Category Archives: Friends

Ashe and I just got off the phone. During our conversation we discussed how difficult it is to deal with someone who has disappointed us without intending to. I suggested that sometimes we feel like we’d prefer the person was simply being an asshole because we know how to deal with that. We become angry or hurt. We pee in the vents of their car and we feel better.

Yet, no one ever wrote a manual about how to deal with the accidental douche. It’s harder to accept poor behaviour when the intentions aren’t just as poor. It’s more complicated. We want to be angry but don’t know how angry to be or how to express it. We want to be understanding but we’re still hurt.

Because even with the best intentions, a person has to make a conscious decision to be decent, to prioritize the people and things that really matter and to do the things for their significant others that show that they love them. That conscious decision is what makes it okay when we do make mistakes. Others can forgive us.

And the conscious decision to take control of our own happiness is the only thing we can really do to be happy and healthy even when others make mistakes or purposely hurt us–because that is bound to happen. Sometimes we spend so much time trying to prevent others from hurting us or explaining to them their own faults that we forgot the only thing we have power over is ourselves. The only thing constant in my own life is me.

That realization has changed my life. Perhaps saved it. And it hurts to see others who have yet to come to the same conclusion. So many people have failed to make the conscious decisions that will make life work living. Yet, I know that I can only try to steer them in the right direction. The rest is on them. I have to make a conscious decision to lead my example. And try to impart a little happiness in the process.

I’m the first one signed up to participate in WeBlogIt–the blogging project going on over at DayDreamz. Because I also run the project, I picked which theme would occur this week and so I will be writing all about things I hide from the world. I mused over this all this morning. I asked Dez what she thought I hid. I made some foods. I wrote some articles. I got some ideas.

The things I hide from the world are all things that I perceive as faults. Sometimes I can get pretty wrapped up in what others think of me, or what I fear others might think of me, even. So I hide things and this results in even the little things causing me stress.

For example, I hide the fact that I buy Mt Dew a lot. Everyone knows I love it but I also know it’s bad for me so I try not to let on how often I buy it. The truth is, I personally don’t care if it is bad for me (my bad) but I worry about what others might think if they knew how much I bought it. It’s okay, though. After I post this, I’m walking to the gas station to get a Dew. d=

I also hide my weight. Online, I don’t post full pictures but this habit comes out in real life, too. When I sit someplace, I frequently reach for a pillow to cover my midsection. I refuse photos a lot because of this. Or I’ll take a million and delete all but a handful that show the best side of me. During sex, I’ll pull the cover over me to hide my body and resist certain positions because I worry how I’ll look. I’m feeling more confident now that I’ve lost some weight but I’ve never entirely been comfortable in my own skin.

When people ask, I glaze over the fact that I have no driver’s license. Part of me isn’t bothered by it but part of me hates the fact that I’m so far “behind” that I don’t even want to talk about it because that means admitting my fault.

And I hide some of my negative feelings not just from others but from myself. I’ve written about it a few times but I have a hard time feeling things when I think, intellectually, that feeling that way isn’t helping me. Even if it’s completely expected for me to feeling negatively about a situation. I have a hard time accepting that. For a long time, I didn’t even think I could talk to my friends when something was bothering me. I’d like to think I’m better about that. After all, isn’t that why friends are even there? In many ways now, I’m pretty open.

I hide my roots from people. I come form a hard working but poor family and while I respect that, I also feel a sort of shame. I sometimes have a hard time introducing people to my family or bringing them into my family’s homes because I am afraid they will judge my family and, by association, me. This manifested itself a lot in my marriage. Although I secretly wished Ryan knew more of my family and got along with them and even though I know a lot of my family members are fun, I sort of avoided introducing him to people. In the end, I wound up hurting myself to avoid being hurt which is kind of par for the course when you do silly things like that.

There is this 30 days of letters blog meme going around. It requires you to write a letter to someone, once a day. One of those requirements is to write a letter to your best friend. The truth is, that’s really hard for me to do. I have so many amazing friends that I cannot help but give more than one of them the title “best.”

My primary best friend is one Ashley and she has held the title since middle school. The thing that I love about our friendship is that she will always hold the title, even if we haven’t spoken in weeks. And sometimes, when we do speak, we can just settle into comfortable silence. It rocks.

Then there’s Dez. We ran in the same circles for years before we began to talk to each other but now we talk to each other pretty much every day. I would be lying if I said she isn’t one of the reasons that I wake up. Truth be told, I can’t remember just when it was that I realized that I need her in my life but I do. We can be silly. We help eachother with websites and ideas. Yet she’s just as good at being my shoulder to cry on when I need her to.

Ashe and I haven’t always been friends. Or even had the best friendship ever. We’re both pretty stubborn when it comes to things. We can both be emotional. But we can discuss things of a serious matter or that are completely nonsensical, too. I enjoy that.

Even those people who aren’t quite my best friends are too awesome for words. Where would I be if Jenn hadn’t taken me in and spread her amazing positivity all over the place? What kind of person would I be if I hadn’t met her little boy? I honestly shudder to think of the thought.

And two people I could never forget to mention: Lars and Christie. Lars is my Dutch friend who is funny and silly and listens to my crap even when I don’t want anyone to have to listen to is. Christie makes me laugh and smile and..despite the fact that we met using pseudonyms, she has quickly become a friend of the real me, too.

Lately, I’ve (re)started talking to two people whom I feel belong in this post but may not even read it. One of them is my friend Giles. He’s been on my MSN list forever, I don’t even know how we met but I do remember that he’s half Irish. Our conversations are always so entertaining. I can be so stupidly funny (or maybe just stupid) with him and it’s great.

And there’s miss Loony, another one of those folks who I knew of but never talked to. Not any more. We’ve chatted quite frequently, often being ridiculously silly. She went me a message one day when we hadn’t talked about how she missed me which was crazy because I’d missed her, too, and it was great knowing that.. I mattered in someone’s life.

You might ask how I gathered all these awesome friends. You might be surprised to hear that this list barely covers my awesome friends. Honestly, I feel awful for leaving people out of this post but, if I didn’t, it would literally never end.

The truth is, I’m really lucky to have my amazing friends but I think part of the reason that I have amazing friends is because I am a pretty good friend myself. That’s definitely one of the things that I have pride about. It’s one of those things that maybe I didn’t intend to do but now I never intend to stop. Quite frankly, if I died and the only good thing people could say about me is that I’m a good friend, then my life will have been well worth it.

I would like to think that I am on the road to mental recovery, even if I didn’t even realize I wasn’t mentally awesome before. One side effect of this is the tendency to want to apply these newfound lessons to others around me. I am hyper-aware of the negative attitudes they are still perpetuating because I am trying to unlearn those same attitudes. And, sometimes I am able to share the lessons I’ve been learning with them. Still, it’s a little depressing because I’ve come to realize just how many mentally unhealthy people are close to me. I don’t know if it’s just because most people could use a little help in that department or if I attracted these people for some reason. To make matters even scarier, I can see how many people I know and love have no desire at all to be better than what they are. Maybe it’s not my place but I want to help them and I know that sometimes you just can’t. Some days.. I just want to cut all these negative people out of my life but then.. then I’d have no one.

The thing that I see on a daily basis is how much the people who I call my loved ones play the victim, blame others. They bitch. They want change but they do nothing to make it happen. They ask advice but they don’t listen or they come to me wanting to vent and wanting me to coddle them and when I want to give them advice instead, they become angry.

I guess that I just want everyone else to grow up with me. Not because I’m super controlling. Not because I think it’s unfair but because I know it will do them good to own their feelings and take responsibility for their situations. And because growing up feels really good even if it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. Sometimes we get so caught up in what is normal for us, never realizing that our normal is absolutely unhealthy. We don’t realize it because it’s just how we think. We’ve always done it that way but sometimes that’s not a good enough reason to keep doing it that way. Now that I see that, I just want everyone else to as well. I know it’s key to.. everything.

May didn’t go out with a bang, big or otherwise. It did end on a high note if only because I have been working on being more grateful for what I do have. I hit up the mall on Saturday and got a new pair of jeans, a new game for my DS (Galactrix) and a bunch of soap from Bath and Body Works. Rather than being stressful, the trip to the mall was quite enjoyable despite the influx of shoppers for Memorial Day sales. To add to that, I walked into a dressing room with 2 sizes of jeans and only had to try on the smaller one.

May was my first full month working for Demand Studios and I got a good feel for it. I’ve definitely improved and have a better feel for the site.

I got a lovely birthday call, shortly after midnight, from Dez and Ryan and I hit up iHop in the wee morning hours of my birthday. My Facebook was full of well wishes and I got cards in the mail, unexpectedly. I honestly don’t even expect cards anymore so it’s always nice!

I feel like May was a perfect example of lowing your standards a bit and being pleasantly surprised by the world. In fact, it was the best month this year.