At Least

Back in Utah and single still and curious as ever and unaligned... I've been trying to write for a while now.

What is it this time, you ask?  It's Hunter.  It's Avery Taylor.  It's Jesus.  It's finding Katrina and then saying goodbye to Katrina, and then sitting at home a lot.  It's my new roommates.  It's Brittni having a boyfriend and not wanting to hang out with me all the time like we did in 7th grade, and also me not wanting to hang out all the time like we did in 7th grade.  It's not having any new ideas and being okay with not making movies and no female forum speakers and a lot of people being smarter than me and forgetting who directed Being John Malkovich and looking stupid in front of him for it. 

I've gotten caught up in another high school drama and it makes life all sparkly and exotic and I'm wondering how long it's going to last.  I've almost shed my bumbling and achingly dull 16 year old persona and am embracing being the bumbling and insipid 20 year old that I guess I always knew I was.  Still tripping over my drooping socks and telling my palms not to sweat, but I at least have a bag with foxes on it and that's cool sometimes.  

No, I haven't changed much.  

And yet I'm so different that I don't even know what to say about myself anymore.  I don't recognize myself.  I don't sing very often.  

I do, however, know a lot of fun facts about Disney World, though.  So there's that.

But here's the deal: things are happening in a way that is desirable and confusing and upsetting and HORRIBLE and WONDERFUL and I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING and it feels good to have something so exciting again.  It's glamorous, and we are glamorous, and we are giggly and we are secretive and we are fools for it.  We are damn fools and I'm so incredibly content with it all.  And I weep for the day when it ends, as we all know it will.  

But until then, I am going to let my heart race a little bit and I'm going to be late to class and I'm going to write 17 draft texts before sending the "right" one and I'm going to analyze conversations with Avery and hate myself because it feels good to be passionate and it feels wrong to run away.

I'm done running away from myself.

I guess I don't have much else to say now besides this: I've made a string of good decisions and one bad one and my ligaments are tearing and I'm happy.

At least I have that.

Comrades

*Disclaimer: This isn't about any one person.  It's about all of us.*

Half empty, half full,

we're starting over.

I wrote you a letter called Comrades In October.  It doesn't make a lot of sense and goes on for longer than it needed to be.  I talked a lot about Pulp Fiction and it got a bit accusatory of Israel.  But I meant well.

Things never really turn out right.  Or at least not how we want them to.

I wanted a lot more than what you gave me.  The minimalist approach to human interaction, the half-hearted blow off.  When it was slow, it was alcohol you turned to.  The feeling that whatever you did didn't count or mean anything turned you on.  You were invincible.

But you didn't even recognize me at midnight when I left.  Telling you I was just a phone call away and you turned the other way and said you really hate the way I look at you when you're drunk.

"I need to get my life together, don't I?"

We're always starting over.  A big hug and an empty bottle.  You'll get your life together maybe if you want to.  But until then, I'll paint you a picture of a girl who is trying to not let herself love you any more than she already does.

But we'll always have October.  And you'll always be that one who sang me songs and cared about my stupid crushes.  You were there from the beginning, when all we needed was our tree.  Our tree, our music, and our wasted teenage lives.

I'm starting over.

Give Out

Oh dear.

I think I've done it again.

I tried so hard to be better, because I knew that better means happier.  I knew that perfect means success.  The closer I get to it, though, the more I realize how similar it feels to normal.  The longer you look at me, the more I want to leave.  The harder you try, the more I dislike myself.

I don't know what it is.  A combination of bad self image and the stomach flu, maybe.  Or misguided passive aggression.  Cuban cigars that smell bad, but are passed around like the neighborhood harlot.

Oh dear.

I was expecting it to be much harder to figure out, but it was as easy as stepping off the roof.

One step is too far, but three steps and I'm flying.

One day, I'm going to look back and know that no one will ever really understand what this all means to me.  No one will hear that song the way I do.  They won't care about the tree.  They don't get it.  How nothing really happened there, but that's why it is so unmistakably pristine.  That's why I can't love you.  Because of that tree, which means so much because it meant nothing.

Well yeah, a year from now, I know we'll all be in different cities.  Missing each others' calls and avoiding chance encounters in the supermarket.  If there are even supermarkets anymore.  Maybe we'll just be downloading virtual carbs from our super iPads or something.

This isn't what I wanted to talk about.

I wanted to talk about making out and not liking it.  I wanted to talk about not the first guy, but the fourth.  The one who actually made an effort to not be an idiot.  I wanted to talk about slow music and perfect moments that were ruined by a never-ending girl brain, but instead I think this is all about missing you.  Even though you haven't left yet.

Because I know that alcohol is promising and cigarettes are your mistress.  I know that your one true love is the back of your jet black motorcycle, and that I am someone who stands with both feet firmly on the ground.  Too afraid to do anything bad.  Watching you suffocate yourself because being young and free and careless is your only wile.  Because we are supposed to mess up right now.  Because that's what being alive means.

I miss you already, and oh dear.  I think I've done it again.

In my own way, I'm trying to tell you goodbye.  Because we used to talk about never growing apart, but I think it's about to happen soon.

The Very Thought Insults Me

It's only on the especially bad days that I think of you and all that you stand for.  When things are going real good, I can barely recall what color your skin is.  And even when the room is white and bare, and we are the only inhabitants, I still find it hard to see you.  You're like the wrong side of the moon, the side that's always facing out into the rest of the universe.  And I understand your wistful way of constantly seeking out a bigger something, but I want you to turn around so I can remember the little things about your face that I've forgotten.  Like your broken smile and your quiet eyes.  I just want you to understand me like I long to understand you.

Like the way I always sing along when I know the words.  And how I wear multiple layers of clothing even in the summer.  And how my food can never touch, unless I think it'll taste better that way.  You should know my middle name.  Not my real one, but the one I made up in 5th grade and had everyone believe was my middle name for 6 years.  You should know the spot in my backyard where I go to sleep when my parents are fighting.  And the place where that bird fell after being shot by my grandpa.  

What I'm trying to say is that I know I don't look like love to you.  I don't think I'm working to become that either.  What I am is everything you've scolded me for, and it hurts that you don't even blame yourself.  I'm unresponsive, and passive aggressive.  I'm in desperate need of therapy.  And I'm in desperate need of concrete.  Something solid to lay down on, because I'm tired of these feathers and pillows, like the strangers that say, "Oh, I pity you so."  Well, I don't need your pity.  Please, pick it up off the floor.

I'm ready to leave you, darling.  But I've still got some things to take care of.  I've still got some things to say to you.  

But not now, and not out loud.