batshit), and once I asked him how he managed to keep from having hard feelings against people who’d hurt him. He said he just reminded himself that no one ever intended to be cruel, that they were simply pursuing their own happiness, and that, ultimately, we all want to be happy and free. It sounded like a hokey line to me at the time (and maybe he turned out to be kind of a jerk), but the more I think about it the more I realize it’s true.

I’m trying to be better. Really, I am.

I grew up in a house with yelling. Lots of yelling. People would yell and fight, and say things to each other that made the Bundys seem like the Cleavers. Hearing that you were crazy, or telling someone that they were maniacal, was a regular occurrence. Polite conversation, even. And forty minutes later it would be as if nothing had happened.

Now, I’m not here to discuss whether or not this is healthy behavior (because it probably isn’t, but I’m not ready to deal with that). The point is that (as I’ve already mentioned recently), I don’t have a hard time saying what I think. Exactly what I think. Maybe sometimes I even intentionally provoke people. Just a little. But it’s only because I’m a firm believer in getting shit out–you get the shit out, have your words, and then everyone can carry on with their lives. If you’re romantically involved with the shit-ter or shit-tee, you even get to have some of that awesome make-up sex. Bonus!

But sometimes I forget how powerful words can be. And I forget not everyone has the stomach I do. Of course, it’s usually with good reason (and a great deal of aggravation) that I bare my teeth…but that’s not the point. The point is that sometimes it backfires on me. Some folks see the teeth and instead of growling back they turn tail and run.

And why wouldn’t they? I call people emotional cripples then wonder why they don’t want to be friends with me. How can I explain this threshhold for brutality to them? How can I say, Just because I hate you doesn’t mean I don’t love you?

I can’t. And I shouldn’t. Because if it doesn’t make sense now, it probably never will–so I should just let go. And maybe work on letting my head cool before I break out the chainsaw.

So I kind of lost my shit for a while there. Not in the regular losing my shit way, either.

The first three months (well, four really) of this year brought some of the darkest times I’ve ever had. The poem in the extended entry (click More) from March is a testament to that. But really, I’ve been heading down that road for just over a year. After I moved to Los Feliz, I lost someone very important to me, and made some big realizations that scared me. But instead of coping in a good way, I just began pinballing from one romance to the next (my m.o.) hoping to find solace somehow. Surprisingly, when that didn’t work, and then I was forced to be alone (due to the long distance relationship that was briefly attempted), I sort of started to unravel. Not that this should come as a shock to anyone. It was bound to happen sooner or later.

So I tried a few things to make it better. And while it’s not really better yet, I feel like I at least have some kind of a grasp on things now, and the tools to start fixing myself.

I’m not sure why I feel the need to say this here. Maybe because I haven’t really admitted it in a way that is undeniable. I can’t laugh it off, or pretend that things are better than they are.

Some people have said (well, one religious woman, really, has said…) that they don’t like my blog because I don’t seem to have made much personal progress. I hate to agree, but I think it may be true. I’ve spent a long time pretending that certain things didn’t happen to me, and as a result have done the emotional equivalent of chasing my own tail for longer than I care to admit.

Additionally, I’ve been told by a long-time visitor that mainly comes “for the poetry” that sometimes the things I write here seem better suited for a personal diary, not a weblog. I think that may appear to be true, too. But if you could see the stuff that goes in my Wonder Woman journal you’d know that what I publish on this site really is the filtered, sanitized, safe version of my head’s contents.

Mostly, I say these things here because it’s important to me that other people hear about someone feeling the same way they do. I’ve connected with a lot of people in a way that I never would have, if I’d been writing about baseball games or my wacky neighbors. These people, they write to me and say, Hey, I know how that is. Then I feel better, they feel better, everyone gets the warm fuzzies and are reminded that they’re not alone.

I think that, ultimately, I’m providing a beneficial service. It’s always nice to know there’s someone out there just as crazy as (if not crazier than) you. And that someone is me.

these days

i wear pajamas
most of the time
i miss people
but still don’t want them
i make plans
to get up earlier
and go do something normal
but another hour of sleep
in dreams i can shape
seems so much easier
i listen to the rain
and count the necklaces
you gave me
i think of ways
to tire myself out

crying works

I realized that, although in recent years I have become increasingly “shy” in groups (unless I know a few, or have had a few), I have never been “shy” about sharing personal information. This should be evident to anyone who has read one or two entries on the journal I regularly (sort of) and publicly expose myself using.

It’s occurred to me recently that I am, in fact, too open. I never try to hide my flaws, or the fact that I’m a little…off. I never try to pretend I’m cool, or give the impression that I’ve got the answers. I don’t know where I learned it, and I don’t know why, even after all the negative consequences it’s had, I insist on continuing. While lots of people say that this sort of “refreshing honesty” is right up their alley, I’m starting to think that it may not be in my best interest.

Not just because giving people that kind of ammo can be dangerous. But also because it’s scary. To them. It freaks people out. And what freaks them out even more is that I want just as much blood and guts from them. I ask questions that are far too personal, I want to know what makes them happy or uncomfortable, what they’re afraid of, what makes them tick. And that’s all just the first time I meet them. I want to get them to take me to their deep, dark places. It’s just such a good feeling. Like someone letting you read their journal, their poems, their sketchbook, or showing you their really awful scar from the accident that’s the reason they never wear short pants. Being allowed into a private place like that gives me a feeling of honor.

But there are lots of people who aren’t ready or willing to have others poking around the recesses of their mind. I get that now. Even if I don’t understand (Why is this? Why would someone not want others to know who they are? To live in the dark?), I get it. On one hand, it makes me sorry that there are those I’ve pushed too far. Then again, those who are unwilling to open up that way aren’t my kind of folks anyhow. I think of all the people who have confided in me, felt they could tell me things they’ve never told other people, and I know that for each person I’ve alienated with my closeness, there are two dozen others that it has made feel safe, and good. So I guess I’ll just have to risk it. I just wanted to take this opportunity to extend an apology to those I’ve pushed away by wanting to learn too much, too fast. I’m sorry I’ll never know you.

These are some ramblings I composed in an email that I never sent, but it seems better suited for Blood and Guts anyway.

The only difference between feeling lost
and feeling free
is a state of mind.

Earlier tonight that thought got into my head and I’ve been mulling it over since. That one day the very things that give your life meaning can become your shackles. Then I read a blog talking about a teen marriage and why the girl who had wed so young was selling out her dreams in order to resign herself to “pumping out babies,” as one commenter put it. But the teen countered she had done no such thing. Because she said that she was living her dream–to be a good wife and mother.

This aroused such a cacaphone of conflicting voices in my head (one wears a bra, and one wears birkentocks) that I had to put it all down on paper.

I’ve done these things. I’ve both thought that the only reason worth living was adventure and change, then thought that the only reason was to find love and create a family full of it.

I was an independent kind of girl. Always looking for an ideal relationship that never came, feeling I was destined to end up a drunk old maid with a typewriter in a single room. There was a time when if you asked me, I’d have said the only thing I wanted or wished for was to love someone. But I honestly thought I’d never find it.

And then I did love someone. And all I wanted was to have a life with him. Visions of picket fances filled my mind. Sure, it meant a few little changes, here and there. But slowly, the more I cut away these parts of myself in the hopes of achieving the idea (my idea) of domestic “bliss,” the more I felt lost again, like I wasn’t even me anymore. I wanted to blame that on a relationship–on domesticity, complacency–things that I thought a relationship was supposed to entail. I wanted to feel my oats, have a chance to live my own life. To have freedom. So I wrecked it all and started over again.

I know now that the Beaver Cleaver life I’d envisioned was just one more way to search for an unattainable happiness–one peak that was so high and mighty that getting to the top would take me ages and ages. See that top of the mountain, Helena? That’s happiness. That’s love. Go for it. See you again Never, sucker!

But once I get to the top of the mountain, it’s just me up there. And hey, I’ve got all the same fears and scars I did before. It isn’t a magic potion, it isn’t an abra cadabra. Leaving one mountain behind for the next is just another way for me to keep running away from the issues that have been plaguing me for years longer than that relationship even existed.

Now that I’ve spent two years doing just that, again my vision has shifted. What used to feel like freedom feels like being lost, floating without a purpose. That’s because now when I think about my priorities in life, I believe that the love I abandonded, the warmth and support of someone who cared for me unconditionally, was the greatest achievement I could ever hope for the rest of my days. Fuck careers, fuck houses, fuck the Pyramids, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower, too.

Making connections with people, more specifically, making a connection with one special person, is the only thing worth caring about on this worm farm. Yeah, I know that there should “be more to life” than that. But frankly, after all the soul searching I’ve done, I can confidently say (though I speak only for myself) that while all those other things are great, and I want to experience them–they’re not worth shit if there’s no one to share them with.

What’s a bigger dream? Which is more valuable? To know everything you can about the world and the things in it, or to find it all in someone’s arms? I’m hoping there’s a place in between, but sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever get to it.

In any case, I’m tired of being afraid to really put my emotions on the line. I have to go back out there and deal. No flinching. No hiding. No finding one more excuse to make sure people don’t get close to me, and love me, and (yes, most importantly this) have the power to hurt me because of it.

These are the things I’m trying to figure out the last few months. Things we’ve all tried to figure out always. Why we’re here, what love is, how to live our lives.

Yeah, I know. I’ll be here with the typewriter and the bottle if you want to drop in and share your thoughts on the matter.

These are some ramblings I composed in an email that I never sent, but it seems better suited for Blood and Guts anyway.

The only difference between feeling lost
and feeling free
is a state of mind.

Earlier tonight that thought got into my head and I’ve been mulling it over since. That one day the very things that give your life meaning can become your shackles. Then I read a blog talking about a teen marriage and why the girl who had wed so young was selling out her dreams in order to resign herself to “pumping out babies,” as one commenter put it. But the teen countered she had done no such thing. Because she said that she was living her dream–to be a good wife and mother.

This aroused such a cacaphone of conflicting voices in my head (one wears a bra, and one wears birkentocks) that I had to put it all down on paper.

I’ve done these things. I’ve both thought that the only reason worth living was adventure and change, then thought that the only reason was to find love and create a family full of it.

I was an independent kind of girl. Always looking for an ideal relationship that never came, feeling I was destined to end up a drunk old maid with a typewriter in a single room. There was a time when if you asked me, I’d have said the only thing I wanted or wished for was to love someone. But I honestly thought I’d never find it.

And then I did love someone. And all I wanted was to have a life with him. Visions of picket fances filled my mind. Sure, it meant a few little changes, here and there. But slowly, the more I cut away these parts of myself in the hopes of achieving the idea (my idea) of domestic “bliss,” the more I felt lost again, like I wasn’t even me anymore. I wanted to blame that on a relationship–on domesticity, complacency–things that I thought a relationship was supposed to entail. I wanted to feel my oats, have a chance to live my own life. To have freedom. So I wrecked it all and started over again.

I know now that the Beaver Cleaver life I’d envisioned was just one more way to search for an unattainable happiness–one peak that was so high and mighty that getting to the top would take me ages and ages. See that top of the mountain, Helena? That’s happiness. That’s love. Go for it. See you again Never, sucker!

But once I get to the top of the mountain, it’s just me up there. And hey, I’ve got all the same fears and scars I did before. It isn’t a magic potion, it isn’t an abra cadabra. Leaving one mountain behind for the next is just another way for me to keep running away from the issues that have been plaguing me for years longer than that relationship even existed.

Now that I’ve spent two years doing just that, again my vision has shifted. What used to feel like freedom feels like being lost, floating without a purpose. That’s because now when I think about my priorities in life, I believe that the love I abandonded, the warmth and support of someone who cared for me unconditionally, was the greatest achievement I could ever hope for the rest of my days. Fuck careers, fuck houses, fuck the Pyramids, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower, too.

Making connections with people, more specifically, making a connection with one special person, is the only thing worth caring about on this worm farm. Yeah, I know that there should “be more to life” than that. But frankly, after all the soul searching I’ve done, I can confidently say (though I speak only for myself) that while all those other things are great, and I want to experience them–they’re not worth shit if there’s no one to share them with.

What’s a bigger dream? Which is more valuable? To know everything you can about the world and the things in it, or to find it all in someone’s arms? I’m hoping there’s a place in between, but sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever get to it.

In any case, I’m tired of being afraid to really put my emotions on the line. I have to go back out there and deal. No flinching. No hiding. No finding one more excuse to make sure people don’t get close to me, and love me, and (yes, most importantly this) have the power to hurt me because of it.

These are the things I’m trying to figure out the last few months. Things we’ve all tried to figure out always. Why we’re here, what love is, how to live our lives.

Yeah, I know. I’ll be here with the typewriter and the bottle if you want to drop in and share your thoughts on the matter.