Things I Mean To Do But Don't

I used to be so good at blogging every day.  Whether I wanted to or not, even if I didn't have anything to say, I'd still do it.  It's become much less the case recently.  I'm honestly amazed it took over a year and a half for the habit to start fading, but I guess it finally has.  Maybe this blog will die soon as a result of that.  Maybe I'll find more to write about and it won't.

I'm in the middle of an odd transition of computers.  I'm trying to make the new one I just purchased into something of a work-only (or mostly, at least) machine.  That means cutting out things like flash games (or any other sorts of games), other people's blogs, and, well, my own.  That's what this computer (my older one) is for. Except the fact of the matter is, I'm probably not going to have this thing on most of the time, not to mention finding the time in which to blog.

But I'm rambling again.  I feel bad that I keep forgetting.  Hell, I'm not even forgetting anymore, it's just that I realize I should blog but I can't think of anything to say so I don't.  Or I'm too lazy to turn on this computer in order to do it.  And somehow, it doesn't bother me as much as it would have a year or even six months ago.  Things have changed.

Goodbyes

From what I knew of people and the writing I read well after the fact, I get the impression that many of them had this sadness at the end, this odd and fleeting nostalgia.  They wanted it to never end, they wanted things to last forever.  Or at least a little bit longer because at the very end, it seemed that differences started to fade.  But see, I never had that.  I just wanted to be gone.  

I always thought I'd be one of them, laughing and crying and wishing it wouldn't end.  That's how it was the year before.  That's why I wrote a massive post on the subject.  It was a big deal then.  I thought it would be more so now because I'll never go back there.  And it didn't happen.  I wasn't sad or bitter about the fact that I'd never see or even talk to most of those people again.

I enjoy good company and I like having people to talk to.  I don't really need most of them, though.  And the few I do...I know they'll be around.  At the very least until I get myself established afresh.  The past few years have put me through a lot, and while I do have a lot of pleasant memories walking out of that place, there are still so many more that are so painful I can't bring myself to fully think about them still, even though they've worn and faded with the years like everything else.

The wounds are still too fresh.  The fact that it's been so long tells you just how deep some of them cut.  I was young and foolish at the start of it all.  I doubt I'm too much better now, but at least it's something.  Innocent spirit is easy to wound because even though it knows that evil exists, it can't really fathom the true extent of it. I wasn't exactly angelic, but I was far from as stained and worn out by the world as I am now.  My notions of love and loyalty were hopeful and rosy.  I envisioned a perfect world.

And that place, the one I've left but haven't been able to separate myself from, it's what taught me this, it's where I learned.  I found lies and betrayal, I made mistakes, I lost pieces of myself.  So by the time it came to the end, I was ready to leave because I think I really needed to.  It wasn't hard.  I didn't cry.  Maybe I never will.  But I feel like given enough time for the wounds to heal, I'll be alright, I'll miss it and the way it taught me certain things, because even though the lessons left their marks, permanently, I've grown stronger for them.  

One day I might be sad because I wasn't then.  But not yet.  

Moving On

I don't know if I'm ready to move on.  Much as I've spent most of the past year bitching and moaning about how miserable I was and how I was so ready to be done with this and with that and with those other things, now that it's actually over...it's odd.  Somehow I don't feel ready anymore but just a little bit afraid.  Because even if everything did prepare us so well, it's still not the same.  No matter how stupid or annoying it was, that place was still home for several years.  It made me who I am.

I don't know that I really want to leave that behind.  Then again, I don't exactly have a choice in the matter at this point.  It's just scary to have to try to put things back together after everything you once knew is really legitimately over.  It's probably not going to be worse, and there's a good chance it's not going to be better.  That's just how life works.  And I know I can't just dwell in the past, but it's hard to realize that most of the people I've gotten used to seeing every day, I'm probably never going to see again.

I was looking for a quote from Paper Towns by John Green about not being able to follow the people you love, but then I came across another one instead:

"It's so hard to leave--until you leave. And then it is the easiest goddamned thing in the world...Leaving feels too good, once you leave."

That's where I am right now.  Because even though I've been gone for months, I haven't really left yet.  Everything I know about life is about being there, in that place, surrounded by those people and yes, even putting up with the nonsense.  That's why it's so hard for me to imagine that in one month exactly, I'm going to be somewhere else.  In another place, surrounded by another group of people, living another life.

I haven't yet pulled myself out of that life, that place, that environment.  I know that moving will do it.  I know in part because I won't have a choice and in part because I'll be so caught up in everything around me that I won't be able to hold on to it any longer.  And I imagine that then I'll wonder why it ever seemed so hard to let it go.  But for now, I'm still here.  I'm floating between two worlds, not ready to let go of one because I don't yet know how to grasp the other.

Mirrors

I've realized lately that every time I look in a mirror lately, I do it in order to find flaws.  Or rather, that's not why I look in the mirror initially.  It may be because I'm going out and I need to make sure my hair isn't sticking up at odd angles.  Or maybe it's because I feel something bleeding on my face and would like to know what it is and how I can make it stop.  Sometimes it's as simple as washing my hands or brushing my teeth and being in front of the mirror that sets it off.

But as soon as I see my reflection, my eyes immediately start scanning for flaws, problems.  Maybe it's a strand of hair that's too long or a small scab on my chin or an eyelash growing at the wrong angle.  And if I don't see anything immediately, I come up with things to find.  It's just the way I am.  I don't know when it started or why, but it's almost compulsive now.  It's extremely hard for me not to do it.

...And somewhere in there I lost my train of thought.  I think it might have had a bit more to do with hypochondria and how I'm an idiot for thinking I have every possible mental problem in the book (alright not all of them...then watch it turn out to be the ones I skipped over immediately).  Right, that should be fixed.  What I really need is to just have some work to do, because when I have serious work to do, I don't have the time for petty obsessions like my hypochondria.  I'll work on that.

Suffering

I spent so much time suffering that even though it's been a while, I'm still not sure how to do things any other way.  The past couple of years have seen me in a number of different states.  At first it was good because everything was new and exciting.  And then it was good because I thought I was in love.  Then it wasn't.  I made mistakes and I had to pick up the pieces.  There were many, many pieces.  That was probably the start of all the hurting.  Because so much had happened in the course of a couple of months that that summer I had to come to terms with all of it, and it wasn't easy.  I think there might still be pieces I haven't picked up and things I haven't come to terms with from that time.

Just when I thought I was getting things together, other things fell apart because I fell in love.  And if you know me then you know that I'm absolutely hopeless when I fall in love.  Of course, as per usual, it was unrequited.  Which occupied me nicely and drove me to more suffering.  I got good at feeling pain and dealing with it.  I still think there's beauty in agony and maybe that makes me a terrible person or maybe I just don't understand some things, but that's the way I see it.

I know I'm not supposed to think or feel this way, but sometimes I miss it.  I miss hurting.  I miss all of the things that dug into me and threatened to tear me to shreds because it hurt so much.  I know it's not right, but I don't know how to fix it.  If I had to guess, I'd imagine it means that I still have unresolved issues and unsolved problems in my life.  That leaves me to figure out what exactly they are and how I can go about fixing them.  I have a few guesses, because thinking back on certain times still makes me uncomfortable and rereading old conversations from given situations makes me cringe.

So maybe I just need to talk about it.  Out loud.  Not just writing about it because I always do strange things when I write like only writing from a certain standpoint or avoiding names or leaving out particular details.  Even when I'm not blogging where I do it on purpose, but when I'm writing privately, just for myself, I do odd things stylistically that don't make sense and don't get the full picture across.  And maybe if I wrote about things that bother me in every way I could think of doing it, I'd finally get to the heart of the problem.  But I'm so afraid that it wouldn't help.  Or maybe I just want to really talk about it because it feels the way being in love used to, forbidden.  There are things I don't want to say because I know that nobody can say anything back, and that just hurts everyone involved.

Sometimes I think that songs need to be longer.  Sometimes a certain feeling inspired by a song just needs to go on and there's no other song that really does it the way this one does, but playing it again is cheating and it's no longer the same.  I used to be able to pinpoint emotions with music but I can't anymore because every song is a mix of what I used to feel and what I understand, but I can never find anything to express the way I do feel in a given moment.  A moment like this anyway, where I'm sitting here, just me, letting music flow around me and wondering why none of it sounds quite right anymore.

I've never been a music person.  I never owned music until a year or two ago.  Before then I hardly knew what anyone listened to.  And a year or two ago, when I started listening to music (which was, to be fair, only because I fell in love with someone who loves music), started figuring out the names of songs and artists, I found things that made sense to me and that, in my hurt and bitter condition, I could relate to.  And I can still relate, but it's never the same, because I know I'm no longer hurting the way I was then.  I think that something still hurts.  I just can't put my finger on it.  I don't know what it means or how to express it.  I don't know how to talk about it and I don't know any music that channels it.

So I'm left without a way of expressing how I feel except for writing like this, in spurts that are unrelated and can't be connected because they don't make sense to me.  It's hopeless flailing in the dark, trying to isolate something when I don't know how to locate it.  It's by far better than the way I felt some time back, so I feel bad when I try to figure it out because I know that it gets so much worse.  I feel like I don't have a right to complain because it's really not bad...I just don't understand what the hell it is, and that's confusing.

Energy

I don't have it.  Maybe it's a "with age sort of thing" or maybe it's something else.  It's not sleep-deprivation, because right now I'm really not terribly sleep-deprived, if at all.  The weather may have had a bit to do with it, but I don't get the impression it was to blame.  Then again, I have no idea why, but today just exhausted me.  Completely and utterly drained any reserves I may have had.

I don't really have much to say right now.  I'm just tired.  Happy about some things.  Anxious about others.  Hanging in there.  I'm back to sitting back and letting life take me places (last time I got the idea to make things happen didn't go so well).  Now I'm thinking about two years ago.  Not much nostalgia there, nor terribly much emotion anymore at all, really.

I did it because I needed to prove to myself that I could act on my own desires.  Which was an awfully stupid reason to do it.  I knew it, too.  Walking over there that morning, I knew it was a mistake.  I still did.  And it started a lot of hell for me.  No, the start of the hell was way before that stupid decision, but it certainly caused a good bit of panic for a while.

I have no intention of ever repeating it.  I don't feel the need to.  Somehow, I'm becoming more okay with being calm and settled.  I don't mind the idea of consistency and I don't always need excitement.  Sure, small changes and interesting occurrences are nice every once in a while, but I no longer crave them the way I used to.  Anyway, I'm rambling.  I'll wrap it up and stop not making sense.  Good night.

Happy Evenings

You know what we should do regularly this coming year?  Evening walks.  For an hour or even half an hour every evening, just go wandering around the city.  It'll be a nice break from work and we'll catch up and talk about things.  That in addition to breakfast everyday should be a bare minimum of contact.  I'd prefer more, certainly, but I think both of those would be really nice and beneficial for the both of us.

That's not what I was going to write about, but it just came to mind, so I put it down anyway.  I've been quite talkative lately.  It might be because I've been doing less writing and more talking, or it might be because I've finally started getting some work done this summer and have had more time to put myself and my life together and think about it all.  It's pleasant.  I feel like after two months, I've finally started to pull things together instead of constantly moping and feeling useless.  Maybe I am freaking out a bit more than I need to be (alright, maybe more than a bit), but I'm getting things done, and that feels good.

I like evening walks.  They make me very happy.  Part of it is inevitably the fact that physical activity releases endorphins, which make you happy, but that's not all it is.  I like breathing in the fresh air and feeling my feet hit the pavement.  It's pleasant.  It's the one time of the day when I'm not worried about missing an email or having to do something at my computer.  I know that's a bad habit, but it's the way I've become.  I'm working on it though, and spending more time walking and/or talking with you helps, so please continue?

Anyhow, I'm in a fairly good mood right now, and I need to go write someone a letter, so I will go do that while I'm still upbeat and happy and not yet falling asleep at my keyboard.  With that in mind, enjoy your evenings and good night.

Mood

I know I didn't blog yesterday.  I almost don't care anymore.  Skipping a day used to feel like the end of the world and now it's just no big deal.  I have nothing to write about.  I'm no longer interested in writing.  I just want to fill up the space and be done with it.  It feels like an obligation instead of a release.  It's been a while since I've really, sincerely needed it.

I started this blog because I needed to spill my thoughts.  I needed it to be mostly anonymous but still feel like maybe someone would read it and read into it, read down to the meaning.  By someone, of course, I meant you.  I asked you before starting it, I asked you for input, I asked if you read it.  I wanted you to read it because easily half of it was directed at you, screaming in text on a computer screen the things I couldn't, or wouldn't let myself, say out loud.

I don't need it for that now.  I say most everything that I'd consider writing about.  It's better that way, which is why I want to make sure we both keep doing it, because if we don't, I'm pretty sure it will fall apart.  And maybe I would be the one to cause that final crack, but I don't think I can go back to a relationship with anything other than complete honesty and openness.

There's a difference between not being able to talk and refusing to say something.  The former happens to me a lot more than I'd like.  I push myself to avoid the latter.  I think it usually works out pretty well because even if I can't say it, I make myself type it.  Because if this is going to work, I need you to know things that I might not want you to know, as counter-intuitive as that sounds.

I'm not upset.  Yeah, it hurt a bit, there's no denying that.  No, I don't know if I'm going to do anything because I don't know how to change the way I carry myself, nor how I think of people.  I'm just tired right now, honestly tired.  Today has worn me out a bit, that's all.  I know I worry too much, and I'm sorry.  If you want me to try something, tell me, but I don't know where to start.  Or where to go.  I need detail because I just don't know how to interact with people the way everyone else seems to be able to.

Hypochondriac

Hi, that's me.  I self-diagnose.  Only not terribly much in the medical sense, although I've done a bit of that this summer too (see, see what summer drives me to???  This is why summers of inactivity cannot, absolutely cannot happen).  But really, back to the point: I've never been professionally diagnosed with depression, but I've come to that diagnosis myself countless times.

Was I right?  I think so.  I know a number of people who agree with me on that matter.  Okay, maybe that's not the best example of where my hypochondriacal (is that even a word?) tendencies fail me.  Maybe a better example would be the sort of thing where I think I'm so massively screwed up.  And maybe I am, because I suck at dealing with social situations (or am I being a hypochondriac in saying that?), and I have trouble trusting people, and I still spend days trying to figure out why I can't stop comparing myself to my ex.

But then again, maybe I'm not.  Everyone has quirks, problems, things that don't seem like they'd make sense to anyone else.  Right?  I don't know how to stop thinking of myself as messed up because I don't know what exactly it means to not be messed up, and from what I see of other people, from the sorts of problems they talk to me about...I don't feel terribly confident in my normalcy.

And I know, there is no such thing as normal.  It's been drilled into my head since I was a child.  But I'm still learning to deal with it, to incorporate that assumption into my life.  Hopefully I'll get better.  I don't know what happens if I don't.

Personality

To put it simply, we're not together because of common interest or similar habits.  It's just because we get along personality-wise.  And maybe they're not the same, but somehow we understand each other.  I think I had more to say on the subject.  Maybe it was about more of my insecurities.  Because when you have common interests with people, you can do things with them.  You can play games or go places or see movies or something.

And I don't do any of those things.  Because I don't have interests or hobbies.  I had issues with every time someone ever asked me what I liked.  I don't know what to say because it's been years since I've found things that interest me.  Okay, I guess I like reading.  Not that it's a hobby you can really share with someone unless you're a fan of sitting in the same room in silence, which, to be fair, isn't bad on occasion...but only on occasion.  I like camping and hiking, but don't get to do it often enough and am not serious enough about it to even be able to maintain too much of a conversation on the subject.

Part of it is that I don't run into things that interest me very often, not seriously interest me and cause me to obsess, in any case, as many people seem to.  That's partially because I don't put myself out there, because I don't try every new thing, and to a point that's just because they don't stand out to me.  And even the ones that do...I don't have enough time in my day for the way I live now, not to mention adding things to every day.  Maybe it's a consequence of the way I live my life--the whole driven, focused, committed thing.  I've stopped trying to find more things to interest me, because most of the time, I have enough to occupy me.  It's just times like this, like summer, when I don't have enough to do, that this lack of hobbies catches up and bites me in the ass.

To be perfectly honest, I'll throw in a bit of something I don't like to admit.  To a point, I'm afraid of developing a personality for myself.  I care what people think of me to a much greater extent than I'd admit.  So I don't want to like things they don't like, or do things they don't do, or maintain manners and habits they don't maintain themselves.  It's just the way I've grown up, always trying to please.  And yeah, I'll put on this nonchalant face and pretend that I don't give a damn what people think.  I rather wish that was the case.

I've spent the majority of a day attempting to compose this.  I've clearly gotten somewhere, although not terribly far.  I guess what it all boils down to is that I have issues.  Plenty of them.  Mostly with myself.  And they're caused by any number of things.  So I guess that now I get to go try to work some of them out, at least a little bit.  But I'm out of things to say right now.  I guess that's that then, sorry for the anticlimactic ending.

Later

I was going to say something.  I can't for the life of me remember what.  And I'm going to bed.  I hope I remember what it is by tomorrow.  I'm really sorry if I don't.  Good night.

Pretty Creatures

I worry too much.  I don't know how many times I must have mentioned that here by now, but here it is again.  I'm a neurotic.  It runs in the family.  And what it usually means for me is that I have to worry about something.  Constantly.  If I'm not worrying about anything, I start worrying about not worrying enough.  If there's nothing serious going on in my life, I worry about the most trivial things.  And maybe that's what this is.  Maybe I'm just freaking out because I don't have anything significant to be concerned about.

Or maybe I have a point.  I hope I don't, but I think I might.  When things change, when life throws us into a different environment with different situations than we're used to, people go their separate ways.  That's just how it works.  They develop different friends, different interests and hobbies, they just...drift apart.  And I'm afraid that that's exactly what's going to happen.  We're being thrown into a new environment with new situations, we're going to meet, and most likely befriend, completely different people.  So I get the impression that we ourselves are going to drift apart.  I know that doesn't always happen, but we're so unlikely to run into the same people, to have dealings with a common group, that I'm afraid we're going to go our separate ways and the way we are is going to fall apart.

I know it's unreasonable.  We've discussed it.  And maybe I'll prioritize it this way and meet fewer new people, make fewer new friends.  To be honest, I'd be okay with that.  It would just destroy me if things did go south.  And me being me, I'm inclined to think that they will.  Even if there's no indication.  Even if I really don't want them to.  I'm afraid that they will and that I'm going to have to start over, because that's what I do after a break-up.  I don't just hang out with slightly different people, I change absolutely everything about myself because that's how I deal.  That's what happened last time anyway, and I don't know why this time would be any different.

If anything, it would be that much more extreme, that much worse.  Everything I like now would be a painful reminder of you and I wouldn't be able to take it so I'd shove it all away.  Start from scratch, just like I did last time.  Different music, different books, different conversational topics.  Certain ideas and things would be permanently tainted for me.  But I'm just getting bitter and rambling about what hopefully will not happen.  In any case, I'll do my best to not let it.  I just hope it works.

On Fighting to Live

Introductory notice: I know I'm a moron and forgot to post yesterday.  Blame it on the lack of a regular schedule during the summer or on the excessive amount of time I've been spending away from the computer.  I'm working on it, okay?  No, not okay, I know.  I promised I'd blog every day and I haven't been doing so, which is a problem.  Anyhow, that's not the point.  I get it, I'm trying to fix it, I'm sorry.  There.  Moving on to actual content.


"Living is easier than dying.  Until it's not."

A character in Grey's Anatomy (go figure, right?) said this.  It's had me thinking quite a bit lately.  On top of that, me being the morbid thinker I am, I've spent a good long while contemplating the question of life or death in a number of different contexts, situations.  What significance it may or may not hold.  I don't like writing about it terribly much, but I have thoughts on the subject that need sorting and the best way to sort them is generally to write, for me anyway.

Usually, it's a very easy question to answer.  There is hardly ever anything pressing enough to push an individual over that edge.  There may be enough reason to not live but it's hardly ever enough to cause one to take the necessary action to die.  Living is a default.  It is a guarantee (almost).  Death, on the other hand, is a gamble.  It requires one to put in effort and it doesn't guarantee that you'll be gone.  You might just wake up in a hospital instead and now you're ten times worse off than you were when you began.

But when you're dying and have to fight to stay alive...well, that changes everything.  Whether it's from a terminal illness over a long period of time or you're simply at risk of drowning, suddenly it's easier to continue doing nothing and die than it is to live.  In that case, you have to put in effort to maintain life.  I've never been there, I don't know how it feels, I don't know how it works, but I guess some people find the strength to fight and other people let themselves steadily slip away because finally it's easy enough that they can.

Maybe I write about death too much.  Not likely.  More accurately, I think about it too much.  I'm just tired right now, so I'm rambling.  I'm not getting anywhere anyhow, so I guess that's all.  Maybe I didn't actually have any sorting out to do.  I don't know.  Good night.

Operating Systems

I used to get excited about new computers not because they were faster or really any better (to be honest, I never noticed that in computers, I never had problems with their speeds), but it was about what new things there were.  What random programs I could find.  What things had changed from the last time I'd gotten a new computer, especially so anytime I got a new operating system (which, to be fair, has always been Windows to this point).

So buying a computer with a blank hard drive is a different experience entirely.  Because the first time you click the power button and it says "insert boot device" instead of opening some nice pretty GUI and letting you point at random pretty things.  It's a new experience for me, because I've never been terribly tech-savvy.  I know my way around a computer well enough, but I've never installed Linux before.  I still can't say that I have because it still doesn't work.

Oh, and it's frustrating, just by the way.  I've been staring at one of two computer screens all day.  My eyes hurt, my hand hurts, and it does not appear to be installing things that are apparently key to making it work.  So yeah, frustrating.  Also my legs hurt, but I imagine that's entirely unrelated.  I'm just tired and I want this to start working (after doing everything ten times in a row).  I haven't really thought about too much else all day because I've been a bit preoccupied with this.  Which is, despite all the frustration, still pretty interesting.  Anyhow, I'm going to get back to that.  Sorry, no real logical blog post for today.  Too much thinking in strings of letters and symbols that I don't really understand to try to write in pretty words.

Moving On

I feel odd writing this.  I know what I want to say.  But I'm not really sure how I want to say it.  And I'm afraid that I'm mistaken.  That I don't know what I'm talking about here.  I'm afraid of saying something that's not true, or maybe never was.  And maybe part of it is that I don't want to admit some things, I don't want some people to see this.  I hope that's been enough of an introduction and apology for me to actually start writing something worthwhile.

We've both had bad relationships.  Right?  Maybe not?  See, now I'm doubting everything I'm writing.  Whatever.  We're both fucked up.  Or were.  Probably still are, at least a little bit.  Maybe not as much anymore.  Hopefully.  That'd be good.  But the odd thing is, you said you were broken there.  And I just walked away from my own parallel situation.  I wasn't doing great, but I wasn't terrible, either.  I got over it.  Quickly.  Easily.  Which is the opposite of what happened to you.

So why am I the one who can't move on?  I know there are other events at play, that the two situations can't simply be compared like that, but...why?  Why can I not move on?  I'm over it, I've been over it for years, so why does it bother me?  Why am I afraid of that name?  The person behind it?  Any associations with the whole thing.  I want to run away from it and pretend it doesn't exist, never happened.  That's what everyone around me seems to be doing and somehow even you're okay with what happened to you.

Why am I not?  That's what I really don't understand.  Or maybe I did move on.  It doesn't feel like it bothers me.  It just seems to sometimes come up and bite me in the ass.  I don't know.  I can't write about this.  I don't know what to say.  I'm done right now.  I know it doesn't make any sense.  I'm sorry.  I just don't know.  I hope I can figure things out later.

Sleeping

I'm sorry.  I have a headache.  I don't have it in me to write a post right now.  Good night.

Oh Well

You were literally three minutes too late.  By none of your fault, really.  Nor mine.  It happens.  But I have no more excuse for going outside at present and I don't have the ability to fully explain the circumstances right now, so I presume a simple "no" to have sufficed.  You appear to have gotten the point.  Either way, the outcome is the same.

I'm fine.  Honestly.  Slightly hardened, in one of those moods where I'm more likely to give a cold shoulder, but just fine, thank you.  I'm not regretful.  I've learned by now that I move past things fairly quickly.  I can already laugh at things with people, mostly anyway.  Really, with anyone but you.  But don't worry, tomorrow things will go back to being just the way they were.  That's what I mean when I say I'm fine.  One of the things, anyway.

I figure you want to see some of my thoughts on the subject.  There you have them.  Short, simple, probably confusing.  Nothing out of the ordinary.  I don't know what else to say and honestly, I wouldn't say anything here if I didn't make myself write.  I might have said something if you were on the other end to receive it, but you're not.  So in case you don't make it back before, the last thing I said before I left stands.  It always will.  Good night.  I'll talk to you tomorrow.

Habits

They say that something becomes habit after doing it consistently for 21 days.  So I'm trying to develop some new habits over the summer that will hopefully serve me well after the fact.  Mostly my sleep schedule.  I'm trying to fix that now so that I don't have to worry about it later because I really cannot be well-rested if I go to bed late and get up late.  It just doesn't work for me.

I'm also finally going to start being productive and working ahead on things, even though I don't need to yet.  The thing is, I might as well.  It'll do me good and it's not like I have anything else to do right now.  So I'm trying to do things that I'll be glad about in the long run.  Even if they're hard to get used to now (especially the bit about going to bed at a reasonable hour...I'm bad at that).

In any case, I'm rambling a little bit right now, and I'm rather tired and don't feel terribly well, so I will actually be going to bed soon.  I just wanted to make sure that I keep up this posting, even though I don't have terribly much (if anything) to say right now.  I hope I actually manage to get up tomorrow when I hope to...with that in mind, good night.

Forgetful

I was brilliant and forgot to blog yesterday.  Again.  I need to stop that.  I actually considered just dropping this project last night.  I'm calling it a project now.  And you're the one who told me not to.  I listen to you too much. That may or may not be a bad thing.  I don't really care.  It doesn't mean I'll stop listening to you or anything.  I need to fix this failure in habits though.

That and I need to find more things to write about.  That's been a large part of the problem with my writing of late.  I just...haven't had anything to say.  My summer is long and boring.  I don't have much of anything to say, nor anything to do.  I'm wasting my days until I get to start doing things, and have places to be at certain times.  I like schedules and organization and I have none of that right now.

One more paragraph.  That's what I have to do now.  I feel bad that I'm trying to just get to the end of this post, but I don't know what to say anymore.  I'm tired.  I can't maintain a schedule of any sort.  Summers are bad for me.  I keep saying that, and I know it's not going to change until I get out of here, go somewhere else, start doing things.  But for now, for now I'm here.  Bored as ever.

Reading

I wrote a post a while back, one that was about a novel I was in the process of reading at the time.  In the time since, I've read the sequel to it.  I also have the next book in my possession at present, although I have not yet begun to read it.  It was a good book.  I wasn't immediately drawn into it but I found that I enjoyed it more and more with each chapter.

The post I wrote, though, was about one particular character.  That character instantly appealed to me.  To put it simply, this character reminded me of you.  That's what I wrote about.  I don't remember what I said anymore or why exactly the thought was there in the first place, but it was.  And that character really did remind me of you.  I should go back and reread it.

In any case, I'm rambling right now.  I'm just trying to fill things in.  It doesn't matter though, it really doesn't matter.  I want to go back to doing other things I was busy with earlier.  I have priorities.  Okay, that's a bit of nonsense because I haven't been getting terribly much done lately, but it's okay.  I need to stop rambling and then go to bed.  Good night.

Quiet

I'm supposed to be asleep because other people are trying to sleep around me.  This means I should not blog.  Apologies.  Will do so tomorrow.  Good night.

Inability

I can't make myself work.  I'm on vacation, break, leave, whatever you want to call it.  So for the most part, it's really not a problem.  It's frustrating, nonetheless.  I can't deal with jobs that have so-called "flexible schedules" or hours that you can rearrange at will.  I like schedules and certainties.  I appreciate the ability to move things around here or there, but I want a set wake-up time and places I need to be.

I function best when I'm organized this way, when I have things that need to be done, with concrete deadlines and all.  I can deal without them, but, as this summer suggests, I don't do nearly as well when things are as abstract as this.  I don't tend to handle the abstract well at all, actually.  Under any circumstances.  Not necessarily even directly related to work.

I worry too much.  But somehow, I also let things go easily.  Too easily.  I think it's just me trying to compensate for worrying about everything and not knowing how to function.  I think I'm too strict and hold on too tightly, so I loosen in excess in hopes that it'll balance out with my natural tendencies and turn out just right.  I don't think it works as well as I'd like.  But that's okay.  I've got time.  I'm working on it.  Figuring it out.

Hardness

We were all so young then.  It was only two and a half years ago, but it feels like more than a lifetime.  Everything's changed.  We no longer get along the way we did then because we've all changed as people and grown different.  Looking at that photo, I see so many things that are different.  Even physically, so much has changed, and not simply because of the wear and tear of time.

I lost a good deal of weight since then, true.  That's not what stands out most, though.  It's the lines of my face, which didn't change shape so much with the transformation.  By far the greatest difference is my features.  I smile less now, and when I do it's smaller, but it shows more in my eyes.  I only smile when I mean it, which wasn't the case back then.  Everything is sharper and harsher.  My eyes stand out more, I tilt my head differently when I look at people (or cameras).

My attitude toward things has changed and that's reflected in my appearance.  I don't dress radically differently, I haven't gotten tattoos or piercings to show for it, but nonetheless, there's a clear difference.  I don't miss the way it was.  Now that I think of it though, maybe that's just because of the other people in the photograph.  But no, I don't regret this change in myself.  For the most part, anyway, I like who I've become. That's good enough for me.

Fear

I am afraid of losing passion.  For as long as I can remember, I had drive and determination.  I've known what I wanted to do with my life since I was eleven.  There was always something pushing me forward, some motivation toward greatness.  It was usually intangible, but there were constantly moments when I would find myself in an adverse situation (no matter how minor) and the passion would be there, raw, angry, proud.

I'm shy on the surface.  Shy, quiet, complacent.  That's how I come off to most people when I first meet them.  I know how to be calm, respectful, dignified.  I feel that I carry myself well in situations where those attributes are appreciated.  Someone once told me that I was like a baby chick in an egg of diamond.  The exterior is nearly impenetrable, but if you got past it, the inside is the easiest thing in the world to crush.  True.  Although I didn't admit it to him.  It would've been letting down my guard...I understand now that he probably already knew.

It's not something I'm particularly ashamed of, though.  I put my effort into a calm and calculating exterior because it works for me.  It gets me where I want to go.  I leave the core unpolished and underdeveloped.  If you get through the diamond, you find a battlefield of unchecked emotions, unhinged passions, unbelievable stubbornness and pride.  Each of the seven deadly sins probably lurks there, and I make no attempt to stop them.  It's the force of the feeling there that's gotten me where I am.  It's the driving factor behind the rational and calculated ascent that I make.

And some days like today, I look back on the way I was.  The proud, arrogant, even childish stubbornness that won me so many of the fights I went through--mostly against myself--to get here.  In a number of ways, I'm not like that anymore.  I'm calmer, more collected.  Even if you gaze upon the whirlwind of feelings, it's held more rigidly in check.  It has become less fiery and more tempered.  When it flares up, it does so dangerously, but it only ever stirs so rarely...

It makes life easier a lot of the time, being able to take things in stride.  It also makes me miss the excitement of being on an edge.  In the past year especially, I've calmed down significantly.  I've become less easily shaken, but also less easily stirred.  I don't so much fear losing my passion, perhaps, as I fear it being placated, soothed, calmed.  Passion isn't something to be calmed.  It's one of those aspects that's supposed to remain forceful and unpredictable.  I'm afraid that if I lose that, I lose part of who I am.

Books

They always said, "don't judge a book by its cover."  And even as a little kid, that made me wonder...isn't that what the cover is there for?  I mean, we could have thousands or even millions of books on library shelves all over the world with white covers and black lettering (or vice versa, which I think would be a lot more elegant).  That way, in order to see if you were interested or not, you'd have to open the book, or read a description, or something.  And that just complicates the whole process.

People work the same way.  You can tell certain things about them just by the way they look.  You can tell me that's stereotyping all you want, and I'm not going to deny it, but it's a good way to figure things out.  That's what first impressions are all about, and anyone who's ever prepared for an interview has heard "first impressions are important."  So there someone goes, contradicting absolutely everything we thought we knew about judgments and appearances and how the outside doesn't tell you what's inside and all that lovely nonsense, simply when we go out into the so-called "real world" to get a job.

The bottom line is this: first impressions matter.  We do use covers to judge books (and people) consciously or otherwise because it's an easy indication.  Certain habits or accessories or clothing styles immediately give away people that you are likely to not be friends with.  That's not a problem.  And maybe sometimes it's wrong, maybe the person who looked to be the polar opposite of yourself ended up as your best friend, and that's okay because that happens too.

This isn't a certain kind of thing.  It's approximate.  Relying too severely on the conclusions you draw from stereotypes may mean you miss out on a lot.  Refusing to stereotype may make you rub up against the wrong kinds of people.  It's a balancing act.  Judgment is good in limited quantities, you just have to know when to give things a shot and maybe have a chance at overruling that initial impression.

Yet Again

I'm back to having nothing to say.  I don't want to write.  I have had a day that has been far from the best, I've been stupid and damn, I don't care.  Whatever.  I don't want to think, I don't want to write, and I don't want to fix things.  I don't even know if there are things to fix, my own self-mutilated self aside.  That's more dramatic than it needs to be and not really accurate.

I'm back to filling space.  I know this is stupid of me.  I'm falling behind in everything and when I fall behind, it's easier for me to drop things instead of trying to fix them.  I don't know how to fix things so I drop them.  I let them go.  The reason I don't fix things is that I never let myself get to that point.  If something breaks, I let it go.  I try to avoid breaking things because I'm really, really bad at fixing them.

I think that whole second paragraph was just me repeating the same thing over and over again.  As I mentioned, I have nothing to say.  I don't want to write or talk or do much of anything.  I'm just fine sitting in my own little bubble, reading and watching things and just not thinking.  I'm not good at thinking.  I sometimes try to avoid it even though I know I shouldn't.  Oh well.

Challenge

Tell me something.

Spill a secret.

Break me open.

I'm tired of this.

I want something to happen.

Surprise me.

Stupid

I forgot again.  So now it's past midnight and I haven't blogged and I'm such an idiot.  Maybe this is finally falling through.  Maybe I just need a break for the summer.  Something clearly isn't working.  But I'll do my best to make amends right now and so fill in my requisite three paragraphs.  I don't want to mess this up completely, so I'll do my best not to.

Sometimes I miss the way it hurt.  I miss the sheer agony of sitting on that mattress on the unfinished floor and crying silently because I couldn't do anything else.  I'm a masochist.  I only really understand it now that I'm not busy hurting myself, but it feels natural this way.  It's a dull craving.  It's not something I act on or even think about that often, but parts of me certainly miss the pain.  I learned how to thrive on it, how to use it to make myself stronger, and now it's gone.

Stability is good in its own way.  But I'm not used to it yet.  I have yet to come to terms with it and work around it and do things well in its shadow.  I see stability as an obstacle.  Is that wrong?  Probably.  I miss drama, stupid though I know that to be.  I miss anticipation and excitement and anxiety.  I miss thinking about her and wanting to know that one a little bit better.  It's an odd sort of nostalgia that doesn't seem to make much sense.  But that's my life for you, not terribly full of sense.

I want to raise topics I know I shouldn't.  I want to stir things that have been set aside.  I want to think about things that have been forgiven and forgotten whiles ago because I miss the sheer volume of sensation they brought out in me.  It's bad for me, for you, for everyone, I know that.  So I suppress it a bit.  It's not hard to keep quiet about things like this.  But that's what I spent a lot of the time in the car thinking about.  Things I shouldn't wish to have back.  Things I should have let myself forget.