The One

Everyone around you is coupled up and you feel like you’re the only one left standing. They are cohabitating and getting engaged and getting married and you’re buying frozen dinners for one at the grocery store. You contemplate if you’ll ever find “the one”, that person who makes everything in the world make sense. Who gets your obscure jokes and likes that worn out grey band t-shirt you wear to bed sometimes. Who doesn’t mind sitting in the aisle seat all the time and who lets you eat the last donut. You wonder if maybe that person has been in your life all along and you’ve just accidentally passed them over, so you run through your mental catalog of all the people from your past who could possibly be “the one”. 

The boy who you had a torrid and short-lived love affair with; who came to visit at your dorm while surviving a 9 hour trip on the Chinatown bus during a snowstorm. Who stayed on the phone with you late at night while you read poetry to him and he told you how much your prose turned him on. How you took his virginity late one night in his room at his mother’s house on Staten Island. How he held you in the living room after watching Menace to Society, and said I love you in the lights of the Christmas tree. And then how he broke your heart and said it was all a lie; that you didn’t really love him, that he was a tortured soul. And yet, you still held this connection, this bond, on and off again for so many years, finally reuniting recently during Thanksgiving. Older, wiser, a little worn for haul – but he had sent you a text reminding you that you’d promised to marry him when you turned 30. You lol’d and wrote back saying, hold on, I’m not quite there yet.

A boy you met through an Internet dating site that you went on a few mediocre dates with and when he kissed you, it felt like kissing your brother. It was underwhelming and there was never any chemistry, but you still hung out and you still slept in his bed, but you never let him see you naked. And both of you would text each other to hang out every few months; you’d wonder if things would change next time you saw him, but it was always a well-worn friendship and never anything more. 

And then there’s the one that you thought was “the one”. Who was quick witted with even more obscure jokes and who never let you wear that grey band t-shirt to bed because you were too busy making love and falling asleep naked spooning each other. Who showed you the best and worst of yourself back to you like a mirror and kept urging you to grow into the person you are one day going to be. Who started making everything make sense in your life until the day you realized that you were never doing the same things in return for him. The one who told you that he couldn’t love you because love needs to be nourished and fed, even though he was the one nourishing and feeding your love of him for three years. 

None of these guys are “the one”. 

Maybe you’ve met “the one” already and maybe you haven’t. Maybe “the one” doesn’t exist at all. And so what? Who cares? For now, just be the only one you need.

Miss Misery

In case you weren't already aware (and sorry to put it so bluntly) I fucking hate it here in Philly. It makes me miserable. There is just something about living in this area: the traffic, the erratic and reckless driving, the awful accents (South Philly and the borderline southern redneck ones), the sport fans, the lack of culture and diversity, the lack of decent pizza, the bizarre and atrocious liquor laws, the people... I could go on about it all day.

Ok, yes, I know, being a total New York snob, I'm probably not giving this place much of a chance. But there is just something in the air here that makes me feel like I'm sticking out like a sore thumb. I drove home this weekend and as I drove deeper and deeper through Jersey towards the George Washington Bridge, I could feel the calm wash over me. And as I hit my stretch of I-95 from the Bronx all the way up through Connecticut, something clicked: I was home.

I spent all day Saturday soaking in the essence of New York City: Riding the 6 train and people watching, looking longingly over Japanese fashions in the FIT museum, walking those long city streets, eating in a cute little restaurant in Greenwich Village, sipping delicious drinks with friends in an underground speakeasy, watching the Yankees play on TV in an Irish pub, mingling with the masses in Times Square. From the Bronx, into Manhattan, rounding the night out in Queens - where I hope to live in when I move back to NY next year, pointing out bars and restaurants I've already tagged on a Google map to acquaint myself with my future neighborhood - and back to the Bronx, I felt wide awake in the City that Never Sleeps.

And then I had to drive back to PA today. Despite the weather being beautiful compared to the torrential rain I drove up to CT in, a pit just sank deeper in my stomach as I got closer and closer to this place that I am currently calling "home". New York just makes me feel so alive. My life constantly feels like one of those video games where a little line is in the upper right corner, monitoring your character's health. Every day that I am here, those green lines slowly start fading into yellow and then dangerously close to red. But going home re-energizes me, and those green lines are all filled up again.

...........

Being alone in this city doesn't help, either. Emmett is gone, away having the most amazing experience of his life and I can't even compete with that. That just makes me more miserable. Between crying over him and crying over being stuck here, I should seriously invest in Kleenex stock. I just wish I could be with him, watching him be happy and being happy together, smiling this smile I swear he only smiles for me that makes me melt. I'm happy for him but I suppose jealous in a way, too. I had hoped Philly would be the same enlightening, life changing, eye opening experience; a way to turn my life around and start over from the awful stand-still spot it was stuck in, just like he's doing now. (I also hoped that moving here would mean we'd be closer and together.) And again, I know people will say I'm not giving this place enough of a shot, but I shouldn't have to force it. I shouldn't have to force myself to enjoy it here or to feel an emotion about this place that doesn't exist and probably never will.

I hate being the silly, crying girl who worries all the time. I hate feeling clingy and awful and miserable and don't want to bring everyone else down so I don't talk about it. I hold everything inside, which I guess makes me even more miserable. I am trying to distance myself from the obsessive and longing feelings that I have for Emmett. I put away pictures of us and keep trying to stop thinking about him and how great he is and the little things that he does that make me smile, the memories of us that make me smile. I am trying to push past this wave of emotion and outrun it - to move beyond this intangible relationship that will never happen, to move beyond feeling like I'm not good enough when it has nothing to do with me, to move beyond thinking that he never thinks about me and doesn't care because I am always thinking about him and I always care - all I do is think and care. I need to just lock all that part of my life up in a little box and throw away the key. Otherwise, it will continue to consume me and eat away at me and completely devoid my life of the happiness that I am not allowing myself. (In that aspect of my life, anyway.)

And so, everything I built up in my head, these fictitious scenarios about the future stemming from our real life interactions and conversations; I have to break them down slowly brick by brick and start to lay the mortar around my heart and move those cinder blocks back to rebuild the wall that had been up for so long before I met him.

.........

you make me come
you make me complete
you make me completely miserable


...........

Its so hard to let go, but sometimes love isn't enough of a reason to keep on hanging on.

Square Peg in a Round Hole

I am an only child. Growing up, I was very independent and did a lot of keeping to myself mostly. I didn't have many friends growing up. But it didn't really bother me back then. I had my own group that I hung out with. I liked to go out and do things and have fun just as much as anyone else. (I avoided that whole party and get drunk on the weekends thing in HS though; It just wasn't really my thing.) My parents didn't have any friends, and they seemed fine. I never really thought it was strange that they didn't socialize with other Adults or my friends' parents or anything like that. And so, I didn't really think it was a problem. Until I got to College.

College is a time where you are supposed to make friends and branch out and explore the world outside the Parental bubble that has been built around you for the past 17 years of your life. Yeah, that didn't really work out so well for me. My college made us fill out surveys to determine our living and roommate situations. I said that I like things quiet and calm and neat, mostly because I didn't want some crazy party girl slut roommate always coming in at 3 am waking me up. The people over in Residence Life apparently took this as me basically being a nerdy shut-in and so I got placed in a dorm that the year before had been the "Quiet Dorm". It was all the way on the back end of campus. Most people I met had never even heard of it and asked if it was a real dorm. The building was an old house with U-shaped floors, separated single sex with girls on floors 1, 2 & 4 and guys on 3 & 5.

Half the people in my building went home on the weekends, so it was hard to mingle. This left me with little options other than the handful of people I had met at Orientation. Which meant that it was hard to make friends with people who were barely ever around, or to make new friends with people who weren't even sure you actually lived on campus. I started to notice that it was really hard for me to approach people. I guess I was always kind of shy growing up, until people really tried to get to know me. I didn't understand why I couldn't just go up and say "Hey, what's up?" and BOOM! Insta-Friend! I thought I was a pretty cool chick. I was definitely a nice person. And I liked to go out and have fun just like everyone else. So why couldn't I make friends?

I would get kind of a tingle in my nose thinking about social interaction. My heart would start to race a little. And I would feel like I was about to cry. I had social anxiety disorder. When I transferred schools and moved back home, I started to have increased anxiety and panicky episodes. I went to the doctor and she prescribed me Paroxetine (Paxil) and that began to help me a little bit. But I had already formed a big social group by becoming part of a big subculture: Raves. Raves were fun, giant parties with loud music and lots of people under the influence so it was easy to talk to people and make friends. (Especially if you were under the influence yourself sometimes as well.) I joined an internet forum for Ravers as well and began to meet many "friends" that way as well. I also enjoyed moderate Celebrity status as at every party, I wore a pair of Bunny ears and was instantly recognizable and lovable.

The Paxil worked pretty good for a while. I felt more confident. I was making friends. I was being more assertive. I had a good relationship and a good job. I wasn't feeling anymore anxiety. So I decided I didn't need to take it anymore. The medication had worked, right?

Cut to a few years later. I began dating a guy who treated me like shit. He caused me a great deal of stress and duress through his mannerisms, both towards me and in his everyday life. I started cutting myself off from these new friends I had made because I put myself in this bubble where it was just him. I was afraid of him and what he would do to me, and the hatred he had for my friends and family and the threats he would make against them. And the fool that I was, I loved him and didn't want to lose him. So I lost everyone else. And I lost myself in the process. I began having the anxiety attacks again. I was losing ground and didn't know how to fix it. I went back to the doctor again and she prescribed me Lexapro. The anxiety stopped, but the torture in my relationship continued.

I had burned so many bridges, it was hard to get my life back. I had been living with this animal and when we broke up, I had to move in with my parents who had moved almost an hour & 1/2 from where I grew up. It was the middle of nowhere and I was now 24 years old. It was going to be even harder to make friends. My mom suggested I get a part-time job. That worked for a bit. I stopped taking my medication again because I hated feeling mechanical and medicated. I made some friends and hung out a bit, but they weren't the kind of friends I was looking for. The area I was living in was very suburban and close knit, so it was very much like High School part 2. (Especially when you had 20 somethings hanging out with 16 year olds and drinking with them on the beach at night.) That just wasn't for me, so I cut them off too. Plus, I had finally found an out from this middle of nowhere place: a new job, a new city, a chance for a new life.

I moved to Philadelphia in the Summer of 2009. It was supposed to be my chance to start over. Make new friends, explore new places. (It was also supposed to be a chance for me to Love again, but that is a post to be saved for a later date.) Unfortunately, hanging out with Gay men (my best friend and his friends) didn't really give me much chance to explore my options. The one coworker close to my age in my office was married. Strike 2. And the fact that my love life imploded coupled with a depressingly long and blizzardy Philadelphia winter sunk me into a deep 5 month long depression.

With the warm weather here now, it should have put me in a better mood, but the fact remains: I am 26 years old and I don't know how to make friends. Everyone I meet is married, divorced, engaged, gay or in a relationship. I am afraid of marriage. I am wary of dating. I am afraid to trust and let people get close to me because I have been burned a lot recently. Where do you go to meet people and make friends when you are 20-something? And how do you go up to random strangers and make conversation without seeming like a complete Asperger's/Socially awkward weirdo?

As much of a nice and fun person I (like to think I) am, I wonder - Why would anyone want to be my friend? I don't really bring much to the table. My life is not exciting. I don't have a boyfriend. No siblings. I am not close with my family. And so I try to avoid social situations in which I have to talk about myself or my personal life. I don't really interact with others at my office because I hate small talk and don't really care about asking people how their weekends were or about their families because those are not people I'm interested in being friends with and do not like being friendly for the sake of being friendly. (Even though that is probably something I should be doing to develop my social skills to begin with, and maybe that is the problem.)

Should I blame my parents for never fostering these types of social skills in me? Maybe. Should I blame my ex for ruining my ability to trust and interact with other human beings? More than likely. My anxiety is slowly creeping back. Thinking about even being in a situation to meet people makes me uncomfortable and causes me stress and makes me cry. I do not want to medicate myself anymore. I want to be free of this. To be normal. To have fun and be social and to not have to use the Internet to make friends. (Even though some of the most interesting and awesome people I have met as of late have been from the Internet, and are even cooler in person, but unfortunately live 9000 miles away.)

I live alone in a strange city and have no friends close by or siblings or pets.

I am an only child.