realization

while showering, the random thought popped into my head: in three days, dylan and i will have been dating for an entire two months. had i been single during this time, i would have said that two months is nothing, a blip in the history of my life. but it's so much more, and that thought amazes me. time is subjective and objective at once, which is bewildering to me.

anyways. our relationship has been easy, really. especially in relation to blake's situation, i'd say we were soaring through clear skies. but that's not completely true; we've both battled diseases, emotional and physical, drama, harassment, and distance (though not quite as prevalent.) we've had to work to stay together, to stay positive, to stay in control. and i still stand by the fact that it has been easy...because the way i see it, what we have is so worth working for, i don't even realize the hoops we both have had to jump through until they're swinging in the breeze behind us.

that's a comforting thought.

especially now that our honeymoon period has worn off and we're maturing as a couple, the thought that we can stand up to adversity is a really nice one to have.



my great grandmother died last week. i don't know how to feel about this...she was always a bitch, and i never got to know her very well, but she died alone, essentially. her dementia had consumed her, all of her loved ones had died before her, and her "friend" at the nursing home was a completely different person than my grandma thought, and that saddens me. that's not how i want to go out, my family sticking me into a home because no one cares enough to come and live with me at home until my dying day, and then essentially just riding out the last of my memory until i'm vulnerable and alone, never knowing who anyone is.

i'd much rather die young and leave my family and friends than to die alone, forgetting and forgotten.

balance

i have never felt so trustworthy, friend-wise, in anyone as i am towards blake.
i have never felt so emotionally attached, romantically or otherwise, to anyone as i am to dylan.
i have never felt so linked, through all of my life, to anyone more than to jillian.

i haven't felt this balanced in my emotions since maybe snippets of first hanging out with mara and ariel, freshman year first semester.



tonight was right
despite my stupid, accidental self-set curfew
and near-breakdown over a one pound, $350 puppy.

yesterday was right
despite my innate ability to oversleep
and tremendous lack of foresight money-wise.

tomorrow will be right in another way;
i'll clean my room and i'll do some homework
and i'll feel accomplished.


that's a nice thing to know.




i think i'll crash on the couch tonight
i'm already here and the couch is so inviting...

"if you'd only be the completion of me,

i'd be the closest i can be to alive."

for the first time in eternity, i feel like a functioning, flourishing, loving, lovable, loved person.

self esteem through the roof, holding hands with the lovely boyfriend and bestfriend,
backed up by my girls, my momma...being myself for once was nice.

plus my aunt is coming, and she always makes things better.



i'll never let it go again, being myself...being infinite. i say that, knowing i will let go, but i'm sincerely going to try and tackle all the stress and sickness for the betterment of myself and the people that surround me.

blake and i talked about how our whole lives, we've been waiting, not living. and so i'm going to really live. i'm going to try doing something completely me every day.

chasing a train and climbing an old oil rig and getting a manicure and just doing what i wanted for a day was the nicest gift i could have been given :D
DEFINITELY well on my way to feeling infinite again; i had truly forgotten what this feels like.

today was quite necessary.


"this is who we are, and how we'll stay."

i've begun gritting my teeth

at all times from this outrageous stress.

i think i've been doing it subconsciously for quite some time now,
but only realized it two weeks ago upon waking to an extremely painful lower jaw
and perforation-like marks against the perimeter of my tongue, proof that i had pushed my tongue up against my teeth in my sleep.


and now i can't stop; i find myself with my jaw locked and my tongue pressed against my teeth at least ten times a day, sometimes telling myself to stop then realizing that i've allowed my teeth to clench back together in the milliseconds between noticing each time.


i think it's my body's way of retaliation against the waves of stress it forsees.

ugh
i just want my teeth to stop hurting.


now.

this is for you, Akaky Akakyevitch.

practicing for the psat, i came across this question:

"...His name was Akaky Akakyevitch. No one has been able to remember when and how long ago he entered the department. However many directors and high officials of all sorts came and went, he was always seen in the same place, at the very same duty, so that they used to declare that he must have been born a perpetual titular councillor in uniform all complete and with a bald patch on his head. The porters, far from getting up from their seats when he came in, took no more notice of him than if a simple fly had flown across the vestibule. His superiors treated him with a sort of domineering chilliness. The head clerk's assistant used to throw papers under his nose without even saying 'Copy this' or 'Here is an interesting, nice little case,' as is usually done in well-behaved offices. And he would take it, gazing only at the papers without looking to see who had put them there and whether he had the right to do so; he would take the papers and at once set to work to copy them. The young clerks made jokes about him to the best of their clerkly wit, and told before his face all sorts of stories of their own invention about him. They would enquire when the wedding was to take place, or would scatter bits of paper on his head, calling them snow. In the midst of all this teasing, Akaky Akakyevitch never answered a word, but behaved as though there were no one there. Only when they jolted his arm and prevented him from going on with his work would he cry out, 'Leave me alone! Why do you insult me?' There was something strange in the words and in the voice in which they were uttered, so that one young clerk, new to the office, was cut to the heart, and in those words thought that he heard others: 'I am your brother.'

The response to Akaky's words by the clerk who is 'new to the office' is best described as

(A) confused
(B) mocking
(C) disbelieving
(D) timid
(E) compassionate"

i'm writing this, astounded at the serendipity, as an add-on to a post i began scribbling down in a notebook today...

i write this knowing that you will not read it. still, i won't divulge in full detail, just in case: this is for you.

today i saw a side of you i had never seen before. panicking, wounded by the laughter of a hauty classmate, you lost the cool i've always been jealous of. before reading some insight to your past through comments on a blog we both read, i might not have fully comprehended. but i have seen this sliver of a self-loathing past self, and i watched as you did what you could to defend the intelligence that holds you high above the rest. or at least, it does in my eyes. perhaps it doesn't in yours...a tragedy in the form of self esteem.

the student who called you out was poking fun, but deep down it was meanspirited. i would not have seen it, had you reacted in any less of an explosive manner. frankly, i think that E is a dick, but i am wondering the grudges you two hold. a slip of the tongue was enough to send you throwing pens and pencils. those around me laughed, as those around you sneered. i reached out to you, my companion. you couldn't see. "oh my god"s were mouthed all around; i nearly shed a tear.

because i saw you, self-exiled on that island, from a rowboat on the sea. i have been there, although that was the darkest period of my life--slapping myself as i stared at my swollen, tear-streaked reflection in the 6th grade girls' bathroom.

the answer was e, compassionate, by the way.

compassion isn't quite correct, in my opinion. it's understanding. it's having an appreciation for humanism, for the golden rule. it's having even a thread of decency. it is love towards a fellow man.

so, to you i am writing in a way that i can't voice: i love you for who you are, even if we are not close enough for that. because i was sending you all the love i could, i was watching. they are savages if they choose to laugh at mistake, at emotion.

i understand.

ten goals to self-improvement

recently, i've been terribly unhappy. i'm doing what i can to better my life: spending time with the people who appreciate me, not letting those who dont effect my psyche, trying to sleep more often, making good use of my time, trying to take that time as it comes, complain less...

i'm thinking that the majority of my problems are related to my self-esteem: my hair is much shorter than i'd like it to be, which leaves me feeling extraordinarily insecure, the waistband of the skinnies i FINALLY got back into (from 7th grade, my first pair, my favorites) gets tighter and tighter, i work out and feel amazing about myself until i realize it's all in vain, there are bags under my eyes the size of north carolina, and i'm constantly breaking out--something i've never really had to deal with.
yeah, a lot of this comes with hyper/hypothyroidism, but it's not like i'm carrying around a sign that says "DISEASED! PLEASE EXCUSE ALL AESTHETIC DEFECTS UNTIL CURED!" ...i'm letting myself go, my body is letting itself go, and it's going fast. and that pisses me off.
i'm thinking of dying my hair in a few days, a deep reddish.

anyways
christofer ingle of nevershoutnever! wrote this, and i thought i'd copy.
here's his:

10 GOALS TO SELF-IMPROVEMENT

Build a closer relationship with God.
Beat all addictions.
Read a book each month.
Stay true to my diet/life decision to veganism.
Start running again.
Early to bed, Early to rise.
Study music theory.
Learn five new chords or scales a month.
Practice piano every chance I get.
Write in my journal everyday.

he interests me, and some of these choices actually caught me off guard.
i want that...i figure that if i can't have control over anything from my health to how people view me to the number of hours spent at that hellhole downtown, making a list of ten general things will help me not to stress the little things
so here goes!

10 GOALS TO SELF-IMPROVEMENT

keep my room relatively clean.
depend less on caffeine and more on good sleep.
say no to any more ECAs
eat healthier: more fruit and clif bars, less yearbook concessions
go to every class, including music theatre.
take better care of myself; have an hour of "me" time at least once a week
do homework the night it's assigned
complain less
work on emotional self-esteem rather than wasting hours in front of the mirror
listen to music again. REALLY listen.





in relation to your last post, blake,
i agree with you. simply trying to balance ten classes, a boyfriend, some means of a social life, family, chores, and some regulated emotional state is insanely difficult. it's not that everything is falling apart, it's just that the energy needed to truly be passionate about more than one or two of those things is hard to maintain. J was truly being an ass when he said that, but i dont think he realized that his words would have such an effect on you; then again, maybe he was using some primitive attempt at reverse psychology? the shock value of his words were perhaps meant to spark something within you you'd claimed you were incapable of? i don't know. i probably would have punched him in the stomach, no lie.
just know that you're not the only one experiencing this and that i think hope that it will ease with time. for now, don't be a stranger to your own advice: take your time hour by hour, stop and appreciate what you have.


that's all.
i'll most likely post again sometime soon.
nighty night!