Wake up Call

Le sigh. Prepare to be utterly disgusted.

This weekend was pretty rough. My attraction to Sean has made me a very stupid girl. For some reason despite the fact that he a) has a girlfriend b) is not the guy for me and b) he is a total asshole, I have developed an attachment to him that I cannot shake.

I have this stupid character trait where i feel the need to take care of the people i love, even if i am not getting anything back in return. If i love you, whether from afar or a up close, i am selfless. I have a tendency of putting my needs and desires and expectations aside to ensure your happiness. I'll get hurt even if that means that you don't. This is a trait that i admire and loathe and in the wrong hands it can be downright deplorable.

I am going to get over Sean. This is a fact but i can't say it is going to easy. A couple of weeks he said he was going to join the air force because when he was a kid he wanted to fly planes and in the air force he could do that (despite being terrified of planes). I told him that this was a terrible idea because it feels like a last resort kind of decision. He isn't happy at Le Sad store, he wants more money, and his girlfriend (who continues to break up with him) said she'd consider marrying him if he joined the air force for 10 years. To me these are all reasons why one shouldn't join the service, because not once did he say he wants to serve his country, but the boy is determined to get in if he isn't medically disqualified (kidney stones) first.

The fact that he wants to join has made me feel differently about him. For one, at 26, he will be an active member of the air force until he is 36. 10 years is a long fucking time to be away from family and friends and in my mind I think he has this idea that I will wait for him. He hasn't said this out loud, but when he told me about enlisting his first words were "I'll be able to send you money while I'm away. You can get our apartment and I'll take care of you financially". Um, asaywhat? We aren't married. We aren't even dating. Hell, i can't even get the boy to treat me like a friend. So why say you'd send me money to take care of me? What does your big headed girlfriend think of this?

Secondly, he seemed more adamant about joining once his girlfriend said she'd consider marrying him if he joined. Consider. She has told him several times that she never wants to get married and doesn't want to have kids, which is something she has always been against. Lately they don't seem to like each other that much. He couldn't get in touch with her for a couple of days because she was ignoring him. They break up every other week (literally) and she accidentally sent him a text meant for her friend that said "I'm done with him". So i think this too is a last minute effort for him. If he joins, she said she'll reconsider her stance on their relationship present and future. But when he asked if she'd visit him while he was away, she said not unless her mom could come with her. When he told her he had the option to join for 4 or 10 years she said she'd only consider if he joined for 10. What the hell y'all.

Finally, and this is a combination of point 1 and 2. This boy is not my boyfriend. Sometimes he is not even a friend if i can be honest. His decision to even think about joining the air force is, in my mind, his decision to not to ever be with me. Why, you say? Because i struggle to maintain his attention now and we see each other all the time. I struggle to be something to him when i am constantly being a devoted crush. His girlfriend said they should take a break and see other people and he didn't want to do that. This could have been the perfect time to test the waters with me and even then he couldn't commit. And what makes this so painful is that i continue to like this prick so much. 

He wasn't feeling well this week. He threw up 3 times at work and spent the remainder of his shift in the break room. I spent the better part of my night making sure he was comfortable. I got him ginger ale, and saltine crackers, i offered to go to the store to buy him medicine, and when he said he didn't know if he could drive home I damn near offered to let him spend the night at my house (i would have slept downstairs or in my Nicole's room).

He of course loved the attention i was giving him but was not grateful for it. One of my managers walked in while I was pouring him ginger ale and he said "she sure does take care of you doesn't she". Sean shrugged his shoulders and made a noise. When I came in to check on him an hour later he was on the phone attempting to call his girlfriend. He saw me and said "i don't know why i can't get in touch with her. I'm about to go home and i really need to get in touch with her I feel terrible". I walked out the break room in a fury. He didn't even come to see or thank me before he left.

I am not a consideration for this boy. I am never going to be Puerto Rican (which if i was, he'd be attracted to me...motherfucker has said this). I am never going to be skinny enough. Or pretty enough. Or docile enough. I am never going to be a girl who he can parade on his arms. I am me. And with this boy that is not enough (shit i almost just cried. shit. shit. shit). So if he joins the air force and goes far far away this feels like that is what he is telling me. Cause he isn't joining so he can marry me. He isn't joining so we can live comfortably. He isn't joining with our future in mind. But more importantly, he isn't staying for me.

So I've been taking a little break from Sean. I've been trying to go to the movies, read, write a little,  and put the focus back on me. And when i am around him, i make the conscious effort to see the real Sean and not the one I've imagined in my head. I'm not going to lie, this is very hard to do especially because I've idealised him. Despite him having a girlfriend and him being a piece of shit and him taking advantage of me ...the idea of him triumphs the bad. I even tend to get jealous when he is super flirty with other girls at work. I know that I have no right to be but I've convinced myself that they way he acts around me is completely different from the way he acts with everyone else. So, in the past, I've been a little unnerved when he is touchy grabby with other people. I can't help but wonder if he also says the same things to them that he says to me and how wasted my affection for him is.

There was one night, two years ago maybe, when he offered to drive me and another co-worker home. I hated this girl, Pam, and did not want her in the car with us. I had seen her and Sean engage in flirty/sexual behavior in the past (she liked to run her hands through his hair, he let her go to his car so she can wear his jacket at work) and I was in no mood to bear witness to this. While we were walking to his car Pam grabs his hand and they start walking side by side. I literally stopped following them and almost burst in to tears. He turned back to me and extended his other hand "come on, join the fun" he said. I looked at them both, told them to have a good night and that I would walk home.

I have gotten better since this outburst, but I've had my moments where I am like "what the hell is this boy doing" and confronted him about how uncomfortable it makes me feel when he acts this way at work. I can't believe that he has no idea that i like him. Sure the boy is a moron, but it is fucking impossible not to see it. And I hate feeling in competition for his attention. When i confront him about it he shrugs, apologizes and says he'll take my feelings in account next time.  But he never does. In all honesty it's his girlfriend whose feelings he should be most worried about. The point is the boy can be super inappropriate and while i am irked by this out of jealousy i am also turned off by this because it is not a trait I find flattering. It makes me think that a) no one is ever going to be enough and b) that he is susceptible to cheating (if the girl is aggressive enough to pursue). But once again, this isn't my place so lately when I've seen him interact with our co-workers in a way that is flirty I've called him on it and then shrugged my shoulders.

This weekend though the boy might have taken it too far. A mutual friend of ours has been dating the new cashier at our store. I dislike this girl cause she has the personality of a used car salesman, wants everyone to pay attention to her and wont shut the hell up. My first interaction with her went something like this: Kat and I were standing around customer service talking about a cute actor on a magazine. We are standing shoulder to shoulder so we can gaze and comment. Annoying cashier sees us talking and says "omg! let me see. I love cute boys". She literally wedges herself between Kat and I and starts talking about who knows what. This was her first day. We hadn't even been introduced yet. But because my friend likes and has been dating her I've been trying to be friendly.

Sean thinks annoying cashier is hot because she is from the Bronx, very curvy and of all things Puerto Rican! At first I was very threatened by her because of this. He came up to me once and was like "i think i like her. She's a nice girl. She's Hispanic. I don't see what you find annoying". Sean and her are very playful and talk religiously about how awesome Puerto Rican girls are. He has a tendency to follow after her if she is around and make light dumb conversation. It can be annoying but at the same time the fact that our friend is dating her makes me less jealous.

The other night Sean, I and annoying cashier were closing. Sean and I had a pretty good night talking and playing this dumb game on my ipod. He said that i was the only one he cared about at the store and that I was the only one who made coming to work worth it. Of course these sweet words were shadowed by his interactions with dumb cashier the rest of the night. He spent most of the night throwing shit at her and making comments about her body. At one point she was having a fun argument with someone in cafe and she yelled "don't make me get all Puerto Rican on you" wagging her finger at him. Sean, leering from the corner like a dog in heat said "you can get all puerto rican on me if you want. I'd like that". She laughed and said 'you have one at home for that" to which he replied "but she isn't here now, now is she".

This is the part where you roll your eyes. Scream at your computer screen. Threaten to throw something at me for being stupid and liking this boy. If you haven't already...what the hell are you waiting for. This boy is terrible and i am terrible for liking him and i am in desperate need for a 'come to jesus' talk.

I am surprisingly calm during the interaction. Sure i am crying on the inside, but i am calm. I tell myself that he isn't my boy and that he can act and say what he wants to anyone he likes (though if he had any ounce of respect for me he wouldn't cause he knows it hurts me feelings). He is not my boy. He is friends with the guy dating annoying cashier. And I am not his girl and my feelings are not in consideration. So i take a deep breath and decide to let the comment slide. But then annoying cashier, Sean and I are at customer service and he throws a plush toy at her ass. She turns around quickly and rolls her eyes at him before breaking out into a laugh asking why he did that. He says to see if it would bounce off her ass. At this point I've had enough and I turn to him and say "really Sean! really! you think that was necessary to say and fucking do!" I storm off.

Like a dumb girl i spend the rest of the night mad at Sean for being a douche bag and at annoying cashier for having a bouncy ass but mainly at myself for letting this continue to go on. He offers to drive me home, of course, but on the way out i see him go up to annoying cashier and possibly ask for her phone number (after he told me i wasn't allowed to have his because only his girlfriend needed to have it) He drives me home but I am very silent and seething with various ways to tell him to go fuck himself. When i get upstairs to my room i realize that I can't do this anymore with this boy. I feel ugly and stupid and not good enough when I am around him. I have put 100% effort into liking him and I am never going to be enough even if his enough is shitty.

The next day I come to work for another closing shift and before i can even put my stuff down my friend who is dating annoying cashier tells me we need to talk, its very important. I tell him that we can talk now if he wants. He says it's about Sean and that it's sort of a touchy subject. I say, oh great what has this boy done now. So my friend tells me that annoying cashier went to him the other night and said she is very uncomfortable with how aggressive and flirty Sean has been and that he is very inappropriate around her. She brought up the incident with the plush toy but also told him that Sean has said things to her that creep her out not just the night before but weeks ago. That he has mentioned her breast and butt in various conversations and has been suggestive with his language.

She went to my friend, her boyfriend, two weeks ago about it and said she would see how far Sean took it before she brought it up again but after the plush toy incident she's had enough and feels harassed. For Christ sakes y'all. For Christ sakes. Keeping my composure I ask what he is going to do. Mutual Friend says he doesn't know. He said he is going to say something to Sean before it becomes an issue that is reported to the manager. I tell him that he should definitely say something but that it has to be done in a way that will not be dramatic and that it probably shouldn't be done at work.

In my mind of course I'm like 'really! really! really!" this is the boy i like: a disrespectful, boundary crossing, douche. This is the boy i like: a boy with a girlfriend who religiously flirts with me and then in the same breath is being gross and touchy with his best mates girl. This is the dude I like, really, are you fucking kidding me.

I send Sean a text in the morning (he relented and gave me his digits) that our friend was pissed at him and that it had something to do with what ever happened between him and annoying cashier on Friday. I gave him the heads up  as a friend because i didn't want him to be blindsided by the confrontation. Or worse, i didn't want him to get to work and continue being touchy and flirty with annoying cashier if it makes her uncomfortable.  I got no response back and of course now feel sort of like an ashat for warning him. Maybe he needs a wake up call. Maybe he needs to be told that he crosses many boundaries and doesn't know when to let up.

Better yet, maybe this whole damn situation is my wake up call.  I continue to stick up for this boy, and make excuses for him, and clean up his mess. I continue to pine and say look at me from the bleachers. I continue to want him and be wanted by him because i have never felt wanted by anyone. But i can't do this anymore. I don't want to do this anymore. Relationships are suppose to be and feel more fulfilling and i have never felt more empty. Even more than my strong desire to be with him, I want so much more for myself and instead of being worried that I won't ever be a part of his life, it is time that I realize he isn't the right fit for mine. Now or Ever.

 Le sigh this shit is tough.

I'm Addicted

....to Tumblr (what else could i be addicted too!) and I finally remembered how to add a link on Blogger to my other space where pretty pictures and sad words are posted. Check it out. Sometimes pictures express my mood better than words.

Everything is right with the world today.

~Beckett

On Call

Mixed signals will be the death of me. The death of me I tell you.

Sometimes I wish i would have been a little more reckless and experimental in college. Had I had an ounce of confidence, or what i currently describe as 'my lack of not giving a shit what people think of me", I might have dated Mike. Or talked to Art Boy. Or dated casually like normal people do. Instead, I was too anxious to make friends yet alone get to know men (or college dudes at the time).

Unfortunately, this lack of experience has made the last few years....pretty frustrating in the boy department. I continue to have crushes on boys who are unavailable both physically and emotionally. Lets be honest that's probably why i am drawn to them. As someone who is afraid of getting close to people, it's not a shocker that I fall 'in like' with boys who can only give me 15% of themselves because, well, it protects me from being vulnerable and susceptible to liking someone and being open to them.

Not only am I attracted to these unavailable guys, but i feel like this has prevented me from interacting with dudes who could actually fall 'in like' with me and eventually date me. The other night I help these incredibly adorable guy who was looking for a good book in the Self Improvement department. Outside of his horrible taste in literature (really, self improvement) I was quite smitten with him.When we got to the aisle he said I looked like someone who reads a lot. I told him that i do but that i stick to fiction.

"understandable. the real world is pretty frightening, no need to read about it as well".

We both laughed at his quip and then settled into a nice conversation. He asked me if i was a writer. I told him that I use to write, or that i wanted to be a writer, but that i've decided to focus on other things. He asked why. I told him because my head and heart where struggling to create anything these days. He nodded, listened and then said he understood the feeling. He just graduated from school in music composition and that the process of coming up with something can be tiring. He said ideally he wants to score music for movies (sidenote: it has always been my fantasy to marry someone who scores movies. I don't know why. I just imagine my nights with him would be spent listening to something he spent days composing. I don't know. It's weird but whatever). At the sound of "i want to score music for movies" i freaked out and tell him that's awesome. I recommend a few soundtracks that I've been currently listening too and say he should stop back some time to chat.

It was very casual. Very outside of myself but it felt good to have someone's attention for a few minutes. Of course Sean comes walking down the aisle a few minutes later and the first thing i want to tell him is about my interaction with this boy. Because in my mind it will make him jealous and he'll realize that i won't wait for him forever. So i say "omg, i totally just met a nice boy who likes music scores and movies. And he asked me about writing and I think i liked him. Or liked talking to him". Instead of distress or anger or an tinge of jealousy this motherfucker pats me on the back and says "good for you. you really need a boyfriend".

Thanks Sean. Thanks.

I know that I am being a complete and utter idiot when it comes to this boy. My brother, my mom, Heather, Kat, my subconscious mind has tried to warn me of my growing attachment to him. Hell, he has a girlfriend,  regardless if they break up every fucking week (seriously. she broke up with him Friday. They made up Saturday) Despite all of this, he never leaves my mind. I am completely and utterly consumed by him. I know that i deserve more, i want more, I know that he can be insensitive and immature and a straight up jackass. But the moment i'm around him i become engulfed by him and my desire to be taken care of by him and to take care of him back.

But he isn't being fair with my feelings. I am being dangled by a possibility that may never happen. He expects me to be on-call and in wait for him to come around, even though he knows this too may never happen. And for a relatively smart chick I feel like a complete asshole for waiting in the background for him to notice me for him to take me into account. I feel like an asshole. And yet....he has ignited some intense feelings and desires that i can't shake. It doesn't help that he keeps giving me very mixed signals that my inexperience has no idea how to interpret.

This weekend I had to go to the Bronx  Sean lives in the Bronx and a month ago  he told me that anytime I have to go to the Bronx for my various appointments that I could spend the night at his house (as long as I told him in advance). The fact that  he lives with his parents already rules me out for ever taking him up on the offer but I entertained the idea of spending the night with him...because i am a girl after all.

 I didn't tell him i was going to the Bronx this weekend for various reason but out of nowhere he says "the other night I was thinking i'd really like us to share a bed. It's all i could think about. That i'd be able to keep you warm, if we shared a bed". I, at a loss for words, tell him 'that sounds like a nice plan...one day". Two seconds later he mentions that he took off for Valentine's Day so he could spend it with his girlfriend. I said that was nice, sulked away and cried in a corner.

His mixed feelings is killing me. Not only is it consuming me but it feels like it is tearing me apart. I get a glimpse into what a relationship with him would look like, only for him to shut it down. The closer we get the more i am getting hurt because he hasn't broken up with his girlfriend and hasn't come out and said he likes me. So some days i'm like 'fuck you:",' I'll ignore him and push my thoughts of him outside of my head. I'll demand that i find a boy who will commit to me 100%. I'll tell myself, then convince myself, then cry that i deserve better. I'll listen to my various "over you' playlists and banish him and his nice eyes and toned body into the dreaded friend zone. Because i deserve someone who likes me as much as I like them.

But then things like last night happen and i'm further lost down the rabbit that is me and this boy. Le sigh.

So the other night Sean, this guy named Dustin and I are all standing around customer service doing absolutely nothing. A customer comes up, gives me a very seductive smile and asks where he can take his books to pay for them. Dustin starts laughing and I stammer and tell the customer that he can take them up front. He looks me up and down and says "thank you very much" and then walks away. The first thing Dustin says is 'why the hell did he ask you out of all of us where the register was? That was weird right? I mean I was standing right there at the computer and he ignores all of us and asks you". I shrug and say "i don't know" but then another female co-worker says 'well....Beckett's adorable. that's why he asked her. Wouldn't you?". Dustin shrugs and says "yeah, well maybe" (which is the response i expected from him). So i teasingly said "yep, thats what it is i'm freaking adorable. adorable!".

Sean, who has been standing there says "um, no you're not". I turn my head so quickly and say "what?  you don't think i'm adorable". He doesn't say anything. So i, feeling very insecure and say "you don't think i'm adorable. Not even a little bit". He doesn't say anything. I glare at him and then say "well, if i'm not adorable i won't take up anymore of your time. Because i'm not adorable enough for it". Then i storm away. He follows me to the kids department and asks why i'm upset. I let out of the most exasperated groan and tell him that i'm upset that he doesn't think i'm even a little bit adorable or that he had to say it in front of everyone to embarrass me.

He says that is not what he said. I tell him that that is exactly what he said which made me feel like an ugly waste of space.

"whoa. whoa. tell me exactly what i said. I didn't say any of that and you're getting very upset over something stupid"
"you said I wasn't adorable. you said 'um you're not adorable". And I am very adorable, why would you say something like that?"

We stop in the middle of an aisle and I turn to him, who has suddenly become silent and say "tell me the truth. Do you not think i'm adorable at all" (and yes while this seems like a very stupid argument. I cannot have a boy touch me and allude to things like the way he does and then tell everyone that i'm not adorable to him. No)

He looks at me and mumbles "fine you're adorable" and then looks away. I touch his arm and say "no, i'm serious. Tell me. I need you to,  like you mean it or like i mean it". When he looks back at me, he looks so nervous and i have a feeling he's just going to walk away. But he doesn't. Instead, he puts down whatever he was holding at the time and turns my body to face him. I ask him what he's doing and he tells me to stand still. So i do. He takes a small step forward eliminating the small space that separated us so that my nose is pressed up against his chest almost, so i back up. He laughs and asks why i backed up. I tell him I don't know, i got scared cause he was standing so close to me. He tells me not to move again and places his hands this time on the sides of my arm. He moves forward again but i back up. He laughs and tells me this isn't going to work if i keep moving away from him. I wiggle the nerves away and say i promise i won't move again. He says 'good, okay, thank you".

He steps forward again and this time i remain completely still. At the last second i tilt my head up a little so that I look up at him. He smiles and presses his lips to my forehead and whispers into my hair "you're adorable. adorable. adorable" moving his lips back and forth. "You're adorable" he says once more before pulling away "happy?".

I'm not sure what happened after that. My legs may have buckled and I leaned into a shelf to catch myself. I mumbled a 'yeah, that was better" and then stumbled away to some dark corner to squeal and breathe.

Dear god someone help me. This boy is killing me. This boy is using me. This boy is wasting my time. And yet, i...i can't get him out of my head. I just can't. He kisses me on the forehead and everything bad flies out the window. Fuck

I'm going to try and blog as regularly as I can this year. I keep telling myself that I have literally nothing to say and that is why i have been a shitty blogger. I keep telling myself that i do not have enough time in between my two lives, social outings and sleep. I keep telling myself that if this space because on of those blogs that just fades into the blogosphere I would not be upset. But those are all lies.

The perk of working on a small campus is that I, essentially, get paid to sit and make sure the office does not burn down. This summer I got a job working in Document Services (i make copies... a lot of copies) on a awesome law school campus near my house. Before Heather as I had a small falling out last year (around this time i think) she told me she got a job on a college campus that worked out well. 4 hours a day. Higher than minimum wage pay. And weekends off. I was sort of jealous about this because at the time Le Sad Store was cutting hours and I was clocking in maybe, maybe, 8 hours a week. If I was living with my mom or my aunts, these shitty hours would not have been such an issue. But I don't and my mom was helping me pay rent for a very long time.

In April I applied, half-heartily to the same job she was talking about because they were looking for someone to fill the afternoon shift. I sent in the application, totally forgot about it and was shocked when I got a call in August for an interview and was hired on the spot. It was a little awkward at first working with Heather and working out the kinks of our friendship, but here i am, sitting in my very own office with a desk and a computer and a gorgeous view of campus life. I absolutely love it.

For 1) I'm not in the po' house anymore. I mean, I'm nowhere near financially stable but my mom doesn't have to help me pay rent and I can every once in awhile buy myself something that i don't necessarily need but that i want. 2) Time away from Le Sad Store is dope. That place is a black hole. Some of us are there out of comfort. Our friends work there. The job is easy. There are books and music around. But it remains the waiting place. We are all sort of waiting for something big and better to happen and killing time is literally what we are doing. Yesterday we played the Empire Records soundtrack on the book floor and it was very sad and nostalgic because we are sort of there because we don't want to leave this weird stage of life where we don't want to grow up but we can't stay kids forever.

 3) For 4 hours a day I have the free time at the university to read and write, listen to music, or watch netflix on my ipod. Sure, I have actual work to do. I have a campus full of students and faculty to produce copies for on a daily basis. But the workload is rarely over 3 jobs, actual work consists of maybe an hour of my shift. For the other 3, I amuse myself with texting Kat, surfing the net, and writing smutty stories in my notebook. In between this I think i can throw in a blog post every once in awhile. Cause i sort of miss blogging regularly.

The other day i went through old posts. I was looking for the entry where I first wrote about Sean (October 6th 2009!) so i can pinpoint when this disaster of a relationship started. I of course continued to read entries from way back, jumping from 2007 to 2010 to last winter when things went to shit, and more than anything what i love about blogging is having a documented proof of events. I like reading about Mike and Art boy. I forgot all about Professor McDreamy who took up a lot of space in my mind. I like reading about what i learned in therapy and seeing how it still applies. I would have never remembered my therapist telling me that when people get close or I begin to feel like I'm opening up I have a tendency to bail out of fear, had i not written about this conversation circa 2008.

So despite whatever issues are going in my life I'd rather be honest and up front with them and write them out so that I can access them later on and see how far I've come. Even if my days and thoughts are mundane, I'm going to make an effort during my four hour lull period to put my thoughts down again. Like today. Absolutely nothing is going on. Heather and I switched shifts so that I could go see Zero Dark Thirty with Kat this afternoon so I am at work very early praying that I get to just sit here for the next two hours.

During the height of our crush mania (she is still madly deeply obsessed with the married young preacher at work, as i am Sean) we use to go to the movies every Tuesday afternoon. Now this partially had to do with us actually wanting to see a movie and trust me we saw a lot of them, but at the time Sean and Preacher boy use to close Tuesdays. So after Kat got out of work, I'd meet her at the store (dressed very cute) and we'd get our interaction time in with these boys (god I'm so embarrassed by this but whatever) before our show played. We made plans last week to see a movie this Tuesday because we haven't hung out in a while but Preacher became a manager a few months ago and he doesn't close Tuesdays anymore. At the last minute she tells me she doesn't want to go to the movies Tuesday because he won't be there and she wanted to dress up for him (even though he ignores her after they had a falling out).

So she suggest that we go Thursday. I ask why. She says because Thursday is better and maybe i could switch with Heather so we don't have to see a late movie and....and oh yeah the Preacher is working Thursday. She bought a new skirt and tight set to wear just for the occasion. Because she has done stupid things for me in the past (driving all the way to PetCo for Sean), I agree to go along with this. But now, I am second guessing the whole thing. For the last couple of months we have enabled each other regarding these dumb boys and I don't think it is entirely healthy. For a while it was fun but now it just feels exhausting and not worth it.I have literally seen her cry because Preacher refused to take candy from her that she went out of her way to buy for him. I have literally freak texted her in the middle of the night to notify her that Sean was in my room. And because nothing will ever, ever happen between us and these boys I'm ready to bow out of trying to impress ourselves in front of them for small momentary pleasure. It just seems like a waste.

More importantly I do not want to see Zero Dark Thirty. It looks very long and very boring and I understand it may be culturally significant but I'd rather see Django Unchained again or Gangster Squad or something with cute boys that is fictional. I mean if I'm being dragged along for the ride anyway so that she can be sexually suggestive in front of her crush I feel like I should at least be able to pick what movie we are seeing. Le sigh. The things i do in the name of friendship.

I should probably actually get back to work now. I do like that my very fast typing makes me look very professional. Heather and I have started a book club and we are in desperate need of suggestions. I'm not sure if anyone even visits this space anymore but if you have any kick ass reads you'd think we should check out feel free to let me know. Right now we are leaning towards reading Warm Bodies (i'm going to surf goodreads now for further research). I attempted to read it when it first came it. Didn't like the way it was written. Put it down. But I figure I could give it another shot before the movie hits theaters. Maybe.

~Becks

A Great Divide.

Happy belated New Years!

The last two weeks have been kind of rough here. New Years Eve and Day were exhausting and disappointing. I spent New Years Eve at home watching Nickelodeon after Kat couldn't decided whether she wanted to actually do something or not. She complained the whole week prior to New Years that she wanted to get out of plans with her brother and boyfriend to watch the ball drop at home but that she couldn't.

 Come New Years Eve we are standing around at work and she complains that no one asked her to do anything exciting, even though I had made numerous attempts to make plans with her. I think she was waiting for me to say that we should hang out after work (go see a movie! ice skate! eat dessert at a bar again!)but I had it in my mind that I would stay home, eat a bunch of food and watch netflix all day (because a semi-day off for me functions these days as a full day off) and could not be tempted to change them.

I should have. Around Marie's birthday, day of death and even Christmas, i was sadder than usual, but not a complete wreck. I wouldn't allow myself to go to that place i always go where i wonder how things could have turned out differently. I miss her, grief makes sure of this, but some days it is not in the literal sense. I often forget that she is dead. I often pretend as if she has just gone away. That we have grown apart. That, as i always predicted, we would one day just not be friends because of time and distance.

The problem with this is that when I do fully grasp the extent of her death, in the middle of the night mainly, I am smacked in the face with the fact that she is not here. That she has died. That I will never ever be able to talk to her again or see her face or hear the sound of her laughter. She is dead. And I am here. And I am not sure how that happened.

The start of the new year triggered this sudden inexplicable, ache in belly realization. I was home alone, eating another slice of pizza, fucking around on facebook when 'it' came out of nowhere. This 'this is my life without Marie' feeling and I cried harder than I have in a very long time. Because while i miss her, I selfishly miss the person I was before this all happened. I miss the  girl that i will never be without her. I wonder what she'd look like today.

 I wonder if grief is this journey where I am suppose to learn something about her life and death and myself to help cope. Marie and I talked about loneliness a lot. We talked about not being able to connect. We talked about wanting to belong but not wanting to be normal. I can't help but wonder if her desperation had to do with the fact that these were things she felt she would never obtain.

Because those are things that i worry about all the time . I have friends.I have something with Sean (not healthy or good but something). I have a job that i love (the campus job). I have my mom and my brother. I have wants and desires. But everything still feels intangible. Or not enough. The other day Kat told me she felt alone. More alone then she has ever felt. And I was miffed that someone with a boyfriend and family nearby and a history with people could complain about feeling alone. Especially when I, often, have no one to depend on.

Case in point...i got the Flu from Sean two weeks ago (one of the reasons for my absence). The day after New Years Eve i went into work only because i knew he was going to be there. Forgive me for liking this boy, but i do. Our relationship continues to coil itself into a knot that we can't untangle. When he is not giving me mixed signals and breaking up with his girlfriend (only to get back with her an hour later) we are....us. We flirt, and make plans, and hint at things. We find reasons to be around each other. He calls, regulary to check in. He drops by my house after work if he can to say hi. He is more than a friend but not my boyfriend.  But the lack of emotional, physical or mental available is killing me.

I expcet more from him. I want him to by mine. I want us to be able to go on an actual date. I want to be his girlfriend. But most importantly, or heartbreakingly, I want him to want me as much I adore him. Cause I adore him. And he knows this and yet is still madly deeply infuatated with his no job having, 'agoraphobic', writer girlfriend. She broke up with him on Christmas. Made up with him the next day. And then broke up with him on New Years to make up with him an hour later. And he says he stays but she's a 'nice girl who's really pretty'. Which makes me feel like blah.

Anyway, he's been battling some 'bug' since Christmas (coughing, head aches, abdominal pain, congestion..it was awful) and despite his warnings that we shouldn't get too close until he felt better, i didn't listen which resulted in me getting the Flu not too lonfg after. You never feel completely and utterly alone until you have the flu and realize that you are too weak to do anything but that you have to or you will die. Okay, im being a little dramatic...but you get what i'm saying.

 The Flu from hell beat me up these past couple of days. I couldn't move. I couldn't think. I ached all over and thought that perhaps I was being divided into pieces. My mom was too far away to do anything. I couldn't expect much from Sean (who did call to apologize for giving me the flu...but did not drop by to make me soup as I expect my future boyfriend to do) because he isn't accessible outside of work. Kathleen, who too was battling the flu, was being taken care of by her boyfriend. And I didn't have anyone else to call.

So with the little energy I had, I dragged myself to the drug store and bought medicine. Then to the supermarket to buy soup and crackers. I called out for work several days and laid in bed thinking that I was dying. My mom, who is a worry wart to begin with, was days away from buying plane tickets to come take care of me. I told her i wasn't feeling that bad (lie of the century) and not to worry. Then I sulked and contemplated if life will continue to feel so lonely. Sure there was no one to take care of me while I was sick, but when I sit back and think about it i still have issues with connecting. I still don't have this reliable source of people to turn to when i'm in the pits.

AndI hate admitting that i need people. I hate it. I spent most of high school, college, and the last few years convincing myself otherwise. But now in the wake of Marie's death, the connections i have made, and the one with Sean I am trying to understand I want more than ever to have people who need and want me around as much as I need and want them around.

And I feel at a loss for how to accomplish this. I've done great this last year and will continue as i have been. I've been reaching out to people, spending time with friends and family, expressing my love and adoration as much as I can. But how do i know if these are lasting relationships? Maybe I need to meet more people? Different ones from my friends at work? And what am I too do about Sean? I am determined to tell him how I feel this year. I have no other choice. I can't go on another year pining for him and waiting for him to want me. Or more realistically, for him to tell me that he isn't going to leave his girlfriend and that i deserve someone who wants me as eqaully as i want them.

I am not one for New Years Resolutions. I think they are stupid. But as much as I am afraid of change. I am more afraid of not achieving connections and finding happiness and not being okay. I am afraid of being alone. But I most am afraid that because this life without Marie is strange and weird and lonely yet beautiful and scary and new that i'll go back to that place where i pretend like I dont want and deserve happiness for fear of never finding it.

Thanks Santa

So, um Christmas was amazing! Every year I have high hopes for a miracle or lifetime-isque close to the holidays and I am surprised and delighted by how I came to experiencing that this year. Last year i was such a mess and things were so blurry that I don't remember much of it. I felt alone and scared and depressed out of my mind. I was a mess. And looking back on this year, I'll admit, I didn't know how I was going to make it. Or what my life would look like on the other side of grief

 But I promised myself that the month of December wouldn't be this black cloud every year. That for a month of cheesy holiday music and movies, hopes and desires,  I'd miss my best friend but appreciate the years I had with her. Which also means being okay with the life i've created for myself now that she's gone.

And this month was fucking magical. It had it's terrible moments but for the most part it was magical. I put up some awesome christmas lights and spent my mornings sipping hot chocolate and reading great books

Heather and I baked cookies and brownies last Friday. It was better than i expected. While she has a tendency of getting on my nerves our night was filled with nostalgia and cookie dough. We talked about everything, laughed at the absurdity of the quarter life crisis and watched Doctor Phil. Because what else were we going to do.

We made enough cookies to split between us. Kat and I decided that this year we wanted to make gift boxes for our closest friends at work (5 people) and then personalize holiday cards for everyone else. On Saturday she came over my house and we lounged in pajama's, listened to dope christmas music and filled out 50 holiday cards for our co-workers attached with a Hershey kiss and hug! For the boxes we added the cookies Heather and I made, a mix cd, candy, and a personalized item for each person.

 It took us four hours! And by the end of the card signing and box stuffing we were cranky and tired but glad that we contributed to the holiday spirit. We exchanged gifts before she left and I got a motherfucking waffle maker!!!!! And some other dope gifts (the bag is from a suicide awareness orgazination. The pencil case is from Sherlock Holmes...and yeah, and I got a Buffy Necklace!!!!)

On Sunday....Sean finally bought my snowflake sheets. We worked the same shift that day and he said we could go after work to pick them out. Before we went shopping though he asked me if we could watch a movie at my house (snerks gerks!) just for a little while (it's a long story but i've never seen Pulp Fiction and our friend bought the movie for me to watch. I hadn't yet). While I would have said no just a few days ago, the realization that I wouldn't see him for a whole week got to me. So i said sure but that he couldn't laugh when he saw how girly it was.

We went to my house right after work and he stayed for over an hour! He sat in my pink butterfly chair while I camped out on the bed and we watched Pulp Fiction. He kept looking at my room and said he liked it. That it was me. It was sweet. During the movie he kept glancing at me and I'd say
what" and he would reply that he was just making sure I was paying attention.

We watched a good chunk of it before we realized it was late. I walked him to his car and we hugged out it. I thanked him for coming over and he said that he had a good time watching it with me.

Le sigh. I like him.

I spent Christmas Eve and Day with my aunt and cousins! We watched a ton of movies and drank eggnog. We went to sleep that night with snow falling. In the morning I made breakfast (pancakes, hash browns, cinnamon rolls and eggs) and I must say everything was pretty tasty. My aunt bought me an awesome pajama set and perfume and later that night we had ham and apple cider.

When I got home Sean left me a text wishing me a Merry Christmas and that he missed me. Kat thanked me for her gifts. And I opened some awesome gifts from my mom before falling into the best sleep ever.

This year has been really rough. I have more downs than ups if i can be honest, but the last few days have been splendid and lovely and I am happy. Incredibly and utterly happy.

Waiting For A Christmas Miracle.

Welp, Christmas sort of snuck up on me this year.

I don't know where my head is at these days. I feel like I just got back from Thanksgiving break. How in the hell is it Wednesday? How in the hell is Christmas less then a week away.

I woke up today in a near panic because I spent the night wrapping my moms gifts so that I could mail them this morning. But yesterday I had a holiday Christmas party at the law school, followed by a trip to the mall and target for last minute shopping, followed by actual work and then a meet up with Kat so we could fill out holiday cards for people at work. I got home around 7. Wrapped my mom's gift and checked the status of my online orders that have not come in yet and then passed out around 11.

I didn't wake up until 10am! And that was only because Kat's boot broke at work and she wanted to know if I had any she could borrow. I hurried off to the post office to mail my mom's gift, then to the store and literally gave her the shoes I was wearing (i had sneakers with me) and then scurried to the mall for a last minute purchase. I feel like I haven't had a moment of silence or clarity the last couple of weeks. And i am a little stressed.

It also doesn't help that every year, despite how old I get, I hold out for some Christmas miracle. My expectations are always so fucking high that by New Years I have cursed the year for it's awfulness and disappointment. But last Christmas I was such a fucking mess. I didn't want to celebrate the holiday at all. I don't remember what i did for Christmas to be honest. I think i went to my aunts house. I think I opened gifts. I remember being a piss poor guest though no one seemed to notice. I was a ghost.

I promised myself that i would try to enjoy myself this year. That i would evoke the spirit of Christmas passed and appreciate my time with family and friends. But Lifetimes movies and childhood have ruined me for life I want it to snow on Christmas. I want to be kissed under a mistletoe. I want amazing thoughtful gifts from friends. I want to feel lovely and special and that everything will be okay. I want a happy ending to this very interesting last year.

Instead, Kat and I have had no time to hang out because of holiday hours and conflicting schedules. We barely see each at work and texting has been our main form of communication (or rushed visits at work to say hi to her). This weekend we plan to exchange gifts (if hers comes in time) and then finish up last minute gift wrapping for friends.

A good friend from work has expressed interest in dating me. He came up to me a week ago and passively asked me what i would do if I was secretly in love with one of my best friends. Inside i rolled my eyes, because it is no secret that he likes me, and I told him i wouldn't know what'd i do though i have been in a similar situation before. He asked if this was a recent situation. I told him yes. He asked how the situation played out. I told him it didn't because I got tired of waiting for the guys feelings to catch up with mine.

I think he thought i was talking about him, so i quickly added that I'd make sure that the person liked me back before confessing anything. Needless to say the last few weeks have been awkward between us. I have a tendency of sending mixed signals. Around Sean I am mean and distant. I get angry at him quickly and am quick to find fault so i can judge because I am madly deeply in like with this asshole. With said friend, who i have no interest in dating, i am friendly and flirty. I play into his idea that we could be a couple. I'll hold his hand and say the stupidest things because I'm...not...madly...in....like with me. I don't know what is wrong with.

In the Sean department we are still...us. The other week we went to another wrestling party at our friends house. To say it was a disaster would be an understatement. Just thinking about it now makes me mad. In a nutshell, he was a sweat heart on the way to her house. We talked and laughed and danced to really loud music. We get to her house and he becomes an asshole. I am not into wrestling so I sat in the corner by myself watching the event but not saying much. So he chimes in that if i just planned on not participating at the party i shouldn't have come.

I sulked the rest of the night. Cried on the way home. When I saw him a week later at work I ignored him. But he wouldn't leave me alone so i told him that i was sick of the way we are. That something needs to get better between us because it's difficult being his friend (who he is mean too) and it's obvious that I'm not his girl (even though he have a non-sexual though intimate relationship). He apologized, said he'd try harder with me that I put a lot of pressure on him to be something he isn't (true). He asked what i wanted for Christmas. I told him, don't laugh, that I'd really like some bedsheets because I like decorating my room based on the season and that I'd hadn't bought winter themed bedsheets yet. He asked me if I was serious. I told him to forget it and that he didn't have to buy me anything. But he said if it's what i really wanted he would get it for me. But instead of going to the store and buying them for me he attempted to give me the cash for the sheets instead because buying them for me would 'take too much time".

I don't think this fucker will ever understand and i am constantly let down by my expectations and his lack of follow through.

Christmas is less then a week away and to be honest it hasn't felt very christmasy around here. I haven't had time to sit down and just watch a good Christmas movie on television or bake cupcakes. This Friday Heather and I (friend from new job) are baking cookies at her house. Then this weekend I hope to exchange gifts with Kat. I surprisingly have Christmas Eve off, which is a first! I'm going to sleep in and if the presents from my mom come in time I'll open them then. Naturally I am also holding out from some other campy Christmas miracles. Snow, a confession of love from Sean, an affordable apartment and a kitty named Jack. Fingers crossed, I guess but i won't hold my breath.

Tears and Fears

When I was in therapy I was told that I have a tendency of putting other people before myself. I can't remember how we got to this conclusion but we did and it is one of the conversations i replay over and over again.

I vaguely remember telling him this story about a time I stood up for a girl when I was in the sixth grade. She was someone who clearly could not defend herself and when i saw that she, a person i had not spoken too before, was corned by a group of ashats yelling cruel things to her ('ugly retard' is what stood out to me) i put my own fears of retaliation behind me and yelled "what if she were you're sister! stop making fun of her!". I then dragged the sobbing girl away from the crowd of leering bullies and told her i'd walk her to class. She said something along the lines of 'but wont they just make fun of you now' and i told i didn't think that far ahead to worry about that but that we should get to homeroom and forget this ever happened.

I told my therapist that i didn't understand why it was so easy for me to defend other people but when it came to defending myself I continued to fail at doing so. And he looked at me as if he couldn't believe that answer didn't smack me in the face: because you always puts someone else first instead of yourself, of course defending yourself is hard. It's the ultimate form of putting yourself out there.

And i can't believe that after all these years being able to express hurt and anger and disappointment to other people is hard for me. When i get upset I immediately boil the feelings up. I let it sit and stir and fester until i lash out. I am the queen of silent treatment. I have earned multiple gold medals in passive aggression. Even now i don't know how to value my own feelings enough to speak up when it is me on the end of the teasing or the tears or the anger. And i am finding it less and less productive.

These next few week are going to be weird. I don't want to say it is going to be emotionally and mentally devastating but i'm not going to say it isn't going to be tough to hold it all together. Thursday is Marie's birthday (forever i was convinced her birthday fell on the 5th of December but alas, December 6th it is) . She would have turned 27. I am going to call her mom tomorrow just to...I don't know. Speak to her, ask how she is doing, let her know how i am doing. I want to reiterate all the things I wrote in the letter i sent her a year ago. I want to let her know that someone else out there misses her daughter as much as she does. And maybe it won't mean anything. Maybe it will. But it's something i want to do for myself.

This year has gone by so fucking quickly. So much has changed and I still can't believe that I've gotten to this date and time and moment without her. It's unbelievable. I find myself replaying the events from last year over in my head a lot. It's easy to do when I have posts that remind me of the week leading up to her death and the weeks after. It's easy to do when I hang out with friends, pine over Sean, go home and realize that she isn't apart of it anymore. I can't whine to her. I can't ask for her advice. And sometimes that knowledge is a punch in the gut or a tearful moment in a corner at work or in the passenger seat of a dumb boys car.

I have been spiraling more than i've let on. I have not found a way to cope that is positive. I want to go to therapy again because the hardest part of grief is learning how to adjust to this new normal as well as accepting it. Because things are different. I am different. Hell even my wants and desires are new. And it is freaking me out because a part of me is afraid to accept that this is my life now: without her. And it isn't better or worse it is just different. A part of me is trying to understand what it is that i want from myself these days because I am not use to putting myself first and I feel overwhelmed by having to so that i don't drown under my anxiety, depression and general worries.

I made a small step in this department on Friday when I kind of told Sean how I feel about him. Well, i told him that there was a time that I "use" to like him, not so long ago, and that i am gradually working on 'crushing' on him less. He seemed a littled stunned by this confession, maybe even hurt, and asked why my feelings had changed. I told him I had no other choice but to get over him because it felt like his feelings were not catching up to mine and I wasn't sure if they ever would.

I then told him that this has been an incredibly hard year for me and that instead of dealing with my best friends death in a way that will help me I have been distracting myself . I told him that I want to focus on me for awhile even if that meant...being a little selfish. I don't know who i am anymore since she died. My role and spot has shifted greatly. I feel as if i am learning how to be a daughter, friend and person again and sometimes i fail at that. I don't know how the next part happened but he looked at me and told me he was my friend. And i told him that he wasn't. Because lets be honest for every good thing Sean has done there is a long list of ways he has not been a good friend to me. I don't know why i told him this. I guess i wanted to get him off his high horse because sometimes he has this air about him that he is saving me. That if he werent around I wouldn't know what to do.

But this is coming from a boy who left me in closet, who gropes me but says it doesn't mean anything, who won't give me his phone number because i'm not his girlfriend (yet other people and chicks at work have his digits). This comes from a boy who didn't tell me until days later that he sent me to get dog food for his girlfriend, who didn't remember my birthday, who has made me walk home numerous times because he didn't like my attitude. This is coming from a boy who hits on underage girls and is seriously thinking of buying me a vibrator for Christmas....so i can think of him. If anything this boy is struggling to be my friend. I get upset with him every other day it seems. I feel ugly and insignificant when I am around him. I have tried to be someone else so that he will recognize me and instead all i feel is degraded and small.

So when he said that he was a good friend, as if he was nominating himself for an award, I couldn't believe my ears. So i told him the truth...that he hasn't been a good friend. And do you know what he did. Do you know what this closet leaving, boob touching, inconsiderate asshole did...

He looked away. Got really silent. Cleared his throat as if something were stuck in it, turned red and then returned his gaze back to mine...full of tears. "go on" he said his voice breaking and i realized that he was crying. Like actual man tears. And my heart fucking dropped. I was not expecting this. I was expecting him to say something mean back. I was prepared for him to tell me to go fuck myself.

 I don't think I've ever made anyone cry before. And I sure didn't think i'd ever make this one cry. And sure this wasn't a full on sob but it was the most controlled form of crying I've ever witnessed. I dropped whatever I was holding at the time and pulled him in for a hug. I caved and said i was 'sorry' over and over until i couldn't say it anymore. I told him that i don't know how to be anyone's friend either and that maybe we could both work on being there for the other.

After a moment we pulled away and he said he got upset because i was right. He comes from a family where the roles are often gray and indistinguishable. His father doesn't know how to be a father. His mother doesn't know how to be a mother. His sisters don't know how to be sisters. And now here he is not even knowing how to be a good friend...when I've needed it the most this year.

And despite how inconsiderate and stupid and dumb this boy can be, this all made sense to me. I understood what he meant completely.I admitted that is the one thing I have struggled with as well, especially this year. I no longer know who i am or what i am to people. Some days I feel lost and without a stable foundation. I struggle to understand all the wants and needs and desires that are floating in front of me. I struggle with my role as a friend, daughter, potential awesome girlfriend. I am struggling. I am head above water but struggling. And i am tired.

So instead of hitting some terrible dark angry place I need to figure out and get myself together. It's weird feeling like I am just particles of this person floating in a million different directions. And there is this force trying to pull the particles back together. And i'm not sure what the final result will look but i'll be a whole person again, one day. I just needed to get to this place a year later of bad decisions, hurt feelings, terrible grief and misplaced feelings to realize this.

Disappointment Alley.

My trip home to thanksgiving this year was okay. I'm not going to say it wasn't a little weird but the complete fucking break down i expected to happen did not occur. The moment i got off the train though, i must admit, i was counting down to my return to New York. I spent the better part of my trip sleeping, watching season one of Homeland and talking to my brother.

Before I left I promised Kat that I would ask my brother relationship related questions. As a serial dater and womanizer there is no one better to go to about what is going through a guys head than my brother. He tells it like it is and has absolutely no filter. Of course as soon as I got home my brother and I had a three hour conversation about Sean and my feelings and what the hell I am suppose to do with this boy.

 Immediately he told me that Sean is trying to have his cake and eat it too. He is setting me up to be the rebound chick should his girlfriend and him ever take a break. The truth is the last year i have been his 'puppy' I've willing down stuff for him and embarrassed myself because i thought he'd choose me. But a guy who: leaves you in a closet, asks you to get dog food for his girlfriend, abandons you multiple times and shows you semi naked pictures of his gf is immature and not sure what he wants. What he is sure of is that Sean has set me up to be a girl in wait for him if or when  things fall apart. If they do, I'll be a quick replacement. Though not temporary. If they don't, the only person who'll get hurt is me.

Oh and moving in with Sean would be a fucking mistake. Like a huge, worst idea in the history of the universe, mistake. "There is no girl I know who will let her boyfriend room with a single attractive female. Especially if they've been dating for 5 years! He isn't telling  you something about this roommate arrangement. Which means it will end up badly"

Sometimes i need a come to my senses talk to well come to my senses. And my brother sort of solidified how irrational, time consuming and wasteful this crush is. But my amplified feelings for Sean has a lot to do with my grief. A part of me needed a distraction and this boy filled that position well. I've spent the whole year trying to distance myself from the girl I was before Marie died. And an aspect of that girl didn't get attention from guys, was never the object of anyone affection and or desire. And with Sean it just sort of came naturally. We fell into this cat and mouse flirtation. And it worked for a while.

But now I want more. Not necessarily from him but just from romantic relationships in general. I don't want to wait around for this boy to catch up with my feelings So I  get back into town after a few days with my family and tell myself that I am going to tell Sean that I can't move in with him. That its not that the thought has never crossed my mind but my feelings for him aren't roommate compatible. Of course upon seeing him I forget all of that. He asks how my trip home was, i asked him about thanksgiving. We talked about the prospects of living together and i told him it was a possibility as long as we established boundaries.

My boundaries, in an attempt to convince him that living together is not a good idea, is that i refuse to be a third wheel. If he and his gf are considering in the near future ever moving in together I don't want our place to be a template for it. Respect my space. Respect that i'll be paying half the rent and I don't want to come home and see her. He shrugged and said that wouldn't be a problem.

His boundary: when we share a bed....no touching below the belt.

Is this kid serious. I rolled my eyes and tried to explain that as roommates there would be no bed sharing. Because roommates don't do that. Couples do that. And we're not a couple.

Asshole.

It's get worse. Later that night Sean and two other 'good friends' decided that after work they want to hang out and play video games. It was a spur of the moment thing but something i would have enjoyed being invited too. Especially because of of the people going was the Linda who always throws the wrestling parties. Plus it was my day back from vacation so spending some time with friends would have been nice. Not only was i not invited but they intentionally went the whole night trying to hide these plans from me. I only found out because Linda came up to me and said Sean had asked her (it's completely, utterly, non threatening and platonic between them) to come along and that she found it weird that she was invited .

I of course stared at her and fumed. I wasn't invited. I'm close to Sean. I like video games. What the hell. He spent the rest of the night avoiding me and when he finally did talk to me he asked me if i was walking home (he usually offers to drive me. He didn't that night). I told him I guess so because I heard he had plans.

 He replied: Yea. It's cool that you're walking. Be safe.

Are you fucking kidding me. On the way out the door. Sean kept trying to rush Linda because he didn't know that I knew that they were heading over to our friends house to hang out. I ended up walking home at midnight bawling my eyes out.

Why am i putting myself through this. Why is it so hard to unlike someone. Despite all the shitty things he has done to me I continue to care about him. I've spent the last couple of days placing blame on Linda for not asking why i couldn't go. For our friend whose house they were invited to to play games at. But mainly at Sean because not only does he not like me the way i like him, not only is he setting me up for heartbreak. But he's not a good friend. He doesn't care about my feelings. I am not someone he considers.

Linda is throwing another wrestling/Christmas party next Sunday and while I am not sure now if i want to go (because my exclusion from Saturday stings like a bitch) I still want to get everyone going a gift (the three of them from Saturday fiasco and our friend John). Sean hates gifts. No one ever gets him things that he likes. He'd rather get money so he can purchase whatever he wants. But i don't give money as gifts. I think it's impersonal. So instead I had a really cute idea. Despite the fact that we are never ever ever going to be roommates, I wanted to get him a key ring and draft a roommate contract.

The roommate contract would explain my excitement over the idea of us living together but reinforce the impracticality of it. I'd confess my concerns and offer a small glimpse into why it wouldn't work. I'd also admit why i wish it would work. The key ring, would for me, symbolize that I hope he finds the 'roommate' he is 'looking for' to share a 'home' with cause it's a commitment. A commitment both should be invested in. This gift will totally go over his head but what the hell I can't go another year being obsessed with this boy. I'm over it.

So the last couple of days, despite being pissed about Saturday and not being able to ask him about it (we rarely work together) I still looked online for his gift. I thought about getting a Thor key chain, cause he likes Thor. I thought about getting him an iron man one because he was so excited about the trailer. I even thought about finding a scorpion key chain because he likes Drive and wants to bulk up like Ryan Gosling. And then, out of the blue, i remembered this very obscure character from a comic he brought up ages ago. He's not terribly popular but during our break once when we were reading together he was reading this comic. So i purchase the key chain even though I'm not sure if this is the character he likes.

When i get to work next day I ask my friend in the music department (and fellow comic book nerd) if Sean is interested in any particular comic series. The first name that comes out of his mouth is the name of the character i purchased the night before. When i walked away I was filled with a weird empty feeling. I know all about this boy, I wanted to be apart of this boys life so much that I took note of his likes and dislikes. His mannerisms and quirks. He cut his finger a couple of weeks ago and waved the bloody mess in my face to show me the damage. Without even thinking I grabbed his hand and marched him over to the sink in the break room  I grabbed the alcohol rub and the band-aids and without a second thought started cleaning up his hand.

He flinched underneath my touch and then asked why i was doing this. I looked up at him suddenly and realized that I had no idea I'd even taken his hand to clean up. It was instinct. I wanted to make him better cause it would make me feel....something. I pushed his hand away and handed him the band-aid and told him i didn't know why i was cleaning him up. And then I walked away. But this is the basis of our relationship, me standing around to pick up the pieces and him not even considering me.

I don't new years resolution, but my goal is to be apart of a healthy two one relationship in the near future with a boy who available and attentive of my feelings.

Scar Tissue

...wrote a lengthy grilled cheese post called Scar Tissue.

....the next few weeks are going to be rough and while I am able to write about my grief here, my friends are in the dark about this stuff.

...So i wanted to write posts periodically on Grilled Cheese to give them a sense of my internal thoughts.

Here's the link if you're interested in reading it: Scar Tissue

On Going Home.

On Monday I am going home for Thanksgiving.

This year I have many reservations about my usual trek home. Instead of a deep sigh of relief because I will be away from Le Sad Store and New York for a week I am filled with...fear. I think that's the emotion i feel. Absolute fear mixed with grief and dread.

When I headed home last year I was under the impression that Marie and I were on a break. I hadn't heard from her in a few months and thought, perhaps, that she was shacked up somewhere in North Carolina with  new friends and a guy. I didn't attempt to call her once when I came into town because I was in a "well if she doesn't want to talk or reach out to me i'm not going to contact her either" mode.

I now regret and often can't get over the fact that by then she was already living at home with her parents; unhappy and miserable and possibly plotting her death. I don't remember much from last Thanksgiving. I think my brother and I played video games, i took pictures of my nephew, i read old journals and watched a lot of TV. It was an ordinary week with my family and yet there was so much going on with Marie who was less than an hour away.

This year i don't have the 'luxury' of thinking her absence has to do with our friendship falling apart. This year, I am returning to South Carolina where memories await me and it is freaking me out. It's almost been a year since her death and I am still not ready to confront it. I've distracted myself with boy drama, socialization, a new part time job, and sleeping. I cry for Marie. i cry for myself. I am coping in ways that are not completely healthy but now I am going to be in South Carolina for a whole week surrounded by places and things that will remind me of her, that will in someone carry her memory. And i am freaking out!

This is not an exaggeration. In the past few weeks I have lashed out at people, endured sleepless nights, wallowed and nearly cancelled my trip home because I don't think I can do this. I don't think I am ready to go back yet and be surrounded by 'her'. Outside of my family, my memories of home are entwined with hers. The coffee shop near my house is where we hung out that one night a few years ago and face-book stalk my crush from the internship. The track across town is where we laughed hysterically at two people making out in a car on prom night. I'll no doubt drive past our high school while i drive around trying to kill time. The journals i usually re-read will be filled with Marie stories and complaints. And don't get me started on the photo albums.

The other day i got into an argument with a co-worker who said she didn't like my attitude when i was around her. She said that when Kat and I are together I become a different person and she doesn't feel like she knows who i am anymore. I was totally offended by this comment, told her so and then said if she wanted to explain what she meant instead of giving me stank eye we could discuss it like adults. She didn't want to do this and we haven't talked since. I don't mind not talking to this woman. She is immature and annoying and the most aggravating person i have ever met. I am however, offended and stung by her remark that she doesn't know who i am anymore because I have often thought this in the year since Marie has passed.

I have said it many times that I am not the same. There is a chip on my shoulder. I am quick to find fault in people. I am quite judgmental of strangers and yet insanely territorial about my friends and family. I am a moody, complicated girl whose temper is swift and unforgiving. I often feel like someone has shuffled me in a crazy grief tumbler and placed me back together a little...different. Not bad or good. But different. Because of this, going home feels paralyzing. I am the same girl who left South Carolina four years ago and yet I am different. And now, on top of that, I am going home to a place that doesn't feel like home anymore because Marie isn't here to validate a huge chunk of what made it home for me. She isn't here.

Last night i had a fucking panic attack about leaving on Monday. I went in the back, hid behind some boxed and cried. I kept telling myself that I was not/am not prepare to go home. I kept cursing Marie and her fucking stupid decision to end her life. I kept cursing myself for being such an awful friend to her when she needed me the most. And I almost collapsed from the insufferable knowledge that she is just gone, that she is never coming back and that that this is my life without her; often more of a mess then an actual life.

Of course, feeling stupid for crying, i shut down the rest of the night, got in a fight with Sean and convinced myself that I would tell my mom i couldn't make the trip home. I was starting to spiral. Sean came up to me and asked what was wrong. I lashed out and told him that it didn't matter what was wrong because he doesn't care anyway (our relationship is weird). I ignored him the rest of the night and then cried in his car on the way home. I will have to write the events of the car ride home in more detail. I don't want to forget it. Since her death I have not been able to express in words how it is affecting me. I told Sean that I wasn't doing well since her death, which is something that I rarely even admit to myself.

He started to tell me a story about a friend he no longer is in contact with and how fucked up it feels to care about someone you are never going to be in contact with again. I turned to him and started crying and told him that that story about his friend is not that same thing. Marie is never coming back. She isn't off some where living a life that I am no longer apart of. She is dead. She took her own life. She is gone. Gone. There is never going to be a possibility that I will see her face again or hear her laugh or see the world like we planned. She is gone and it isn't fair I cried.

He pulled into my driveway and turned off his car while I whimpered for 15 minutes in the passenger seat. I stared out the window so he wouldn't see my face as I started to cry. He took my hand and stroked the inside of my palm with his thumb and said he was sorry. That he was really fucking sorry but that maybe I shouldn't keep trying to pretend that everything is okay. We spent an hour in the car talking about her. I told him some things i have only written about on this blog and others that i have not. He said her name out loud a couple of times and I forgot how much i missed someone else referring to her.

I cried some more. Told him I thought i was a terrible friend. Told him that I use to wish I didn't know her when she was alive. That out of the two of us, I wasn't the one who was suppose to survive and I feel guilty often that i did. He didn't say much and if he did my sobs drowned his words of comfort out for awhile. He did manage to say that I shouldn't feel guilty for hating and loving her. That to deal with her death I should be honest about the kind of person she was. Even if that means admitting that she was a dick sometimes (as am I) Then he asked if i was writing my feelings down somewhere, documenting what i am going through. I told him no. He asked why not and i said because i don't the words anymore to express how i'm feeling. That my expression and emotions are stuck in places i am not able to reach. And he said at a time like this, dealing with everything i'm going through, I should be writing this stuff down instead of fighting my 'words'.

And for a stupid stupid boy who continues to do stupid stupid things and break my heart in the process he has a point. I am not dealing with Marie's death well. I have spent the last year shutting myself off from how fucking traumatic this really is because when the sinking realization of her death sneaks into my mind it beats me up, it takes my breath away, it prevents me from feeling anything except numb. But maybe i do need to talk/write about what i am going through more often. Maybe i do need to see a therapist or attend a support group or something to learn how to cope.

 Because i am not coping well, I find myself acting out, panicking, misbehaving, spiraling because i am not dealing with the fact that my best friend is gone and is never coming back and the plans we made and the future i thought would include her is gone as well. And it's not to say that i'll go home this week and have some profound epiphany about her and my life and i'll be healed of my pain but i do hope in some weird way that i'll have no choice but to face what i've been running from and begin to accept her loss so i can enjoy things again.

I am all packed up and for the most part ready to go tomorrow. I can't stop my heart from pounding though and i still feel very very anxious about going home. But i feel ready at least for the time away from New York to collect my thoughts. I told Kat that I would write daily reflections on grilled cheese (the other blog, i write on sometimes) for her (and Sean) to read while i am away. She is as nervous as I am about the trip because she thinks i'll come back distant and weird. But if anything i just hope i'll come back determined to get better and not feel so overwhelmed by the changes in my life and the loss that is somehow connected to it all.

Playing House.

So I guess I've got some explaining to do.

Last week after Sandy came in went in my neighborhood I went back to Le Sad Store and was disappointed to hear that Sean had reached out to several people on the day of the storm to check in on them.

As usual I was not one of the people he called or texted because I am in that weird position where I am not his friend and not his girlfriend. For the last couple of months this has been a hardening reality as i attempt to befriend this boy because his relationship issue are too complicated for me to comprehend (he doesn't love his gf. but he doesn't want to break up with her because she is a nice girl) and wait around for him to pick me.

So instead i am working on being his friend. We joke around. Make plans to do things and generally like being around each other. We still flirt and cast glances and smirks but i am putting my crush in check because i'd rather lose him as a crush then then not having him in my life at all. And with this boy that seems to be the only two options.

He doesn't know how to stay in touch with people. I don't hear him talk about any friends outside of the ones he's made at work and when he does mention someone from high school or college it's always in past tense. "my best friend from' "this guy i once knew'. His social life consists of family, his gf and work friends and I, being me, am trying to become something different out of the three of these despite my reservations.

I am failing at this because i am still suspended in the crush/friend sway and it's becoming a little heart breaking being his crush because the possibility of 'us' is constantly dangled in front of me but he isn't making the moves and I have yet to reveal the extent of my feelings for him. But being his friend is hard also because i can't be a bro. I get uncomfortable when he talks about chicks or his gf. I don't watch the shows he watches or play the games he's interested in. I have nothing much to contribute because being a bro involves a penis which i (thankfully) lack.

And a huge issue, lately, is that he is only accessible to me AT work. He won't give me his phone number, we don't hang out alone, and during a freaking HURRICANE he checked in with everyone except me. Needless to say I was livid when I finally saw him last Friday. I couldn't understand why of all the people he checked in with, I was not one of them. So I ignored him for the first hour and when i finally talked to him I told him i was pissed at him because i was worried about him and he wasn't about me. He had no comforting words. He said he asked Kat how I was doing when he saw her at work a few days afterwards. That he just assumed I was okay and that he forgot until the last minute that he hadn't called. I rolled my eyes and complained later to my mom that he could have called me and asked how I was doing (once he remembered  instead of reaching out to my friend.

The boy is not bright. Or he's scared. Or he is just inconsiderate. Regardless it's just another Seans an asshole moments

After we made up and he apologized he told me that he's been without power since the storm and that his gf wouldn't let him come over to charge his phone and take a warm shower because she thought it was a bad idea. I held my tongue and  didn't tell him that i think his girlfriend is inconsiderate too. He said that the only good thing about the storm is that a cat displaced by the storm has been hanging out at his house and he's fallen in love. The cat is sweet and tiny (possibly underfed) and has half a tail. He is friendly though and seems to have found a friend in Sean. He of course had pictures and video of the kitty to show me and I said "this is why i want my own place, I really want a cat and a living room and a kitchen!'.

He followed my enthusiasm quickly with "so why don't we get a place together"

ASAYWHAT?! ASAYWHO? WITHMOI?

I laughed and told him he was being crazy but he got very serious and said "no, i'm serious. Why don't we just move in together. My dad is retiring soon and will be home all the time and I can't live with that man any longer. And we'd make really good roommates. Let's move in"

For some reason all my rational thoughts about what he was proposing flew out the window once i saw how serious he was and how excited he seemed at the prospect. I have a weird thing about where i live. I want to make any and every place i rest my head a comfortable, relaxing, oasis to live in. And during the course of this crush I have often thought of what it'd be like to live with Sean because I am a girl and it is what we do. But of course I never considered that the thought has crossed his mind too, even if it is in a non-romantic roommate way.

So i told him a secret i was not suppose to tell anyone.

A co-worker came to me a few weeks ago and asked me if Kat and I was still thinking about moving in together. I told him that we were mulling the idea around but were not actively looking yet. He said that a friend of his who lives in a sweet two bedroom apartment near my house might be moving soon and that if we were still interested he would keep us informed. Not only does this place have 2 bedrooms but it is cheeeeeeap! I pay $200 less right now and all i have to show for is a mini fridge and an extra bed in my room. This apartment is a gem and a rarity in my neighborhood. If is does become available I want to grab it and move in and never leave but Kat's boyfriend wants her to move in with him and I can't pay that rent  by myself soooooo....

I told Sean about the apartment and he said "let's do this. I'm serious. Lets move in together, the moment it becomes available. Please, it'll be awesome". And like a dumb stupid fucking girl I told him 'we should...roomie!'

What the hell is wrong with me. What the hell is wrong with me. I can't move in with this boy (the apartment wouldn't be available til spring anyway, but still). It is the worst idea ever. One, he has a gf. I don't want to create lovenest for them to chill at. Two, i like him. Living with him would drive me crazy because a) i'll either   hate living with him or b) we'll be playing house together in domestic bliss while he just so happens to have a gf. But the last couple of days have been awesome between us because he is treating me like someone who matters in his life.

He spent the afternoon looking at pictures of furniture we would buy to decorate our 'home'. We've created house rules and decided we definitely want to get a cat that he'll let me name (but who will have to share sleeping arrangements with). And while I will at some point have to break it to this boy that us living together is not going to happen as long as he has a girlfriend or as long as we kept playing this stupid game of 'i think i like you. do you like me" it has been nice seeing his excitement over this possibility.

I keep unrealistically thinking that this is how i'll be accessible to him. We'll be roomies, we'll be housemates. He said he'd cook as long as I was okay doing the dishes. We'd get to go grocery shopping together. And at the end of the night, if we closed together at the store, we'd get to leave together and go home. And it's that stupid part of me that has made it impossible to tell him that this isn't going to work.

That I can't live with him not knowing what we are or if we are ever going to be something. I can't create a home for us just so he can bring his gf over and cuddle with or worse to bring other girls over should he decide to break up with her. In my fantasies of living with him it has been because we are dating and it's convenient to live with someone you plan on being with for a while and because we really really want to have a life outside of work together. And because that is not the case, I continue to play into the fantasy of us rooming together despite the constant reality of it smacking me in the face.

I don't know how to get out of this situation. I just hope i figure it out before spring.

For Christ Sakes....

Sean thinks we should get an apartment together.

Are you fucking kidding me?!

More on this later.

Hey Sandy

Seems living atop a steep hill has it's benefits during severe storm weathers.

Despite the various sorts of catastrophe and awfulness Sandy brought to the NYC/ Tri-state area my neighborhood, for the most part, escaped unscathed. On Sunday I closed at Le Sad store and was told that we'd be closed on Monday due to the hurricane. The University I work for was also closed Monday so instead of preparing for a storm like a responsible human being (buying supplies, charging phone and ipod, securing general safety of my shit) I bough waffles, added movies and shows to my netflix queue and created a playlist for my first day off in a very long time.

Now that I work two jobs my days off are non-existent. I'm either at Le Sad Store slaving away for minimum wage. Or at my other job getting mad paper cuts. While my other job is less stressful than the bookstore it is still a 20 hour a week commitment. Two weeks ago just as i was packing up my things to head home a professor came running into the office with a +1000 page document that needed to be copied (6 times) immediately for a pending court case. I called my manager and asked what I should do. I had to be at Le Sad Store in a few hours and could stay a little while but not the duration of the print job. She apologized for the inconvenience but asked if I could stay just because the nature of the job was important.  I made two hours of over time that night and was 15 minutes late to the bookstore for my closing.

I don't have time for much of anything these days. I am always doing something or planing something or anticipating something. Doctors appointments, socializing, work, reading, boy progress and missteps. I am trying to live in the moment as much as possible but in doing so i am getting lost in the shuffle. The ebb and flow of things around here lately is like a wave. I am being tossed around by the constant rise and fall, roll and thrashing of things. But my head continues to remain above water. I haven't drowned yet.

Next month is looking a little insane. I am going to a baby shower, a birthday party, home for the holidays and possibly bowling if i can convince Sean to go. The boy shit is still very complicated. I have stopped telling Kat about anything that goes on between us because of fears that it is damaging rather than helping the situation. I've been a little more direct with him these last few weeks after the disaster that was the wrestling party. We had a great time up until we got to our friends house and I got stuck sitting next to someone else. He gave me the stank eye for most of the evening and then asked if i would come sit next to him. When i did, I was a little tipsy and full from the food and alcohol. I curled up into his side and took a cat nap. Then the jerk i got stop sicking next to on the other couch decided to sit next to me. Suddenly i was a Beckett sandwich between Sean and this other kid, who i am not attracted too.

I quickly felt uncomfortable. One moment Sean was all "lie next to me" the next moment the other guy (a mutual friend who has admitted to said feelings for me some while back) was like "hey, why don't you lie next to me". I tried to stay as close to Sean as possible but he was getting annoyed and distant. So eventually I sat on the floor and fell asleep on the floor. Yeah, a great night indeed.

Since then i've tried being more direct with him about everything. I like him so fucking much but i want more than just a pretend relationship at work. I want to be someone he thinks about outside of work. Someone he considers. All day yesterday i sent texts to family and friends asking about their well-being. Sean only calls me when he is at work, because he won't give me his cell phone number, and it is usually to talk about something stupid or to apologize. But yesterday like a dumb girl, i hoped that he would call and ask if things were okay in my neighborhood cause I sure as hell wondered how he was doing in the Bronx. But of course,  like most realizations about this boy, I have limited access to him and this is wearing on me. Like everything else in life.

Anyway, I have to open tomorrow and need to get ready for bed. I found the most awesome female Thor outfit this weekend and am filled with regret for not buying it. It fit like a fucking glove and i looked aTHORable. It was 50 bucks though and i still have a few hospital bills to pay off so I am reusing my Buffy the vampire slayer costume this year. I can't go wrong with Buffy i suppose.