things you forget, or remember

it's funny, the way we can linger in someone's memory.

we know the ways people linger in ours, of course. we can feel them. we know we listen to this band because of someone we met in college, because of a drive we took late one night; we know we like a certain dish because we had it states away, on a trip. we remember a dress we had in preschool gifted to us by a classmate. we remember the first time we learned about batman, or played nba jam, or learned that you could do tricks on a trampoline. or the smell of someone's house that has too many cats. even maybe someone we never met. we can think of them when looking at a landscape, because it reminds you of a photo they sent you once of the area near their house, in another country.

my friend, a dear friend but someone i don't talk to often anymore, texted me out of the blue to say he was thinking of me because he'd invented a malaphor at work. that he said to someone they have bigger fish to put before the horse. and... what that makes me think of is my grandmother. whom i never met, but i would hear from my mom the way she said things like "you buttered your bread, now lay in it." instead of "you buttered your bread, now eat it" or "you made your bed, now lay in it."

and so not only do phrases like that make me think of someone i never knew, but apparently at one point in time i told that to this friend of mine. i have no recollection of doing so, but now phrases like that make him think of me.

i wonder what other parts of me exist in the consciousness of other people.

apathy's a tragedy and boredom is a crime

it's been over a month since my last post, and i feel oddly guilty about that even though this blog doesn't have an audience? nor do i particularly want or need it to because it's only my own thoughts written down somewhere that isn't a material object i have to maintain or fill. and because sometimes the detachment of a keyboard makes honesty easier. even if i have always liked the way a pen moves on paper. i remember back in the day (high school) having a diary in the form of email drafts in a yahoo inbox, because that was the only place i felt i could handle talking about my friends growing up and starting to deal with sex and drugs. not so much rock and roll. what is this blog but an expanded yahoo email inbox, with perhaps less spam in it.

things haven't been all that great here. KW's in a full depressive episode and it's frustrating that i don't know how to support him. when a depressed person wants to be left alone, is that the depression talking, or them? how do you make someone smile when they don't want to? when they think they can't do something because they're not up to it, do you let that stand or do you push them into it because you know that they really can? and then i know his depression has nothing to do with me, but it drags me along with it sometimes. it's a fucking bummer, to feel so useless and unhelpful when the person you love is in crisis. but in the moments i've been unable to stop myself from being down on myself and giving the negative thoughts a voice, KW has attempted to be there for me, sometimes successfully, but at other times telling me he can't deal with the same conversations again and again, or that he can't really give me the support i'm looking for because he's unequipped, also depressed. so... i try to tamp it down.

it's one of those days. KW's been in the bedroom all day, i've been out in the living room listening to the songs from the most recent bo burnham special, inside -- a musical depressive episode played out in quarantine, and watching his old performances. just a big bo burnham kick today. i tried to go get KW to do dinner with me, but then raised the idea of maybe going out either to pick something up or eat at a restaurant, and then... things just collapsed, until he basically stared at a menu on his computer for 5 minutes straight, and the plans for the evening ended. i can't get him to have dinner. maybe if i'm lucky at midnight he'll decide he actually is hungry and will sort something out then. i microwaved the remaining 40% of last night's leftover burrito and ate it at my computer. we were going to watch the new in the heights movie; he's been excited about it coming out, and this is actually a night where we're both at home without other real obligations. oh well.

i don't want to be egocentric, what's going on in his head is about him and his brain chemistry. but he seemed to be doing okay, until i tried to make dinner plans. he told me he was a little down, and then i just watched him decline.

anyway, i'm still at my computer, where i've spent the better part of the day. i probably shouldn't, given that i learned at the end of the last month that i actually need glasses now for the computer. i have hyperopia - ironically for my life, i'm farsighted. she who fears thinking of the future because that's how hopes are made, and hopes are how disappointment comes to fruition, is farsighted. excellent distance vision, is what i was told, but having to focus on the screen in front of my face all day is straining my eyes and worsening my vision overall. anyway, i got a pair of glasses but then immediately decided i hated the frames on my face and went back (with my mom's assistance) to pick out new ones, but i had to give up my old ones and haven't gotten the replacement yet. so... here i am. spending the entirety of a day i'm not required to be on the computer, on the computer.

one thing that's become clear - or had its clarity reinforced, rather - is that KW vastly prefers when i actually engage with the world. that's been a theme for a while, as was bravery in our first relationship. and i think the definition of that's pretty flexible - to do more than be carried through life by the relentless passage of time, to be conscious in how i spend my days. it can be playing video games and watching netflix, as long as i do it with intention and find a form of joy in it. and growth. if i find it fulfilling, and not just treat it as a way to make the day end. this comes back to being interesting. passivity isn't interesting, action is. intent is. purpose is. thinking is. i still say creativity is but i don't have that. i find myself, right now, at 11:50 PM (and earlier when i started this post) wanting a way to improve myself, right now. to learn something, to practice a talent somehow. i'm watching bo burnham and i'm watching him express himself and perform with piano, with guitar, with words, with cinematography and lighting. what is my... any of that? on a smaller scale of course, since i neither expect nor have a desire to be famous or renowned or particularly widely appreciated. i'd just like to do something for myself that KW can see me do and be proud of me for. for whatever it is, it would be a thing i did with purpose and found something in it for myself, even better if also for other people. i want to make him proud. i want to be worthy of him. i don't want to be sitting here trying not to fall apart alongside him, i want to show him that i am and/or still can be the person he's fallen in love with. although a part of that has always been a potential, not an actualization. part of what i strive for is to realize that potential, lest i let him down. i can't grasp what he sees in me, but he hates not seeing me be it, or be working toward it.

can i do art? can i paint? can i draw? can i find a class online and actually stick to it? can i put effort in without immediately feeling it's too hard and giving up? can i do more photography? can i take pictures and like what i see and enhance them in lightroom and photoshop, rather than looking through my shots for the day and feeling disappointed that nothing in there is spectacular? can i study code to advance my craft and my career, or dedicate myself to learning for its own sake, as long as i stick with it and retain it? can i practice languages and not be afraid to use them?

i want to be more confident. i know, i'm sure i've said that before. my self-image is at quite possibly an all time low. and yes, i used to have anorexia. i still feel worse about my body than i did then. at least then i had discipline. my skin's gone to shit and i can barely take care of myself for more than three days at a time. i've gained weight because not only did i stop going to the gym, but i picked up baking. i don't get dressed in the mornings because there's no reason to, and i don't want to wrinkle my clothes and be uncomfortable just in order to spend all day in my living room, or bedroom as the case may be. it's hard to dress up for KW either because he's never really been clear about what he likes to see me in, other than not skinny jeans. even when i try to ask, he just says confidence. he thinks i'm sexiest when i feel sexiest. what a fucking ouroboros of sex appeal. i guess that should make it simple, but it doesn't.

so... what? what'll it be?

movin' on up

view of the entryway, ft. large box of broken down boxes from the move

literally, up. KW and i are all moved in to our new apartment, which is on the fourth (top) floor of a walk-up building. it was exhausting. it's nice to be here though. it started by feeling... oddly surreal. like this was just an odd vacation home. a stopover, somewhere and somehow and with all our stuff. it's begun to feel more normal though... funny how that changes. how home is so much more a feeling than a place, and how we almost bureaucratically override that periodically by moving. it takes feelings a while to catch up, like they took the cheapest shipping method to get there.

my birthday is tomorrow; i'll be 29. if i think about it too long i get angry that i was robbed of the opportunity to be 28 at all. second pandemic birthday... i always used to be so obnoxious about my birthday. it was my favorite holiday, essentially. i've never particularly liked attention, but on my birthday i wanted it. maybe the pandemic has finally killed that for me. it feels like it's sneaking up on me this time. like, usually by april first i'm all about "it's my birthday month!!" but... now my birthday is tomorrow. i took the day off, but i pretty much just intend to sleep til 11 and then play video games for the rest of the day. KW has a full day of school from 8 am to about 10 pm. i'll go get a nice coffee at starbucks, trek for my favorite bagel place, and go buy a hopefully-discounted bottle of wine from a place i half-tried to talk into giving me the member discount for my birthday even though i'm not a member. maybe i'll chat with some friends online for a little bit. i find myself not particularly excited. did i get any birthday gifts last year? i don't even recall. god, last year was a horrible birthday. a year ago today, KW started showing early symptoms of covid. a year ago tomorrow, his symptoms advanced and were undeniably covid. i spent my birthday crying and terrified and overwhelmed, and still reeling from an exhausting, stressful, and insanity-inducing weekend. so... this birthday is best viewed in comparison with my 28th, i suppose. still, i miss birthdays of yore. being able to get out of town, be taken to a nice dinner, and just spend the day with someone who loves me. that's all i want, really. i guess for my 30th birthday, maybe that'll be possible then.

i know i have more to say, but none of it is ever important. it's fleeting, leaves no impact on my brain and i forget i ever wanted to say it.

steeped in the words of others

when i was younger i used to write out the lyrics to songs that moved me, or stuck with me. all the time. i'd have a notebook just for writing out songs by other people. is that weird? i find myself missing it. maybe it's part of my mental efforts to put myself back into a place where words used to flow through me. how many teenage habits can i adopt without reverting? i'm blogging, i'm writing out song lyrics... shit, i'm even dating my high school-era boyfriend. have i gone too far in the pursuit of poetry? in recapturing youthful habits in the hopes of rediscovering youthful words?

i think there's some drive to echo beauty. you know how when people - particularly kids, at least that's when i remember this - hear something funny, part of their appreciation of it is repeating it? i wonder if that's a similar instinct. i don't remember particularly feeling this desire in my baltimore era. or maybe call it my ZM era. if i had to hypothesize, i'd guess that back then i could sing more. we had more space, more privacy, more places to ourselves - our own building, a store i was frequently alone in, our enclosed car. i used to sing. all the time. i loved it. i miss that tremendously, too. i used to be able to sing along to songs i liked, if not at the top of my lungs then still passionately and frequently. that was my channeling the beauty, expressing that it moved me. and it really did (and does) feel cathartic on a soulful level. i think even in my new apartment i won't feel free to sing as much as i'd like. i learned how noise-permeable the walls of my childhood apartment were after hearing a first floor neighbor sing loudly one day, and instantly being horrified that my whole building could hear much more than i thought. sorry, neighbors.

so maybe now that i've been a few years without regular private car access and in a very non-soundproofed apartment, it's all pent up in me. if i can't use my voice and my lungs, i'll use my pen. ..and hope that KW doesn't think i'm super weird. there will be fewer habits i can hide from him, now.

half full, half empty, half hungry

sour cream crumb cake

i'm not eating enough. not to echo my old blog too much. it's not on purpose, really, i just cannot be fucked to put effort into it. it's just not worth the energy to get up, go to the kitchen, and put even a modicum of effort into eating something i'm not particularly excited about. i'm literally too lazy to eat. a lot of it's probably got to do with the fact that i've been buying and cooking the same food for a year with minimal reprieve. haven't really put many new things in my rotation, aside from baked goods. and i have been enjoying those baked goods, although i've been off my cookie game for so long...

if i'm honest, there's probably part of it that's old ways. like... i guess if i notice it's been a while since i've eaten, there is a small voice encouraging me to keep it going. like, if i've already gone this long without dinner, and it's practically bedtime, may as well push through and just skip it, right? i have lost weight... my clothes fit better than they did a few months ago. never exercising but always baking has its impacts.

this is a terrible habit, though. it'll probably resolve itself when i live with KW and he can cook delicious food and we can order in and there's someone there at least sometimes to hold me accountable. and help me stock the fridge.

i don't know what's wrong with me.

y'know, i'm kinda sad that the old Pretty Thin forum died. and its replacements. i found a small community there, for a time. i wonder why i routinely gravitate towards anonymous forums. there were the old fan forums circa, what, '05? that lasted a while. there was PT the "pro-ana" forum. there was some app? something with an L. and then there was yik yak, and its chain of successors... sometimes i wonder why other people don't need anonymous apps as part of how they spend their time. where do they vent to? why am i the one left needing somewhere to talk to no one in particular? am i running from my thoughts, or processing them?