How does someone else look at me and tell me what I deserve? and

Then proceed to demand what they think I deserve, on my behalf.

Don't get me wrong... I love my close knit, overprotective, sometimes bitchy but usually harmless circle of chicas. But there are certain things that I genuinely don't know how to tolerate, and one of them is when you tell me what I deserve and what I should demand.

I hate to sound like a secretive bitch, but I like to keep stuff to myself. I don't really know how to talk to people about how I feel about the serious stuff, and I like to steal away for time by myself. The introvert in me still struggles to appreciate the tight circle I have.

I don't think there's a single one of my friends who can genuinely say they know everything about me. So when you proceed to exclaim that you "know exactly how I feel", I get frustrated.

But to take it a step further, you want to tell me that this boy most certainly isn't worth my time and doesn't deserve me. I deserve better.

You don't know what I deserve at all. Neither do I. And you can't tell me what is or isn't worth my time - the fact that I'm willing to give this thing, whatever it is, a try means that I do indeed find it valuable enough to be worth my time.

Support me, as my friends. Or know that your opinion has been filed away into "thanks, but no thanks" piles to be disregarded at a later date. I love you, but you can't tell me who to invest my time and energy into.

You can't complain about what doesn't even bother you. How does that make sense? If it's affecting me, and I don't complain then how do you look on from the outside and complain? It just doesn't seem right.

I appreciate that you think that you should let this bother you, because it should and even might be bothering me... but you don't have to attack anybody. You calmly state your side and then sit your ass down and be a friend. Whatever that means. I'm sorry you're hurting because you think I'm hurting, but I haven't asked you to take up my cross and carry. I haven't asked you to absorb my hurts, my feelings. That's ridiculous.

So don't complain about what I accept.

Yours in solitude in suffering,
me.

I never ever doubt my ability to make a huge ass mess out of everything I touch... and

I'm tired of crying.

There's nobody to blame but me.

I just don't know how to allow myself to be happy. I'm so scared of someone breaking me, that I don't realize I'm breaking myself. The only person who is hurting me, is me. When I push away every single person who gets close enough to give a fuck about me.

I think I've chewed off an entire layer of my bottom lip and listened to every single song on the Paradise album and I spent two hours buried in bed trying to shake out enough crap out of my head that I could get some sleep.

Words, unfortunately, are failing me. Not just expressing myself here and now, but today's just been ridiculous. I seem to possess only two extremes. I'm either really bad or really good. I bounce from babble and giggle and sing and twirl to distant and solemn and silent and absent, and right back again. I'm all bounced out and I still can't find a balance.

My happy feels fake. My sad feels dramatic.

I feel like I exist in a simple state - like a switch. I can only ever be on or off. Every child has tried to balance a switch between on and off, but it isn't possible. There's no middle state. It's on. Or off.

I was talking to a friend today, about how much I just can't stand touch lately. I don't think it's ever been this bad. I just... don't like when people hug me, or hold my hand, or even stand close enough to brush against me, when they lean against me, when they rest on me. It's not that I hate it, but lately it's been making me jumpy. I cringe away from people. I shudder. I grimace.

So now, I'm not just afraid of emotional proximity. I'm afraid of physical proximity too.

But the scariest part, is that I want him to hug me. I want him to hold me, and tell me silly bullshit about how I'm being ridiculous and I'm making mountains out of molehills and I need to calm down, sleep at night, eat decent meals and stop beating up on myself. I want him everywhere.

It's frigging terrifying.

Yours with words failing,
me.

(This hasn't even been double checked for errors. Apologies in advance. I don't know where my ability to express myself has gone. Maybe it's time to get back into poetry.)

The thing about liquor is, if I'm drowning in it then I'm. not. okay. and

Right now, I'm sinking fast.

I can feel the whiterumorangadetropicanabluegatorade sloshing around in my tummy, and this is so very bad. So so so very bad.

I'm a good girl, a smart girl, a strong girl.

I know when to stop.

But I'm not okay, and I'm tired of being not okay. How did I dive so hard, get so far and fall so fast? When did I tell myself that it was okay to be bare, be naked, in front of someone else? Since when did trusting someone come so easily? My human instinct of self preservation is telling me I've screwed up.

I really really really like this boy, and it feels right but I know it's wrong.

Because I'm a smart girl. I'm a strong girl. I'm a good girl. I know better. I don't need anybody who thinks I'm funny, and wants to stay up with me all night talking about absolutely nothing. I don't need someone to listen to my stupid childhood stories, and share their favourite songs with me (Ode to a Dream by the Internet is still a really weird song but you get fifty billion cool points for loving Lana del Rey). I most certainly don't need someone I can spend all day talking to. I don't need someone to make plans around, someone I want to be with me when I go out. I don't need someone I choose over doing work. I don't need someone.

But I really like you. (And I'm tempted to use the other L word, but I don't play with that and feelings aren't a joke, so I'm not quite sure what's happening but it isn't safe.) I like how you try to be too cool to be phased by anything (trust me though, that's a hard facade to keep up). I like how you smile. I like how you insist on leaning on me, even though we both almost end up tumbling. I like how you call me nicknames like it's natural, like you've been doing it forever. I like our stupid lame broadback, pink liver inside jokes. I like how you send me to bed when it's getting too late, and how you say goodnight. I like how you're not scared to joke around with me; how you force me to take a joke, how you force me to like myself more. I like you don't take me very seriously at all.

Most of all, I like how you don't seem to resent the speed we've moving at. The only speed I know how.

I really like you, and that scares me.

Most terrified and infatuated and quite possibly sorta intoxicated (by you),
me.

How do you learn to build bridges again after you've been taught the art of building walls? and

How do you learn to love again? Learn to trust again?

I feel like I need to address my issues with whatever's holding me back from trying again - from making more mistakes, better mistakes, wiser mistakes, so I can move forward from where I am now. Bitter.

It's as good a time as ever, considering I have this huge crush on this guy who is incredible and is my best friend and is just downright amazing. It's like deja-vu; a feeling I remember, but it's hard to tell if it's imagined or experienced.

It's laughing at midnight because I can't bring myself to say goodnight and all his jokes are so lame and silly and I just can't help but finding them funny. It's singing and dancing and air-guitaring at school because I'm just so happy and I don't want to tell anybody why. It's seeing him and getting the flutters in my tummy. It's talking about anything and everything and just having the best conversation of the whole day.

It's falling for someone again.

And that is scary.

I can see myself racing towards the cliff that I'm bound to happily tumble right off and free fall from but I just can't turn the vehicle around. At this rate, I'm going to laugh myself right off the edge and laugh and laugh and laugh until I hit the ground. Silly old me.

Watch me invest so much of my time, my heart, my hope into another guy.

I'm not trying to be a pessimist... It just, kinda, happens?

I just don't know how to let go of the past and step bravely into the future.

Yours most cowardly,
me.

I'm really, really, really, really tired of everything and

I don't know what to do about it.

Desperately yours,
me.

It's one in the morning and I'm up doing IAs with this guy who is more than a friend but isn't my boyfriend... and

I started looking into teenage relationships. (Because this is part of the topic of my IA. I should really be doing said IA. But y'know, if inspiration comes a-knocking and you send her away, you have to wait for her to return.) I started thinking about my own views on teenage relationships, which I'm not even sure are valid because I am a teenager.

It's sorta like "Should cows eat grass?" by a cow.

Okay, maybe not. Bear with me. Huge cup of coffee with lots and lots of sugar to make the taste of blackness go away. I'm a fan of coffee, but I'm not always a fan of the taste of coffee. It's weird.

Anyways. Off tangent. Back to the topic. Teenage relationships.

What do kids know about relationships and love and making a relationship last?

Probably nothing.
But what do adults?
What does anyone?

It's not fair to base our ability to love another person on our age or our maturity levels. What's the relationship between age/maturity and being with another person anyways?

As far as experience goes, I have very little. I've only ever had one committed relationship. Before that there were crushes, and then after that there was a stupid stint with a boy who was as bad for me as mixing my pills and now there's... this.

Whatever this is.
I don't know how to define this. I don't even know how to feel about this. But I'm not going to overthink this, yet. I'm just... gonna give it the chance to be what it wants to be. One of my art teachers once said to me, "The mark of the great sculptor is a great listener. You have to let it tell you what it is; it's not for you to decide." I'm going to look at this as a piece of art - something beautiful, something delicate, something fragile and something full of possibility.

I could break it, or I could listen to it and feel it out and then let it tell me what it is.

So I'm listening.

What I like about teenage relationships, though, is that they're so much while still being so very little. They aren't permanent but still they inspire change and growth and help to make two individuals better. That is, if they'll let it. (Sometimes they reject 'better' and be 'bitter' - I know this, I was and still am a little bit bitter. But I'm working on being better.)

My first relationship taught me an infinite amount of things. If I started to think about them, they'd flow from my fingertips and I'd be here for a long time. I promise one day to think about all those things and tap them out and free them from my mind, but not now.

My flirtationship taught me some very valid lessons too. One of the greatest things I learnt from that is that you can't forget the climb, no matter how great or how terrible the view from the top is. (No matter how much the end product sucks, you just can't erase how much you invested and how long it took. You just have to let it pull you up.) I also learnt the importance of having someone to talk to. Even if just for a little while, every day. Even if they weren't really yours to own. Just someone who cared enough to listen helped ease a burden.

And now... I'm learning the importance of being a good friend before being a great lover. (If ever a great lover.) At least if I fail at being a great lover, I took the time to be a good friend first. This boy sure is something else though. I can't tell the last time I had someone I felt so comfortable around. Not just being close to, but sharing myself with. It's certainly very nice.

Teenage relationships offer a challenge. Teenage relationships leave room for growth. Teenage relationships inspire. Teenage relationships experience.

Most importantly, teenage relationships are the things we reflect on and think "Damn. Those sure were the days."

I hope I'm creating a chapter of love I'll be happy to reread when I'm old.

Procrastinatingly yours,
me.

Guys think with their genitals... and

GIRLS?!!!

They say boys only love with their penises. And girls with their hearts. But I disagree. I don't think either of these statements are true.

Girls, I must confess, love with their heads. They think way too damn much when they love someone. It's always about figuring it out, sorting it out, fixing it, defining it, showing it off, etc. Girls overthink. Girls analyze. Girls assess. Which isn't a bad thing. You've gotta give your head the reins sometimes or you'll run right off the track. Plus, we just like knowing everything. Which isn't a bad thing.

And then boys? Boys probably love with their hearts. (I tried to decide which of the body parts they use more when they're in love: hearts or arms?!?!?! Went with hearts...) They just love. I don't know many boys who overthink anything when they really love a girl. They just love her. I guess that's why girls always blow up on them for making mistakes. We just wonder why you didn't THINK THAT THROUGH OMG. Boys just don't overthink everything. They just feel.

(Arms because boys are awfully comforting when they're in love. I mean, they hug a lot. And the good ones wipe away a fair share of tears. And they hold hands and stuff. Which is sweet. They're very hands-y with the girls they love.)

Don't get me wrong though, these are both generalized statements and I'm not saying that they're true for all individuals. Sometimes we girls through reason into the wind and sometimes boys get rational. I'm just generalizing and throwing out my opinion.

Then there's the statement "boys like to get into girls' pants." Now I'm not saying this isn't true.... because we know it is, for the most part. If a boy lies, he's probably out to get into either your pants or another girl's pants.

But when girls lie, why do they lie?

Nuh to get into a boy's heart?

So let's stop nitpicking at the sexes and just spread more love and stuff. This post was pretty short and, well, I just felt like putting this out there. Have a good week.

Yours with head-over-heart,
me.

Jean Rhys, Madness.

Posting the first draft of my Literatures In English Internal Assessment piece as a favour to a friend.


-

A reinterpretation of Meditation on Red by Olive Senior, a narrative about Jean Rhys.

–

Madness is a hell of a thing.

If you’d asked, Jean Rhys would have vehemently denied madness. Jean Rhys was a pretty girl, a beautiful woman. She was good at getting what she wanted from men and she was good at giving men what they wanted.

She first met England at seventeen, back when she was Ella Gwendolen Rees Williams. It shook her hand with a cold which would never leave her fingertips and endless green seas of countryside that would haunt her.

“I hated the mountains the hills, the rivers and the rain.”

“I’ll be an actress,” she’d say.

Unfortunately, her West Indian accent was far too thick and she could never land the best roles. Not to be dismayed, she travelled with performance companies and chorus lines—anything to stay in the world of theatre. She seamlessly transformed into Vivienne or Emma or even Ella Grey.

Lancelot Hugh Grey Smith was the first man who Jean Rhys discovered would take care of her if she knew how to make him happy. A bat of her eyelashes here and a swoon there and he had fallen for her.

When the shiny copper coins stopped pouring in, pretty little Jean Rhys had to fend for herself. With a dead father and no acting job, she sought a different set of men to lean on.

These men did not have Smith’s kind eyes or hold her and whisper ‘I love you’s against her silken skin. These men had rough hands that bruised and stank of stale cigarette smoke… but all of these men left the money on the bed when they left, and these men always came back.

Jean Rhys started to drink. (“So much drink / flowing / so much tears / so much …”) She made wet glass rings stain the furniture, one for every man she sold a piece of herself to.

“I have an irresistible longing for a long, strong drink to make me forget that once again I have given damnable human beings the right to pity me and laugh at me.”

Her scarlet letter was stitched onto the breast of every dress she owned.

Smith paid for the abortion of a child they both knew wasn’t his and that was the end of that.

Jean Rhys was a rudderless boat, anchored in a murky green English countryside and dreaming of blue skies and wanting to go home, longing to get away, dreaming of places but never people; Rhys learned that people leave and die and change. Places don’t.

Rhys learned early: if she called herself English, they would remind her she was but a horrid colonial. She most certainly wasn’t English.

Jean Rhys knew the power of red. (A red dress worked on men in ways few other things could. Red would blind their consciences. Red would dazzle. Red was awfully pretty.)

“I took the red dress down and put it against myself. ‘Does it make me look intemperate and unchaste?’ I said.”

//

“Your red dress,’ she said, and laughed.”

A Christmas-cracker red dress in the back of her closet for when they whispered. A red wig to shock them. A red housecoat, frayed, for when she couldn’t manage to escape.

 (escape was a pretty word and Jean Rhys was good with pretty words
and theatrics and mad people)

Jean Rhys once wrote a very successful story named The Wide Sargasso Sea about Mr. Robinson’s mad wife in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre.

(Bertha Antoinette Mason was locked in the attic with a drunken nurse and abandoned by her husband because nobody seemed to understand madness. They called her attacks ‘explosions’, but if mad women could make things blow up then they wouldn’t be stuck in attics, now would they? It is written by Bronte that Edward Rochester was enchanted by her loveliness—but pretty girls are always just a little mad. You can ask Jean Rhys about this.)

Jean Rhys just couldn’t shake her inner drama queen. Her breakdowns were awfully theatric; lots of screaming and scratching… and she pretended to be a ghoul in her own attic and the neighbours were all convinced by her performance. As a little girl, Ella Gwendolen Rees Williams made her daddy check under her bed for monsters… but as a grown woman, Jean Rhys learnt that monsters don’t live under beds, they live inside our heads.

Depression is a funny tasting word that comes with a funny tasting set of pills – red, what else? – that she had to remember to take three times a day. Red pills drove away her monsters.

“I am not used to happiness.”

 //

“…I want to be happy. Oh, I want it so badly. You don’t know how badly. I don’t want to be hurt. I don’t want anything black or miserable or complicated anymore.”

Jean Rhys made up her pretty face and dressed carefully, a string of pearls around her neck and a fine dress. The village children called her a witch, but she couldn’t even spell her seeds into pushing up blossoms of bright red. She bled her pain into paper—black ink that smudged and blue murder in her heart. She honed her craft. She planned to write brilliantly.

In her last days, she wrote in notebooks and on napkins and in Parisian hotels. She, fearing that she would be forgotten and never good enough, buried parts of herself in her writing to be exhumed at a later date. She returned to drinking, letting the drink flow until she could barely distinguish between Jean Rhys and Anna Morgan and Sasha Jensen and Julia Martin and Marya Zelli.

“If you want to write the truth, you must write about yourself… I am the only real truth I know.”

Even with her last breaths, Jean Rhys would have denied the madness that defined her life. Her ebb and flow, her come and go. But the madness was in Jean Rhys.

“She lifted her eyes. Blank, lovely eyes. Mad eyes. A mad girl.”

"I don't believe in marriage" and

Every time I say this, someone gives me a funny look.

Like "This cray cray ratchet girl just say she don't believe in marriage?" or "It's not Santa... or the Easter Bunny... it's marriage."

Yes, it's marriage. It happens every day and all that.

But I think it's an outdated and failing institution. Marriages don't work. (This is, as far as I'm concerned, the rule. If you are an exception to this rule, props to you.)

(Feel free to skip this next bit and pick up at the next bolded section if you don't want to read my view on homosexual marriages.)

First, let's talk about how marriages are excluding couples. This isn't a gay marriage protest post, but I'd like to know why a same-sex couple isn't entitled to a piece of paper guaranteeing the security of their relationship? It really isn't your business, but I think if I was a lesbian and I had a girl I'd love to spend the rest of my life with... I'd like knowing that I could die today and she could be taken care of by whatever I've left behind.

Yes, the Bible outlines it as being wrong and on that ground your argument may have some basis. But the Bible also states that the removal of the penis before ejaculation is wrong (so, hey, you guys talking about "I'll pull out", you're sinning), a woman in a man's clothing is wrong (you too, ladies in pants... and Amanda Bynes, we aaaaaall saw She's the Man), the trimming of facial hair of men (bros, that line up? Might be your ticket to Hell...), the mixing of textiles in outfits (you DARED to put on a cotton tee with those denim jeans?!), adultery is a sin - even if you cast your eye upon another with lust and desire (you check out another girl, but you have yourself a wifey a yaad?), the wearing of gold jewellery, pearls, costly adornments by women (hahahaha - your entire jewellery box is standing between you and salvation), speaking about another person's evil (you gossipmongers), despising government ("PNP a slackness!"), getting drunk (I hope you guys had fun on grandmarket night), fornication and prostitution, gambling (we see you, boys in the sixth form study rooms playing poker), idols (that's a pretty Mercedes...), being lazy (an actual thing, don't just take my word for it: 2 Thes 3:10 - 12, Eph. 5:16, Heb 6:12, Ecc 10:18), lying - but also TRUSTING in lies, bad manners (I hope you said 'good morning' when you woke up), sex with a prostitute/with a virgin without marrying her/with a relative/with someone who is already married/with a virgin, betrothed-if she cries out, you should be put to death and if she doesn't you should both be put to death, tattoos (YOLO trampstamp now, Hell tomorrow?), being a witch or having anything to do with a witch (how many of y'all read Harry Potter? I know I did..) and seeking riches. These are only a few. You can check out some more here or here or here.

And James 2:10 says "whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one part of it has become accountable for all of it". In Matthew 7:3, Jesus himself mocks you for attempting to remove the speck from your brother's eye while the plank blinds you.

Denying them the right to get married doesn't stop their relationship from happening. So before you go devoting your precious time to ensuring that these couples stay unwed, go sort out the man or woman having sex with someone else in your bed. Sorry, not sorry.

This is my opinion. I'm not forcing you to agree, but I'm asking you to be respectful and diplomatic about your disagreement. Thanks.

I've been told that when I get older, my views will change (and I'm opening myself up for the possibility of this - I'm actually eager for this... I love to hear OTHER people's views on marriage, in the hope that it will help to shape mine, as a matter of fact, a male friend or two of mine have contributed greatly, but I'll get to  that soon). I'm still not satisfied.

I can't actually see myself devoting my entire life to someone else yet - vacations with them, waking up to them, etc. I like being able to escape from people or a person in particular if I don't feel like I can deal with them, and return when I can. It's like being handcuffed (or fingercuffed, heh heh heh...) to that same person. Forever. *shudders*

The ROUTINE. That may just be the worst possible thing, ever. I hate routines. I don't like doing the same thing over and over and over. If it becomes predictable, it becomes stifling and it makes me unhappy. And someone whose opinion I have always respected once said, "You wake up every morning beside the same ooman, nyam the same sh*tty breakfast,[ go to work and complain to your friends about the things that ooman always doing,] come home and nyam the same sh*tty dinner and go have the same boring sex if she nuh have some excuse why you shouldn't and go to bed so you can get up and do it again".

Interestingly enough though, one of my guy best friends said something to me recently that got me thinking. He said that the marriage most likely to work is the marriage with your best friend. And it made a lot of sense to me.

But until I find a man who is both my lover and my best friend, and is someone I can happily imagine waking up next to every morning (even with morning breath and messy hair) and sharing a family, a home and a life with? I'm with those anti-marriage people.

People are always asking me stuff like "So... you don't plan to get married?"

I have bigger plans. I plan to see the world, study abroad.... I have an entire bucket list. But, ironically enough, getting married is on this bucket list. I want to be proven wrong. And I especially want to have a wedding of my own - I love love love love weddings.

Yours not-in-matrimony,
me.


_____________________________________________________

A couple of interesting articles:
(Note: these aren't necessarily my opinion. The fact that they are shared on my blog proves nothing. It wasn't necessarily something this Mandeville girl said, or felt... or agreed with. I just felt like sharing.) (These are actually in ascending order of awesomeness; they get more interesting as you go down.)

9 Marriage Rules You SHOULD Break
17 Rules for a Happy Marriage from God's Great Book
Marriage and Divorce Statistics from Dr Phil
11 Rules on Marriage That You Won't Learn in School
25 Extremely Strange Marriage Traditions
50 Wedding Traditions and Superstititions

Pizza is romantic... and

Happy New Year! I hope this year brings you happiness, joy, peace and nuff nuff nuff love.

h'Anyways.

romantic (adj.) - Inclined toward or suggestive of the feeling of excitement and mystery associated with love.

It's subjective, really.

Maybe you think romantic means chocolate and roses and candlelit dinner on Valentine's Day. Which is completely fine too. If that's what gets your romance wheels going, then press along.

But I don't think that's romantic. I think that's commercial and stereotypical and spoonfed. I feel like it's the idea of romance that's taught to us. We're taught to ooh and aww when a man gets down on one knee in front of the Eiffel Tower, or presents us with a bouquet of red roses.

I've only ever received a rose once. The gesture was sweet, but the rose died anyways. The card was nicer - with the sweetest note ever. It meant a whole lot to me. I still have both the card and the note, even though they really exist mostly as painful reminders.

I'm not fond of flowers. As a matter of fact, I can barely distinguish between types of flowers. I think they all look the same. I guess everyone can identify a rose. And I can identify orchids and sunflowers. Sometimes lilies, which are really pretty. Otherwise, they're all just... flowers. They don't even smell that great.

So someone presenting me with a bouquet of assorted flowers is rather meaningless. The gesture behind the gift is romantic, but the gift itself isn't.

Then what in the world is "romantic"?

Pizza.

Pizza is romantic.

I swear this isn't like one of those "#fatgirlproblems" hashtags or something. I think the idea of pizza is romantic. Because pizza is casual, the perfect idea of casual. How much more casual does a round baked meal cut into triangular slices in a square box, topped with grease and cheese and grease and meat and more grease get?

You don't eat pizza in front of strangers. You don't eat pizza at fancy dinners. I don't know about you, but I really only ever eat pizza around people I'm comfortable with.

There's the thing though. Comfort. I think comfort is romance. Being with someone who you feel at home with. When you can be dressed down, hair up, no make-up and feel okay with that.

Not someone you put on a pretty dress and curl your hair and dust your eyelids for. (Not that there's anything wrong with getting dressed up; I've actually acquired a fondness for the occasional dress-up.)

That suggestion of love is someone you can accept you as you are when you're comfortable.

You don't have to spend all your money on jewels (it's advised that you not do this, considering I've worn about three pairs of earrings in the past year), you don't have to get me flowers (I won't appreciate them and they'll die anyways), you don't have to take me out to expensive restaurants (I'm a picky eater and I live on comfort foods - ice cream  pastas, pizza, rices, chicken and desserts - anyways, plus I don't like eating in front of loads of people), you don't even have to plan a splashy proposal (I think they're cute on TV or in movies, but if someone took me to Paris and got down on one knee with a fat rock, I'd probably run away and have a breakdown in some bathroom because I hate crowds and I don't like being the centre of attention anyways).

I like handwritten letters, and gifts with lots of sentimental value (and usually little actual value). I like Chinese food. I like watching movies wrapped up in the couch. I like the idea of finding someone I can go to church with. Someone I can wear my yellow pajama shorts around.

Romance isn't Edward and Bella, with Elizabeth Mason's century old engagement ring and honeymooning on Isle Esme. Romance is Grandma and Grandpa, married for dozens of years, comfortable in a home and a family and a life they share.

Romantically yours,
me.

I wrote a blog post about friends and feelings a few posts back... and

Since then, I have gotten my foot stuck in a hole. A sizable hole, actually. A hole about the size of Antarctica. Which, in theory, means that I should be able to remove my foot quite easily... but I'm just stupid. 

A warning, at this point. This post is extremely personal, and I have a funny feeling that I may cry a few times while writing this. I hope that in trying to reach a point where I understand, you too may understand something. I hope you understanding helps you in some way too. Even if just by learning from my mistakes. It is gonna be a long read.

I have gotten myself into a strange state; both mentally and emotionally. I have found myself rather confused, and mostly irrational. I wonder how much sense I've been making to other people because I haven't been making much sense to myself, at all.

Maybe we should start at the beginning, in order to get closer to the end I seek so desperately.

Now, let's take it back... say, about two years and three months. Not quite the beginning, but most certainly the only definite point where we can begin (for, before this, there were merely insignificant crushes which really just blur together into a big mass of "I can't believe I did that"s)... I can't believe it was that long ago that I met the boy who was to become my first ever boyfriend. The first, and currently only, notch in that column of my bedpost. (Not that there are many notches elsewhere, of course.) Here began the blissful few months of awkward friendship becomes joined-at-the-hip friends set on fire. We were kids, fifteen and fearless. Looking back, that period had some of my fondest memories of times with that boy. There was really no pressure to make anything work, anything at all. It was simple and it was easy.

It was so very simple, that the next step was perhaps inevitable. We gave the relationship thing a shot. My first, not his. And that was fine. Slow, very hesitant. Like that first time riding a bike without training wheels. And there was that satisfying whoosh when we realised that we were, in fact, moving forward without our training wheels and somehow hadn't fallen over. Yet. But I was still a girl who had perimeter walls surrounding her heart, as most girls do... even girls who had no prior experience with relationships. (Instinct, maybe?) Opening up in a different way took time. Slowly, he became less of my best friend and more, but never entirely, my boyfriend. For he would still retain many of those "best friend" perks.

A relationship which grew and matured, struggled through and consequently overcame the silly trials of teenage relationships. Overcoming our parents, our friends, our fears, ourselves... we became a lot of things to each other. I cannot speak for him, but I know for a fact that he became one of my closest confidants; I stored in him things that had reached a point where they could no longer hold in only me without causing hurt, one of my best motivators; he challenged me to be better than what little I saw of myself, and eventually (and even now) better than what he saw of me too.

Teens don't always get enough credit. Teenage relationships aren't always awkward half men and half women fumbling around with each other's bodies, but sometimes are those same awkward half men and half women finding someone to help shape them into something amazing. My teenage relationship certainly pushed me towards maturity, towards accepting responsibility for a lot of things and the consequences of these very things. I learnt that things weren't always going to be great... actually, things were rarely going to be great. But that those rare moments of absolute greatness were worth all those moments of not-so-greatness.

Now, we certainly weren't always those mature teenagers who were trying to be great and shaping and all that lovely stuff... we were sometimes still just a half boy and a half girl who did stupid stuff which hurt ourselves and each other. The trick was learning to forgive each other and ourselves for those stupid little things. Or try to, at least. This bit is complicated and I don't think we ever truly got this part perfectly... but I don't think I've ever told him how much I appreciated the fact that he tried, we tried. I think our intentions were good, we just might not have been the best at execution. Good people do bad things, that doesn't make us bad people. Just kids. Who made mistakes.

Break-ups and make-ups, because sometimes things need to fall apart so they can fall back together in new ways. We fell apart many times, but it seemed like we'd always fall back together.

Until we didn't.

I won't try and fool myself into thinking that I don't miss that relationship, but maybe this falling apart is so that God can put together something different for both of us that needs to happen. It is that faith that has held me back from forcing the course of our current situation. I firmly believe that what is meant to happen, will.

Now, on a separate, but possibly related, path that appeared once I had reached the end of the previous one... There had been a boy that I had liked when I was twelve. With all the passion that a twelve year old can have... which basically means that I stayed far away and imagined what it could have been like instead. Before I had any sort of realistic expectations of relationships, boys, or even that highly debated "love".

I thought I had already wandered away from this path... but no, alas there I stood. Confused. It had been a text, I think. A text which followed a casual "buck up" at a mutual friend's house. Suddenly, there he was again... but closer, much closer. Dangerously close. And I was already wary.

We talked. We talked, a lot. And often. And about many, many things. I trusted, I told, I explained, I laughed, I listened.... and unfortunately, I fooled myself. Fooled myself into thinking that I held the cards of fate in my hand. For, when the time came for this path to merge into another, I was absolutely stubborn. He had come soooo close. Close enough for my fingers to brush, but never close enough to grasp. I felt cheated.

No matter how cheated I felt, however, I could not stop what was destined to happen. You may challenge the existence of "destiny" and "fate", but I don't. I believe that everything happens exactly the way it is supposed to, and we have very little control over the course of action that is set for us. For example, if he was just not meant to stay in my life, then there was very little I could do to convince him otherwise.

And so that path ended. I stood at a fork. Both roads were narrow, short, rocky and unpaved. On one side, there had been a boy who lived many miles away but had once been very close; a friend. A very good friend. And on the other, a boy I had only just met... with a very nice pair of eyes.

In hindsight, I doubt I was very interested in either road. Which, perhaps, explains why I didn't spend very long on either. I ambled down one, quickly determining that this was not desirable and not fair. I thought he should have a chance at finding a girl close enough to home to relate to. (Note: she's beautiful and they haven't been together long, but I'm very sure that he likes her very much and I do too. I'm very glad I didn't wander the entire way down the road.) And, after travelling a few feet down the second road, I discovered that I would rather rub a grater across my face than settle for a jerk anyways.

And now I stand facing a very wide lane. It is late at night. I can gather, from the light cast by the nearest streetlight, that the road is well maintained, paved in rich asphalt with generous sidewalks. But it is a fairly deserted street, and it is late at night and the lights are few and far between. I stand at the intersection, hesitant and unsure. One hesitant step, and then I pause. I'm scared to go any farther.

I know the road is very well maintained. I know that going down this road is simply a matter of walking from the circle cast by the glow of one light to another until I have traveled the length of the road. But still, I fear. I hesitate. And I overthink.

This road is my best friend. I have known him for as long as I can remember.

Hesitantly yours,
me.

I may or may not have consumed a third of my weight in Christmas dinner... and

Society is a bitch.

Pardon my language, but I think I've had enough. This is ridiculous. The endless, constant pressure to be something that we're not and we're not even capable of being- perfect.

This pressure to be a certain size, weight, look, social status, wealth, etc. Like there's some cookie cutter machine that churns out equal lumps of human to be baked at 350 degrees to become average height, skinny girls with flawless faces and long curly hair and straight As, loved by all.

It just isn't possible.

Perfection isn't an attainable goal. Not for people, anyways. We're flawed and constantly making mistakes and screwing up and doing stuff wrong. And I think that's how it's supposed to be.

I'm not trying to be perfect. I'm just trying to be the very best me.

I don't wear a pound of foundation every day, I don't have perfect hair, or perfect teeth, or perfect skin. I don't dress up often. I don't get perfect grades. I don't do everything right.

And I'm trying to be okay with all of that.

Because if my hair was different, or my eyes were different, or my skin was different... they wouldn't quite be mine.

So, society, go screw yourself.

(Just to point out here that this isn't me bashing "society" or anything, because we all are society and in order for there to be change, we sorta have to stop complaining about it and start doing something about it... changing the way we think and everything. But, y'know, I'm just saying that I'm trying to love who I am. Flaws and all.)

Happy holidays, all. Here's me sending love to you and your family and hoping you spent it with the people who meant the most to you... even if it was long distance, such as a very late Christmas greeting to a best friend in the States via Whatsapp. Let the people you love know how much you love them.

Most imperfectly,
me.

I think I want to be Marilyn Monroe in my next life... and

I'd love to live the life of a beautiful woman, desired by men and possessing a reputation I've been lucky enough to be blessed with. I'd be a lethal combination of brains and beauty. I'd change people's lives.

I think I'm going to go to the sixth form dinner as Marilyn Monroe. Now to convince my date to go as President Kennedy.

Yours clad in fake pearls and sipping on apple juice instead of champagne,
me.

I really really really want a huge hug... and

Loneliness (n.) - a complex and usually unpleasant feeling of emptiness and solitude with no established common cause, treatment and/or prevention.

I looked it up.

And then I took the UCLA Loneliness Test, out of curiosity. After scoring '33' which suggested extreme loneliness, I scrolled all the way down to the end of the page where I found a tiny, fine-print warning: This is not a diagnosis.

Loneliness as a social phenomenon isn't new to the world. It's as old as humans themselves are thought to be.

(I'm gonna go out on a limb here and assume that the Christian context is appropriate, but no offense to you if you're not a Christian, and that you're familiar with the creation theory of human existence.)

God made Adam. "And The Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being." (Genesis 2:7)

And then Adam, in his awareness of all the things around him, found none to be his companion. "And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him." (Genesis 2:20) 

And then the Lord made him woman. "21 And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; 22 and the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman and brought her unto the man." (Genesis 2: 21-22)

So not only is loneliness a social phenomena as old as the idea of socialization itself, but it is undesirable. So much so that the Lord saw it fit to create a whole being to satisfy the loneliness of one man; taking from him a rib, something so personal and dare I say necessary to create such a being.

Imagine being that first human. Imagine looking around at all the wonderful things that the Lord had made and noticing that you could relate to none of these things. Not to the flower, nor the fish. Not to the fowl of the air or the beast of the field. Despite the grandeur of all that he saw before him... there was something missing.

I promise that this post isn't about the story of creation, or even about Adam and Eve. This is about that something that's missing.

I'm not a super scholar or a genius. I'm not a psychologist or a sociologist. I know near to nothing of any incredible or notable depth on anything (except perhaps how much it sucks to be sixteen, how to procrastinate, how to complain a lot and how to need money while not having any). Because I can draw for a comparison from the Bible doesn't make me a credible researcher of any great degree.

But what makes me feel like I am capable of delving into the mystery that is human loneliness? Because I am lonely as f*#k.

I have 798 Facebook friends, I attend a school of almost 1800 students, I have a decent friend circle, I have a huge extended family which grows every single day and I have a cellular phone for which I paid more than it is worth.

And I'm still lonely.

It's a hunger, a deeper hunger than the hunger for food, that one has for companionship. For someone to understand them, to love them, to be with them.

You know that cliche idea that some people are so special that when they reach for your hand, they touch your heart? It's... kinda true. And it's such a cliche because people want that more than they want most things.

Like, for example, I really want a 32GB Product Red fifth generation iPod Touch. But I want someone to hold me really tightly and make me feel less alone more. No matter how many shiny toys you have to play with, nothing beats being loved by someone who seeks to give rather than to receive.

I just really need a hug.

Yours in loneliness,
me.

I am in need of a major paradigm shift... and

A vacation.

I really, really, really need a vacation.

I'm running on 15% battery life and the week hasn't started yet. Not to mention modular exams are right around the corner (December 3rd to be exact).

I think I'm just gonna cut off my hair, throw away any and all entertainment and social life I may have pretended to have and balance all my time between work and a convent.

Not like there are any jobs for this generation anyways.

Most exhaustedly,
me.

Parents like to pretend that if they don't talk about sex, their kids don't have it... and

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Sometimes I work myself into a right state just thinking about stuff... and

I need to stop overthinking. Really.

Have you ever just sat down and thought? Like, not thought. You're supposed to be doing that 24/7. I mean, just pondered everything from where do we come from to where are we going to who am I to why.

And then an endless number of whys just start to tumble down on you and you wonder why you started in the first place. But then that's another why and the cycle continues.

Overthinking is such a bitch. Pardon my language, of course.

But it really is.

It is the mother of insecurity and the cousin of depression. Gets you stuck in the prison of your own human inquisitiveness and then you're basically screwed.

I'm gonna go to sleep now though, because it's getting closer and closer to prime overthinking hours and I just can't manage tonight. 

Yours pensively,

me.

That moment when you lock eyes with someone you know like the back of your hand and learnt how to love like it was a skill... and

Then you both look away, hurry along the corridor and disappear quickly.

Sometimes I wonder... are we strangers now or were we always just strangers pretending to relate?

But alas, that's an ex for you.

Once upon a time you knew them like you knew yourself- what made them tick, how they loved, how they kissed, how they argued, how they slept. But now you stand at opposite ends of a corridor and one of you goes the other way. Now you buck up on the stairs and look down as you cross to the other side. Now you pass their classroom and suddenly become fascinated with the spots on the ground.

It's not easy, forgetting them. But remembering them is worse.

The memories. That's what kills.

Yours reflectively,
me.

We're all a little messed up... and

It's sad.

Welcome to Generation X.

Where instead of talking to people, we use pointless social media and condense our thoughts into 140 characters and send texts that don't follow the rules of grammar and prose. We don't tell our parents things. We take drugs like it's no big deal. We care more about the clothes we wear than what we put in our bodies.

Where we let our boyfriends, our girlfriends, our friends-with-benefitses touch our bodies, taste our tongues and probe our genitals... but don't ask them how their day went. Where we date for three weeks and then profess undying love, only then to scream and slander and hate when the relationship ends. Where we think knowing what someone looks like naked means knowing someone.

Where we hate ourselves; we wish we were skinnier, prettier, smarter, better... and care too much about what's on the outside as the inside rots away; like spraying perfume on a casket.

Where books don't get read. Where music demeans the woman. Where movies depict sexual relationships. Where art is obscure in all the wrong ways.

Welcome to Generation X. I hope you enjoy your stay.

Yours disappointedly,
me.

Can I just take tomorrow off... and

Stay home and watch Once Upon a Time and eat icecream and wear my PJs and wrap up in my blanket of misery and patheticness?

....no? Okay.

Seriously now.

I'm so freaking tired. Not sleepy. Just tired, exhausted, worn out... pap dung. I can't deal with stress. And I'm not even stressed out by schoolwork. I'm stressed out by myself. By my feelings.

That's not cute.

Yours pop-down-edly,
me.