unsympathetic.net

I’ve started writing a story. An actual piece of fiction that has reached critical mass — more than a thousand words in a row with named characters.

This is a different type of piece for me though. It’s based in real life on real events, but from someone’s point of view that is not mine. It’s an exercise in imagining what it’s like to be someone else, especially someone I don’t know very well. It’s also focused more on the internal character development, as opposed to the dialog that I usually rely so heavily on.

I don’t think that this piece will ever see the light of day, except with a few select friends who I trust with my life and my secrets, because the piece is intensely personal for being from another point of view.

However, it’s good to finally be able to stretch my imagination again. I haven’t written anything but half a poem since January; the words have been bottled up inside me, which is always an uncomfortable situation. I’m always coughing up chunks of dialog or exposition that goes no where, free to roam the wind because I didn’t catch them with my butterfly net and pin them down.

This piece though, has got me thinking about writing another story, with the same starting inspiration, but with entirely fictional characters and fictional events. Of course, some true-to-life events will slip in, but only because I couldn’t make it up better than it happened, and it’s what caused me to open up a text window and tap out a few words here and there until they were lined up into a story.

It’s such a relief to have the words back, to finally pour onto the page what is inside me. I was afraid they would be gone for good, that nothing would come to me again.

I can’t wait until my characters start taking over, when things come out that I never expected or imagined. I missed my imagination taking me someplace new, someplace unmapped and undiscovered.

I am a pretty patient person in general; rush-hour traffic doesn’t bother me, I can show up early for appointments and easily entertain myself until I’m wanted. I can wait for Christmas morning and summer break and the first day of school.

I can wait.

I am not a patient person when it comes to things I want.

If I want something, and it’s within the realm of possibility — meaning that I don’t need to break the time-space continuum or engage a team of scientists or programers to make it happen — there are two possible things that will happen. Either I will talk myself out of wanting it, or I will do anything in my grasp to get it.

I talk myself out of lots of stuff. When shopping, I will hold something for the entire half-hour I’m wandering around the store, but put it down when it comes time to actually pay for it, convinced that it’s too expensive and I can live without it. If I make plans early in the week, sure that the event is one I must attend, I will have managed to convince myself by Saturday night that I don’t want to go out, and would really rather stay home and read a book.

Then there are things that I want very badly, and whether or not I can afford it or is good for me, I’ll get no matter what. My Wii is a good example. I don’t really need it, probably should have saved my money, but I wanted it more than I’ve wanted anything else in a long time. My sister bought it for me the week before spring break, and I was impatient to get home and play with it. Books fall into this category too; I have far too many books waiting to be read, but every time I go to the bookstore, I end up with more, impatient to have them waiting and available to be read, whether or not I’m going to read them in the immediate future or not.

This impatience for things I want extends past physical goods — it extends into personal relationships as well.

I’ve been hanging out with a guy for a while now that I really enjoy spending time with. We go to the movies and sometimes to the bar, we play video games and board games, we hang out in groups of friends or on our own, we txt and IM and stay up far too late at night doing absolutely nothing. We were not introduced by friends, and so have to decipher each other’s character without an intermediary to help us along, pointing out habits that are ingrained but not obvious to the casual observer.

We do not talk at all about what it is we’re doing, or if it means anything at all.

Part of me is thrilled with this. I like the uncertainty this brings to my life, the unexpected curve-balls inherent in any new thing.

I’m trying very hard to be patient. To let things go on in their slow undefined state, to take things as they come, to puzzle them out and slowly decipher this fragile thing that has sprung up in an unexpected place.

I have never been patient when it comes to relationships. I’ve always been afraid of the awkward stages where nothings been defined, and you don’t know where anything is going, and a misspoken word — let alone a blog post — can screw the whole thing up. And I’ve always been afraid of screwing things up.

So here I am. Half of me wanting to let this play out slow, to live in the moment of not knowing, to relish in the uncertainty and the whims of life, the other half wanting to know where we are now so that I can expect what’s coming in the future. Is this a fling, something to fill the time between classes and homework, or is it serious, where there’s a chance of meeting parents and comparing histories and learning what makes each other tick?

And the part of me that wants to define what this is doesn’t care what the definition is. There’s no set answer I’m looking for. It’s just that I haven’t figured out how to be psychic yet, and I’m not sure what is expected or wanted from me, and that makes me impatient.

So, I’m trying to wait, to be patient and not force something that isn’t ready. It’s driving me (and those closest to me who must listen as I try to puzzle it out) batty that I can’t let it be, let it play out and unfold without any hints to what is coming. That I can’t stop analyzing what this is that’s standing before me.

But you know what?

I can wait. I’m going to have to.

Somehow, I completely spaced on the fact that this week is midterms.

I use Schoolhouse to organize all of my assignments and notes, and to keep track of what’s due when (brilliant at that, really), but I never look forward more than a week in advance. Thus, I didn’t notice until Sunday night that seriously? this week bites.

It’s the week before spring break, and for the first time in a long time, the majority of my classes have a midterm attached to them. And if there’s not a midterm, there’s a writing assignment that is sucking my soul (take your pick, they all feel like that this week).

I’ve been ready for this week to be over since before it began; just thinking about what has to be done is driving me crazy. It’s not like it’s hard, it’s just that it’s far more than I expected.

It doesn’t help at all that I’m working on absolutely the worst paper I’ve ever written in my life. I had to have a rough draft ready for class yesterday, am waiting for peer reviews that are due tomorrow, and have to pull everything together to turn it in on Friday. I’m at seven pages already, and it’s a large rambling mess that’s comparing two radically different articles with out a thesis statement in sight. I’m sure I’ll have to come up with something soon.

Granted, I thrive on the stress of a tight deadline, but really I hate when it’s stretched out over the entire week, because I can stare at Thursday’s list, thinking “OMG THREE MIDTERMS IN A ROW, WHO PLANNED THIS SHITTY SCHEDULE” and then I remember that it was me, and I don’t feel any better or have anyone to take it out on.

So this week is an exercise in not breaking things, because I get antsy and angry about thinks I don’t like but can’t change and haven’t passed.

But… thank god for spring break. And the Wii that’s waiting for me at my parent’s house.

How do you know the difference?

Am told me last week that I’m a serial-monogamist, which is completely true. I spent two years with Fat-Boy, and after a three month break, five years with Dustin. I have a problem with long term relationships and leaving them (lets leave the reasons behind this problem, for another day, shall we?).

However, this elephant-in-the-corner that we’re ignoring leads me to a new problem. How do I differentiate between the different types of men the newly-single me will now encounter?

Mr. Right: Obviously, this is what optimally I’m looking for. At 25, I’m ready to find someone to settle down with. Hell, at 22 I was ready to settle down. But Mr. Right is supposed to become Mr. Forever (at least in my book), and that always takes awhile to figure out. So, Mr. Right will most likely start out as…

Mr. Right-Now: Any guy who I would call my boyfriend would ideally fall into this category, but not always. Mr. Right-Now is the guy that seems like he could become Mr. Right, but it’s unclear. Usually it’s a gut feeling that tells you he’s not the forever kinda guy, and in the back of your mind you’re questioning whether or not there is someone else out there who would be a better fit.

Mr. Right-in-front-of me: This is the hardest guy to figure out, because he can wear many different disguises. The one-night-stand, the rebound-guy, the all-consuming-crush, and Mr. Right-Now are all different aspects of this category. The hard part comes from trying to decide who, in the grand scheme of things, Mr. Right-in-front-of-me is.

So this is my problem. I must start at the bottom, and work my way back up, and so thus will begin with Mr. Right-in-front-of-me. But figuring out which roll he (whoever he is) will play in my life is a much harder thing to grasp.

It doesn’t help that I’m being thrust into dating after seven years of serial monogamy. Dating at 25 is different than dating at 20, which is different again from dating at 16, which is the last time I was really active in the “dating scene.” This whole thing is making me feel like high school all over again.

I think my greatest fear is in being wrong again. I’m terrified of making the wrong decisions at this point in my life. I’ve been wrong so many times before, and am tired of it, and thus find myself keeping away from any sort of serious decision that isn’t related to my college courses.

If there isn’t a decision to be made, I can’t be wrong, right?

Traits I look for in a guy I want to date:

• Creative. I’d rather do something fun on a date than the same old things everyone does.
• Brave. I want a guy who will make the first move, push past the awkwardness that newness brings. Also, it takes a brave man to face my family.
• Outgoing. I suck at small talk and introductions, and want a guy who can bridge that gap between me and him, and us and everyone else. Because I’m very bad at it.
• Patient. Perhaps I’m a bit different than the “modern single girl,” but I can’t hop in the sack on the first date. Or the fifth. Or the twelfth. Actually I’ve got no timeline, but I’ve got to be comfortable enough to take my clothes off for someone new, and that always takes time.
• Brainy. I like me a smart guy, and a guy who can talk about a wide variety of topics.

Unfortunately, while I value these things, I don’t always get them. Creative often goes out the window, along with Brave. The last three guys I’ve dated, I was the one who made the first move, the one who pushed for more. And they were all introverted; we’ve always become “those people” who never go out or do anything. Which is odd, because I love to go places, see things.

This time on the dating-go-round, I’m going to hold out. I’m not going to be the one who makes the first move. I’m not going to settle for the same old things.

And you know what? It’s going to be awesome. I’m going to learn how to be single again. How to have fun on my own, and with guys. Exclusivity is overrated.

So I’ll be looking for these traits in the guys I date. I may be ready to settle down, but I’m not ready to settle for second best. Variety is the name of the game this year. And I’m going to have a blast.

– “London Beckoned Songs About Money Written By Machines,” A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out: Panic at the Disco

I was talking to Josh on Sunday night, running through the things that had happened since the last time we had talked, when we hit upon a truth for both of us: it’s terribly hard to let one person in on everything.

I dated Dustin for five years, loved him terribly, but still he didn’t know everything about everything. You knows more about my sex life than the guy I had sex with for the last five years. Me knows more about me intellectually than my own sister does. My brother knows absolutely nothing about my life except the breakups with my exes.

We compartmentalize to protect ourselves. If no one knows everything, then it’s almost like everyone knows nothing, because you need all the pieces to finish the puzzle and see the whole picture, and I’m hiding a fistful of of pieces even from myself.

Because… what if I complete the picture for someone, and they don’t like what they see? It would break my heart to be so open, so exposed, and rejected because it wasn’t at all what they expected.

I guess in a way, I’m really only giving the pieces of myself that I know particular people will understand. My English major friends get the book geek in me. My geek friends get the tech fiend, my guy friends get the coarse side, the one that’s not afraid to look stupid for a laugh.

But no one gets all of me.

The oddest part about all this compartmentalizing is that it doesn’t really matter in the long run. It doesn’t matter, really, who knows what. That’s why I don’t mind if everyone reads the blog, because this place is the place that has all the little bits and pieces of my life — it’s the inside glimpse inside my head, a snapshot of what is important to me and what I’m thinking about, what I’m comfortable sharing in my circle of friends and the entire world.

There are always going to be pieces of myself that I section off, to protect myself. I can only hope that one day I’ll find that one person who will know all of me, who I’m secure enough in telling them everything about everything.

I thought that person was Dustin, but as I look back at our relationship, I see how I still managed to keep myself separate, protect myself from… something that is completely unable to be defined.