Letters with Myself: Inner Dialogue Building to the Hardest Time of My Life
I picked the flower, not for anyone but myself. I studied its beauty, its delicateness, how the pedals warped around themselves. It forced me to stop, with an open hand.
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On the porch of a grey, shadowy day I sat. It was not cold but it was not warm. A gentle breeze filled my hair, sometimes blowing it into my face, others making it absolutely gorgeous. The sun did not shine through but it was still bright. A shadowy bright. The calmness of the world resonated with me then. Through the trees like a fog there was no sky, but still there was depth. In the rustling of the branches and leaves, the crispness of breath traveling through the lungs, and lack of necessary, overwhelming, anxious responsibilities filled my heart with content. Then my mind wandered, as it does to go wherever it so chooses. It went to the past. To her. To the fantasy. Then it travelled to all the fantasies, “what could have beens” and “if onlys.” I wanted love, I wanted it back, I wanted that comfort, that softness and reassurance of someone with you, someone to be with, hold your hand, express romantic, and lustful gestures with. I thought about all the terrible times, the shit that comes with it all, the time that I don’t have, the heart ache and strife, the arguments, the expectations. As I thought, there through the trees, through the clouds, the breeze, the far-off whir of a leaf blower, I realized what I wanted most was just a friend. To sit with someone and talk about nothings, while discussing everything. A shared view, or perhaps not. But civility, enjoyment, and flexibility, with a severe lack of expectations. In that are the politeness and friendly encounters. In the reoccurrence are your friends.
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When we were together, life wasn’t good when we weren’t good, now life isn’t good when my work isn’t good. When I can’t make my pages, when I can’t focus these feelings into the art, when I can’t create.
That just means I don’t know what I’m feeling, or they’re too strong. I can’t focus because I can’t think clearly, those feelings aren’t clear. So, I write. Or I draw. Or I wallow is self-loathing. It’s up to me.
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God, she was attractive. He squinted his eyes a little and smiled. He would’ve had no way of knowing if she was interested if it wasn’t blatantly obvious. He could get a little sense but there’s no way to be sure of wishes or intentions. There never is. Every time He wanted to act it’s out on a limb, with the threat to fall to the depths of the earth.
She was gorgeous, and she was fun, but she was naive. Not that he nor anyone else wasn’t or isn’t, she was just blind to the way he saw, the things he looked at, as he was with her. It wasn’t wrong and no bad feelings were felt (at least he hoped). They were just on different frequencies.
That of course left him anxious, worried, fearful, hesitant for another time.
Can I go through it all again? Oh god, how fun it was to feel that. Oh god, how bad and weird it has made me feel.
But she’s cute. I’ll see her a lot. She’s fun to be around so far.
But you don’t know her.
Get to.
You can’t go through this.
So, don’t. Make a friend ‘in-passing’ as you’re obsessed with.
Don’t fall for every smile. You need a friend more than anything else.
I have friends. My heart needs to express itself.
Don’t jump into anything like this. Be a friend, only expect a friend, then you can’t be crushed. You won’t want something you can’t or shouldn’t have. Plus, you’ll have gained a friend. How many female friends do you have?
A lot.
And how many would be ruined if you wanted something more?
All of them. I am happy that they are what they are, but I don’t want them to change. But I want something to go somewhere.
Then give it time. You just have to wait. It will come by one means or another, but you must give it time to breath and ferment.
Life is tough.
Yes, it is. Remember all those times. Remember the hurt, remember the great. Make something out of it. Be someone. Do something. Work, study, make, learn, LIVE. All of this is part of living.
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What do I want? To be happy. To be a good writer. To be a good painter. A good cook. An artist of every craft I apply myself into. The latter outweigh the first. And I know they won’t always overlap.
Life can be interesting, life can be boring. There is laughter hearty enough to ache your belly, there is jealously that will contort your vision and mind. Life is good and life is bad, we still have to live it.
Qu’est-ce que c’est?
C’est la vie
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Sitting in the lobby he saw Jack. Jack from orientation. Jack from that one Halloween party with the JellO shots and punch that would knock you out. He could’ve said hi to him, he could’ve called out, “Hey Jack!” and gone into a semi-meagerly friendly banter, but he didn’t, he made the decision not to.
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Talk to the girl, but don’t get wrapped up in her. Be her friend, but don’t only be a friend to her.
You think about this kind of thing way too much. It isn’t healthy.
If I didn’t torment myself like this then what would I do? Dostoyevsky thought about this kind of thing way too much.
Dostoyevsky didn’t make any money.
Dostoyevsky didn’t write to make money, he wrote to write.
You still have to make money.
I know.
Dostoyevsky was obsessed.
Then, perhaps so am I. Is that bad?
I don’t know yet. It will depend on how you use it.
It will.
It could corrode you and destroy you, or it could raise you up above everyone else.
It could.
Or it could make you work too hard and burn out before you achieve anything.
That it could also. I can still be a character. I can still live an interesting life. There is still much good in it.
Yes, there is.
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Good things come to those who wait.
Bullshit.
Good things come to those who take the initiative.
Also Bullshit.
Everything is situational.
Everything is constantly changing.
And everything is the same.
Life without change is death.
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Hold someone’s hand. Love someone. Take the initiative. Get involved. Feel it again. JUST FUCKING LOVE SOMEONE!
No. Love no one. Love everyone. Love yourself. Live life as yourself.
You’ll either get attached, or you’ll have no one, no love, and feel ashamed, pity, loathing, sorrow, loneliness. You’ll focus on it. Sometimes you won’t, but it will always be there.
Fuck you. I’m going to live my life, appreciate what I have and don’t. It’s my life.
You know it’s true.
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The glass is half full, always and forever. He only ever wanted it filled about half way. It never had to be perfect though. That wouldn’t be imperfect, and imperfect is often perfect. There, somewhere inbetween birth and death, the beginning and end of the drink, is the heart of it. There it is neither full nor empty, you have some but not all. He also never drank the last rim of liquid. It would always stay in his glass. Perhaps that is saying he cannot finish anything, or perhaps he is saying that even though he is through with it, he is completed drinking as much as he will drink there is always going to be more he could do. Nothing is ever finished is it? Even when we die. Our work stays as we pass on into the abyssal oasis of death. Nothing is ever done. No piece of art or work. There will always be imperfections and that is why it is perfect. We will not always like everything and that is why it is perfect. We will fall in love with some things and that is why it is perfect. Nothing and everything is perfect.
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Every time I see a ginger is weird. There are only a few things that happen. Girl or boy, it is the same, though often times I will give the girls more of a chance. But it can be felt. We are one in the same. There is something there between us as is the same species amidst an ocean of others. There is the shared identification though slight as it may be, but then you find more. It’s a bond, created without knowledge of the other. I tend to talk to them, make friends or at least want to do so. Upon first encounter I either feel that connection, that deeper string between. Or there is the opposite. The need to distance totally, emotionally and physically. The males are either the nicest people you know or the worst. They flux between the two. They are specific and set, so much so that often on the first encounter a judgement is made, and true it holds. Perhaps that is a judgement and reflection of myself.
I was in the airport, going to I don’t remember where. I saw a ginger. His hair was redder. His freckles contrasted more. His style was different. Sleeker, while still practical. Not too official, nor proper, but not a cave man. No. He was simply different. I looked and judged him to be no one, one of the shitty ones. A try hard, lost from the reality of the world. Then he looked up from his phone, at me, into my eyes. His eyes were brown, the same brown. They were my eyes, though he did not have the pinguecula, the scar, the callus, the buildup of skin, in his right eye. They were my old eyes. Before. When I would cut my hair like him, shaved sides and slicked back on the top. When I was only a few years younger, the same as he was now. When I hadn’t loved yet. When I didn’t know. As I was undergoing the transformations of forcing myself to grow up too soon, too quick. When life was great and terrible. In the brown forests of his eyes I saw the same feel of being lost, the same constant thought of the world. In the eye light, the glimmer, the shine I saw that same hope, that same wonder and intrigue of the better things. In the deepness of his eyes, my eyes, I saw that he was exactly as I am, and as I was. Putting on a flexible shell of sorts to deal with and make sense of the world. To give off the aura of being put together, of confidence. I do not know if he did as I did. I do not know if he faked it until he became it. Admitted strong adaptation, the ease of accepting and moving with the change of life. As I have. I am adaptable. I am confident. I am many things. There will always be doubt. He was making mistakes, trying new things, not caring what anyone thought of him, or the social normality, just being totally him. Which is exactly what I had done when I had those eyes.
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That was a while ago.
I don’t remember how long ago it was.
You have changed some.
Yes. But it was important.
Your mind’s a mess.
I know. But I can handle it.
Can you?
I have so far. There may be times when that control wavers a bit, allowing for more or less at points, but is that not life? I’ll be fine. That’s a fact of life. It will come and it will go. Life will go on. I am strong and capable and I always have been. I am me. The past months have questioned that but I know what I am, what I want to be. I’m me damnit.
You’re a cookey guy.
Yes. Yes, I am.
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You sit by a wall of large windows. The sun sets, it washes streaks of orange across the sky which fades into yellows then blues. There is snow on the ground outside but you are not cold. It is dark but you can still see across the field. It is light, it is quiet. This is what you wanted. Now that you have it you no longer know. You are alone in a room of other people. You cannot focus on a single thing. Gabe isn’t too far off. Gabe, from your floor last year. The one you kinda connected with more-so than anyone else. But you don’t say hi. He was sitting with Cally. You were told they broke up, that was a while ago. They looked to be having a serious conversation. You can’t help but overhear. You have no one to talk to, no work to get done, no book to read. You look out at the snow. Your mind wanders, but not in the good daydreaming way. It is in a way where you can’t focus on anything. You can’t help but hear bits of their conversation. Without context you have to pass off the few words you do catch, for they mean nothing. Perhaps their conversation isn’t that bad.
Everyone is sitting in a couple or group. They always are. How? You wonder. You look at the empty seat across from you. You’re sitting alone. You seem to sit alone a lot. It’s only fun when it’s voluntary. It’s often not. Your roommate never wants to talk, and can’t hold a conversation with you. Nothing the both of you want to talk about at least. Not all the time. Your mind wanders. Your brain doesn’t want your heart to be happy, and it knows how to make it hurt. You think back on the past, the way things used to be. You have to remind yourself that things are different for a reason. But you still miss having that connection, that security. Where you more attracted to the idea? You do not know for sure. For the first time in a while you really realize that you don’t have a person. You are alone in this world. You are an individual. So much so that it’s hard to find someone with your mindset, your interests, your method of thought. You wonder if people think about you, if so, in what way? It won’t change anything, you’re not going to change your character. That’s you. You just want to know. It’s you. You distance yourself to some extent because you never want to impose. Even though you crave human interaction you seem to have an awkward time initiating anything constant. You weren’t always this way, not before, but then you were totally comfortable and confident. You had reassurance. Now you’re in the real world again. You wish something else would be the catalyst to cause you to be with people. In person you can do anything, you’re always fine then. Usually. When it comes to figuring out something to do, you become lost.
You find anything to change your thoughts, divert your mind, so you write this stupid little thing to get you out of your funk. You became weird again, because that is you. You are not tied down. You are alone, individual, free to float. You remember who you are. We just have our moments is all.
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I hate how I have to be the inciting party. Do people forget about me? Is it just too much of a hassle? Do you really care? What are the parameters for being someone’s friend, or for choosing to spend your extra time with someone? Is it because you’re in an enclosed space, so it comes naturally? I don’t know anymore. Do people think about me? Am I on their radar?
Why do you expect them to be the one to incite any incident?
I hate you. And it’s because it feels like I’m always the one to have to incite anything. Or that I’m not a part of anything spontaneous or fun. I don’t hang out with them, and no matter what I’ll always feel left out of something.
That’s because you don’t belong anywhere.
That’s cruel.
But you believe it.
… On some level, yes.
What if they think the same thing? That they’re being left out?
But they all live together and do things.
Do they?
… I don’t know.
If you move off campus this will only get worse.
Yeah.
How do you always seem to be left on the edge? Floating from group to group, being able to survive, but do you actually thrive in them.
I think I do, until it disbands.
Then you aren’t invited –
- And I refuse to invite myself. I’ve been unwanted in a group before. It doesn’t feel good.
No, it doesn’t. You don’t have your person.
No one to run back to.
You’re a coward.
I’m alone.
You cut yourself off before they can.
Do I? I don’t even know anymore. I’m just stressed right now. This feeling will subside. It will return to normal.
What is normal?
My friends. They are my friends. I don’t get to see the people I like because we are all super busy. We have chosen that life, we knew it. Motke even said it a bunch and we’ve only seen evidence to prove it.
You don’t get to hang out with people anymore.
I know. That sucks. But it doesn’t mean it’s gone. It’ll never be gone. I have to carve out time. I HAVE to, for my sanity. I can like a whole lot of people from a whole lot of places in my life, but I want my friends.
Be careful they still feel like your friends when you return.
… Don’t bring them up.
People change. Those guys are your friends, but they’re not them, are they? They’re not the same guys you could sit on the low wall with and talk about nothings and every-things all day.
Maybe they are. You don’t know.
You don’t know.
What do I know? A lot. Nothing. This constant work is killing me. There’s too much to have all the creativity I think I need.
Before you were bored with all your time. And you feel like if you did any less, you wouldn’t be doing enough, or being productive enough. You always feel that way unless you’re overworking and stressing yourself out. Stop. It isn’t healthy.
Neither is drinking yourself blind and going to parties every day of the weekends after production season.
It was fun.
Yeah, but you can be so much more creative. You don’t need to spend all your money on booze so you can’t remember the time. You can go out and have fun, go do real things, you can hang out and spend time with your friends. Actually, do something worth remembering.
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Remember your words,
Be brave and bold.
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I used to hear how we were relationship goals and it made me happy. It was actually one of the things that made me happiest. It was a huge source of pride. I was content with that being my life. Content, but was I going to be happy? Probably not. I wonder if I would have chased my passions as hard, or would I make decisions based off of our relationship. Now I don’t care about any of that. I don’t care when people talk about the cutest couple, or relationship goals. I guess I don’t want a relationship. It’s not my world right now. And I guess, when it comes down to it, I don’t want it to be. I want tight relationships with the people I love platonically. My friends. The crazy nights, the early mornings, the long days, the insane nonconforming structure, the quiet risers, the slow days, talking for hours, total silence. I don’t want to just be content anymore. I want to live life fully. My friends should be a major part of that.
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Look around you. Feel the breeze coming in. Smell the fresh air. A friend stopped by, you got to talk, forget the load, the worries slightly calmed, energy found. Now you can sit and do work. It’s what you dream of, to calm down.
The computer doesn’t work, I can’t study, I can’t write. I can’t write! Oh fuck I should’ve backed up onto the pony before updating. It’s taking forever.
Relax. Breathe. Take your time. You have it. It will be OK. You can walk to class with your computer open, it doesn’t matter. The only reason you cannot get it done is if you worry about it. That will cause you to stress, procrastinate, and do a bad job.
OK.
You don’t have to be perfect, you have to remember, life is better that way. Today is a good day, because you make it.
Thank you.
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I used to believe I was a family man, that I wanted a wife and children. That was what I truly believed. But. As is proved evident by my actions, and tendencies, I am doomed to live my own paradox: Father’s tend to disappoint their sons, and the sons spend their whole lives trying to be anything but their fathers, only to end up just like them. I like my father, am not truly happy unless I am constantly busy, overworked, so to say. I get bored, and angsty. I need the change, I need the work, I need the whatever it is. I need to chase the feeling of being productive, leaving my mark, making a difference, gaining something. I have to either produce something or take something in. Even those quiet moments, I’m taking something in, observing, enjoying the simplicity of it maybe. Time with friends is not wasted. It is an observation, a fun one. It produces feelings and emotions, excitement, with the people I like and care about. That is fulfilling I have come to understand. I do not know if I will want to be married or have kids. Perhaps I want to float, be able to make split second decisions without someone else to think about. Perhaps I don’t. Perhaps I need it in order to effectively chase the emotions and stories, I want to tell about the relationships we carry. I am young. I am free. I am busy. I am working. I am creating. I am here.
I am here.
You’re chasing it. Does that not mean, on some level you really want it, or even need it?
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Fuck it’s been a while. I don’t care. I want to kiss you. I want to hold you. I want to feel your cheek on mine. I want to fall asleep with you. I don’t care if we have sex, I just want to be close to you. And you’re gone. You’re in Jersey. Then you’ll be in LA. For a whole fucking semester. And I’ll be here. Fuck you life. That’s too damn long.
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I put my arm up against the wooden doorframe. To try to understand what I am within existence. It hurts. Right at my elbow, right between the bones, a ligament. What I am within existence. Me. Not attached to anyone or anything, but me. What am I? what is life? What does it mean to exist? I feel the need to go outside and sit in the grass. I feel the need to look out at the world in silence and feel the wind on my skin and under my coats.
I feel the need to be sad and lonely. I do not believe there is anyone or anything that can work on that. I feel alone. I feel as though the rest of the world is a shroud of smoke. I feel as though I am the only one left alive. Alone is not freeing, alone is painful right now. But right now, I feel I need to be alone.
Why the fuck is my face making this one? Why are my cheeks pushing themselves up? Why do I have absolutely nothing to say to anyone? Is it just anyone here? I talked more than easily to the random lady at the gallery. I was comfortable and weird and I loved it. But with these people, with mom, Elliott, Rebecca… I cannot bring myself to be happy. I fell fat. Lethargic. Trapped. Bored. Stuck. Isolated. Disqualified. Uninvested. Unimportant. In normal life I do not want to be alone. But here all I want is to run away and be alone. Be with strangers.
Today… what the fuck. Today was boring, bad, terrible, then super great after a while. After we had our experience of my pain, my being with these people who annoy me, who when I am around, I have no words or care to speak any words that might come to mind. Why does this hurt?
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I know I need to go away and feel these emotions to the fullest I need to hurt and be angry I need to process otherwise I will not be able to really laugh or love.
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How do I tell the people that love me that they are what makes me hurt? That they are what dulls my blade and kills my spark?
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And then poof. Just like that. It goes away.
Finished December 23, 2018