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The only problem with anger is that it burns hot and fast. It doesn’t tend to burn long. Sadness burns long. Grief. Disappointment.
Places I knew were less stressful for me because I had a sense of how loud it was going to be, how crowded. I wouldn’t have to ask anyone where the restrooms were.
When my mental health was struggling, I had a strict self-care regime. The second I started to notice the glitchy, staticky feeling creeping in, I made a concerted effort to exercise and get enough sleep. I cut out alcohol, processed sugar, and carbs, tried to eat more whole foods. Journaled. It all helped.
Interactions like this one didn’t wear me out. They knew me. They didn’t take it personally if I slipped into silence and just listened. They didn’t give me a hard time about not having any alcohol, which is something I never did either, to anyone. You never knew what someone’s reason was for not drinking. These friends were easy. Not all of them were.
Different people had different energy demands. Some people took more from me than others.
That was the worst thing of all. The boredom. The monotony of my uneventful, unremarkable, depressing fucking life.
I sometimes find that journaling helps me organize my thoughts. I seem to be having a hard time saying and doing the right things recently, so I figured writing this down might be best.
It’s worse when I’m in a new situation with people I don’t know. Interaction doesn’t come naturally to me in those circumstances and I struggle. When I make mistakes, like I’ve done often since I got here, it makes me more uncomfortable and my anxiety gets worse.
They should make an app for that. A facial recognition one that could detect and delete photos of your ex. One click and your whole device is wiped clean. And it should delete all their comments too, so you don’t have to see things like “hot mama!” on a picture of you in a bathing suit at your best friend’s house
Wouldn’t it be amazing to live like that? To not carry that burden around with you. To not feel constantly overwhelmed and overstimulated and second-guess every little thing.
For me, nervousness usually got better with time. Uncomfortable didn’t.
Silence was always my default response. Sometimes things are easier to understand when unsaid. Sometimes words complicate things and make them murky. This moment didn’t need them.
That quiet, thoughtful look he gave me sometimes, and I realized that behind that expression was probably the wheels of his brain, working overtime. Trying to assess the situation, worrying, overthinking like I knew Benny always did. His anxiety pinging around. A clawing internal panic nobody else could see.
It’s like when someone’s pet comes to sit with you instead of their person, and you feel like the chosen one. It made me feel a little special, like he saw something in me.
“Have you ever heard that quote if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it’s stupid?”
“You know what these silences make me think of?” she said. I looked over at her. “What?” “I always think that when we’re quiet, we’re agreeing to be harmless to each other. That we’re just sharing the same space and letting each other exist exactly as we are, and neither of us would hurt or upset the other one.”
“Un hombre que puede mantener viva una planta tiene la paciencia de aguantar tus mierdas.
“I know what you mean,” Briana said curtly. “When Jacob told me what this party was for, I couldn’t believe that either.”
It was weird to say, but she made me feel alone—the way I felt when I was by myself. Calm and unaffected. Like it was just us here and not a hundred other people. I liked being alone. With her.
“It’s like I always say,” Mom said, wiping under her eyes. “Love shows up. That’s how you know when it’s real.
“Jacob. Have you ever heard the saying that if you’re with someone who doesn’t speak your language, you’ll spend a lifetime having to translate your soul? Amy
For so long I let my life be dictated by my anxiety. Everything I did revolved around not getting uncomfortable, not leaving my safe space. I didn’t have the tough conversations I should have had with Amy, and I didn’t end it for fear of the unknown afterward. I stayed where I was because anything new was scary for me and I wasn’t willing to risk it. I needed my life calm, easy, and static.
Retreat into isolation like introverts do when they’ve had an unpleasant encounter and that I would have to make first contact.
“Anyone who says money isn’t everything has never had to live without it.”
My desire to see her overrode my own self-preservation instincts—in more ways than one.
“I said I poured glitter all over the house.” I choked on my laugh. “What?” “Five gallons of it. I put it on the blades of the ceiling fans too. For later.
“I stole the microwave plate. And the lightbulb out of the fridge.
and the garage door opener and I untuned his guitar and I tore out the last five pages of the book he was reading. I put red Kool-Aid in the shower head and peeled the labels off all the canned food and I put raw shrimp into the curtain rod on the window next to the bed—
Amy always said the cabin was boring because there weren’t any bars within walking distance or enough rooms for friends to stay with us. When I told Briana that, she’d looked at me confused and said, “How could it be boring when you’re here?”
We hadn’t been able to do lunch together like we planned, so I didn’t get a chance to ask about Levi—I winced when I thought of him. Levi. What kind of a name was that? It sounded like a garden tool.
I was always starved when it came to her. I lived off crumbs, never getting full.
“We’re all a little broken, Briana. We are a mosaic. We’re made up of all those we’ve met and all the things we’ve been through. There are parts of us that are colorful and dark and jagged and beautiful. And I love every piece of you. Even the ones you wish didn’t exist.” I pulled away to look her
There’s a special peace in sleeping next to someone you love. When you slip into the dark holding them and wake up and they’re still there and you know that everything that matters is just opening your eyes away.
I didn’t even want to go to sleep because I’d rather be awake and with the woman I love than risk being alone in my dreams…
Because that’s what love does. It shows up. And I’d never stop doing it.
