Fumbling Plays for the Heart

I am not a particularly happy person. But I am a fan of Wes Anderson. And watching The Shins latest music video for "Simple Song" got me thinking.

For those of you who haven't seen The Royal Tennenbaums, Life Aquatic, or Rushmore, Wes Anderson is a director of melancholy, eccentric, and nostalgic films that don't tend to feature happy characters, but generally have relatively uplifting endings. Like The Shins video above.

They're inspiring, in a rather odd way. And I watch this video a couple of times and think "Where is my whimsy? Where is my sense of fun?" I've been sitting alone in my apartment for most of the weekend doing nothing but watch time pass without anything to show for it. Man, fuck that noise. Now that I've got the basics down (work and identity), I want to start enjoying my life. I want to grasp the now before it all turns into pseudo-nostalgia of a time and place that never existed in the first place. I want something now so I don't have to have the revitalization thirty years later.

I just have to figure out how.

Even More of the Same

I haven't posted in quite awhile. And I haven't done it for the best of reasons: that things were going well and I didn't have a need for the outlet. Writing for me, usually, is about purging and analyzing. And when things are going well, I don't really need it.

But they're not going well now. I'm crying and hurting and confused and I don't really have anyone to call or talk to. Of the small handful I'd consider contacting, at 10:50p they're all most likely in bed. So I'll write. And hope it's enough for me to be able to get to sleep tonight.

I have horrible trust issues. I think that's pretty easily established. I am afraid of letting anyone in because it sets me up to be hurt and disappointed. And honestly? It's entirely justified.

Every relationship I've been in has ended in what, to me, was a surprise. I'll think things are going well enough (and I swear, the feedback I get tends to indicate it), and then, suddenly, I'll find that I'm too "honest" too "draining" too "caring" and I'm alone again.

I swear, is it just my imagination that there are people and relationships where the individuals involved talk about and try to work through/compromise about their differences?

I hate being alone. I hate it so so much. I don't understand why this all has to be so hard. It just... it just doesn't seem like it should be this hard.

And now my chest is tight and my heart is beating so fiercely and I just want to be ok. I want to stop hurting, stop wanting, stop needing. I want to know why it's so hard. And I want to know why so many people don't seem to struggle at this nearly as much as I do.

I want to wish I could die. I know it's unhealthy. But it's so fucking relieving to be able to think "Well, no matter how bad it gets, I'll have a way of ending it." But, honestly, I don't want to die. I want to live. I just want this pain to stop.

Bleh. Things shouldn't be so hard.

Yet Again.

I feel like every post I write is the same. And it's been like this for ever.

Yet, every time, it seems new as I the first.

It's always been this. My hatred of myself, my desperate need for someone else to love me. I've been journaling for seven years, and it's always been this.

At church today, someone I was sitting with at lunch mentioned how one of his friends had been stabbed 16 times in "The Fort" (the mostly student housing area where I live, adjacent to some lower SES areas). I've known friends to be shot at, raped, mugged, and so on just walking through it back to their homes.

So I went home this evening and I thought about it. Because, see, I walk home alone in the middle of the night in The Fort. It's one of the self-harms I allow myself, the risk without actually having to hurt myself. I've fantasized about being attacked a fair amount. But today was something new. I wondered "What would make me finally feel like I've atoned?" A scare definitely wouldn't do it. Sexual assault would probably just make me hate myself worse. I settled on paralysis below the waist; above it I'd probably just prefer to die anyway. My mind drifted to being deaf, blind, mute. And I think I could do one, but if I was deaf and blind I think I'd feel as if I trapped in some kind of tomb. It would be terrifying. And I sat with that a few moments, idly wondering if perhaps I'd be in the process of being mugged when somehow I'd manage to either run into or get pushed into an oncoming car.

These fantasies mostly make me feel better (although the blind/deaf/mute combination just left me terrified). I either want to die or be significantly damaged while not being a burden on others. Because I need to keep working, keep trying to make my existence worthwhile to *someone*.

This, of course, is nothing new. What is new, though, is how increasingly I seem to have it together externally. I'm a smooth-motherfucker when I want to be. There's an elegance, an empathy, a light joy and positive regard to me that just seems *good*. I'm the person that people with trust issues talk to. I'm the person who listens not in a "passively absorb what 'other' says" but "actively engage in communicating self."

And I could be this person constantly if I had a consistent source of validation. But I am fucking hard to reach. You have to make a conscious effort to burrow, to fling yourself at my walls and keep trying til you make it in (you will make it in, though). But, of course, that's rare. I've met two people who can do it consistently and a handful more who can do it if they try.

And that makes everything really lonely. Fuck, I just want to talk to someone who cares about me. Like, reaches out for me to get to the place where things actually hurt. I don't need my problems solved; I know how to do that. I want *love*.

But because I hate myself, I can't get it. I'm stuck as an ancillary companion, a third, a fifth wheel. And, increasingly, I'm realizing that until the hate changes, the lack of love won't either.

NeoAnnual Progress Report

Three years ago, I was staring down my final semester of undergrad. Staying in bed all day, my girlfriend would sometimes come over at 3:00p or 3:30p and crawl in with me because attempting to get me up was largely futile. I was preparing to teach high school, a career I had more trepidation than passion about, but it was safe and I was anything if not safe.

Two years ago, I was working my part-time job over winter break. I could not sleep late, and that was wonderful. I had been single for a bit more than two months, and it still stung poignantly (although not nearly as bad as it had). And, the last week or two, I had decided to finally transition genders. I came out to my immediate family around this time. And although I dreaded returning to teaching high school, I felt significant hope for the first time in my life.

One year ago, all of my applications had been sent in for graduate school. I was staying in bed until 4p or 5p, going to bed at 7:00a as the sun came up. I had just driven to Memphis to see the young woman who I loved more than I thought love was possible, and a few days before the last day of the year, I had three hours with her that encompassed the happiest I've ever been. I had been on hormones for eight months, had my chosen name legally and been full time for two months, and there were moments where I felt overjoyed simply to be alive. [And moments where I felt I was haunted by a stain of self that would never truly leave]

Today, I find myself in graduate school. Based upon one client, I love my chosen career. Based upon one semester, I adore my cohort and I appreciate most of my classes. I look in the mirror and see Juliet. I have increasingly closer friends who I really believe truly care about me.

I'm still single. I still find myself staying in bed for too, too long. I still don't eat well, don't take care of my environment, don't regard myself particularly highly. The notes from one year ago aside, last year contained some of the absolute most painful and stressful times in my lifetime. And they ended in a way that will deny me closure until I can figure out how to conjure it for myself. I have motivation problems. I have significant anxiety. I have monstrous fears of and intense desires for intimacy. I have a lot of work to do.

But, overall, considering where I've been, I'm in a decent place. All I have to fear and dread are research deadlines. And, truly, that's a lesser concern that I hope I can figure out. I have a lot of things to look forward to this year. And, if I keep on progressing, I think I might find a bit of contentment along the way.

The Last Girl

Without a doubt, my favorite genre is the post-apocalyptic. I include dystopia in that, because dystopia encompasses the same kind of widespread destruction of humanity in a spiritual form, even if the people will likely survive into the future (and may move to a non-dystopic phase within their ontology).

In the abstract, it's romantic. Youth, desperation, terror, and unquenchable need all lend themselves to the "fucking like they do in art films" mentality (and support the "hot/crazy" positive correlation). The apocalypse lends itself to those emotions directly.

In the immediate, it's, of course, not romantic at all. I've had conversations and long periods of time with someone I desperately loved when I had reasonable expectations of her not surviving or not making it to safety and those months (crystallized in a few particularly intense weeks) are some I never, ever want to relive.

But what that experience and genre do convey is an immense sense of meaning. It's survival. Except, in most of the better media involving the apocalypse, it's rarely the survival of the individual but the survival of the community. It's love, it's family, it's human as a quintessential social animal and the struggle to not let that spirit of humanity die lends a sense of importance to every moment that is largely absent from modern, middle-class, Western lives like my own.

In the apocalypse, there is literally a struggle between Being and Nothingness. Whereas we are interchangeable and expendable (outside of our communities) in modern life, in the end of the world we *are* life.

Or that's how it often seems, anyway.

In truth, there is so much "quiet desperation" even in this world of comforts. One need only go to a "Take Back the Night" rally and listen, for an hour, to every single person who comes up and says "I've never told anyone this before, but..." and you find that spiritual survival is very much an ongoing and contemporary struggle. And, indeed, those struggles are what make me feel real and vital.

The lives of others, as it were. In an apocalypse, I would survive for someone I loved. But I wouldn't survive for myself. And the same's true now. I find meaning in the meaningful struggles of others. I'm only safe when I'm ensconced in another, only happy and joyous when another is embracing the all of me. It's all other other other.

It's the same way in apocalypse too. I write this same post again and again and again. Because it's the fundamental tension in my life. I have no (or minimal) worth in and of myself. And I'm not entirely sure if that's a bad thing. After all, I rather doubt most people would want to be the last person on earth. But one of the last of a select two? That would make all the difference. Why not in life as well?

Last Night in Three Acts

Last night, I went to three things.

First, I went to my ex's to play board games. She generally hosts a boardgame night with her boyfriend once or twice a week, and I try to go whenever they don't have too many people attending. It was really nice. I like her, I like her boyfriend, I like his friends, I like her friends. It's a warm, intimate place with lots of laughter and engagement.

But I left because there was a going away party for someone I didn't know too well, but that I admired anyway. She was a member of LAMBDA, the gay-student group on campus, and pretty much ran the thing single-handedly. So I went. There were a lot of folks from Americorps there, because her girlfriend is in Americorps and they were her friends. And many of them were really nice. But I tried to have conversations with them and, due to my complete lack of interest in small talk, I tried to talk to them about their plans and passions and education experiences because I figured folks in Americorps would be committed to these sorts of things. And it largely failed. They'd talk, but it was clear they felt uncomfortable, and for all their years of study the level of their discourse was... somewhat less than I would have liked. Some other lesbians from LAMBDA showed up who I knew, which was nice, but I still found it difficult to have longer conversations with them. I had to work hard at it, asking lots of questions and drawing them out. And that's generally a sign that they're not interested.

So I went home, and then I went out to a gay club for about an hour last night, at the behest of some friends who were already there (it's a five minute walk from my apartment). It was interesting to people watch, certainly. Seeing so many queer individuals in one place, I can really appreciate how much diversity Knoxville has, even if it's not immediately apparent day to day. But I kept my long coat on inside, my coat of armor, my "don't fucking mess with me" veneer. And although I enjoyed the company of some of my friends, it was hard again. I felt out of place. And when someone asked me "Are you a real girl or not?" it pretty much deflated me entirely.

I say all this not to give a travelogue, but to point out a few themes. One is that so much social interaction is hard. It's not that I can't do it, but it just feels like I'm trying to force something that's not there. And it ends up being quite alienating. Another is that I'm quite guarded. I defend myself by reverting to cognitive discussions, I come on too strongly in that domain because it's the one I feel strongest and safest in, and I just give off uncomfortable vibes. Someone at an autoparts store yesterday asked me why I was so sad, and I thought "I'm not really that sad right now, am I?" I am uncomfortable, unhappy, and afraid. And it shows.

And that's the kicker. I want so much to connect to people, but *I'm* the impediment to connection. And I don't really know how to change. There are times that are better, like with my ex in places where I know everyone and we're doing things I like. But is there a way to translate that comfort and security to places outside that comfort zone? The only way I can think of is to carry a partner inside me, a safety net to fall upon. That, or love and believe in myself. But how the hell does a person manage to do that? I really wish I knew.

"I'm not single, I'm alone."

I can't tell whether online dating is killing me or keeping me alive. It's a ray of tantalizing hope, certainly. But it's frustrating and fraught with perpetual disappointment. Conversations are abruptly dropped with no warning why. There's no real way to evaluate why some people respond and others don't. I fall in love with someone's profile and she lives in fucking Toronto. I've exhausted the supply of remotely compatible individuals within at least 200 miles. And there seems to be little chance of things getting better any time soon.

As someone [the only one] I've been messaging off and on on okcupid said,

 "you continue to be hilarious as your emotional investments in this website's prospects fall away like so much overstewed tallow from the bone. "

 The conventional wisdom is to learn to love yourself and love will eventually find you. I'm improving on that count. I am continually surprised at my confidence and assuredness, knowing what I want and taking active steps to try to make it happen. I still have something of a fundamental lack of self-worth, but I'll find the suicidal ideation creeping back in and part of me shouts at it that even though things aren't great, they're encouragingly positive. It's progress.

But as one of my friends said, quoting tumblr, queer dating is like applying for jobs: you either do it online or through referrals. One can hope you'll meet someone socially, but especially in Knoxville that just doesn't seem feasible any time soon.

And that's quite discouraging. I put myself "out there." I go to all kinds of events, talk to all kinds of people, look for what I want and don't get too beat down when I fail any one individual time. But I worry that it really is a matter of place. In Asheville, in Atlanta, in some big city elsewhere, in some *progressive* college town, maybe there'd be a thriving queer community. But here there just... isn't. And although many of us are making efforts to advance that cause, it's not like lesbian graduate students are just going to pop out of the woodwork.

So. I keep staring "3.5 years" in the face. And part of me feels like that's insane. Surely I'll find *someone* eventually. And even past that, I have a lot going for me in my life otherwise. If only what I have felt like it was enough.