Image: I Have Lots of Problems Too. I'm Just Like You... Except I'm Not.

Not too long ago, I realised I'd answered a question of mine, a question I'd asked myself ages ago. How ever long ago it was, I looked at all the things that I don't like about myself, the things that are 'wrong' with me—the way I eat, my difficulty in dealing with social situations and change in life, my discomfort around trying new things, the list goes on—and I wondered if there was a central issue surrounding it all. I thought "well, if there's a central problem inherent in all these smaller issues, then I only have one problem to solve, and it'll be my first step to making my life a whole lot better". Oblivious to my discovery, I summed it up in an earlier entry with these words:

The fact of the matter is: I'm not willing to take risks anymore. I don't want to talk to this girl for fear of embarrassment and rejection; I don't want to ask anyone to let me perform comedy for fear of social contact and disturbing the status quo (in terms of scheduling: you have no idea how much I hate interrupting people—I don't even make phone calls on that basis :P); I don't want to drive a car for fear of a collision; I don't want to drink or consume any party drug for fear of loss of self awareness and control, possible arrest and almost certain bodily harm. I'm simply no longer in favour of putting myself in any position where there's anything substantial to lose anymore.

So, the central issue appears to be fear of a negative outcome. Problem is, I've conquered the problem before, and several occasions on which I did so follow that quotation. I used to be able to deal with that problem; the issue now is that I don't have the self-respect or self-worth to justify doing such things.

Speaking of recent discoveries, I found out a day or two ago that a friend of mine made her blog public again. Turns out she's been reading mine, and she wrote a few entries on topics I spoke about. Some might be pissed off were their friends to read their blogs, but I'm actually quite happy she's reading it. Obviously, I'm pleased someone's reading it at all, that's nice on its own; but it's also good to know that there's someone out there, incidentally someone I know, who I can kinda talk to about things without actually talking to them. One might think "why not just fucking talk to her about the stuff directly?"... I dunno. I feel uncomfortable talking to anyone about these issues because I always feel like I'm being a nuisance. At the same time, if someone needed to talk to me about something, I'd try to help them, and in reality, my friends would do the same for me, so thinking I'd irritate others if I did so is a little ridiculous :P  Even with that said, however, I still don't like to do it, so I keep to myself.

Anyway, this friend is currently trying to lose some weight. That's all well and good, and she seems to be managing it quite well (from what little I've read, anyway), but she keeps calling herself 'fat' and describing her body as if it's some kind of blob with a head on top. I don't see that. I will admit, there's meat on her bones, but I thought that was fucking normal :P  I just cannot see a problem with her size or her figure. Granted, this is coming from the same person who was attracted to her seven months ago, but even though all that sexual tension is gone, that doesn't change my opinion. Thankfully, she realises that the negativity is simply a state of mind, and she tries to counter this mindset.

Thing is, there are heaps of things I could say about myself that would paint an equally negative picture. Friend of mine thinks she's ugly? Bullshit; I'm ugly. Face is alright, but my teeth are all out of whack (sucked my thumb as a kid, hated wearing the corrective gear to fix the problem :P). My hands and wrists remind me of Mr. Burns; I have no muscle whatsoever; and my legs are like those you'd find on starving African children. That's all due to my diet, which is abhorrent and will probably lead to my death at 30-something. I don't have the determination to change that, nor even the will to try any new food. That begs the question: why bother asking a woman on a date? I'm going to eventually have to make it clear that I don't eat like everyone else, which will probably be a huge turn off. There goes any hope of dinner at a restaurant, lunch with friends for introductions, dinner with the parents: that's all instantaneously fucked as soon as the declaration is made. That, coupled with the shallow exterior and opinionated interior, makes for a shitty boyfriend :P

This is all assuming, of course, that I'd ever have the guts to talk to a woman, but why do that when rejection is more-or-less guaranteed not far down the road, if not on the spot? Where am I even going to meet one? I have no social life whatsoever. All the friends I have are from my old school, and I'm hardly ever in contact with them. I really only ever start chatting to two of my friends; a few others occasionally say 'Hi', but it's mainly the same two people, and it's not all that often. I have nothing interesting to talk about, so why bother? I never go anywhere either—no parties, no outings, nothing other than the occasional movie. Where else is there to go, anyway? I don't drink, so why go out to clubs and bars? I'd be wasting my fucking time, not to mention putting me in that atmosphere is the quickest way to make me bored and uncomfortable. Most times I've been with people who are drinking, it ends up sucking major balls. Unfortunately, that's where you meet people these days, so no progress can be made on any front.

It all comes down to perspective: my friend sometimes thinks she's fat, and this can lead her to believe she is viewed as unattractive. I've never believed she's fat, but her self-image is a lot closer to her than my image of her, as would be the case for most people. Likewise, my other friend tried to imply that I wasn't the arsehole I was making myself out to be. I disagreed because I felt more strongly about what I'd done then he did. It's like we don't want to get our hopes up for something that won't happen, at least when we're in this state. This has been getting worse for me, though. I've spent a few mornings lately lying in bed practically bashing myself up in my own head, thinking about this stuff and basically not seeing the point in even getting up. Once I make all the inferences from the data, there ceases to be a point in doing anything, so why get out of bed?

I wish I could just ditch all social desires, friendwise, romance wise, all of it. It's only when I think of those things that I look at myself this way. When I'm preoccupied doing something else, this shit almost never happens. When I'm writing a monologue, a script, a poem, or a story, or when I'm working on a bigger video project, or playing a game, or watching YouTube, I'm focused on everything else. I don't think about other people, only myself. It's indulgent and selfish but it fucking works. All I get then are challenges and ideas: things to beat and ways to beat them. Good ol' problem solving FTW :P

There are heaps of things I seriously want to do, but don't, and even when merely thinking about doing them, it's better than thinking of my social life. I wanna get on stage every week at uni and rant about whatever comes to my mind. I wanna join an improv troupe somewhere and learn how to think on my feet a little better. I wanna write satirical articles for some newspaper and get under people's skin. I wanna take my Nintendo 64 to the mall and play Mario Kart and Super Smash Bros. with complete strangers. I wanna wear a Klu Klux Klan outfit in public and hold up a sign that says "FREE HUGS (COLOUR DOESN'T MATTER)" on one side, and "NEW KKK: MORE ROBES, LESS RACISM!" on the other; then, when I get arrested, I can ask why I'm being judged on what I'm wearing rather than what I'm doing. I wanna go into a high school pretending to be a Department of Education representative to tell the kids on their assembly that school uniform is a psychological control mechanism. I wanna learn martial arts from Jackie Chan, then crash through the roof of Parliament House and beat the shit out of everyone in that motherfucker. I wanna go to an anti-LGBT rally and hold up a sign saying "HOMOPHOBES ARE THE REAL FAGGOTS". I wanna intercept the O'Reilly Factor broadcast on Fox and play 'Wake Up' by Rage Against the Machine instead. I wanna break into a bank and modify the code in the system such that all the bank fees and loan interest go straight to charity (and a little to my own account, for my services :D).

All those things I can do without worrying about friends or food (except the Jackie Chan one... that one's a little outta reach :P).

Most of all, though, I want to be with someone, and love someone. I don't know why, but the urge is always there, and it grows every day. I feel like I've devolved, like I'm back to being a 16 year old boy, simply wondering what it's like to be with someone, how it feels; I just don't know anymore. That's half the fucking problem: I've been there. I've actually been there. I don't just want it; I want it back. I want to explore another relationship. I want to feel for someone so strongly that I can't hold my feelings back anymore. I wanna hold her hands and get lost in her eyes as she looks down in shyness and giggles. I wanna know what it's like to wait for a text I'm expecting from her. I wanna have that one in-joke that only we understand. I wanna watch TV with her and berate whatever shit they've put on. I want her to run up to me from behind and cuddle me, the warmth from her body filling my own. I wanna walk home with her in the rain. I wanna make her feel better when she cries. I wanna have arguments with her just so we can come out stronger and hug tightly when we make up. I wanna see her close her eyes in ecstasy as I feel her up under her shirt. I wanna kiss her all over her naked body before she pushes me onto the bed and steals my idea. I wanna make love with her at her old high school... during school hours, for that extra thrill :P  I wanna be told what turns her on so she can lure me into her fantasy.

I wanna feel so much for her that I can't help but tell her I love her.

That desire always comes back; it never goes away. Problem is, shit that perfect is, like, unattainable, especially with all my flaws :P  It's awesome to write about and fantasise about, sure, but is it gonna actually happen? The image isn't quite that strong :P

I still feel like that little 16 year old boy, but now I'm in the adult's world. I still have that teen angst, I still have that teen curiosity; I even look the fucking part :P  That's even why I don't perform comedy at uni: are a bunch of young adults gonna take some fresh-outta-high-school fucknugget like me seriously? Are they gonna think I can actually humour them? That sounds intimidating. I mean, I've performed in front of adult audiences, and I've performed once in a really adult environment (which was the most fucking fun ever :P), but there's an eerie 'you don't belong there' vibe I get, being the presumptuous cunt I am.

I don't know if a woman will really ever see anything in me, nor do I really think I can do much to make one happy. I don't even really know what love is or what it feels like, not in the romantic sense—I haven't experienced it enough to get any strong grasp. I assume I'll know when I feel it, but I don't know. All I really know is that, with all that's been said and all the conflicting emotion, I still want to find someone I can be with.

Even if it's only for a little while.

Tenacity: A Cunt in all its Forms

As you'll soon see, if I could start this one off with a relevant quotation, you wouldn't be here :P

It's 1:49 in the morning. Uni starts at 8:30 for me tomorrow. I should be asleep, or at least in bed trying to sleep. Insomnia's been a problem for me lately, oftentimes gatecrashing at around midnight and insisting I carry on playing Tetris, persist in listening to sceptics of religion, and write things like this when I should be tucked in. I've grown to hate this and have made considerable efforts to get back in line—it was fine when I didn't have a schedule to adhere to, but now I do, so it just serves to fuck me up and leave me without energy at a time when attentiveness is everything. I woke up later than usual yesterday morning which certainly isn't helping, but that's not why I'm up.

Fuck, make that 2:12 in the morning :P

Go back a couple of hours: I'm on YouTube, as per usual, when I get an email from Facebook: an invitation to an event of some kind. I'm not invited to events very often, nor do I know of any upcoming event I'd expect to receive an invite to, so I'm curious as to what it is. Upon taking a glance, I gather its a petition for some kind of music thingy, the invitation sent by one of the more musical people on my friends list. I start reading through it, and do a little research on the subject matter. Turns out there's a budget deficit issue at another uni that's lead them to plan to axe half the music staff, as to get the facility back in the black so to speak (a conclusion I'd more or less come to when I'd finished reading the text in the Facebook event: university's a business first and an educational facility second :P).

Didn't take long for me to process this: the students who applied for any qualifications stemming from participation in the music programs did so on what was advertised to them. What was advertised to them was, among other things, access to a comprehensive musical program led by all the staff that worked there, not just the half that'll keep their jobs if this goes ahead. That's retroactive false advertising, plain and simple. +1 signature for your petition. Thing was, the person who invited me still went to high school... so whose petition was it?

Then I saw the name up the top, having missed it when I first arrived at the page: Sally.

For some reason, as soon as I saw that name, I started to feel weird. I can't explain what it was, but I soon became restless and had to get out of my chair. I wasn't in some kind of uncontrollable fit, but I was certainly irritable. I was shaking a little too, pacing around my room, murmuring incoherently every now and then. After a good ten-to-fifteen minutes of that, I sat on my bed and just silently pondered the clusterfuck that was my brain at that point. I didn't understand what was going on. At some point during all this, as if in disbelief, I walked over to the computer and hovered over her name: up popped the little box with her picture. I'd done little more than see her name and her face, and my mind had gone into an infinite regression, my chest felt heavy and tense, and I was shaking—it may have only been mild, but it was still involuntary.

What the fuck happened?

Seriously, what was that? I want to know! It's not like this person's fucking traumatised me; she's just some girl I liked years ago, who I also happened to want to date and sleep with at my Year 12 Formal. This wasn't a repeat of such desire; it was anything but feelings of desire. It was just awkward, tense and uncomfortable, perhaps anxiety, leaving me unable to concentrate on anything else for a good fifteen to twenty minutes. I haven't been feeling the best lately (evident in the last two entries), but this wasn't depression; it was just strange, something I haven't really felt before, something I'd rather not feel again.

We have thoughts, but thoughts are fluid. Then we assign a word to a thought... and we're stuck with that word for that thought...

George Carlin

Replace 'word' with 'symbol', and that's my belief in terms of how we understand thought. I could be way off base, but that's what I think for the meantime: we understand thoughts by assigning symbols to them that we can relate to. In this case, I have no symbol to which I can relate almost anything that went through my head—no word, no phrase, no clause, no sentence, no paragraph, no picture, no video, no sound, no song, nothing. What did come back were simply the two most recent images I have of her: seeing her at the Formal after-party, the last time I would see her. Both images were mentioned in an article I published recently discussing those events and my previous writing on them.

One is of the very last time I saw her in the flesh:

[Right before I went home], I looked over one last time at the tent area to see Sally and her friends sitting around. Still, there was no smile.

The other, far stronger, is of the last time I spoke to her:

I returned to the camp-fire to see Sally still warming herself. I took the (only) spare seat next to her, and looked at her. She looked down... really down...

"Hello, Sally. How are you?"

"I'm alright... how are you?"

"I'm OK... ... ...you don't look like you're having very much fun."

"That's because I'm not."

Even though I want to remember her as the happy, kind-hearted girl I had feelings for all those years ago, the last time I saw her didn't capture any such emotion. Even her profile picture didn't deliver a look much different to the one I remember—it's honestly a stupid question, but I've even wondered if she's smiled at all since I last saw her. Any time I think of her (which, contrary to what this article may suggest, is far from often), those are the two images that usually end up dominating my memory. I don't want to remember her in that more positive way to instil feelings for her. If anything, I want to avoid having feelings for her—it's fucking moronic to think we could ever be something. We aren't even acquaintances, let alone friends; we have nothing in common with each other; we live in totally different places and do totally different things; we are incompatible. Granted, I can assert that these feelings aren't ones of love nor lust, but that doesn't mean I know what they actually are. 

I've heard things recently about people having feelings for others far beyond rejection, long after they've supposed to have moved on—I really, really don't want that. I have better things to do than ponder over a future I can guarantee won't come to light, and she has better shit to do than hear about me ever again (like, I don't know... worrying about her education :P). If I'm going to remember her at all, however that remembrance be inspired, I want it to be at least somewhat positive, not me having a mini-freakout over such nothingness as seeing her name :P 

I don't know why it hurts, and being a male (hence thinking everything's a competition :P), I want to know what's going on, to crush ignorance and misunderstanding under my foot and claim victory through knowledge and comprehension. Falling short of that, I'd just like it to stop and not happen again. Perhaps these feelings do mean something, and I don't want to block any emotion just because it makes me feel uncomfortable, but I hate feeling like shit for no reason.

3:31... sigh :P