A Brief Retrospective

There have been three instances since June 7, 2007 when I have been truly happy. Just three, in the last year and a half.

1. The beginning of my relationship with Mattie, circa April 2008.

2. My arrival and subsequent first week at NYU, circa late August 2008.

3. The RENT Finale B party at the Life Cafe, September 5, 2008.

What the hell am I doing with my life? What is going to show up and make me happy, or how am I going to make myself happy? Because this isn't working. Yes, I love being here, and I have some great friends, but on a general basis, I am not happy. I miss him, and it seeps into every ounce of my being. It's subconscious and out of my control. I keep trying to let it go, and letting it go just means I can't control it. I don't know what to do.

Why am I so fucking lonely? Dammit.

A Few Days Old Reflection

This is like a week old:

I'm starting to forget the good memories. I can't remember all the good things about Jack and all the best times of my life that we had together. They're falling away and I don't know how to save them. Mostly what I remember now is all the times I have spent crying when I think about him, and the pain in my chest, like I have right now, like I'm suffocating and I can't breathe and my heart's not working. I want my best friend back. I want those memories back and I want all this past year of pain to go away and be forgotten. I don't want to remember all the horrible things I'f thought about him. I'm reaching the point where I would give up the good memories just to forget it all It just doesn't seem worth it anymore.

There are four times I really still remember. After closing night of Annie Get Your Gun, Jack came over, and we just sat downstairs on the couch, for hours. We just sat there. He had his arm around me, and he kept saying, "You're so good. You're so good." And I remember being so sad because I didn't know when I was going to see him again, and I'd been seeing him almost every day all summer, and he was holding my heart in his hands, but it was safe there. I didn't want anything else but him, to keep sitting there with me. And he didn't want to leave. And finally, around two in the morning, we went up to the kitchen and I walked him out to the car, and we hugged for a really long time and then I finally let go, walked back across the street, and from the kitchen door I watched his car drive away until it was over the hill and I couldn't see it anymore.

Sometime around Christmas (of 06), we were walking in the city, and we were going to meet my mom, and Jack held my hand and wouldn't let me go because he didn't want us to get separated in the extra-crowded streets.

When we started our acting exercises in the winter, there was a time when we were creating a picture in our minds, together. We made a beach scene, with a log washed up on shore,  and a dog sniffing it, and a family under a big umbrella, sitting on striped towels. And we put a big gold frame around it. It was our painting, and we both saw it and no one else could. And the whole time, we just spoke quietly, and pointed at places on our painting where we were adding things, and he was simply standing next to me, and we were just us.

He tried to donate blood, early one morning after he had spent the night. He went with my mom; I had donated too recently to go. They didn't let him because he's gay. We went to church that morning, and he slipped his hand into mine, and kept it there for the length of the service. I got to be his support, and he let himself need me.

Oh and that day we had his mom and step-dad over, his mom said she hoped we'd be friends for a long time.

--7.28.08 5:04 pm

New Light is Kinda Dark

I feel like a spectator, watching my own life. I'm in my head and my body is doing something else. I feel like I'm moving in slow motion and I can't quite see where I'm going. I'm letting go of the past, so I don't know what I'm walking on as I head for the future. And I don't have anyone's hand to hold anymore. The words on the page are blurring; there are no more directions. I know it's not me against the world, but it feels that way. I don't know what I've still got.

Today I released something I really wanted. I wanted a relationship where I felt like I wasn't afraid of losing the other person, and I got that. And today I let it go. I had to keep telling myself I wasn't the bad guy. I was being honest instead of dragging it out. Even now I'm still trying to convince myself though. But at least I didn't stay in that relationship to boost my ego while turning into someone I didn't want to be - someone unfaithful and untrustworthy. I hurt someone I love, but we are still friends, and things will get better, and I, for once, did what should be done instead of what I wanted to do. 

Now I'm just not sure wher to go from here. I don't know what this place is. Wherever I am, it's a new place, and no one else is here.

In the Ballroom with the Candlestick

No one reads this anyway. But I'm going to be vague regardless. Or irregardless. Why do those two words mean exactly the same thing? What's the point of adding a prefix if it doesn't change the meaning of the word? Rational and irrational certainly mean two different things.

I'm stalling.

All of the sudden it feels like... I don't know. I keep having flashbacks to my relationship with Jack. And when things start to go too well, I become afraid that they will end as badly. So I like him so much and I'm trying to get myself not to. He's being so good. Better than I deserve and like last time I am scared of caring. I am worried because I think about it so much. I fear what I want because I cannot have it. I wrecked that opportunity. But the desire will drive me mad.

I feel like I can't see what he looks like anymore. He's just words coming up on the screen. He has no voice or body. Yet I imagine us in beautiful places. I imagine calm, peace, serenity and happiness. I think of him and know that I would feel safe in his arms. All these things it feels like I will never have as I want. And I feel like I can't tell him because I broke that right. Broke it at the first moment and can't get it back. I loved that moment. I loved all of them. But I traded those immediate ones for the potential for any later. 

That's all I'm going to say about that. I'm so overwhelmed with relationship crap and my own inner self that I'm not sure what I'm going to do with myself for a while. A sincere thanks to the people who deserve thanks though. I'm a bit fucked up, but I still love you.

I Had to Turn Around

Now I'm doing it right from the start. I'm placing cracks in the foundations of relationships before they even begin, so they can fall down around my ears with a little less work later. I feel like such a failure. Why can't I create my relationships the way I want them? And now I am planting seeds of doubt in the minds of others. I've become the disease I loathe so much. When did that happen, and why?

I could have minded my own business and kept my mouth shut. I could have kept my distance. But instead i turned around and we were face to face. I couldn't just be happy with the connection I had to look him in the eyes. And I continued without a word of caution.

I could have moved on and gotten over it. But it took hold in me and I let it stay there, and I turned around again. More roots and less soil but I wasn't thinking about what lay beneath. It was just the moment and I was just in the moment and I didn't want to be anywhere else for once in my life. And I stayed right there. And when I turned back around, he didn't go anywhere.

I could have mentioned it before. I could have pulled those roots before they were there. Planted them somewhere else. Somewhere safer. Somewhere that wouldn't cause such a problem. But I am my own problem. 

I keep turing around, looking at him, and looking at him. And they stand there, and I feel like I am falling away, because I planted those roots in such little soil that the wind just picked me up. And I am so far gone, while they are free. Free, except for that stupid seed I planted, to ruin them like myself. 

Now I spread the distrust. I am my own destruction. My own worst enemy. They are too good for this. This is not what they deserve. I didn't know how things would go. I didn't intend to become a liar and a deceiver. I didn't want to hurt anyone. I keep breaking what I say matters most to me and I don't know why or how to stop it.

Box It Up, Ship It Out

Today I packed up all my leftover school stuff. I fit pretty much thirteen years worth of learning into one box. There, contained in that little bit of cardboard, sits all of my accomplishments.  my life fits into - is summed up in that box. It just seems like it doesn't matter anymore. I mean in the  real world, how much will my high school transcript really matter? I can be defined in a box of paper but that isn't all of me.

This box has all of my awards in it. A stack of paper that's been sitting in my desk accumulating over the years. Who will care in a year that I got the principal's award in 5th grade?  Who cares now? What is the point of all this paper? The point is that it's my record of what I gave my life to. I focused on school and skipped out on relationships.

Now I've got relationships, at least sort of. But I realized today as I was ruminating in the sun that though I know so many different types of people from so many walks of life, I have only two kinds of relationships. Mostly, I keep people at a distance. I avoid getting attached to people as much as possible so that I can't get hurt. Then if I do have a meaningful relationship with someone, I'm constantly preoccupied with the concern that the relationship means more to me than the other person. I don't know where that fear started, but it has been true of my connections for a long time, and I think my failed relationship with Jack only cemented that fear as legitimate in my mind. My rationale and my emotions are fighting to the death in my brain. It's exhausting to think about.

I guess what this means is that no matter how good people are to me, at this point I just can't let things be the way they are. My fears and emotions keep getting in the way of amazing relationships. And I've got some great friends right now and I'm fully aware of that. I'm grateful for it. Yet when I'm not hanging out with or talking to these people that are so great, I'll think about wanting to talk to them and say to myself, yeah, but they have other things to do besides talk to you. 

Perhaps the problem is that I don't trust myself or anyone else. I constantly doubt my friends and my ability to create or maintain relationships. I end up testing my friends to see if they'll initiate anything if I back off. It occurs to me that I should have to do that. I don't have to do that. But somewhere along the way, I decided I can't trust people (okay, so I know when that was) and I developed a fear of abandonment (I guess that was the same time). Such features are rather detrimental to surviving relationships.

The summer feels long. I'm going to use it to rebuild myself. I have to. Since I can remember, I have defined myself as someone who is the best in school and has a unique love of the stage. And these things are true. But now I'm going to college, in a place where that defines a large percentage of the people I will get to know. So I've got to figure out what else I am, beyond grades and stage. There has to be more to me.

Speculations on Myself

I always get good grades.

I am a dancer. An actress. A performer. The stage is my home.

I'm moving to New York City.

I never care about my family as much as I should.

I let one relationship screw up all the others.

I used to open myself up to people.

I used to think about decisions before I made them.

I used to wait.

I take action on impulse without thinking about the consequences beyond the present.

I am devoting my life to finding myself through embodying others.

I don't always have all the answers.

I don't always tell the truth.

I am always looking for affection.

I am still not over losing Jack, and it has been 1 year to the day.

The New Mess

Inspired by Danny and a need for an outlet... and not wanting to return to the depressing mess that was my old blog. Here's the new mess:

Lately I've been thinking about my social life It's never been a big issue or a high priority for me At least not in high school. But I've noticed in the last few weeks and this one especially that my social life has moved itself to the computer. I don't hear people's voices anymore. What does that say about me?

My conversations and interactions have still been lovely - sometimes funny, or thought-provoking, or just for the purpose of good company. But I am staring at words all day. I have to create my own interpretation of what someone is saying. Find the sarcasm, seriousness, and truth. Nothing replaces face to face conversations. Tangibility adds so much. My favorite way to talk to most people is lying next to them, staring at the sky or ceiling.

Now, instead, I'm staring at a screen. I do stuff around the house all day waiting for a window to open, and for someone to walk into my cyber world. It's a little depressing.

Of course, this could all just be because I don't know what I'm doing with my summer and I feel like it's not in my control. I know that's not true, but it feels like other people have been deciding my fate lately. I need to get out. I need a change.

People are complicated. Relationships are even more complicated, even if they seem or start out simple. Why do I make things so hard though? For the last year I have been creating relationships that are doomed to fail, or will require so much work, and now... I have this relationship I was so excited about two months ago. But I'm pushing the affection away. And I keep looking for someone else. And what bugs me most is that I don't understand why.

Questions keep arising without answers. I don't know why I've become the person that I am, who I never expected to be. I've always known what I wanted, and I feel like I still do. But I don't know me, the person who wants it.

Recently some relationships have come (and some have gone) without me knowing why or how. I look back on a collection of random meetings and wonder, "When was that me?" Is that still me now? I have no regrets, just questions and complicated relationships and desires I don't understand.