happy is pretty.

It was fall in Vancouver and freezing. We were perusing the wall decor at a local shop and everything reminded me of someone I once knew. Every dream, every crystal platter, every cigarette.

I wondered when anyone would ever be enough that I wouldn't draw the comparison to him. No one is him; and I wouldn't want anyone to be.

After that, I was crying a lot. Almost every day, actually. I cried until yesterday when no tear dared to surface. I concluded that happiness is more worthwhile than sadness; and she was wrong, sad is not beautiful. Sad is sad.

In the car, he made me angry for echoing my own sentiments. I wanted him to be more committed than me; I've always wanted that. And then he talked for half an hour about how he too experiences amazing things in loneliness and lives every day wishing he had someone to share those isolated moments with. It was the first measure of understanding I've experienced since I was seventeen years old: See the world; do it alone, if you must.

Wandering through galleries and meeting people on Sunday left me sobbing in my driver's seat on Sunset Boulevard. He knew how I felt, but I never thought to mention it.

I could feel him falling in love with me when my sister visited. He said I'd never looked so beautiful, he said he'd never seen me so happy. I told him that family is what makes me happy. I told him he was my family but also the person I have the freedom to be sad around. He said I can't count on him for so much.

He was right.

I continue to wonder when it will ever be enough. According to my sister and mother, it never will be. Maybe there is a tiny avenue others don't know about. How hard it is to mend this vast dichotomy; that is, if it were meant for mending in the first place.

Chair Lift Anxiety

On the drive to work, I attempted to explain the dizzying panic attacks I always have two minutes before the chair lift reaches its destination. We exited the 710 to the 91 freeway and I was trying to finish my story so I didn't have to aggravate him with it in the future. I can't recall now what I was even talking about, but I felt the familiar urgentcy he induces in me to get to the point and spare any details.

Last week, in one of my stomach ulcer-inducing dreams, a friend and I were discussing the absolute sufficiency of holding a person's attention. I was excited just referencing the idea of being looked at in the eye as I talk and the feeling of being the only person in the world. I said, "I wish he knew I felt that way," and then I woke up and shuttled away my instincts.

My lungs were holding significantly less oxygen and he laughed at me as I stumbled out of the car and promtly to my desk to vomit into my waste basket.



I was awake all night with thoughts I had no concern for. I told my brain continually to shut off, but all I could think of was fairness and a certain thing for which I want to fight. And worst of all were the jumbled thoughts from earlier in the day:



"I just never have understood how love isn't enough. In my experience, love is the only thing that is real, the reason for everything, the very breath of life. Love is what we were created out of and placed on this earth to give. Love wakes me up in the morning and provides me with work and a purpose and relationships; love is my comfort in sadness and my reason for existence...it is the essence of being; and yet when it comes to dating, love alone is hardly enough to sustain through insecurity and fear and misunderstanding and failure and disappointment. There are such politics and nonsense which circumvent what should be the bain of a relationship: love, which commands respect, which births appreciation, which caters to compassion, and so on."

The 60:40 Ratio

I went to lunch with a coworker last week and when we were driving back, it came up in conversation that his daughter's friend is getting divorced after being married for only a year.  He squinted at the road and said, "it's so sad.  I just don't know how two people could let a marriage fail."  I laughed and told him I don't know how anyone could make a marriage work. and he looked so appalled that I thought he was going to drive off the road.  He turned to face me from the driver's seat and said, "Claire!  It's so very simple.  Relationships are not about equality.  They're about inequality."

A few months back, S and I were on our way to a comedy club when I got a message from a friend.  It was the most meaningful thing anyone had said to me in months, so I began to question what I was doing with my life.  The entire way there, I stared out the window and began a mental list of regrets and failures and reasons why I needed to quit; but like clockwork, he caught on, hugged and and said, "Let's go to Catalina Island!"  He was relentless that night and it forced me to laugh and realize that his was the level of love I wanted. 

Lunch with my coworker last week felt a little like a date.  We went out, asked each other questions, gave each other answers and listened attentively.  I was on a high that afternoon from the things he told me, and I realized how much I miss male friends.  He's my Dad's age and full of amazing stories; and old enough to have wisdom to impart on the young, but young enough to understand another's point of view.  He said, "Relationships, Claire, are 60:40."  I wanted to iterrupt, but I didn't.  He continued, "Someone will always be giving 60%, and until you are able to realize and accept it, things will never work.  But if you can swallow your pride, if you can give a little bit more, if you can take the blame and pick up the pieces and love unconditionally, then it will work; and it will be better than you could imagine."

I knew he was right, but 60 percent is so difficult.  Last night, S told me that my honesty makes him think he deserves better than me.  I've begun making such effort - 65% in fact, but the more I give, the less he does; and the harder I try, the more he accuses me of not being fun anymore.  I don't know where I was when he stopped loving me as much, but I'd like to go back to that place and regain my dignity. 

The Chicago Talk

I've been wondering lately what I was thinking when I decided to move to California. I believe a large part of me came here to retire. Sand. Sun. Activities. Beautiful people. I have all the makings of a good vacation, only vacations end at some point. To continue at a leisurely pace and leave everything worrisome behind leaves one feeling extraordinarily artificial -- and that's what this place is. Beyond the beautiful landscaping and countless things to do lies a world where rainy days and all things necessary for balance are bygone. Reality masked by forgetfulness.
The trouble with forgetting things occurs when those things long-forgotten resurface. There is no current strong enough to carry away a full quarter of a life.

A boy from Iowa once tried explaining to me why the most interesting people in California are from the midwest. He said we're all looking for that place where we can finally identify with something other than our small town upbringing; and once we arrive we find the only things worth value are the other ones like us. I didn't listen to him, certain my experience would be different. Unfortunately, he was correct.

I moved here anyway and developed alzheimers or something similar, dismissing who I was for a person slightly less. I moved into retirement, a nice home on the beach, in order to put to rest everything I had spent the previous years fighting to become. No more sadness, no more searching. "I am content," I decided.

I carried my amnesia proudly, considering myself well-adjusted until late one night in February when a maniacal disc jockey unleashed a decade of fury in my parking garage. He saw everything he hated about himself in me and wouldn't stop yelling because of it. I chased him out onto the street, confused and very drunk, and his last words were something about being much better off now that he's become desensitized to the things that matter in life. I spent the following weeks thinking he had a good point.
From time to time, I remind myself of that horrible moment.

I was standing in line at Albertson's last night when I got a message from one of the most interesting people I will ever know. It was an update on his life, his failures, his accomplishments, and at the end an addendum, "I still do not know who I am." Thank God.
Only the ones who can admit to not knowing - those continually searching - ever really amount to anything. Something about Los Angeles made me think it was okay stop wondering.
Five months ago, I encountered the most necessary relationship I have found here; and it's one of the few things I hope to take with me when I find the courage to dig myself out of this mess. Last night, we talked about it. We talked about not knowing who we are. We talked about wanting nothing more than to get away from this and reestablish priorities. We talked about Chicago.

There's nothing to encounter when we're counting on the house of cards to fall, fall, fall.

Before we had reached the sand, he asked me if I was satisfied.  He said, "no one ever really checks in, you know?  And I am, but I just want to make sure you are."  I never know how to react to questions as absurd as that one.  Of course I'm not satisfied in a relationship.  So I said, "yes, absolutely," because the conversation that would have ensued if I told the truth would probably have brought an end to things that are - more often than not - satisfactory.

We stopped before the water where he gave a long-winded explanation for his behavior, then he asked my advice and I could think of nothing to say.  On an interest scale of one to ten, I was at about a two.  I was sitting on the sand, watching the occasional boat drift by; and he could not hold my attention.

It's unintentional, but whenever I catch myself giving an unreciprocated lot, I am scared into regression.  I wonder what happened to my drive, my ability to persevere, that reassurance that says a storm doesn't last forever.

The buildings of this city float at night.

It's been a terrible two weeks, relationship-wise, but in other areas, I'm doing fine.  A refreshing hint of self-actualization has managed to intermingle with my disgust of codependent behavior; he must hate this new person, but I'm glad to feel like myself again.

I went home for a week.  It always happens that I lose interest in my 'other' life when I'm back there, so I tried very hard to focus on him and remind myself that he is significant.  We have our own monumental collections of insecurities, which makes me think it probably isn't a good time for either of us to make any life-changing relational moves like falling in love or moving in together or anything like that.

Arkansas was ridiculously beautiful last week.  Everything was lush and green and magical and I was very, very high.  I trained my sisters in the stealing arts, caught up with old boyfriends and contracted another desperate hunger for making children's books.  Then, when I returned to California, I had a difficult time adjusting.  I spent an entire evening in the cold sand, crying as the sun set and wondering how many more bad decisions I will make with my future.

Many wasted days have passed and I am extraordinarily lazy and hungover at 2 p.m. on a Sunday.  

I wish my sisters were here.  I miss 'em.

Expiration Date: When good goes bad

We're in a railcar heading northbound and the sun is setting behind warehouses.  As long as he has his ipod and I have my sharpies, we are just distracted enough to overlook anyone else on board.  I'm thinking, "I would not do this alone," but maybe I wouldn't do it with him, either.  Uncomfortable stares from old men don't matter when there are two of us; and with two, becoming lost is an adventure instead of a nightmare.  I always wanted to be two...but two never satisfies. 

 

All the Saturday afternoon fun the world has to offer; I'm making a hat and I'm waiting on this to expire. 

 

He hands me a brick.  It is cold and uncomfortably heavy in my hand.  He says, "build a wall," so I pick up the mortar and begin. 

As warm and inviting as things were beforehand, evidence only hints that time is running out. 

 

When he asks how I know for a fact that I have ghosts in my apartment, I tell him it's because I can sense them.  He says that feelings are not concrete, and every reality - with its honesties and complexities - is completely abstract. 

 

So we rewind the tape and the playback is just as our memories promise; but there is such delight in revisiting the dead: 

 

It must be almost dawn and we are in the most secluded part of the forest in the backseat of my parked car.  It isn't the first full evening we've spent, shivering against the cold leather seats and aggrandizing our past musical careers, but it is the first time we are without snow in weeks.  We almost get arrested, but I can't stop laughing.  And though he will never know the hope he has given me to move forward, he must see me getting better.  I stopped writing the same way after I met him. 

 

There is a container in the back of this car and it transitions from one trunk to another until it ends up, seven years later, in the storage closet of my California apartment. 

 

One day, when I am looking for something else, I will thumb through the contents of the container, finding dozens of journals and various art supplies from my freshman year of college.  One particularly dusty notebook will catch my eye, so I will read over passages and lyrics as someone stands in my living room, waiting; and I will note the common angry tone and an immense appetite for self-destruction.  And then, I will wonder what has happened to me. 

The fortune has faded, and I am bowing out. 

I was absolutely certain I would make a career out of the things I love.  My unending pursuit of clarity was the driving force behind those creations, but I am no longer angry, and I am no longer an advocate for humanity. 

Today she tells me she is throwing in the proverbial towel; and I wince with envy because all I want is to go home.  Amongst all the things I've lost along the way, I still cling tightly to the aspect of running, the shock of a door slamming behind me, the agony of starting over.  

The problem with my current location is the lack of seasons.  There is no beginning, no end; and the only comfort I've found in such monotony is eaten away by the only force that reminds me I am still alive: growth.  It's a thick black mold and it's covering me and it is my reminder that all things expire for a reason.

Heart Failure

If we are all dying of something, then I am dying of acute heart failure.

The heart, afterall, is "deceitful above all things and beyond cure."
And if tose words - which are ancient - continue to ring true thousands of years after being written, then it is a fact that my condition is a fatal one. 


I try to reason with myself and with others about why it is that I have such trouble being faithful and truthful and consistent. Everyone tells me things like, "you're too hard on yourself," but the fact is, if anyone ever had the misfortune of knowing the heart of me - with its deceit, shame and ill intentions - then perhaps that person could see what a failure my heart really is. 


I don't know why I can't do it - why I can't give myself out of love to others. I had big plans for this year. I wanted to be honest and I wanted to give love. I'm beginning to wonder if my desire to serve people is just my selfish effort to prove something to myself and to the world - to prove that I am capable of loving, when everyone always said I wasn't. Even so, I am failing at that, too.

A rare moment of certainty

And so, my most beautiful and gracious best friend, I am with as much sincerity writing this to both you and myself as I was that night two and a half years ago when I was awake from jellyfish poisoning in a stuffy hotel room in Don Guan, China.

Today, I got a haircut. My new stylist (who is amazing) was telling me about her perfect fairytale romance and how it is the thing she never thought possible in life. I (somewhat begrudgingly) described how my sister met her husband in the cheesiest and sweetest possible way, and I told her how these true stories always cause me to rethink things.


When she asked about my love life, I quickly change the subject for lack of anything nice to say, really. I thought of all the conversations you and I have shared, and I thought of that night I wrote to you, and what I tried to say as gently as possible. 


I wanted to tell you that you deserve better - you deserve the world, actually - and I also knew that no one could fully know your situation but you. I did mention, however, that if he didn't notice that your lip gloss smelled like raspberries, he would probably miss out on even bigger, more important details. And if he didn't point out how absolutely beautiful you are right after you wake up, when your hair is in your face and the light is in your eyes and you fight to force a smile and say "good morning;" if the first thing he mentions is not that he is the luckiest man in the world, then there's a good chance he never will realize this. I tried to say that catering to his insecurities is both unnecessary and degrading. I wanted you to know that it is his honor to spend a moment with you, and it is his duty to let you know he is aware of this. I meant to tell you that if you ever slave away in your kitchen, making him your famous potato soup (you know what I'm talking about), that it would be a privilege and NEVER an expectation. Because if he doesn't see the effort you put into beautiful jewelry you make for your friends, then he is never going to see how much love you pour into the lives of others. And if he cannot respect and support your chosen career, then he isn't man enough to love a woman who might not need him. And, if at the end of a hard day, he doesn't first ask about yours before whining about his, then he clearly considers you second-rate.


A few weeks ago, I was alarmed. You said, "I deserve better; I am over this," and you moved on in the way only you do; I envied your balls.


Not so long ago, I was on a date with a fantastic guy. He seemed to be just what I needed, and everything added up except for the fact that I felt nothing for him. I tried, throughout the evening, to return his affection, because he was so promising. But the later it became, the more annoyed I was by the way he talked and how he asked invasive questions. The more I wished he would take me home, the bitchier I became until I realized I was the absolute worst version of myself. Still, he persisted and told me how great he thought I was, and I couldn't help but thinking, "this guy MUST BE an idiot." 


So that situation was on my mind recently when I was trying to sort some things out and conclude why this more recent great guy was so moody; and then the truth hit me like million tiny pebbles, pelting me all at once - not only in my heart, but all over my body (because I think that would hurt, if they all hit at once). And I parked my car and said aloud, "I...must be...an idiot." 


Let's not fool ourselves here, my dear friend. There is better. You said it to me on Sunday, and on Wednesday I came to a conclusion: I am right there with you. 


It's been so long since that night. I remember how ill I felt; how I changed my hair color and marveled that people can change. (We have since established that people do not, in fact, change.) There was no resemblance of love in his jealousy and possessiveness, but a part of me wanted to believe that if he was territorial, it was because he wanted me. Still, that night, I said to both you and myself that if he is not fighting for you, if he does not tell you how spectacular you are, if he is not chasing, pining after and pursuing you; then other men will. 


For so many years, we've fed one another the same advice, and consoled one another when another jerk turned out to be...a jerk. 


I thought I'd let you know, though, that your courage has given me courage; and I couldn't be more at peace with this decision.




So, thank you.

xo

Balance Beams were never my thing

I was saying, "I'm not even a uselses piece of rubbish washed upon the shore. At least then I might do more than make the beach dirty. If I were wedged somewhere along the coastline, an art student might pick me up and throw me into her found still-life collage; a bum might discover some value in my material; a sea gull could, I don't know, add me to its nest. 

"But I'm not even that. I'm still wandering, floating, littering the sea with absolutely no more purpose than that of a shipwrecked raft. I am polluting the water with my presence." 


He didn't respond; at least, I didn't hear him, but I'm pretty sure he was glad I finally realized this. 


So I asked, "Please, just show me how to wash up on shore. At least then we're getting somewhere." And after that, I was finally able to sleep. 


I had been reading old school Donald Miller when the words "I am the problem," stabbed me in the heart. He writes, "I think every conscious person, every person who is awake to the functioning principles within his reality, has a moment where he stops blaming the problems in the world on group think, humanity and authority, and starts to face himself. I hate this more than anything . . . the problem is not out there; the problem is the needy beast of a thing that lives in my chest." 


I know this too well. Had I been focused on rectifying my own behavior rather than contributing to the problem, I might not be wallowing in absolute shame and humility...again. 


I am terrified to try to defy gravity. I keep failing at it. I deny the purpose of my existence and continually prove that I know absolutely nothing of love. 


He told me that his response when people ask what happened between us is always, "Claire just isn't the girl I fell in love with," and at once I selfishly wondered what happened that finally marked me as unlovable. 


I felt like American cheese. Not like a Leicestershire Stilton, whose texture and robust flavor become refined with age; but an unnatural, processed slice of Velveeta that is at home among kindergartners and others who lack taste buds. I guess that means he lost a taste for me. Or he outgrew me. Or he realized that I am a better theory than actuality. As self-centered as one such realization was, I had to ask myself how many others were disappointed in my life...and these humans don't even know the disgusting depths of my heart. 


I ran home and tore through every drawer and shelf and cabinet, looking for something - anything - that might remind me of who I am. I wanted a letter from my Dad, a card from my Mom, a note from a sister...anything that might say, "you are loved." And I sobbed when I came across my Africa pictures, because the Khassonke woman preparing millet in Burkina Faso never even had a chance in life to be as despicably human as I am. And I wanted to wanted to vomit when I found a final credit card bill that had taken me years to pay off - I had saved the last statement as a reminder of a materialistic and irresponsible creature I never wanted to resemble again. 


I rummaged through far too many letters of apology from friends. "I'm sorry I hurt you so bad," "please find it in your heart to forgive me," "just one more chance," and marveled at the truth - that I was most likely wrong in each of those situations but far too proud to admit it. 


When I finally found the letters my parents wrote me after I was suspended from school in eighth grade, I knew I had found the indication of love I had wanted before, but it left me feeling anything but fulfilled. I remembered what someone said a few days ago about a particular man's affection for a woman: "I'm trying to understand what he sees in her," and I couldn't stop asking myself the same thing. 


What use, what potential, what possible reason could my creator have found in bringing me into existence? I wanted to know, so I asked, but I'm still not certain. DM continued on his rant about whether humanity is inherently good or evil and concluded by saying, "...the soul was not designed for this. WE WERE SUPPOSED TO BE GOOD." 


When my mom called today, I told her everything. I cried in my car for half an hour and she said, "yes, there is much to prove. But, Claire, I'm not worried about you. You are okay. I love you." 


And then I stopped crying. And then I went back to work. And now it's the weekend. And I guess, now that I'm not completely blind, I do have a chance to be okay. And I do have a valley to traverse. And beyond that valley another. And so on. 

Monday Fun Day

When I woke up, everything was different. I opened my windows and it was overcast, but for the first time in months I wanted it to be raining. I wanted to be in the woods. I longed for extreme temperatures and I wanted to be alone in it.

Maybe the ocean isn't everything.

Maybe California isn't what I thought.

I'm ready to move again, but I don't know where. My Dad said yesterday that he's looking for jobs for me because he wants me to move home. I giggled then. Now it sounds like the best idea I have ever heard.

I need my family in my life now more than ever. I'm twenty five years old and the most directionless I have ever been. There's no one here to tell me right from wrong when I'm unable to determine it for myself and I'm an absolute disaster.

He was right. A disaster. 

So I'm considering moving back to China, permanently. I am the healthiest when I am the most alone and have plenty of time to come to terms with myself. With the exception of my family and a few friends, most everyone in my life is a massive distraction from the order I'm meant to seek. 

When I am sad and alone and forced into, I'm able to find solace. 

My life has been a giant vacation for a whole year, and I'm ready to force myself into solitude: to be unhappy, to be afraid, to cry. 

I was so glad for the ocean yesterday when we were baking on the beach, but the ocean isn't everything. If it isn't a reminder that the world is bigger than myself and that I'm meant for more than I achieve, then there is no reason for it.

Starting this morning, I am coming down hard on myself and being the disciplinarian that I lack. 

I'm lost without my Dad. He is the single person in my life that doesn't have to say it for me to know it. All it takes is one furrowed brow and I break down, knowing everything I needed to know was evident if I would only take a moment to put life into perspective. 

The further I am away from him, the less I can feel his influence. This is just a few thousand miles. But the distance I've created between my Father and me is infintely greater.

The further I am away from Him, the less I can feel His influence. 

How many times have I reluctantly heard Him say, "Claire, I did not have to drag you half way around the world to get your attention, but you better be attentive now," only to forget everything I learn within days?

The fact is, there's never another head at the table. Never a better time to be stable; time to stop spinning, time to sit down. I need a beginning; I need to come around.

This afternoon, it finally started raining. As I sat in my car, watching the rain and fumbling around with a few words to try to find some clarity, I had an odd memory. It was a Tuesday night and I was in my studio painting when i got a phone call from the boy I was dating. He asked, "What are you doing?" And I said, "i am painting; what are you doing?" When he replied, "oh, you know, playin some beer pong with the guys," I felt ill. I knew that we were not the same, that his lifestyle was unlike my own; partying with friends every night, to me, seemed empty and meaningless.

It frustrated me endlessly that he was never alone and that every night, when we talked on the phone, he was too intoxicated for a real conversation. Slowly but surely, I have regressed to such a state. I'm that guy. 

It has taken a long time, but I'm ready to move on. Last summer, probably around July, we sat in my car outside the house where she now lives, and I cried. We talked about the world's impending doom, and I told her why I don't sing anymore. The windows got foggy, just sitting there, but I will never forget how kind her voice was when she told me I would be ready to start living again sometime soon. 

I tried preparing myself a few nights later when I was running on the beach and crying and asking myself who I was. A better question - the one I've avoided - is whose am I? Because if I give any consideration to the One I belong to, I should know better than to live in such a way.

I'm an absolute disaster; he knew me the minute we met. 

But there's no time like a Monday to make a life-change.

(If I make it)

I'm not sure what compelled me to say something after eighteen months of silence, but I said what I meant to an unattentive audience, and I felt nothing after saying it. The day before, I was instructed not to do something as it would be "tacky," only to realize that his version of "tact" is not the same as my own; if I had followed through on the plans I originally had, I might not have felt so screwed. So I sent him a message. I told him that I will never fully heal, but every day I'm trying. I wanted him to know that I wish him well, regardless. I wanted to say, "i fight a battle to forgive you every day of my life. I have to remember that every man is not the enemy - every man is not you - but I am searching the darkest parts of myself to find and extract any ill feelings so that, in the end, I can love you." Love is a never-ending challenge. When someone once told me I was the hardest person in the world to love, I took offense. But now I know it has something to do with how closed I really am. Yesterday, I heard someone say, "if I make it, we make it," as an answer to why he moves forward with his life. He was talking about community - about the effect that loving one person has on the rest of the world. I feel I've done nothing of value recently, and with every day that passes, time is running out. If I build my life on an "I will make it" philosophy without first considering what my presence can do to reward those around me, then I am building a house on sand. I woke up this morning to the pouring rain and there was sand in my sheets. I don't mind the sand but I've been disturbed by my dreams lately. I can't help but note the implication that the sand came from somewhere. I am building this house. My recent decisions are pulling me in a direction that is so opposite of where I'm meant to go, but life is racing by at a pace that causes me to overlook it all. The list has been revised. The goals are simpler now, but more direct. I will, in fact, follow through. Because if I make it, we make it.

Onions.

I like chopping things. It's probably my favorite part of cooking, and it's very important to have sharp knives. The preparation that goes into a creation is, to me, more enjoyable than the finished product. So, when I'm making dinner, I line up several bowls and cutting boards to chop, then separate. I used to help my mom in her kitchen as a kid, and I was far less interested in cooking than I was in washing lettuce and peeling carrots. That, I reasoned, was the really fun part. 

I believe in the thrill of creating something. Every day at work, it's another exciting project and intense deadline; and when I don't have time to eat lunch, I don't care because I am so involved in my creation. It's interesting that I rarely care to see the finished products when they come in for approval and subsequently hit stores. The creative process is designing the product. That, I reason, is the really fun part. 


I usually like planning trips more than taking the actual vacations. I like writing songs that no one will hear. I prefer dating to serious relationships; and I wonder if my zeal for excitement is simply overshadowed by the idea that I might be disappointed in the result of all the prepping. Or perhaps it doesn't matter either way. 


But when he suggested some 'onion' theory, I remembered how I love chopping things - I will chop anything and everything - WITH the exception of onions. A pair of useless corneas and bad allergies make it nearly impossible to for me to get past the first layer without crying my eyes out. So, fearing the next layer, it's easier to avoid onions altogether. This is sad, as they enhance the flavor of most everything. Occasionally, I'll close my eyes tightly and recklessly chop as much as possible before running to the bathroom for some eye drops. It's a disastrous situation, really. I'm so afraid of something so good that I'm willing to sabotage it or lose it completely.


I don't know how to respect the inner layers. 


I talked to one of my most influential friends today, and he told me to consider if I was even ready to be respected. I said I was, but I have to wonder if I'm being honest; if my frail outer shell is one that can be removed without wounding the one who wanted to see inside. 


Lately, I can't seem to take a joke, and my expectations are so unrealistic that I know they will not be met. Although there are so many I'd like to blame for my disposition, I'm the only culprit. 


So. The New Year's Rez. Loving people. Wow. It's tough...particularly when I hate myself this much.

Final Curtain Call

Everything came back to the moment when he turned to me and said, "So, move on." We were caught somewhere in between sleep and dreaming, between fear of failure and regret for not trying. We were at Ocean and Shoreline. And just to be clear, he repeated himself; this time, with a softer tone: "Move on." 

Somehow, the "right" thing is nearly always the hardest thing. I tried explaining this but stopped mid-sentence to wonder: if I had known beforehand how much loving another would hurt me, would I then have followed through?

A few weeks back (and moments before the tables turned on me), we sat in the back of a bar and talked about things. I asked why she was so tired and she said she had been up late with a lot on her mind. She mentioned having so many regrets that they were keeping her up at night. I said I hate regretting things. 

It was the start of another new year and I resolved to make it better than the last. At the heart of my resolution was the thing I knew I was meant to do. I thought that by loving people more, there would be far less room for regrets. 

Fourteen days into it, and I haven't gone a day without crying. I still wake up in the mornings, regretting that certain decisions were real and not only bad dreams. 

An old friend in my kitchen laughed at my neurotic behavior and proclaimed, "You are, by far, the very most independent person I've ever known." I explained to him that this is just the reason why I fail at relationships. My supportive and accomodating friends would say this is because I've never met my match. Others still would say that loving is about giving up the most precious, guarded parts of ourselves for the sake of another. 

The water couldn't have been more than forty degrees, so my feet were freezing. As we stood there, making holes in the sand and watching the sun set, we talked about perspective. He can't figure out what he wants out of life. When he said he felt purposeless, I had no idea what to say. 

After dark, the four of us took off our clothes and dove into the waves. We were naked and shivering and laughing louder than we should have, but at that very moment, being alive, in general, was purpose enough. 

He said, "if I didn't know you better, I would say you're trying to prove something," and I winced. 

I thought I had nothing left to prove. 

For twenty five years, life has been about apologizing and being forgiven. 

Breaking up and remaining friends. 

Trying, failing, trying again. 

Having confidence in decisions and not regretting things. 

Two weeks ago, I made it my objective to rethink my purpose in life. It will be my most challenging year so far. Last evening, a few self-centered moments into the conversation and I was arguing, "but I'm not trying to prove anything to anyone! I can't help my independence - I just want people to love me." I wanted to take it back. "Uh, wait, what I mean is, uh...um..." 

He stared at me, disappointed in what I was revealing. 

Life was about me. 

Life was about making my decisions. 

Life was about doing whatever I wanted. 

Life was about pushing to get ahead.

Life was about bypassing everyone on my way to wherever it was I was headed. 

Life was about ignoring the mistakes I have made, the people I have wounded, the enemies I have created, all to save myself from the pain of regret.

And I regretted not seeing the snow on the mountains that morning. I was too busy putting on makeup that I had no idea what she was talking about. And I regretted that I never appreciated him for cleaning up after me. And I was ashamed for not noticing mom's Christmas tree for two whole weeks, for never telling her what she meant to me. I regretted that I see every situation as it is according to me, with my best interests at the front of it all; and I'm ashamed that it's taken me this long to realize it. 

I regret that I've known so many people that I devalue everyone against the one who makes me feel the best about myself. When, actually, I am blessed beyond measure to have ever been loved at all. 

After he pleaded with me to move on and let him move on, I realized it's time to grow up. I knew then that loving has nothing to do with what is gained from it, and everything to do with giving it out, as if it is deserved. 

And loving is the essence of living.

Life is not a dress rehearsal. It is, if nothing else, the final curtain call.