Keeping up appearances.

I think what I hate the most about having to be around other people is the smiling. That, and the pseudo-apologetic persona that I use to prevent storms from brewing when I am not in the mood to deal with any conflict. The other day a woman tried to order things from me while I was clocking in. I look up and inform her that I am unfortunately not trained to take orders and therefore don’t know how to use the machine. I always grin and say this politely, because it happens all the time. This woman says to me very rudely, almost under her breath, ”Well where is someone who can?” Oh gee, you know, I’m awfully sorry that my manager, who is over there kind enough to be helping with the chaos the grill people are dealing with, is delaying you from your greasy, disgusting food for ten seconds. Normally, when someone does this to me, asks me to do something I’m not sure/allowed to do, I’ll immediately go get someone who can. Instead I give her the grin that sometimes makes people back away from me, then I walk away without another word.

I went into a consignment store yesterday. One of the saleswomen was fluttering all around my godmother, completely ignoring me. This happens frequently, and I love it. Yes, please ignore me, I’m a shadow. Shadows don’t like to speak. They always think that because of how I’m dressed and how young I am, that there’s no potential money for them to claw out of me, which gives me the opportunity to shop without irritating interruptions or too much anxiety.

I actually found something that I liked, and couldn’t figure out which door was to the dressing room. I nearly went in the wrong room. I do things like this all of the time; I get nervous and I don’t pay attention to what I’m doing and I end up looking like an unobservant idiot. I’ve done some very embarrassing things while out, because I get stuck inside my head and put the rest of me on autopilot. I’ve walked into men’s restrooms before, broken things out of carelessness, and otherwise landed myself in situations where other people smiled at me sadly, as though they were thinking ‘wow, didn’t know they made things that stupid’. I do this at work too, and I’m sure by now that they think I’m a little slow in the head, because I repeatedly make mistakes, sometimes the same ones over and over because I am not mentally there. I either have no interest, or I’m too anxious to handle everything while I’m still thinking at full capacity. If I think, it will make me back out, give up, so…I don’t.

Anyway, it was ridiculous. I tried this dress on that was a little too small, but I really liked it and considered buying it since I keep dropping weight and would probably fit it just fine in a week if I wanted it to. Suddenly I was the center of attention. I awkwardly stood there letting my godmother state her opinion and all of that, and the saleswoman decided abruptly that I was the person to hound and flatter if she wanted to get at a wallet. I more or less got dragged to the mirror outside the dressing room, because the woman wanted me to look at it better. She said a bunch of the typical bullshit, repeatedly asserting that she’s a seamstress that could fix anything I don’t like about it, and that it was such a pretty dress and it was so me (she was very certain she knew…), and that it fit perfectly fine and I was lovely in it.

 The store was really small, so I knew some of the other shoppers were looking over at us curiously, and I was getting more stiff and unmoving by the minute. I pretended to examine it in the mirror, but was doing everything I could not to really look; I didn’t want to see. I didn’t want to think about the fact that people behind me were looking, or that my godmother was looking or the saleswoman was looking. I crossed my arms over my chest, feeling horribly narcissistic for even thinking to try the thing on, and eventually managed to get away from them by more or less running to the dressing room. I stood in there for a moment, irritated and shy, trying to decide if I liked it. I decided that I did, and put my clothes back on as quickly as I could. I felt better with my suit of armor, and suddenly I was alright again, if not a bit jittery. I even let her have my mailing address because my defences felt too drained for me to argue with any real conviction.

I ended up putting it on hold, and went back at the end of the day and bought it after some thought, because I decided that it was me, at least the person everyone sees and believes is me. The manipulator. She wears dresses. She’s not a boyish misanthrope that covers herself up with layers of clothes and shrinks away from others. She smiles. She likes people. She treats them well and is always polite. She never thinks about how much it would please her to shout at everyone to stop fucking staring. She would never think to give the smiles that I give, the ones that are all threat and no happiness, and always follow as an unconscious reaction to some sadistic thought. She would never do that, think that. No, not her.   

Because she’s exactly what they want her to be.

To keep.

There’s so much about this I don’t understand. Every time I open a new doorway, a million more appear for me to explore. It’s a labyrinth, and I’m beginning to think it will stretch on forever, if there is such a thing. It’s a dark, long road to either doom or hope; I still don’t know yet. I’ll face that door when I come to it. God, all I can do is speak riddles today.

I feel so wrong, standing there in my blue uniform with my pressed pants and hair pulled back. That person isn’t me. People always ask me how old I am. Even when I say 19, they still ask if I have children. It makes me laugh every time. And finally, the other day, I snapped a little, and said rudely, “I’m 19, of course I don’t have children.” All of the women are around 24-26 mostly married, and nearly all of them have 6 year olds at home. I can only look at them with amazement. Why? How could you? You are barely even done being a child yourself!

Imagine, this one girl I see frequently, had her first kid when she was twenty. One year from now, me, having a kid. The thought sends me into an absolute panic. The responsibility…. I almost can’t care for myself (let’s not even get into that…), let alone some infant that would be completely dependent on me. It’s just two very opposite lives, two extreme ways of thinking. Me, with my solitary, self-centered existence, and them working at a fast food restaurant to keep their kids clothed. It’s so fucked. I can’t understand them, that mentality. I simply cannot ever see that mindset applying to me. Everything that these people are is all that I am not. 

Another one of the girls at work is trying to befriend me, even suggesting we carpool (oh, the horror). I feel like this monster. I look over at her and find myself aggravated. We discovered we both moved to the area three years ago (and we lived near one another before too, apparently, which she thought was the greatest thing). Turns out we live a street away from one another currently, in the same subdivision. In fact, I think I figured out which house is hers. She was going on and on about things, and I could only swallow and grind my teeth as she went on to tell me how she hated where she used to live, how it was a terrible area and so on and so forth. My home. My beautiful home, was all I could think. Don’t you dare speak against it.

She inadvertently turned me against her with that insignificant conversation. That, and one of the first things she said to me in the morning was that she likes working in the front so that she can watch all of the hot men (she said this as she craned her neck around all the cooking equipment and giggled, pointing out some poor, unsuspecting individual who was prowling around the booths in the corner). That’s just not something you say to a person that you have met all of once. I don’t want to know. I don’t care. Girl talk is not something I can relate to or understand. Quite frankly, I find it fucking stupid, but you know, we all have our dislikes….   

I shouldn’t talk so badly of it. The people are extremely friendly. They always try to help you out. You have a tray in your arms, someone is usually ahead of you to open the oven, or take it from you. Today, my schedule got thrown out for some reason before I got to it. One of the guys dug through a pile of garbage and got it out for me. It was covered in grease and all manner of nasty things. I didn’t even ask him to. Shit like that makes me take a step back, as ridiculous as it sounds. Even the smallest kindness is not something I am used to getting from others.

I can’t begin to count how many times I’ve struggled while taking my mother somewhere, trying to get her wheelchair to some impossible place, with people walking around me not even giving me a second glance. I don’t even expect people to open a door for me. My whole perspective of humanity is usually down in the negatives, but at work, it’s either everybody helps everybody or we all fall behind. It’s different when there’s a paycheck involved, at least in this particular workplace. I’m grateful for that, because I know I could easily have been shoved into a situation with a bunch of assholes who weren’t willing to help me learn the ropes. Everyone has made an effort to teach the newcomers. In all honesty, I don’t think I could have had it much better. I may not have anything in common with anyone, and I may not have any inclination to befriend them or any of that, but I’m more than willing to be cordial with them, which is more than I can say for the majority of people I come across.

On a side note, I got payed. My first ever paycheck. I couldn’t be disappointed by my reaction; I saw it coming the first day of work. Not even the slightest sense of accomplishment, nothing but stony, cold silence in my head, no flip of my stomach or surge of excitement. I looked down at a check and just sighed. I don’t know where this is leading, but I guess the best thing I can do is not stop to think about it so much. It’s only money. It’s only life.

Worst nightmares aren’t so terrible when you live them.

I can’t think of anything more horrible than having a bunch of neighbors milling around my yard. Truly, there is no thing that irks me greater than having my personal sanctuary violated by indolent, rubber-necking strangers. I just couldn’t believe we invited them to be there.

 They always gawk; that is the way of people in tiny backwater communities. But having a yard sale around here is like some grand event. The termites crawl out of the woodwork to inspect the goods. It had to be done, I suppose. Our garage is like tumor that just won’t stop growing. So many storage containers piled halfway to the ceiling, making a miniscule (and very precious) void to park vehicles. Technically it’s a four car garage, but Christ, you wouldn’t know it. We had to get rid of some of it, and why not make some money while doing so?

But three hermits having this sort of thing is weird. Everyone was clearly intrigued, plastered to their car windows every time they went by our house. Not that they aren’t always…we’re like the haunted house on the block. Too neat to fit in, too distant. They watch us. Even our acre of property isn’t protection from their constant stares.

It used to be I could walk out into my yard with nothing on, or half dressed. Our old house had so much property, all atop a steep hill. I could do whatever the fuck I wanted, and our two neighbors, the wife beater & wife to the right, karaoke family to the left (you could hear their screeching across the canyon—goddamn those loud amplifiers), couldn’t have given any less of shit. They couldn’t even see our house, and the thought of coming over and saying hello never entered their conscience.

Those were the good old days, back when I couldn’t walk up the hill to visit my goats without fear of ticks and poison oak. But fuck, the damn solitude and beauty of the place made up for it. I found out recently, that the family who bought our beautiful little house couldn’t make the payments. It’s all empty atop that hill, where one pine tree, the same age as all the others, has grown twice as tall from all the childhood pets I buried beneath it. I guess that saying is true: you don’t know what you had till it’s gone.

Don’t get me wrong, the woods here are amazing, but they aren’t lush and green like I remember so fondly from when I was a kid. There are no leaves here to change with the season, no lovely reds and oranges and yellows. The ground isn’t that almost black, incredibly rich soil that used to grow anything. You’re lucky if you can get a rugged little pine tree to grow here without complaint. I like it, but it’s not my home. I still don’t feel like this is it, “The Place”. I know that if I do come into money, I will easily leave this place behind. Someday, maybe I’ll go back home again. 16 years is what it took for it to root into my heart, and as ridiculous as it sounds, I know it will never be fully replaced. Now I’m telling another story….

Today stretched on forever. I was a little homesick, for the first time since leaving. It’s been so long, so I really don’t get why I feel it now, of all times. But all those people invading and looking around, just made me miss my little ‘cottage’ on the hill. We never would have thought to have had a yard sale there.

I dealt with the people. I had to put up signs the other day, and when I was hammering one into the ground near the highway with the blunt side of an axe (yes an axe; someone misplaced the hammer), two boys rolled down their windows and shouted obscene things at me. There parents were in the car with them, too—that’s great parenting for you. I grinned, completely disgusted, and waved my axe at them. 

I placed people’s purchases in the bags, and stayed out of conversation for the most part, when it was avoidable. It was very hot today, but I wore long sleeves and gloves and kept my hair down to keep the sun at bay. I get burned so easily here, that I constantly have to cover up and suffer because I know I’ll end up red if exposed for a mere five minutes. Even sunscreen isn’t all that effective, so I slather it on repeatedly. I’m like one of those stereotypical nerds people make fun of when they go to the beach. I never see daylight except behind sunglasses and long sleeves. I should feel foolish, and people always comment, but I don’t bother caring anymore. Oh well. You think I’m weird? That’s grand. It probably didn’t help that I wore all black clothing, was somewhat dusty, and smelled like a gasoline canister. Quading clothes from yesterday. I didn’t even wash my hair, though it had that scent of engine exhaust to it when I went to bed last night. It’s like an aphrodisiac. I want to bottle that smell. Maybe I should work somewhere with cars.

So many people said, “You’re that girl who goes walking!” It was a bit disturbing to think about. But they bought my shit, useless shit I don’t want anymore, so I guess they can be tolerated. It was life story day too, like at college. I tried to talk to someone over IM about this, and she more or less said I was an ass for getting irritated with people who were trying to build an acquaintance. Well, I dunno, when you first meet someone at college, and this girl tells you that her boyfriend was shot in some horrible accident and she went to such and such elementary school, such and such junior high, and such and such high school, and her parents were over for Thanksgiving from whatever state, and that last night she had blood in her stool—and oh, do I think she should go to the doctor—-is a little too much information for a first introduction? And no, I did not just exaggerate, believe it or not. This really happened. In all honesty I don’t think I’m being overly harsh when I say, blatantly, I just don’t give a fuck. I’m not apologetic about it either—I just don’t.  

This is turning into five posts in one, but anyway…. It went okay. It wasn’t total doom or anything. I didn’t die, or run inside and hide in my room. I faced the beast and he pissed on my clothes rack and it wasn’t so bad (that was actually someone’s dog, but I digress…). I did eat enough ice cream to stock up for next winter, and binged on every food imaginable from all the stress after the day was complete. I drank White Russians and ate birthday cake that wasn’t mine, and went quading in the heat and saw three deer. It was like I lived a week of my general dullness in one day, and it felt like overload.  

I have to get up and do it again tommorrow. Damn.

Hiding away.

I’ve returned to my bizarre nightly schedule. The entire being awake before 1:00PM routine just isn’t for me, apparently. I only lasted a week. It’s 3:30 in the morning—I feel the tiniest bit delirious. 

I don’t know what is going on with me. I’ve been having nightmares, which never happens, and I’ve been shrugging everything off. I’m very Scarlett O’Hara lately, and fuck, tomorrow is another day, is it not? I haven’t even begun to think about the college thing, because each time I do, my stomach tightens and I feel the acids churning unpleasantly. I could try more places for work, but the truth is, I don’t feel like going through with it anymore. It’s a waste of time. People are going to go in and give a sob story about how they need a job to support their family, and I’m going to look like the privileged child who is looking for employment purely out of boredom.

Okay, the last part is half true. But hell, I would give my parents money if I could. We are always struggling. It’s hard to sustain three people when only one works, one is disabled, and the other is too stupid to have had a job previously. We’re such a motley group, mother with her love story obsession and 3 pound chihuahua, dad with his guns and fishing boats, and love of flowers, and me with my cats and loads of electronics that I sure the fuck don’t need, and mountains of horror movies that I watch through half-lidded eyes.  

I’m sinking deeper into the numbness for awhile, and it is much needed this time. I’m grateful. I want something to take over for awhile, that blessed autopilot. I know it is useless to say anything. I’m choosing to remain static in the world of chaos, as always. The dullness of it is so easy to fall back into. I forget sometimes that there is supposed to be something beyond this, that my laziness and safe position will not last forever. My parents will only tolerate me for so long. Sometimes I wish they would just give up on me; it would be easier that way. But I guess the truth is, I don’t deserve the easy way out in this situation; I’ve done it all to myself.

The dove is best part, because life goes on, doesn’t it?

Hopeless. Even more of a waste of time.

I understand perfectly well that nothing is fair. I get that it doesn’t matter if I’m depressed or suicidal—supposedly, unless I’m an utter failure, I should want the exact same things as everybody else, regardless of my personal feelings. If I’m depressed, it must be my fault. I should just take pills and stop whining.

But I won’t take pills. I won’t tell anything. Why live when I want nothing of what everyone else prizes so much? Their goals aren’t my own, the will to live is not my own. In all truth, I want nothing of anything; I want as far away from people as possible. I don’t want to participate in their sick little game and pretend to give a shit, because I don’t. I truly don’t.

I was watching a movie with my dad the other day, Jumper. I’m not fond of it, but he wanted to watch it, so I said nothing. He kept going on and on about how the main character should have used his powers for ‘good’. I could feel the little coil of revulsion twisting around in my stomach like a snake. Even he doesn’t get it. We are more different than I ever imagined, and each day that passes, I see that more and more. Everyone always claimed I was just like him, even I have said such things recently, but secretly…I’ve known. I’ve always known. He’s the hero sort…and me? Not so much. 

Heros and villains are practically the same; one has just deluded itself into believing that their purpose serves this thing called “the greater good”. They are only separate and different because of that single fact. But it is a tremendous difference. One has drive and will, the other has a lust for the kill. Generally, heroes are mistaken for villains. Just because a cause is ‘evil’ to one, does not mean it is the same for another. Killing a woman who had sex before marriage is perfectly normal in some cultures. Evil? No, it’s plain mercy to those who wield those beliefs. It is for the greater good to them.   

 I don’t want to save the world. I don’t even want to exist in it. And if I could teleport to where ever the hell I wanted, I would end up on some mountain in the middle of nowhere with a tent and a smile, poor, helpless citizens be damned. Let them suffer. They would turn me away given the chance, every last one. They already have, come to think of it. There are people all around, but the truth is that we are still all alone. So what does it matter? Why does anything matter anymore? This place has no purpose, no reason, and the more people struggle to make one, the more they show their weakness.

I may start attending college again. I haven’t decided yet. But if I do I’ll take five or six classes at a time and finish as quickly as I can. I don’t know if I can bear going back and participating in their useless bullshit again. It’s the people that kill me, more so than their stupid ideas. It’s the fact that they believe in their reasoning so deeply, when I stand back and tell myself again and again that what I think can change in an instant if I see anything the contrary. I contradict myself. And I don’t care. What is wrong with being wrong? Nothing. People don’t like to lose, so such things are hated. But I don’t care. Let me be wrong. Let me be right. At the end of the day it is all the same to me.

Sometimes giving up sounds so much better.

I feel like I don’t want to fight for me anymore. I want to give up, just stop all of this madness. I keep telling myself that it is so pointless to continue, that I am not going to be mourned long, that there is nothing in this life I’m going to be missing out on. I can’t love, I can’t be, not without feeling so incredibly wrong. I want nothing from this place. It holds no magic for me anymore, no mystery that must be solved. I figured it out as well as I ever will and now all I want is out.

I don’t want to have a future. I want to jepordize it so that there is no chance, no more excuses for me to continue. I’m only doing this because it is what I was taught. It’s not what I want. Fuck, it’s never what I want. I know I am a failure for willing this all away. So many people certainly have it worse, but they want to be here, for whatever reason. In these moments of clarity, it is not the uselessness and pointlessness that hurts the most, but the knowledge that there is something in me, somewhere, that has inadvertently kept me going. I know that this survival instinct is so fucking futile, and it disgusts me that I hold onto something after learning just how ugly it is on the inside. I’m stupid for doing so, just as worthless as the people I hate for accepting this system, embracing and loving it for the pseudo power it grants them.

Wave salvation in my face and I’ll throw it all away. I don’t want to go to the interview in two days; I’d rather…not be around instead.

How fucked up is that? I need to stop thinking like this. I need to face what I hate. But all I want is an easy way out, a permanent darkness where consciousness doesn’t exist. Where I don’t exist. I want to never have a thought again. Because I think I won’t make it. I can’t bear going on when it’s nothing but pain and hatred and wallowing and lies. This isn’t going to change. I’m not going to wake up tomorrow and feel like I live in a beautiful world, with wonderful people that I want to care for and help. If I make it, I’m going to hate every second, and I’m so sure of it…that I can’t stand it.

If I live I’m an idiot. If I die I’m a failure who gives up too easily. There is nothing to win, always a draw.

Always grey.

Sticks and stones.

I never went to sleep. I must have somehow built up reserves from all the nights—or should I say days—of a mere ten to twelve hours of consciousness. I may ward off the hours, but my hatred and feelings of helplessness toward it all, continue to seep into my skin. I can feel it there, spoiling, infecting like a disgusting pus from a festering wound. It’s not going to end until I’m dead and gone. Pity.

I will say with little doubt that my struggling was worthless; I see nothing coming of the brief two minute interview that was more laughable than serious. I was nothing but a bundle of overexposed nerves, tapping a foot against the leg of the chair I was sitting in, in an altogether vain attempt to hide the shaking of my rebellious limbs. Even the cruelest of conversations with myself could not calm me. Anger boiling in my gut only made the shaking turn to shivers as I waited for doom. I’d have preferred the noose; I wouldn’t have been half so nervous.

Over, done with. Like all things human. Just more worthlessness and stupidity to add to it all, more lines for me to draw in chalk as I tally up the never-ending list of cons that living comes burdened with. I don’t know why I try.

I went to a health food store, and found more joy in sorting through the strange food than I’ve felt in awhile. I was struck by how pathetic that was, that something so positively inconsequential could make me smile. But it all has ulterior motives, strings attached, especially the smiles.  Torture comes in many forms, some glaringly obvious, but easily ignored by outsiders who would traitorously deny me one of the few pleasures I still have left, that I can still call my own. We reach the danger zone, and all I want to do is laugh. They think they know me. They think that there are bones in this body that care and still are capable of compassion. I’ve never considered those ‘heroes” emotions to be ones that came preprogramed; completely learned in my opinion, and therefore nothing but another construct of this place and its cancerous people. I bleed malice these days. All the sleep in the world won’t take the dark circles of weariness from beneath my eyes. It’s been over for so long already.

I play my games for no audience but myself. It’s so blatantly narcissistic. Wait until night, which doesn’t take long anymore. I wake at 6:00 in the evening sometimes. Then it starts: the enduring. Wait, wait, wait. Night falls and I wait some more, for everyone to drift off to sleep, on a plane not connected to this one. It’s the only way my paranoia will leave me even partially; if I have reason to believe I am somehow less observed.

Nights staring at a computer screen. Nothing causes a reaction anymore. It’s all so useless now. Depravity doesn’t mean a goddamned thing, as its cage is the same that holds sway over everything: all in the eye of the beholder. To me, the only thing that is depraved or perverse is the fact that people get up in the morning believing they’re making a difference, or that the little useless shit they do all day somehow piles up on a list that is going to be reviewed after they breathe that lovely death rattle. I revel in the knowledge that it has always been over but they are merely to blind to see it, too vain, too determined, too scared.

I keep finding bits of gold in my self loathing. I find it too in those moments where my own uselessness and unimportance smile malignantly back at me. Yes, I know this. Yes, I accept it. And doesn’t that just make your skin crawl? It angers the darker side of myself, that on my best days I embrace my own worthlessness as though it were the entire point of my existence.  I don’t fight it anymore. It is the one enemy besides breathing that I have finally yielded to. I see now that my dreams were pointless, that planning beyond this is nothing but masturbation. Pining after something you can’t have, waiting for it, planning for it, only to have it torn away like everything else by the harsh winds of reality. It is useless to hope, and I wish to stop doing it. The future will be as bleak as the present; no amount of money or creature comforts are going to shift what already has come to pass.

It will not change the world. Nor will I. But more importantly…it will never change me.

I am already set in stone.

The awkwardness of living.

I left the house for the first time in at least a month, it might have been two; I have lost track of time. It’s strange, trying to integrate. I feel dissociative. I feel like I’m not a part of this place, just an observer, just someone watching with the flat affect, that humdrum numbness that is beginning to seep into everything. It is right sometimes, that apathy; it makes me perfect. It makes me…unaffected.

I didn’t feel any anxiety, more of an awkwardness. This hasn’t happened in a long time. There was no pulling from the bottom of my stomach, no lurch that made me want to run to the nearest corner and vomit. The cold sweat never came, my voice was quiet, but steady. Acceptance, I guess. Acceptance that though I am nothing to these people and they are nothing to me, in order to survive I have to tolerate them. It didn’t hurt; I can’t feel anything right now anyway.

I was standing in line for coffee. No, I didn’t force my mother to go get it for me; I took the money and went to the register myself without even thinking about it. She was on the other side of the store. It sounds like nothing, but my misanthropy and introverted nature have made simple tasks like that absolute torture. The looks, the eyes I can feel burning into me. The knowledge that my ineptness is completely and totally visible, that I am making a fool of myself before I even speak. This usually floods me, but not this time, not when everything is so impossibly cut off, disconnected. I’m more like something automated than something living.

The awkwardness came when I realized I didn’t know who was next; I assumed I was, but the woman behind me had moved toward the register and I just stood there. I blinked, thought about it, and stayed exactly as I was. I wasn’t in a hurry, and I really couldn’t care less if she went ahead of me. Then she tells me to go, smiling. I say sorry, and mutter something about not paying attention.

Again, this sounds normal. It sounds like any everyday event. But the fact is, standing in front of a cash register and having to order something and converse with an employee is more painful to me than something dying. I feel it like a tragedy. It builds like some sort of fucked up finale: standing, waiting, knowing that impending doom is coming for me. That soon, I’m going to have to talk to whoever is standing there, I’m going to have to feign that the last flitting thought through my head was not about sticking one of my hands into the blender sitting on the tabletop. Then, ding. I’m next.

I had a bit of a breakdown today. I threw a silent tantrum and binged on everything I could find in the pantry. I must have eaten two days’ worth of food (at least by my meager standards). I had to get my mind off of the thoughts, I had to concentrate on feeling something besides complete agony. Breathing, existing…it hurts more than anything sometimes. I wanted to sleep, but it seemed that no one would have it. The cat meowed, attempting to rip the tape I’d stuck to the bottom of my door to block out the sound of existence. I locked the door, but people tried to get in anyway. Finally I managed a few hours. I woke up ravenous and dull feeling. I ate sugar like it was a drug; I needed the shock to my system because I was feeling so incredibly low.

I hate these mood swings. My six month diet change has altered everything, made it all worse. I’ve menstrated twice this month, which to me is bizarre after having times in the past where I’ve gone years without a single period. But it makes me emotional in a very strange way. I cry for stupid reasons, but yet I don’t feel it…. How to explain…. It’s like I’m crying for how sad I am, but I’m using other things in order to pry the tears out of myself. So I’m not crying for the movie, I’m crying for the residules of whatever this is. The darkness. Because I can never cry for it. I never get to shed it; it just stays there, impervious to everything. Perhaps then, I do need to mood swings, if only to vent.

It’s ridiculous what effects me and what doesn’t. My boldness shows in some places, yet shrinks in others. I wore my corset to the stores, and didn’t cover it up with a jacket. Just didn’t care. I like it, I felt like wearing it. People stared and I didn’t care. Where I live isn’t exactly the place to dress up; I was out of place. How fitting. Sometimes I think I like that they know it, others…I’m not so sure. But why can I wear what I wish yet not present myself without feeling incredibly inadequate/out of place? I want to laugh at the sheer stupidity of it. 

It’s been a long day. I need more sleep.

Life: the irritating, sing-song merry-go-round.

I don’t know what I’m doing, I honestly don’t. And I don’t care. Even the urge to die has tapered off lately. I’ve become this obsessive, pleasure-seeking thing. Not that it is bad—I think anything is an improvement, if I’m truthful. I’m nothing when I’m numb, and I want to die when my depression hits its peak, but right now all I want to do is anything that is different than the stagnation I expose myself to.

I’m not even worrying anymore. The guilt about not working is slowly dying away. I guess I’m hitting that “blind acceptance” point, because I’ve realized that I’ve done all I can do for now and I’ll just have to wait. I keep selling my useless shit online, like a fucking hobby. All the bullshit that used to mean something to me is now just trash. Things that I treasured no longer have that sacred value they used to have. Now I couldn’t care less if they are gone from my life.

I don’t know if this is permanent or just temporary. But I suppose at the moment all I want is something that isn’t exactly the same as everything that has happened before. If that means purging the old self, then fine. Oh well. It’s not like anyone would miss her. I’ve been holding onto that memory a little too long, I think.

When I get money I’m going to spend it. I’m going to spend it and not care. Because there is nothing to care about anymore. There’s second to second and nothing else. It’s all just a game that is long past being fun, long past meaning anything important. I don’t want it, so what does it matter?

The future is the past. It is the same thing. Why do I keep hoping for something different when I know that I’m running the same track over and over? You can’t suddenly wake up and expect things to get better, can you? It would be like asking the night not to come or the sun not to rise. It’s going to happen; there is no stopping it. I fight something that is inconsequential, and I smile at my own stupidity.

Nice or sinister? With some people, their smiles are difficult to read.

Yesterday I went to a city a few hours from here. They have a huge mall, something that is fairly non-existent in the area I live in, so I thought there was a good possibility I might find something interesting. Like I said some posts ago, I’ve been searching for boots. It was also just an excuse to get out, and my mom loves to go driving to new places, so it worked out.

I never did find my boots, though I got more useless clothes as a buffer for my depression. No, it doesn’t work, except for the first five minutes. Afterward, meaning today, I regretted some of my purchases. I actually would throw some of them in the trash in frustration, but then it really would be useless, now wouldn’t it? Doesn’t that sound like something a spoiled little child would do? Throw things away in a fit of rage? Hm. For some reason that still does nothing to quell the thoughts. I buy things on impulse; I hate it when I do that. I already took the tags off; no taking it back. It’s too far away anyway.

We stopped at a surplus store on the way home. I walk in the door, wearing my old pair of boots. They’re ready to fall apart, but I don’t care. I immediately get cornered by some man I don’t recognize, and find him asking me too many questions for me to really recall. He gives some sort of comment on my boots, about liking them, etc. After I give an automated answer, I give him a sideways glance and stalk away, realizing that he’s not some random person, he works at the store. Maybe it’s okay then? I still thought he was a little overbearing, but given that I was in the perfume section at Macy’s only an hour earlier, with saleswomen circling me like vultures, I figure, hey, maybe he’s just nice and shrug it off.

I’m alone all of…a minute? If that. He’s back again. I’m examining a tactical vest and he’s saying, “Oh, you’re that kind of girl.” I mutter something about “just looking”, and he laughs. He tries to start yet another conversation, but I manage to get away after a few murmured answers. Now I’m starting to think something’s weird. There are other people in the store, so I’m hoping he’ll go bother them, as there is a huge boot section I need to investigate further.

Now if he was not around 50 years old, this wouldn’t have been as strange. I wander into the boots, glance around and realize there are no knee highs to be found. When I see used army and navy uniforms I make a beeline for the back of the store, and immediately start trying things on. Naturally everything is all out of order, so I have to sort through an entire rack to find my size. I see my mom moving through the displays, and end up showing her the things I’m looking at. Then he’s back again. Internally I groan. I know that I can’t tell him off, because I’m deeply considering buying something and I don’t want anything fucked up on account of my being a cold bitch.

He says something like “so that’s where you went”, as though he’s been looking for me. Now I’m getting not only uncomfortable, but more than a little irritated. I haven’t been without his presence for even five minutes. I release the jacket I’m about to try on when he says something about it looking good on me. I’m not at all in the mood to be examined. I grind my teeth at this point and my mom is not saying anything either, though we exchange a “what is with him?” glance.

This is when it gets into a conversation. He’s asking a bunch of questions again, and I just let my mom answer. Somehow we get on the topics of boots for a second time, and mom ends up telling him that was the reason we came to town. This is where it goes from mildly irritating to screaming in frustration. He keeps talking about how they don’t have any knee high boots but they might be able to order some. In order to get the the right sizing I’d have to try some on.

I confess, my social anxiety makes me want to curl up in a corner and die. I can’t stand trying things on in front of people, shoes or otherwise. It just makes me very uncomfortable, same thing with eating. I can’t eat in front of strangers. I pick at food, then wind up eating nothing. Strange, I know, but I’ve been that way since I was a child.

Thankfully he runs off to do whatever, and I stomp over to the jackets, hoping he’ll forget, though I know it will never happen. I never did find one of those jackets in my size, as I didn’t get all that much time to look.

Back he is again. I only tolerate all of it because I’m hopeful that there might actually be boots that I want in that stupid magazine. All of them are steel toed and lined for cold weather. The fact that they all seem to run upwards of $300 puts me off though. He comes back with a 7.5 when I told him an 8 or a 9 (they’re men’s shoes, so the sizing was all off for me), but I grudgingly try it on anyway, and barely manage to get my foot in. My toes are all smashed into themselves, so he goes and gets yet another. My mom is with me the entire time, like a protective bear—it makes me want to smile. 

I try on the new ones, and he just HAS to say something about my socks. The bottom part is covered in rainbow stars (don’t laugh…), which is fortunately all he can see. In actuality they are knee high with GIR from Invader Zim all over them. Another compliment comes that makes me want to throw the heavy shoe at him, but I smile benignly. What can you do? This time it was something about how I have style or some such bullshit. I was dressed like a preteen, wearing purple pants, combat boots, and a shirt with GIR and neon stripes on it. I had to change in the car from my “adult” clothes because it was so stiflingly hot, and because we had nowhere to go, I didn’t give a shit if I looked like crap. Now I know he’s just after something and I’m completely suspicious.

It gets weirder. I have to get wide shoes because I’m flat footed, and when I mutter it (becuase all of the shoes are narrow as fuck), he automatically pipes up that he is too. Oh yay. He lifts his hand up for a high five and I consider ignoring it. I’m too old for it, far too old. I went to college, I’m not 12. Then the more malicious, clever side tells me “could mean a discount if you treat him nice”. That’s all the encouragement I need, so I humor him.

The second shoe doesn’t fit either, so he steals my boot and tries to look for a difference. I’m kind of miffed because I hate people touching my things. My boots are sacred, more so than just about anything. I keep them impeccably clean, even in my messy room and from the sloppy, muddy roads.

Finally we go to the register to see this magazine, and he leaves us alone for a moment, not before introducing himself a SECOND time, and shaking my hand. This is the second time I’ve heard his name, and I still for the life of me, can’t remember what it was. I’m too busy trying to gauge the smile—what does it mean? The humanist wants to assume that he’s just one of those annoying, overly nice people that you sometimes want to club, but tolerate, due to the fact that you know only a jackass would crush such a optimistic moron with cruelty. But he’s touched me a couple of times, laying a hand on my arm, etc., so it’s boiled down to something being quite wrong. Too many red flags. He asks me my name, and I give it, then turn away. I guess I had a high tolerance for bullshit that day. Or maybe I just really wanted boots.

Of course, he isn’t gone forever. He comes back after we talk to the guy at the register about the shoes. They do have one type of knee highs that they’re going to check up on. There’s no hope though; there was no price. I’m sure they aren’t even going to be a whopping $300, but more in the $500-600 range. Still, we leave our number (something I later regret, though nothing has come of it…yet). Mom has already said we are in a hurry (we are both looking to get away from the place, though there are about a hundred unique things there that I’d love to buy), so we finally depart rather quickly.

We laugh about it in the car, discomfort gone. Yes…it was a little weird. I’m writing this all down so that I don’t relapse into thinking I’m crazy later. I keep doubting things that have happened; my memory has been completely shot lately.

About the boots, not that anyone would care, but if I come back and read this later I might want to know. I bid on some on ebay, but eventually gave up when they went to high. I’ve decided I want New Rocks, either the 161 or the 272. I was going to buy another pair of Demonias, but I’m finally facing up to the fact that I want what I want, and if I buy the ones I’ve been looking at from them, I’m merely settling (I already got the Reapers; they can’t make anything more impressive). Now I’m going to have to save up a good, solid $300 to cover them…. That $2oo more than I wanted to spend. Oh well. I guess I can save for it. At least that way I have something to look forward to when nothing else seems to get me interested.

I also might get a job in a few months where my dad works. They might be hiring soon, and they usually take employees’ kids no questions asked when they are short on staff (they always are during spring and summer). Might get me work for 6 months at least, so I can help my parents out with the bills—and of course, buy insanely expensive boots from Spain because I’m materialistic and don’t give a fuck about it. I guess I’m Jack today.

There’s nothing to do anymore but what brings a little bit of pleasure. There isn’t anything else. It’s all useless now, and I don’t want any of it.