Unclench.

Last night was a long night. Today will be an even longer day.

The older you get, the more you realize the value of friends that you can keep throughout it all, even though it’s just a bit different and not exactly kosher. The whole weirdness of it makes it all the more… precious? If that is what it really is.

For that, I’m really, really thankful.

I spent a long time last night taking care of a drunk someone who broke down over someone else. I’m just… drained, by the utterly deafening sense of loss they felt. At that point, the breaking point where I sat down and cried with him, reminded me of me. Until then, I’d never seen another reach the same point I reach every time someone even threatens to leave. But I cured that by getting a laugh.

The more I live, the more I feel that what makes me feel best, the best, is seeing other people laugh. And in some cases, just simple smiles make me feel on top of the world. Like somehow, by managing to entice that odd pull of specific facial muscles, one of your goals in live has a nicely shaped check mark right in the box.

Just so you know, that’s one sure sign that I honestly really give a damn about you, whoever you are.

Maybe it’s time I start trying to feel about the things I do for myself rather than how people react to whatever I do. Truth is, I try, but I haven’t found that sort of enjoyment in it. Not for a while. Because, honestly, the biggest sense of achievement is putting a smile on a face belonging to someone I really, truly care about.

I really wish I could at the moment, but who knows what’s going on there? Who knows what will go on? I certainly don’t.

 

To my love.

Dear you,

There’s a feeling of malcontent somewhere around the back of my throat. Would you like to know why? A certain frustration comes with the sense of a thwarted ambition, a diverted purpose. What I would really love to do right now is tell you how much I love and further emphasize the fact by lifting you ten feet into the air (a physical impossibility, so the laws of physics say) and swinging you round and round like a five year old on a sugar high

But that would be unwise, like sticking your hand in a blender is unwise. The same sugar-grazed five-year-old is playing with matches near gasoline. Self control, self control. Were I to blurt out everything I would love to say, no doubt you’d turn a deaf ear on me again – no doubt, you’d shut us out, lock the door, and swallow the key. Can’t tie you down, can’t wrap you tight, because there will still be more of the same, more of the long disappearances and the chance reacquainting. More of the casual “serious” flings we both delude ourselves into going into. You, deluded in thinking that it might be true, this time. I, deluded in thinking I could convince you to stay, this time.

Oh, how my heart swells. I would skip across the Northern Lights just to catch the scene of you right before the door closes behind you, if I had to. I would walk on dreams in hopes of the odd second our eyes meet and the quiet spark goes off.

Won’t you please, stay? No.

I thought that might be the case, so I won’t argue mine. No need for me to accurately describe the ways I love you, because I don’t know. You’re a concept, a wild imagining, a dream escape – yet, also a constant. I’m sorry I called you an ideal wedding photo; we would never need one. We don’t feel the odd need to validate your love through a commonly accepted, majority approved tradition. Our love is beyond such mundane things, beyond such petty routine. Our love is galaxial. Our love is… nonexistent.

You come, then you go; you come, then you go.

I’m putting the pen down now, dear. I have to make the bed. It has this you-shaped crease in the middle, and it still smells of you.

Please tell me if this is for the best, now, before it’s too late.

Love,
Me

Eve’s Dilemma

I am afraid to write what I really feel. I know that the words are stuck right now, because I cannot bear to have its permanence marked by ink on paper or words on a screen, captured by screenshots in the mind. If I don’t let it out, I do not acknowledge these feelings.

I am afraid. What if this is not what I am really looking for? I honestly feel so overwhelmed by the prospect of finally being able to be in a place where love for subject matter and actual anticipation for the future trump everything else. This concept is entirely foreign to me because never, in my entire eleven years of education, has there been any form or truly zealous love towards what I learn study, just for how teachers remind me what I knew before.

Yet, dangling so scrumptiously, this fruit of knowledge hangs. What will I unleash if I (dare) take a bite?

Lessons and things to remember from 2010:

-Planning is very important.
-Having nothing to do is something to appreciate.
-Having a lot to do is even more appreciable.
-Sleep cures a lot of things.
-Time is money.
-There are always gonna be people with really bad attitudes, who put you off, and you’ll have to tolerate it. but I’m so tempted to ask them, “Do you really hate your job that much?” instead of, “What’s wrong? Can I help you?” Because help will only go so far if people do not expect it – and so, I think one day I will.
-Courage is something to build.
-Confidence is sexy and attracts me.
-After Emilio’s departure, instead of throwing myself at other people, I learned to spend time with myself. And right now I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. Because this kind of happiness is not… the busting kind, but rather the type where I can be walking down the road with a stupid grin on your face for no particular reason other than knowing that I’m alive.
-Take your work seriously, but not too serious that you forget the bigger picture.
-Love people. I read somewhere that when you keep getting disappointed by people and relationships, and you get angry, then you spend time with yourself, and gradually at some point you learn to love yourself, then you love people. Just anyone, unconditionally. I think this is true.
-I’ve learned that nothing that’s worthwhile is easy, and its a matter of mind over matter – whether you think it’s really that worthwhile.
-Everything happens for a reason.
-I still have the person that I met a year and a half ago in my heart, and I’m starting to believe this might not change.
-Warm weather is something to love; if anyone spends too much time in the cold, they will begin feeling less for those in the warmth.
-I love it here, but I subconsciously hate it too – because of the stress. But experience has taught me that whatever’s bitter will have its benefit later.
-Part of me loves the way things are now, but part of me is secretly hoping there was that little bit more. But, I know I’ll have to wait.
-Life can be unfair, but I am one of the lucky ones. and therefore, I must make the most out of what I am given.

In which Amy sounds like an OCD maniac.

Major pet peeve: I can’t stand bad hygiene (I’m going to omit the ‘personal’ in ‘personal hygiene’ since it sort of implies that hygiene on its own isn’t yours and could be someone else’s hygiene you’re looking after… and that’s just plain fucking weird). Untidiness I can deal with (and I will deal with your untidiness), but bad hygiene is the biggest turn off there is in the world.

What’s funny is that the inside of my head is like a massive pile of unsorted laundry where clean socks mingle with dirty underwear. I reckon my brain figures that’s enough mess for me to deal with and makes me feel like cleaning all the time. No joke.

All the clothes hanging in my wardrobe face in one direction and arranged according to function. Bathrobe on the far left, followed by coats and jackets, long jumpers, dresses, blazers, shirts, going-out tops, and skirts. All my sleeveless tops and t-shirts occupy one drawer, my long-sleeved tops another. Shorts and sports attire go in the last drawer.

I have four different coloured highlighters for different purposes. Green is for major subheadings, pink is for important citations, orange is for terminology and key phrases, and yellow is for everything else I deem relevant.

That was completely irrelevant.

My cousins may complain that women these days are unhygienic, don’t cook or clean and expect to be royalty, but I disagree! Mom has trained me well indeed. I can cook, I can clean, and God damn, I can iron.

Now the only problem is the other person. I feel like I’ve successfully redressed the role reversal single-handedly.

Mom will be ever so proud of me.

Just to amuse you,

I post here the 11 rules of life, attributed to Bill Gates in several chain emails – but falsely so.

Rule 1: Life is not fair – get used to it.

Rule 2: The world won’t care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something before you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3: You will not make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won’t be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both the pay, the position, and the car. Don’t just sit back and expect life to be served to you on a silver platter.

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait until you get a boss.

Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping. They called it opportunity – opportunity to see what will happen if you give up. If you don’t like it, don’t give up.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’t whine about your mistakes. Learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes, and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forests from the parasites of your parents’ generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life has not. In some schools, they may have abolished failing grades, and they’ll give you as many times as you want to get the right answer. This doesn’t bear even the slightest resemblance to anything in real life.

Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don’t get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you find yourself. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10: Television is not real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.

To my best friend.

Before I begin, I should warn you: this letter is two pages long in word. (:

Dear you,

I miss you. It’s a bit ridiculous and it’s a little stupid, because we talk every day, but it isn’t like we used to – or like we usually do when we’re face to face; I mean, you live half a country away. We used to live in the same town, within a ten minute drive of each other – we used to live at each other’s houses, switching off every weekend.

We clicked really quickly. In sixth grade, Mrs. Schleippman sat us next to each other in our art special; I had the tenth volume of Fruits Basket manga under my chair, and you saw it, and then – then, I don’t really know what happened. We just started talking about everything and nothing, and then my mom, after hearing me talk about you 24/7, told me to have you over. You brought me a mixtape with an absurd amount of anime soundtrack on it, and for the longest time that CD was all I listened to. I remember the stories we made up, with all sorts of characters – but no two were alike. They were completely fantastic stories; and I promise you I will write Thread of Duty. I swear.

When I moved from St. Louis to Florida the next year, it was really difficult. After spending so much time with you and really, really knowing you – better than anyone – it felt wrong to have empty space where you used to be. When you visited me at that awful school, I ran at you and tackled you to the ground, screaming your name all the while. In that scream I tried my hardest to release all the loneliness and sadness and I-miss-you feelings, so that I could be less of the person the people there made me and more the person you remembered me being. I wasn’t – and you saw that. But you accepted it. But there were changes going on in me that neither of us expected.

At the end of the weekend you spent with us, I confessed my biggest secret to you. I was terrified about what you would think, but I think you knew before I knew. I confessed – that I had had feelings for another girl. Her name was Evan Hill, and I remember she was absolutely adorable. She had a lot of freckles and blue-green eyes and curly blonde hair that came to, oh, the small of her back at least. When she straightened it, it was past her butt. But since I never knew how to tell myself I had feelings for her, let alone how to tell her, I kept quiet. You were silent for a while, and then you asked, “Have you liked any other girls before?” I didn’t answer. I had an answer, but I couldn’t tell you. So we left it alone.

After I got kicked out of Canterbury, I went back to Belleville. We clicked again, spending so much time together – and then it happened. We kissed; accidentally, but still. It happened and it was wonderful. We spent the summer and eighth grade and a rather good half of freshman year together – long distance, though, except for school breaks, but it didn’t matter because we were dizzy in love – or I was, or you were. But distance has an odd way of pulling people apart: you can never tell when it’s happening, and you cannot tell when it has happened until you are with the person you love – or loved – and things are not the same. That happened, for a little while, many times. Then, over the weekend of September 11 of my sophomore/junior year (because they were meshed together), we seemed to just fall apart. We didn’t spend that much time alone together. We went to Delmar Loop, and you brought two people along, Steve and Sarah. You knew Sarah and you knew Steve, but they didn’t know each other, and I didn’t know them – but we still managed to have a pretty good adventure. But then, we went to Shiloh Homecoming, and we met Sarah again – most of your time was spent keeping Sarah from beating her ex-girlfriend up, or with Faith and Karma being all couple-y and adorable. I admit, I didn’t mind it as much as I should have, but we didn’t do anything. We just walked around and you socialized and when I tried to hold your hand (and you have no idea how big a deal that is for me. Really.) you pulled away; when Faith asked if we were together, you said, point blank, “ No, we’re just friends.” You didn’t say we were good friends. You didn’t say I was your best friend. Nothing more was said about it. But after that, it was awkward.

Then, you met Allen. To be honest, I hated him a bit when you told me about him, because you told me about him after not talking to me for three months; because of drama, you said. I told you that you didn’t need to deal with that, and you said that it wasn’t your fault – people brought it onto you. You wouldn’t understand that if these people constantly pull you into drama like you say they do, you could just stop being friends with them; you wouldn’t let those people go. You didn’t tell me about the relationships you’d had in those three months, with Theo, who I definitely hated, and David, who cheated on you with one of your really good friends, and Evann, who you constantly went back to, five times. Six times. And then he, like David, got feelings for Kat. I figured Allen would be like those guys, because those guys were much the same person I had been before Arizona. Let’s face it, Arizona has changed me. I won’t deny it any longer. But, I’m digressing: back to Allen.

You complained about him all the time when you came here. I talked to him on the phone when we were in Alamogordo, when we snuck out to get Taco Bell at midnight. He slurred his voice like he was drunk – or high – or both. When I asked you about it, you said, “No, he does that on purpose. He thinks it’s cool.” Then I got ridiculously upset; how could something like that be cool? How can you stand it? The complaints continued: He makes me feel fat because he’s so skinny. He doesn’t make food, he just microwaves chicken and pizza. He made fun of me for liking Pierce the Veil.” Excuse me, but he called people who express themselves on Tumblr “faggots.” He called people who like Pierce the Veil – “faggots.” He inadvertently insulted you, and you didn’t say anything because you’re nice. So yes, I was upset. I was very upset.

Now though, I’m a lot less uneasy about everything that’s happened. I still love you, in the same way you remember me loving you in the beginning, even though that love has changed much the way I have changed. And you let me know every day that there will always be special places in our hearts for each other – and that’s the greatest thing I could ever ask for. I love you. <3

Forever,
Me

Letters

Day 1 — Your best friend
Day 2 — Your love
Day 3 — Your parents
Day 4 — Your sibling (or closest relative)
Day 5 — Your dreams
Day 6 — A stranger
Day 7 — Your Ex-boyfriend/girlfriend/love/crush
Day 8 — Your favorite internet friend
Day 9 — Someone you wish you could meet
Day 10 — Someone you don’t talk to as much as you’d like to
Day 11 — A Deceased person you wish you could talk to
Day 12 — The person you hate most/caused you a lot of pain
Day 13 — Someone you wish could forgive you
Day 14 — Someone you’ve drifted away from
Day 15 — The person you miss the most
Day 16 — Someone that’s not in your state/country
Day 17 — Someone from your childhood
Day 18 — The person that you wish you could be
Day 19 — Someone that pesters your mind—good or bad
Day 20 — The one that broke your heart the hardest
Day 21 — Someone you judged by their first impression
Day 22 — Someone you want to give a second chance to
Day 23 — The last person you kissed
Day 24 — The person that gave you your favorite memory
Day 25 — The person you know that is going through the worst of times
Day 26 — The last person you made a pinky promise to
Day 27 — The friendliest person you knew for only one day
Day 28 — Someone that changed your life
Day 29 — The person that you want tell everything to, but too afraid to
Day 30 — Your reflection in the mirror

Someone remind me to do this. I’ll start during art; I know I can’t do this day by day. :/

Sui Generis.

I have some questions that I need to ask myself. Actually, I’m just going to leave it open to the general population.

1. Do I care too little or just about the wrong things?
2. Do I not show that I care at all or do people just not believe me?
3. Do I just have a different way of showing that I care?
4. Am I less sensitive to what people should usually be sensitive to?
5. Am I just inherently wired differently or am I a result of watching my parents’ relationship and interacting with them?

I like to think I’m capable of caring and that I do. I like to believe that I do sufficiently show that I care and maybe sometimes it’s just a little different from what people are used to or expect. I’ve been told over the years that I need to tune in more to other people’s feelings and not be such an insensitive prick (though clearly therein lies a paradox: tune in, pick up negativity, and provide other person with desired responses even if they aren’t completely honest, OR, be frank and piss them off). I’ve been told that maybe I just need to feel more; to visibly be affected by harshness instead of just… not feeling anything or accepting it at that.

A lot of this clashes with the priorities I’ve set for myself over the years: My future next, family, my very closest friends, and then there’s everything else. I don’t know if people expect me to… put them above everything else, or if I’m too inflexible to juggle everything competently, but the major discord here is the expectations I have of myself and of the other person versus the other person’s expectations of me. Or so I see it to be.

Maybe I only have to look at past experiences to see where I’ve gone wrong and learn from there, but it isn’t fair to generalize, is it? Every new encounter will be different and what never worked before might just be it this time. Plenty of new opportunities to succeed, but plenty more to mess up, too.

Ideally, I’d just lie in bed, close my eyes and think about this for a while until I’m slightly less on edge and annoyed at myself, but I have work, and as my priorities dictate… I have no time for this.

School update~!

I got a 74% on my Chemistry final, but Mr. Smith says he’s going to definitely curve the grade because the class average was super low. So I’m definitely going to do better! I already did better than I thought I would; in all honesty, I wasn’t prepared at all. But I’m glad I succeeded.

My Modern Literature final went too smoothly. The thing consisted of matching characters from Native Son with descriptions of the characters, multiple choice questions that were from the quizzes we took over the book all quarter, and a composition that involved regurgitating the plot and explaining how the emotion “fear” controlled Bigger Thomas’ life; again, this was easy because we had written a paper about it soon after starting the book. So I’m pretty sure I’m going to do well on that final, too.

Tomorrow, I have my AP art portfolio due, which I’m psyched for because it’s all photography, ha. I haven’t finished my dragontree yet, but in truth I have given up on it. Oh well, I’ll finish it tonight. And draw Lady Gaga for the millionth time. (: But, I also have AP government. A lot of it will be multiple choice, and there will be some subjective short answer questions; short answers are something I’m okay with, because I don’t have to formulate my idea into paragraphs. Five sentences will do as long as a point is made and explained. But I still have to study like hell for Government… it’s one of my favorite classes, but as usual, I have a horrible grade so far (a low 70 something.)

Thursday is Photography and Algebra 2. Photography will be a breeze for sure, because on Monday we took the written portion of the final, and on Thursday we will be reading our group stories and presenting the pictures. I wrote the conclusion so I, of course, totally flipped the story on its head and spun it about fifty times. And I couldn’t ask for better pictures. (: Algebra 2, well, algebra in general is something that I can understand very easily. My brain naturally solves problems without any form or equation and I’m usually right. The only thing that bothers me about algebra is the graphing, in all honesty, because I’m a perfectionist. But I can’t use a ruler correctly. But I’m prepared and I know what I’m doing (unlike in Chemistry) so I’m sure I’ll go out with a B-A-N-G.

 

Over break I have tons of photoshoots planned, and, hopefully, either extra photography assignments from Mrs. Gallo or an internship of sorts with her on her work. (: I need to get her my contact information for sure.

 

So yeah, that’s my week.