Food & Friends

Wanted to write about a few things. Having three essays due in a two week period pisses me off. But such is life in the humanities.

I've been wondering a lot more about other things, very distracting things, in fact. First off, I've been contemplating my feelings toward food, and the reasons for my strange eating habits. I think I finally found a way to properly describe how I feel about it all, something I don't think I've had before; and a problem well-defined is a problem half solved, as they say.

Basically, imagine the most disgusting, rancid food you can think of. It looks awful, it smells awful, and you definitely would not eat it--but you also know other people eat it, even some who love it. You know you can buy it in a supermarket; you know it's got ingredients in it that, on their own, you're fine with; you even know friend and family who eat it on a regular basis. But to you, it's so repugnant that you would never indulge in it, not without being forced to do so. That's how I feel about pretty much everything the average person eats, particularly meat and vegetables. Bread and fruit look okay, for the most part, but they're still kinda scary. Meat and vegetables, on the other hand, are just awful.

I don't like that mindset, and wish I could change it, but it's been ingrained in me for so long that it seems beyond repair at this stage. It's such a central issue, though; it's the root cause of a lot of other problems, so to fix this would be to half-fix a lot of other shit. And part of me wants that change, but it's not enough to get me to do anything.

Like, today, I was in a tutorial, and I looked around at people's arms, comparing them to my own. I have no desire to bulk up or become super-strong; I just want arms that don't look like a skeleton wrapped in skin :P  No one else I looked at had arms as skinny as mine. I mean, no one's ever said to me "my god your arms are skinny!" out of the blue, but I still look at them and go "...these could look way better". And I know that changing my eating habits would give me a bit more bulk, a bit more substance to my body.

Though I don't think I look ugly or repulsive, I honestly, sincerely doubt that anyone does (or can) find me physically attractive, not in the sense that they want to actually explore my body. It's not the only reason I wanna change my eating habits--it goes without saying I'd be a lot fucking healthier :P--but I seriously wanna look a little better than I currently do. I want to have that experience where a woman sees me and wants me, but it's hard to expect any girl to feel that way about me when I look so much younger and less mature than I actually am. And every time I become interested in a girl, the food thing is usually one of the biggest obstacles as far as confidence is concerned, cos I can't imagine any woman really being OK with it. I don't know if the rest of my personality makes up for what I lack physically and diet-wise. I know I can approach women if I like them enough anyway, cos the butterflies in my stomach are really good at instilling confidence, but I think if that I ate properly, it wouldn't take as much to get me to approach cos there'd be less anxiety getting in the way.

I've even thought about doing a little exercise, just some cardio cos I like to walk/run (I actually kinda used to exercise, sprinting home from high school to see how quickly I could get home with my backpack and heavy-ass laptop slowing me down :P), but without the fuel to facilitate the growth, it's not practical. If I try to exercise now, with what I currently eat, I'll just burn up what little fuel I already have that's keeping me awake. But if I ate properly, that regime would be possible to implement. Again, I've no interest in going to a gym and lifting weights or any shit like that--I'm a nerd, for fuck's sake :P--but I'd at least like to look average, cos right now, I'm a walking skeleton. Fairly sure most chicks aren't into that :P

I wouldn't even know where to begin with it, were I to decide to change. I'm fairly sure I'd need professional help. I know I can rely on my friends for support--it's certainly an admirable goal--but the perspective is so ingrained, and long-term battles aren't my forte. Haven't felt this much desire to change before, that's for certain--a good sign :)



I was also wondering about my friends a little. First off, my best friend is overseas now--it's the first time in a long time I've had my closest friend that distant. So far, it's no biggie, cos she's only been over there for ten days or so. I was worried before she left that I was gonna feel lonely, but it's not like we saw each other in person every other day or some shit, so that hasn't happened, at least not yet. We'll probably end up Skyping in the future, which will be fun, cos I haven't really Skyped before (did some webcamming with my ex over MSN, but that consisted of nothing but me looking into the lens to get her to laugh :P).

And I want her to have fun over there! I don't want her over there going "I hope he doesn't miss me too much". I want her to do all sorts of crazy shit, make the most of her time, with no more regard for me than she'd otherwise have. I just don't want to sit here counting down the days until she comes home cos I'm aching to see her again.

And though it seems like nothing, she referred to me as her 'best friend' at some point recently (I don't remember exactly where). She's by far my closest friend, and I've called her my best friend quite a few times, but though I knew I was up there on her list, I wasn't sure how high up. I've had close friends over the years, but they usually dwindled for one reason or another (relationships, moving overseas, school work, etc.)--the identity of my 'best friend' changed multiple times over the last two years of high school and my first year of uni. But this feels really cemented, especially with verbal confirmation on her end, and I'm happy about that, to know I have such a good friend who I can rely on :)  As I said, it seems like nothing, but it's something to me.

There's also another friend I have who I'm just... up in the air about. She's probably the furthest connection I have--one of the least-close friendships I actively maintain (if you can even say 'actively'). I don't doubt her as a friend; I just wonder how close the friendship actually is, and if it could even possibly be any closer.

Cos we never really talk to each other--the only means of communication we have are our blogs. I know she blogs for plenty of reasons other than me (in fact, I very much doubt she blogs so she can talk to me specifically :P), but though I blog for all kinds of reasons too, sometimes I do publish posts at least partially so she can see them, cos it's literally the only avenue of communication we have at this point.

But is it really an avenue of communication? Or am I just throwing information into a void? I don't know anymore. I know for certain she used to read my blog--she even said she had me in her thoughts back in February for that 21st I went to, which was totally unexpected. I like the rare occasions when we comment on each other's stuff. But that rarity is just... weird. It's like having a conversation with someone where each person speaks once every few months.

And she posted recently about being busy, doing uni work, having a crush, etc.--stuff I can relate to! I mean, most people can relate to that stuff, but that doesn't take away from the relation, surely; it's still something to talk about, right? So I thought "hey, I should post a comment!", but then didn't quite know what to say. I know I can relate, but is that enough reason to say something? Does she care that I can relate? She doesn't often reply to comments (something even my best friend, who's closer to her than I am, confirmed, meaning it's not the fact it's me leaving comments), so I'm often left wondering what the hell she even thought of what I said. I remember leaving a pretty long comment ages ago, something to do with being funny and making jokes (if there's anyone who can fuckin' talk about that, it's me :P), and didn't get a reply. I wondered for ages "well, did it help you? Or should I just not bother in future?"

I dunno. It just feels like an under-maintained friendship, I guess, maybe because we're not that similar, maybe cos we just don't interact much.

EDIT: upon further reflection, I've realised I could technically say this about multiple friendships of mine. The only reason this particular case sticks out is because while I do get to hear about what the person does, it's in a more impersonal way (from a blog rather than in a conversation), whereas with my other friends, while I interact with them only a little more frequently, it's almost always conversational. I could really talk to all my friends online more than I currently do. /EDIT





Back on positive notes, I've also started to talk more with one of the people I met at that sleepover I went to in February. He's starting most of the conversations, so that's a good sign: I'm cool to talk with and other people want to talk to me enough that they'll say 'hi' of their own accord :)  I'm really bad at that (perhaps explaining my previous dilemma): I almost never say 'hi' to people. It's like a pattern: I'm almost always on the receiving end, so to start convos myself feels like I'm breaking a pattern, like the other person's gonna go "he never says 'hi'... he's up to somethin." I know there are plenty of people I could start convos with and it wouldn't matter, cos they wouldn't think that at all; but there are at least a couple of people where, though I'd like to talk to them, it seems too out of place to start the convo.

Enough typing for me. Must get back to works.