I Was In Love With A Girl on the Metro.

There are moments, in the midst of our individual scurryings, when someone pulls us from our inward selves, out and up and back to reality, reminding us that there is more going on than what is happening in the small bubble of our own lives.  Tonight, I was rapidly approaching the apex of a bout of extreme existential loneliness.  I was sure I wouldn’t make it home, sure I was going to lay down on the sidewalk and give up. And then, I got on the metro and sat across from a girl.  I didn’t know this girl, but we sat across from each other, mirror images. Heads held up by our hands, sad eyes looking into sad eyes.  Then we both smiled.  She got off at the next stop and the moment ended but it remained imprinted on my mind.  That few seconds of solidarity with a stranger allowed me to breathe and to make it home in one piece.  Sure I’m still going to listen to Elliott Smith and mope but it seems way less tragic now.  So thanks metro girl, you made me feel less alone in the universe.

 

Notes from the Black Hole.

Last night I had a dream that everyone I knew was a simulacrum.  I knew that their insides were nothing but sentient liquid but I had to pretend not to be scared.  I escaped on a train to the country where I floated in a river, surrounded by ravenous crocodiles.  I made my limbs go heavy so I could sink to the bottom because I knew if I pretended to be a stone the crocodiles would ignore me. I sank and sank and sank until I surfaced in consciousness.

I awoke to the greyness of my room, the light never changes in here. I almost wished I were still a stone, sinking in that river.  There are heaps of laundry on my floor, my bed is a nest of books I barely have the energy to skim, papers of haphazard notes, and kleenex boxes, but I just want to stay here, cocooned from the world.

Depression.  It leaves you at once empty and too full of emotions. For weeks I’ve been standing at the edge of a precipice, knowing if I take one step in the wrong direction I will tumble off, into a darkness so thick it fills your nose and lungs until you cannot breathe.  And I’m scared. I’m really scared.  I’ve battled depression for as long as I can remember and every time I find myself in this space, I wonder if I will ever find my way out. There is a chasm that opens in my chest, a black hole that slowly pulls me in, turning my spirit into dust.

I apologize for the bleakness of this post.  There is a large part of me that feels embarrassed and ashamed whenever I’m depressed.  I think that my friends will leave me because I am a downer, that whoever I’m dating at the the time, if anyone, will decide I’m crazy and toss me, I think that my mother will call me with the kind of worry in her voice that makes me so sorry that I cant be just a happy, normal daughter to her. I guess I just wanted to write this as a way to purge some of the darkness that is plaguing me because I have so much trouble just talking about how I feel.  So there it is. I’m scared, and I feel alone, and I don’t know how to deal with the world right now. I can’t eat right, I can’t sleep right, I can’t say the right words, and sometimes I wish I didn’t exist but I’m here, and I’m surviving, and I feel love so maybe I’ll win this battle . . .

In Which I Should Just Give Up and Go To Bed.

BEHOLD! A self-indulgent pictorial diagram of my no good, really bad day.

In Which I Make A Lot of People Feel Nervous

Ever have one of those days that starts out badly and just builds and builds until you totally snap? That was my day. It started when I opened the fridge to make breakfast and all I had was one shriveled up apple. It proceeded to get worse bit by bit as: I spilled coffee over my notebook, tripped over nothing as I was walking down the sidewalk, had to pay a gazillion gold doubloons for birth control because my health insurance STILL hasn’t kicked in, and handed over my last 2.50 for a slice of pizza that was soggy and cold. On top of all this I was feeling a bit of what the kids call “heartbreak.” Needless to say, by the time I hopped on the metro to go home I was using every last ounce of energy to hold back my tears. Unfortunately, the second I turned on my magical music machine, one of the saddest songs on my playlist blasted into my ears. The damn burst. I started sobbing uncontrollably on the metro. At rush hour. It was hilarious watching everyone eying me warily as they inched away from me so of course I did what any sane person would do: started laughing hysterically. So there I sat, crying and laughing as people moved more and more quickly to the edges of the train car. I suppose public outpourings of emotion are inappropriate in this day and age but hey, I felt better for getting it all out of my system. Plus, since all the seats around me were swiftly vacated by nervous people, I got to sit down for the rest of my journey.

The song that was my undoing (please don’t judge me!):

In Which I Am Sad.

I haven’t posted in awhile. I could cite many reasons for this; I am busy, I am tired, I tripped over my cat, hit my head and suffered from temporary amnesia. But the truth is, it has been a year of heartache for me. Relationships have ended and grad school has become the source of endless pain and stress. As a result, my mind has been thrown into emotional turmoil. It’s hard to care about blogging (or anything) when all you want to do is crawl into bed and never come out.  I finally sought help and am on a nice cocktail of medication and though I still have a knot of sadness in my heart and I still cry at the slightest thing, I am slowly getting better.  Yesterday I carved pumpkins with two dear friends and as I hacked out a hello kitty that looked like a bear on the surface of my pumpkin, I realized that I was truly content. I’m going to be ok.