s02e04 - that's what you get
you somewhat accidentally committed to writing these entries in the second person because it gave your writing a more interesting voice. with tonight's entry though, you feel like the abstraction would just make it clumsier.
so stumble, then, through the briar patch tonight.
through the tears and angst, some higher power sent a series of miracles your way. you stretch the definition of the word to its absolute limits when you use it. to you, a miracle is something spontaneous that happens exactly when you needed it to. it's not about how improbable something is. to you, at least.
your week was (with the notable exception of Monday) monotonous and lonely. your weekend was filled with love and hope and spontaneity. you slept two of three nights (in this house, we include Friday after work as "the weekend") curled up next to some of your favourite people.
you played magic the gathering with some friends + e, an activity that sounds deeply boring and nerdy, but you had fun because you fucking thrashed. and she has a way of making everything fun.
you had been panicking about a themed party on Saturday night. you get really uptight about themes. you don't consider yourself an overly glamorous person, so when the rare opportunity arises to put on a new face, feel confident, feel beautiful, suddenly there's a lot riding on your ability to look the part.
you're…not especially good at makeup. with constantly shaky hands and a general lack of experience, the more intricate procedures are lost on you.
you message your ex boyfriend in distress.
The look is not looking. in fact, it doesn't exist.
Do you want some help? I cancelled on the dinner I was gonna be going to
oh please god yes
he is very good at makeup. he salvages your misery and makes you feel beautiful.
you drive to the function singing to fall out boy songs, as queued by your passenger, who spends a bit picking the polish off her nails with the tab from a can of monster energy because it "doesn't go with the rest of the outfit". it's endlessly charming.
you were so anxious, so filled with dread, but your heart couldn't be lighter.
after several drinks at The Function, the host performs a lip sync, Drag Race style, to a song. It finishes, and you find yourself wondering "What if I went next?". You generally can't dance. You possess a kind of grace, but not grace in the general sense. But you pull through. Everybody fucking loves it. It reminds you of performing comedy, having an audience on your side.
later, much later in the evening, you ask a question that only occurred to you in the moment. you act on the answer. the morning brings some light hand-wringing and fretting: "was that okay?". you feel liberated by the fact that you mean it wholeheartedly when you say "yes".
in the morning you bring some bags out to your car with her, and it reminds you both of travelling together. the morning sky is overcast and the sun glares through it. it is cold. you look back at her taking a picture of you. you ask why, and she tells you that the empty streets make her feel like she's wandering through the end of the world.
a breakfast, a drive, a lucky+shiny giratina, some more driving, some singing. you make plans to play music.
you don't expect what happens after you pull up at her house, before you see her walk off into her driveway. but you're smiling like an idiot.
the weekend's events are not without a host of complicated and confusing feelings that follow, but you decide ultimately that in the moment you were happy. you don't want to overthink it.
you are also aware that your assessment of events is not the only one that matters, in this case. so you hope that your happiness hasn't come at the expense of hers.
the emotional history we share with others can often feel like a sentence. cause begets effect. "consequence" is a charged word, but everything has consequences, whether good or bad.
…right?
there's this lyric in a jimi hendrix song.
and so castles made of sand / melts into the sea / eventually.
you believe that time is a traveller who hands us second chances.
if you felt the full weight of the past on your shoulders, you wouldn't be able to get out of bed in the morning. you wouldn't have rekindled relationships with lost friends. they wouldn't have done the same with you. not everything washes away on the same time scale. some things might take longer than we spend on this earth.
but there's a lot that does. there are many things you can spend your life blaming yourself for, beating yourself up for. but should you?
perhaps not.
perhaps those sandcastles melted into the sea long ago. you just didn't let yourself notice.
love, in all of its forms, is the panacea to the lonely miserable life that we sometimes find ourselves in. forgiveness, especially self forgiveness--- letting yourself be happy is the only way through.