the devil and god are raging inside me

"And over the sea in a warm sunny place 
men and women sit watching TV 
they say, 'it's a shame anyone has to die
but it was either them or me' 
all safe and snug, tucked away in our mansions 
we smile feeling comfortably safe 
and over the sea there's a dark cold place 
out of sight, out of mind, out of reach, washed away..."
-Showbread, Escape from Planet Cancer

"The death, the rape, the tragedy

the world is an ugly place

what's capable inside of me

is going to rear its ugly face..."

-DIES, Aesthetics of Violence 

"And in my best behavior 
I am really just like him 
look beneath the floorboards
for the secrets I have hid..."
-Sufjan Stevens, John Wayne Gacy, Jr.

Several years ago at my former job, I sat down at my makeshift desk, which was really just a folding table propped up against a wall.  I was a temp, hired on to help the company catch up on their paperwork and they had no proper office to give me.  So they made due and assembled a desk from extra parts they had in storage.

As I sorted through the stack of files, I noticed the room grow dim on my right side.  I looked up and saw the florescent light on the ceiling had gone out.  I looked at the wall three feet in from my face and saw the light and the dark encompassing the same portion of polystyrene.  To me, it felt like the technological equivalent of the angel and devil on my shoulder.

When I was a child, as I came to understand myself and the world and people around me, I realized I wanted to help people.  I lived in a small town with small minds.  Religion reigned over everything.  God was not at the center of people's hearts but at the center of social normalcy.  And with that warped sense of religion came a warped sense of right and wrong.  They did not look to the Bible but to their biased pastor to see who should be shunned or celebrated and a mess was made of everyone.

Fortunately, I was able to avoid such brainwashing.  I did not grow up in the church and it spared me from being taught to discriminate (disclaimer: not all churches teach hate, just all the ones I attended).  I wasn't told to hate the gays or keep my distance from the blacks and shun the atheists and fornicators and underage drinkers.  In fact, all these "bad" people comprised the majority of my friends.  I liked them and I was a good judge of character.  How could they be bad?  And how were they any worse, open with their vices, than those who hid their sins on Sunday and resumed their wicked ways the rest of the week?

Although this "Christian" behavior was hypocritical, it didn't anger me at the time.  It only inspired me.

I realized I wanted to help people. I wanted people to love each other, to realize we are all the same underneath our skin and sexuality. I wanted people to know we all have the same desires and defects. I wanted to use my art to inspire and incite revolution. All I really wanted to do was open people's eyes.  I just didn't think I was good enough at the time. I wasn't quite ready yet.

I was a child, still developing my skills and message. What did I want to say? How was I going to change the world? I had lofty ambitions and I didn't want my life to go to waste. I grew up deformed in several ways and I felt so much pain inside because of my feelings and fears. I didn't want anyone else to go through that. I didn't want anyone to feel as alone as I did. Despite my personal demons, I thought people were basically good. The world was bad and we would get corrupted but we could be saved. We were worth saving.

two corpses, caressing

for p.

two bodies traverse the expanse of a bleak surface

turgid tendons, split shins, flayed toes

but still walking

propelled by a hunger surpassing the stomach

as lidless eyes dance among the faces

desperate to find a hollowed out counterpart

two bodies come together with clanging cartilage and vacant stares

empty eyes and lolling tongues

tissue skin sheared from the friction of fingers

gnashing teeth reminiscent of romance

hollow hearts and hands, touching and tearing

clamoring for a clavicle

but only grasping guts

devoid of pleasure but programmed by dim memories

of what this once felt like

two bodies moaning in the murk

assuaging and assaulting, seething and writhing

 falling away from each other in the blood wet world

trying to taste the truth of one body to another

but only tasting tin

drunk on the red wine of blood

full on necrotized flesh

satiated by nothing

one body gasps and screams

and shudders and stumbles
stops

then moves past the other

blood on the mouth, hole in the chest

seeking sanctuary in another skin

one body stands alone

and watches the other shuffle away

filled with a mud soaked memory of pain unidentified
flooding back from the faint fog

no marks on the skin, no bruise to the brain

only an internal hemorrhage

one person bludgeoned by the burden of belonging
recalls the ramifications of respiration
and dies again

 then concedes to the cold dark

and crumbles

be my veins

"Love is nothing, nothing, nothing like people say
you gotta pick up the little pieces every day..."
-Liz Phair, Love is Nothing

"For a heart beats the best in a bed beside the one that it loves..."
-Lady Lamb the Beekeeper, Crane Your Neck

For a while, it felt like everyone else was falling in love and I was just falling apart.  It was like some kind of pheromone phenomenon.  Everyone around me was talking and dating, mating and relating, getting engaged and pregnant and coming together.  Normally, I couldn't care less about people and their paramours but when so many people were coming together in such a small amount of time, it threw me for a loop.

And I kind of felt down about it.

I never wanted to be the kind of person who was happy simply because I was in love.  I've said it before and I'll say it again:  you don't need another person to be happy.  I really believe(d) that.  I know my writing and whining about being lonely doesn't always (or ever) reflect that philosophy but even loners get lonely...right?

But what if I'm wrong?  What do I know about love?  I've always thought I had the level head, that my heart wasn't tainted by crushes or heavy feelings and I could dole out decent advice about the topic because I was removed from it.  I could think logically.  But maybe you can only know so much about love from mere observation.  Maybe the best way to know about love is to live it, to love and be loved.

But how do you start to love?  How do you know if you're doing it right?  How does any one of us know?  The heart doesn't come with a handbook.  Love is universal yet it seems the way in which we all come across it and experience it is unique.

And what if happiness, or at least some form of it, does come from love?  If you don't love, are you missing out on happiness?

heterotaxia

"You love, love, love
when you know I can't love
you love, love, love
when you know I can't love you
so I think it's best we both forget
before we dwell on it..."
-Of Monsters and Men, Love Love Love

If someone says they love you but they don't show it, does it really count?

It's like living in poverty with a million dollar bank account no one told you about.  You're rich but you're not rich.  You're blessed but you're not blessed.  You're loved but you're not loved.  

I don't want to say not being in a relationship has been detrimental to my self-worth but I don't think it's helped.  I just keep thinking how I'm 27 and have never connected with anyone on a deep, meaningful level.  And the one time I thought I did, well, it disintegrated and completely changed the way I saw people.  If that strong of a friendship could crumble, there was no hope for me and anyone else.

But stuff happens.  People form relationships and those relationships sometimes end due to any number of circumstances.  And sometimes you're left wallowing in your own cesspool of self-doubt because no one else comes along to help you correct your interpersonal errors.  Sometimes locations and circumstances make it hard to hone in on a partner.  Or even a friend.

There must be some benefit to being told your loved by someone outside your bloodline.  They can be with anyone but they choose to be with you.  They open their hearts to the possibility of pain and see through the marks on your skin and the mistakes in your mind.  Someone out there came to you and decided to stay because you were worth getting to know.  For me, people have come into my life but it's the staying part that seems so difficult.  Do I subconsciously drive people away?  Do they just get tired of my incessant self-deprecation?  Or do they get bored with my personality?

I often feel like a novelty act, a brand new Brannon still in the cellophane and once the protective casing has been cut away and I've been squeezed of jokes and encouragement and conversation, I am discarded.  The newness wears away as the imperfections poke through the shellacked surface that's eventually worn away through long exchanges and lots of laughs and eventual awkward pauses.  Then missed e-mails.  Unanswered text messages.  Phone calls not returned.  There's something about me that hooks people in but once they've penetrated whatever "thing" magnetizes them to me, they realize I am too flawed, too flat, too frail to stick with and they eventually pull out.

I'm not trying to make myself look like a victim.  I know you think I am.  But I'm not.  And I am not blaming anyone who has gone away.  I wouldn't want to put up with someone like myself either!  The novelty becomes a nuisance after a while.  And everyone says they aren't like everyone else.  They'll stick around.  They never do.  Some stay longer than others, but for me, it's just a waiting game.  Classmates never called when class was over.  Co-workers never kept in contact when they found better jobs.  Old roommates haven't written.  It hurts.  It hurts so bad.  But I'm not bitter about it and I don't blame them.  I just take it for what it is: another form of rejection, just a slow kind, a knife plunged inside by inches. 

duck, duck, noose

"I'm sorry for the way I am
I'm tired of waiting for the past
I'm lookin' for a better place
I'm longin' for findin' my way around..."
-Groove Armada, History

I feel like we are living in an age of one-sided relationships.  We as social network users put ourselves out into the world and allow anyone with an Internet connection to get to know us through our words or art or music or favorite movies, etc.  And we never know who's watching, who has taken an interest in us, who forms feelings for us based on mutual love for zombies or writing or puppies or Sweet Brown memes.  We build our personalities through our blogs and Tumblrs and other sites and that creates the potential for trouble.  

The problem with following someone through their social networking sites before you get to actually know them is you've already taken the time to shape who you think they are in your head, forming a one-sided sense of who they are through their words.  And you see these commonalities and connections and when you finally talk to that person, you expect the two of you to click and hit it off right away.  Sometimes it actually happens.  Sometimes it doesn't.  And in the times it doesn't, you feel disappointed.  I've been let down.  I wonder how it didn't work out.  We have so much in common.  We've walked the same paths.  Maybe I'm ugly.  Maybe I try to hard.  Maybe the other person is just looking for a certain type of person to befriend.  Maybe the other person just doesn't have room for one more friend.

I think we've all been through this.  We all know how it feels to follow someone who doesn't know we exist or couldn't care less if they did.  It's definitely disheartening and as painful as it can feel, we shouldn't take it personally. 

I try to remember it's not my fault and it's not the other person's fault.  Sometimes two people just don't connect.  Sometimes you're the one with no interest and sometimes the other person has no interest in you.  I've been on both sides of the situation and both are difficult but at least I can understand when someone does not want to talk to me and I can leave it alone and deal with my issues without pulling the other person into my muddled mind.

Those polar opposite examples sum up my relationships with everyone throughout my life.  It's almost always been one-sided.  Any mutual interests have been superficial friendships or genuine good relationships I eventually wrecked due to my insecurity and selfishness.  But despite these many mishaps, I feel like I've tried to continue to branch out, connect, and make new relationships.  I have not been very successful.

The only problem is when I meet someone new, especially someone I admire or respect as an artist, I over think and over analyze my words and actions.  I want to be cool and smart and easy to talk to.  I want to be funny.  I want to be liked.  And sometimes I think the stress of trying not to show my craziness becomes more trouble than the relationship is worth.  I just don't know how to interact with people in a natural, effortless manner.  I feel like every move and word is calculated and it's exhausting.

The stress makes me want to withdraw.  I don't feel cut out to be a sociable creature.  Nice effort, Bran, but no success.  It messes me up because I don't want to be isolated.  I want to be able to reach out and have someone there.  But am I deserving of it?  Can I handle it?  Have I been mishandling all my relationships and that's why I don't feel fulfilled by any of them?  Or am I just over thinking again?

There is an ebb and flow to every relationship.  I'm not going to be great all the time but I'm just so terrified of losing people that I feel like one awkward moment or social slip would mean the demise of the relationship.  And as lonely as I might feel, the frustration of dealing with forming a fellowship doesn't feel worth the hassle anymore.  Maybe I'm alone for a reason.  Maybe I'm mean to be a loner.  I can talk with people and share and give and take but at the end of the day, all I have is myself, which would be fine if I liked myself, but you've got to like yourself before anyone can like you.  Or some horse crap like that.  I always end up feeling empty.

I walk around this circle of people and inspect and analyze and hone in on those I feel have potential and when I choose, the race is on and they chase me down and knock me over the head with my own insecurities.  But they aren't really doing anything.  I think I'm in control, that I'm choosing carefully, that I don't just let anyone in.  I think I'm being particular in picking these people out but I'm really just picking myself apart.

with guitar strings to guide us

I want to make out to some good music.

I just want to make out.

I really just want to make it through knowing I have no one to make out with.

a couple of perks

I watched The Perks of Being a Wallflower last weekend and it was great and it made me both happy and sad.  I related to Charlie, the main character and an outcast of sorts.  I could not relate to the Charlie who finally found a place he belonged.  But good for him.

I just wondered if there was a story out there about a boy who never found his place.  Where was the tale of the guy who sat at the lunch room table by himself?  Where's the book about the boy who reached the end and found nothing was resolved?  Stories like that don't exist because people don't want a depressing ending.  They need to have hope for the boy because they are the boy and if the boy doesn't make a connection, they fear they won't either and no one wants to consider that could be a reality for them.

So we set him up with some good friends and a crush and he gets kissed and holds hands under the stars and it's book perfect.  And we feel both happy and sad because we don't have that but the boy is us and so if he finds it, so will we.

But some people know better.

In the movie (and book), Charlie writes letters to someone, chronicling a year in his life, but we are never told who he writes.  And it made me want to write letters to anonymous people, too.  What if I selected an address out of the phone book and wrote to this stranger, told him or her what was going on in my life?  What if I sent several strangers these kinds of letters?  What if I followed up every month or two?  "Hi, it's me again.  This is what has happened since the last time I wrote you."  But I'd keep myself anonymous as well.  A letter written from the heart and sent to one stranger from another.

Of course, it could be borderline creepy.

I think there's something kind of romantic and beautiful about reaching out to a complete stranger, making an intimate connection, sharing personal struggles and triumphs through a filter of anonymity.  I like the juxtaposition and the...well, borderline creepiness of it, to be honest.  I just know if someone sent me a random anonymous letter that let me glimpse into their life, I'd be fascinated.  Well, it was a good life with good writing, of course.  I don't need anyone sending me their school schedule or grocery list.

Oh, and I listened to the author/director commentary after I watched the movie and it was almost better than the movie.  He delves deeper into the book and the movie and the characters and how he felt about making the movie and writing the book and all the feels he tried to capture and it was just nice and warm and beautiful and I recommend it.

every night is a knife

I don't want to be here anymore.

I don't want to be         anymore.

in spite of the frost

"You're not alone, you'll never be
just like the stars lay over sea..."
-Jem, You Will Make It

"This could be a movie, this could be our final act,
we don't need these happy endings..."
-Funeral for a Friend, Drive

Hands 10 and 2.

He watched the broken yellow lines slide beneath his car, one after the other, hypnotic in repetition. Gliding through liquid time and space. The drive, the road, the interior reaching different levels of quiet calm. The kiss of wind. The lulling hum of the engine. The soft squeak of leather from shifting matter and a thumping chest. He turned up the music and exhaled as the tempo traced 'round his ears. Steam from the coffee in his cup holder rose and twirled in the air.

He felt the warmth in spite of the broken heater and the frost outside. It wrapped around him. Around them.

He reached across the caffeine and crumbs and slid his hand in hers. He kept his eyes on the road, his concentration on the yellow lines, his skin on the other, foreign skin.  Cashmere atop tendons.  Cool and fragile.  A burst of nerve cell signals.

He had written this scene so obsessively, dreamed this dream for so long, a dream miles away from reality.  Was it possible that when she came to him, materialized in bones and blue eyes, he had willed her into being?  Had he etched her into the interior of his retinas, cones and rods vibrating, crafting her shape and angles? Or had the divine hand peeled back its palm and formed her with featherlight lips and sent her to him?

Did such mercy exist?

As far as his memory could reach, he had traveled with a knife in his neck. It was a pain he knew better than himself. An old companion. A disease he wore like a winter coat. And then she came and withdrew the blade with breathtaking ease. Without the obstruction, he was able to look up away from the dirt and into the sky.  Eyes opened with a mobile spine.  This was how humans lived, how they felt.  This was the way it always could have been.

He was a pauper turned to a prince. A bug into a boy.  He wasn't used to such delectable treatment from anyone. It was scary and unnerving and unrelenting. It was decadence and sugar and flooding. It was a revelation, a religious awakening.  God existed in the space between pressed lips and pounding hearts.

Despite his resolve, he smiled, sank into the seats and into the moment, fleeting pleasures of pavement and porcelain.  The sun was spinning back around to find him but for those moments, the world was asleep and they could sneak away to enjoy the shadow sky, just the two of them, reveling in the moonshine and kissing under the holes poked through the charcoal veil of heaven.

He said if only they could escape the sun, driving off the path and into their own world, from gravel to grass to galaxy, they'd be free of it all.  She whispered something but the music drowned out her words, consonants cut up and lost in the percussion. 

He felt her touch withdraw. He looked down and noticed the cold coffee.  He looked to his right but only saw a blur of green from the passenger's window as the trees rushed past him, felt the jolt of a popped valve, smelled the black streak parallel to the yellow lines. 

He found his answer. 

He watched, suspended, his neck tensed, as the trees lifted off the ground and tumbled in the sky.

vent-ricles

Feel free to skip this as it has no significance other than me ranting about retail and who really gives a crap?

my lorazepam says i'm happy for you

"We'll never be the same, never feel this way again
I'd give you anything but you want pain
 little water please, I taste you all over my teeth..."
-Jimmy Eat World, Just Tonight...

"She'll break your heart like she broke mine
bipolar, baby, make up your mind..."
-Forever the Sickest Kids, Bipolar, Baby

Wednesday at work, I had lunch with work girlfriend (WG) as we tend to do when we work the same shift.  Everything was fine and well until we clocked in to go back to work and a coworker walked toward us.  The coworker pointed to WG's hands and said, "Why are you hiding that?"

I looked over to see what the coworker was talking about and WG, who conveniently had her left hand covered with her right, uncovered lefty and held it up.

The coworker looked at me and said, "He did a good job, didn't he?"

Confused, I didn't reply.  I just looked at WG.  She held her left hand closer to me and pointed to a shiny silver ring.

"What's...that?" I asked, still confused.

"I'm engaged," WG said.

And my reaction went a little something like this:

"Da fuck?"

holding severed hands

"You wish that you won't wake up but you can't even get to sleep
six feet under for these six months, just dying to be buried..."
-Sacha Sacket, Sweet Suicide

"I'm waiting for blood to flow to my fingers
I'll be all right when my hands get warm..."
-Dashboard Confessional, The Best Deceptions

I've come across peculiar customers throughout my years in retail.  One gentleman used to come in through the rear entrance of the store and always went through my area to get to the jewelry department.  He was a tall man in his late 40s with a big, round belly.  He always wore polo shirts, shorts, and white crew socks that stuck out from tennis shoes, no matter the weather.  His shaggy hair was brown and unkempt, swept across his brown eyes and over his ears.  He had bristly hair that hung down from the nostrils of his Roman nose. 

He liked to pass the time talking to the jewelry associates, sometimes spending a whole hour looking at jewelry and chatting.  Sometimes he branched away from jewelry and talked to other associates in other departments.  Eventually, he made his way to my department to talk to me.  He spoke with a deep, booming voice and also with a lisp.  As he talked, his tongue darted between his small, brown teeth, muffling his "s" sounds.  Right away, I could tell he had a mental handicap.  He often spoke in circles, repeating himself as he stood with his hand propped on his jutted hip.  He talked about the weather a lot, hoping for rain or wind to break the southern heat.

I noticed he wore women's jewelry.  His hands waved in the air as he talked and I noticed several rings on his fingers.  The bands were thin gold that supported small diamonds.  He also wore a delicately thin necklace with a heart pendent nestled in the hair that crawled up over his open shirt collar.

I inquired about his taste in jewelry to one of my coworkers one day and she said the rings and necklace belonged to his dead mother.  He wore them to feel closer to her.  I didn't know if I thought that was touching or creepy.  Maybe a bit of both.

He also bought a lot of women's panties and his name was Roger.

But out of all his eccentricities, his incessant talking was the most problematic.  He talked about things I was not interested in, therefore it was painful to stand through one of his rants or daydreams.  He also often showed up when I was busiest and, not wanting to be rude, I stopped what I was doing to listen to him talk about hoping to win the Publisher's Clearing House Sweepstakes and what he would do with his windfall.  I mostly nodded and even chuckled when appropriate.  Sometimes I folded a stack of shirts and then picked them up and slowly walked away from him to give him the hint that I needed to get back to work but he never picked up on any of my cues.

He made me uncomfortable in a way I couldn't articulate.  He wasn't rude or intimidating.  He was just awkward and I'm awkward as well so we didn't make a great pair.  I found myself hoping a customer would need help or the phone would ring so I could shimmy my way out of his conversational grip.  It came to a point that when I saw him stomping my way, I sprinted in the opposite direction so as to avoid his laser gaze.

I've known him for years.  He was one of many customers that I'd see and feel that sense of familiarity coupled with a bit of unease, but nothing I couldn't handle.  In his own way, he was a part of my routine, a consistent face, an expected presence during my time at work. 

While I was on vacation, he shot and killed himself.

One of the scariest moments of my life was when I had to talk a good friend out of committing suicide.  We were only children back then, in the middle of our teens and awkward with acne and agony.  I wasn't writing down my life back then so the events are foggy at best but I remember I caught wind that she was thinking about taking her life and so I called her on the phone at two in the morning and tried to calm her down.  She sobbed and I stuttered to find the words to talk her out of it.  I threatened to drive to her house in my threadbare pajamas if I had to just to get her to not hurt herself.

I remember the panic in my stomach and this heavy feeling of hopelessness that wrapped around me like a lead blanket.  I suppose she was feeling the same hopelessness, just filtered differently than mine.  I asked her to consider how killing herself would make her parents feel, would make me feel.  Through sloppy sobs, she told me she didn't care how it would make us feel.

I was hurt and offended but I pushed through my feelings to try to save her life.  Eventually, through an hour of calm coercion, she settled down and decided not to do it.

I didn't realize until several years later what it meant to not care about the ramifications of suicide.  I went through life with darkening eyes.  I felt the pain intensify every day, the hurt bubble up and bloom out over everything until it was all I could see.  All the laughter in my life didn't make a difference and was rendered ineffective, like putting sugar on a suture.  I realized I wanted out.  I realized how selfish it might be.  I realized I didn't care.  I saw how my friend's unconcern for my feelings was not personal.  I didn't want to hurt anyone but I was hurting more than anyone realized, more than I could express.  I was living in a skin that sizzled and the only way to stop it was to slide out of it.  Sometimes, pain is stronger than love or fear and you find yourself willing to do anything to end it, no matter who it might hurt.  It's not something you want to do but something you feel you have to do.

I think my friend didn't kill herself because she wasn't really ready.  I don't think I had much to do with it.  I was an ear and an assuring voice.  She just made a rash decision, a moment goaded by a bad day or dialogue.  I think if she was really ready, I wouldn't have been able to change her mind.  We always hope we have some kind of influence, that our love or language will steer the outcome toward life.  But I don't think that's so.  When someone is ready to go, there's no stopping them.  It may seem like a personal blow to you but it's not.  You can be there and try to create a connection.  You can reach out and hold their hand to comfort them but then you realize their hand is severed from their body and you're only holding onto a few fingers and a fledgling hope that somehow you'd be enough to make a difference.

You're not.

I kept thinking about Roger.  I didn't feel bad about him.  I wasn't upset over his death.  I wasn't going to miss him but he stayed on my mind and I wasn't sure why.  I guess I knew him enough to think it was a shame he passed away but it was also mixed with a perverted kind of reverence.  Some people think suicide is taking the coward's way out but I think it's kind of brave to belly flop into the unknown like that.  He was the first person I actually knew who had committed suicide.  This guy I saw around my store for years wasn't going to walk in with his tennis shoes and shiny gold rings on his thick knuckles anymore.  Why did he do it?  How had he summoned the sadness or courage to pull it off?  What was going through his mind?  Did he have anyone to talk to?  Did his impairment have anything to do with his death?

The possibility of ending my life is always there, always peeking its head out from under the shame and rage that fills my body.  It calls to me, reminds me it's there, waiting.  It all presses down on me until I feel crushed under the weight of every person and voice and insecurity and I have to put my hands up and wonder if I really want to die at all.  I say I do, under my breath when things go bad.  I say it almost every day.  I joke about it too much to be healthy.  But do I really mean it or am I exhaling empty threats?  

I keep imaging scenarios in which I'm faced with true death. What if a disgruntled customer comes in and points a gun at my face? Am I going to press my head against the barrel and tell him to do me a favor or am I going to piss myself and scream for mercy? If a truck comes barreling toward me, am I going to whip out of the way or am I going to stand still with a welcoming smile?  If I'm ever diagnosed with cancer, am I going to fight it or fall frail until I break apart?  Am I all talk and no toxins?   

I guess I'll never really know unless I'm confronted with the true possibility of biting it.  There's a wholly undiscovered world on the other side of a gun.  But I'm scared that world is as empty and cold as the one I'd be leaving and that's why I haven't pulled the trigger yet.  It's the unknown we fear, the possibility there really is a hell or there is nothing at all waiting for us.  We wake in emptiness and live in it and die in it and then we are extinguished.  We have to face the possibility that we are not important and our lives don't mean anything and neither do our souls.  We're all born and suffer and die and then grafted onto the Great Void and it's terrifying to think that there is no point to anything because pointlessness leads to chaos and chaos leads to death and no one wants to die. 

I have no roots, only regrets.  I have no wings, only chains.  I have nothing.  I think about my friend's nothing.  I think about Roger's nothing.  I think of the nothing hidden away inside everyone.  One day, I will be nothing.

I'm just exhausted.  It's that simple.  I'm tired and I want out.  I'm tired of living inside my head instead of living in the world. I'm tired of constantly feeling like there's nothing more to life than what I've already experienced.  I know there's more to life than what I've lived and that's almost worse because I know there's love and happiness out there and the fact that it dangles out of reach is what corrodes my insides.   My life is shallow and trivial and I've become petulant and pathetic.  I see the world through morose-colored glasses glued to my face.  The tentacles come out and lap at my face and neck and chest and sink thoughts of death and dying into me.  They slide the slime of self-hatred across my body, slicing at me until the light pours out.

I'm not ready yet.  But I'm making plans.  I've said to myself that I'll give it a few more years.  I'll give things a chance to turn around.  I'll try to turn things around myself.  I'll be proactive in producing better days.  But if I don't see a change, I'll have to get up and get out because I can't go on like this much longer.  And the consequences won't matter.  The words won't make a difference because I've come across worlds my whole life.  Words feel good on the surface but it's the actions, the feelings, the love behind them that make them effective.  And that's what's been missing all this time.  And it's kind of too late to correct that because that love would have kept me from ever getting to this point.  I'm beyond it now.  I'm coasting. 

One day, I will sever my hands so no one will be able to reach me or come running in their threadbare pajamas.  I'll be beyond help by that point.  In a lot of ways, I already am.

It'll take a miracle to move me.

dented hearts

"It's so easy from above, you can really see it all
People who belong together, lost and sad and small
But there's nothing to be done for them, it doesn't work that way 
sure we all have soulmates, but we walk past them every day..."
-Ben Folds, From Above

"Some men die under the mountain just looking for gold
Some die looking for a hand to hold..."
-Brand New, At the Bottom 

Work girlfriend (WG) went on vacation a week or so after I did.  She scampered off to Tennessee with her boyfriend.   Naturally, I didn't hear from her the entire time.  When I was gone and she had no one to talk to, she blew up my phone but when she was gone and had her boyfriend to hump and hug, she forgot my number.

A few days before she left, she sent me a text:  I'm so freaking lonely.  I say I like being a loner but I hate being alone.

Oh, I had to groan.  She has a boyfriend.  She shouldn't be lonely!  And then I stepped back and tried to examine the situation and see it from her perspective.  I try to understand that you can be in a relationship and still be lonely.  You can be in a crowded room and be all alone.  I do try to see that.  But, I just found it annoying that a girl in a happy, healthy relationship complains to me, the lord of loneliness, that she's "so freaking lonely" because she doesn't have her boyfriend right beside her at that very minute, although she was about to embark on a week-long vacation with him.

It's like going up to an Ethiopian child and saying you're starving because dinner is in three hours and you're not sure you can hang on 'til then.  And you say it while eating a bag of chips.  Ya feel me?

So, I wanted to shake her.  And days before, she told me she hadn't been single in five years.  So, again, she shouldn't be lonely.  Right?  Going from one relationship to another for five years straight, I think her perception of loneliness has been skewed.

But I stepped back again.  Who am I to say she doesn't feel loneliness?  Maybe she just feels it in a different capacity than me.  Maybe her loneliness stems from lacking a physical connection.  She knows her boyfriend loves and cares for her and if that was me, I would like to believe that it would be enough.  Even if I couldn't see the person every single day, knowing they were thinking about me and caring about me would make me feel better, less alone.  But maybe it doesn't work for her like that and she needs that physical closeness.

For me, I feel loneliness in every aspect.  I have no physical, mental, emotion, or spiritual connection with anyone.  I'm not just talking about romance, ladies and gents.  The only connections I share with some people are a mutual enjoyment of writing and maybe zombies and a couple of dick jokes.  Not exactly deep and meaningful.  So while my loneliness is all consuming, it doesn't negate hers (although it feels like it should).

Her loneliness is transient.  Mine is chronic.  But both are valid.  I try to believe that.

And it's just hard because I want to tell her she should be grateful for her boyfriend.  It's not like she's in a relationship just to be with someone.  But she seems genuinely happy.  She's not hanging out with him until something better comes along.  No, that's what she does with me.  And so I just wonder what more she needs.  At the end of the day, despite how she feels, she has someone she can "come home to" so to speak.  I've got my pillows and a carton of ice cream.  But I can't be like that because, as I said, her troubles are no less significant than mine.

But when it comes to loneliness, I'm an expert and I can't take her seriously.  In fact, if it were doled out in credits, I'd have a Ph.D. in Dented Hearts by now.  It's hard for me to understand because I've never been in the position of being with someone and still feeling hollow just as she can't understand my emptiness because she's been attached to a string of guys for half a decade now.  I try to be reasonable.  I really do.  But I don't feel bad for her.  It's hard to when all I can hear is the crinkling of her potato chip bag in my ear.

vestiges of humanity

"I am so scared of what will kill me in the end
for I am not prepared
I hope I will get the chance to be someone
to be human..."
-Ellie Goulding, Human

"I'm not attached to your world
nothing heals and nothing grows..."
-Marilyn Manson, Great Big White World

What does it mean to be human?  Is it our physical makeup, the fact that we get up and walk around on two legs?  Or is it something more abstract and intrinsic?  Is it logic and intricate thought?  Morals and judgments?  Is it love?  Faith?  Boredom?  Is it the invisible wires and nooses or the concrete machinery and hands that hold us to humanity?

Is it textbook or contextual?

I go through periods of wanting desperately to make a connection with someone, to feel grounded to the earth by love and affection and mutual respect and admiration.  There are also periods when I want to be completely isolated and left alone to rot away inside myself.

The unfortunate fact is I usually get my wish when I don't want it.  When I'm by myself, I want company.  When I'm in the presence of people, I want to dash away.

Loneliness once made me its bitch but one day I turned around and drop kicked it into the ether.  I've been better ever since.  That's not to say I still don't feel pangs of loneliness.  It's an unrelenting feeling always scratching at the skin on my chest, begging to get in and make itself home.  But I keep it away with distractions.  I go through an assembly line of lethargy consisting of waking up, eating, Internet, television, eating, eating, pooping, eating, more television, eating, going to sleep, and repeating it all the next day, all in an effort not to face myself or what my life has become.

I'm going to die and it's just not going to matter.  I don't think I've greatly affected anyone and it makes me a little sad to know I quietly slipped into life and will exit the same way.

To some degree, all of our lives are meaningless, at least when you look at the big picture.  The husband who dies doesn't matter to you unless you're his wife.  The child who dies is quickly forgotten unless you're her parent.  We all come and go and the world does not stop to scream and that's okay.

We all can't be in the history books but because I am not influential to anyone in my personal life, my ambition spread to the world.  What if I could impact the masses?  I always hoped I could leave some lasting impression through my art.  But I'm not an artist anymore.  I hoped I could leave a legacy with my writing.  But I'm not a writer anymore.  Okay, so what am I?  What can I do well?  What can I accomplish?  What kind of mark can I leave on the world?  Wait, maybe I need to lower my standards.  What kind of mark can I leave on people?  Still not so sure.

I'm not the boyfriend who taught the girl how to love.  I'm not the child who taught the parents how to think.  I'm not the artist who taught the world how to see.  No one carries me in their iPod or Kindle or in their hearts or minds.

"He's dead.  That's a shame.  Who's on Letterman tonight?"

I've kept my capillaries to myself and consequently, I've converted into a claustrophobic outcast.  I don't know what it means to love another person.  I can relate to people and their situations but beyond that I just don't get it.  What makes you like someone as a friend, as a lover, as a spouse?  I can't comprehend dizziness over another individual, kisses that weaken muscles, love that causes tears.  Is that what being human is all about?  Is it connecting, sacrificing, giving oneself to someone else?  Or is being human a process, a journey of faith and interaction and giving?

I've given humanity a shot.  I've tried to be kind and considerate.  I've sacrificed my own comfort and happiness many times to improve the quality of other people's lives.  I've been respectful.  I've been a team player.  I've hurt with a smile, cried with a laugh, died with a joke.  I've hugged and held hands and kissed and never felt anything but a sweeping sickness in me telling me it wasn't right.  I wasn't meant for it.  Sometimes I keep trying.  But mostly I'm over it.

I cut people out of my life easily these days.  I used to hang on in hopes something would spark but I see now it's mostly useless.  The only genuine relationship I had was something I screwed up, which tells me I am just not capable of maintaining a connection.  If they don't leave me by their own volition, I will force them to with my frustrating nature.

I'm consistently disappointed with people because they do not carry out the roles I have set for them.  It's not their fault and I don't know why I do it.  Maybe because I never had a group of people in my life who came along naturally to fulfill certain needs.  Now, I have to make up for that lost fulfillment by coming across those with roles to occupy.  These people don't know they are playing a part and it frustrates me when they don't act the way I want.  I construct these elaborate dramas to feel included.  To have a story to tell.  To cover up the truth of my deviancy.

"Yes, I've been involved.  Yes, I've had my heart broken.  Yes, I've loved and I've lost.  Yes, I've experienced."

No, I haven't.

Instead, I fall apart and break bonds.

I can't accept anyone for anything other than what I want them to be and that is selfish and shameful.  But no one sees that because I'm playing a part, too.  I take on the role of human, someone who complies with love and decency and understands the value of relationships.  But inside, emptiness is the only thing I understand.

p.a.p.p.

"It's like a splash of water to my face when I suddenly realize
that you could never find a place for me in your eyes
and I don't know why I keep thinking
one day I'll turn around, I'll see your hand reach out
I'm only fooling myself..."
-Kate Voegele, Only Fooling Myself

Work girlfriend blew me off twice in a matter of minutes.  On Tuesday, I said I'd wait an hour after work today so we could hang out when she got off and she said that was good and let me get excited and then said she had other plans.  I told her we could hang out some other time.

Later on, she said she'd wait an hour after she was done with work that day until I got off so we could have some frozen yogurt at a new place that opened up in town.  I got excited again and then a few minutes later she said she had take care of some things and couldn't wait until I was done with my shift.

If she's got plans, that's fine.  I just don't get why she said she'd hang and then take it back.

Yet, last week, she asked if we could do lunch together since we were put on the same shift, which is a rarity.  I said I would but then realized I didn't have to work that day after all (the whole jury duty thing messed up my schedule) but I told her I would go into town and do lunch with her anyway since I already said I would.  I really didn't feel like going into town on my day off but I went anyway.  I didn't take it back.

It was such a small thing but it confirmed to me that she won't go out of her way to see me like I would to see her.  That makes me want to withdraw, to cut off whatever relationship beyond work we have.

It feels kind of silly.

Her boyfriend goes away for work a lot so I think I'm her substitute boyfriend until he gets back.  It's like she's split her boyfriend into two physical beings.  I'm the fun, flirty part of the relationship.  He's the sex and intimacy.  And I understand that we all have our favorites at work and we all play a part and fill a role but she interacts with me outside of work, too.  She texts me throughout the day on an almost daily basis.  She's even told me that she talks about me to her friends all the time.  And in a sightly stunning revelation the other day, she casually mentioned it was her ex-ex-boyfriend's birthday and I said as a joke, "Oh, you still remember?  Still got feelings for him?"

"Yeah," she said.  "I mean, I wouldn't run off with him but sometimes, yeah."

"Hey, now, you're only supposed to have feelings for one guy.  Me!"

She looked at me and smiled and said, "Well, sometimes."

"Really?  I was just kidding.  I meant your real boyfriend."

"Come on, Bran, don't make me blush!"

I'm going to start a campaign called People Against Penis Placeholding, or P.A.P.P. for short.  Kind of like Mothers Against Drunk Driving (M.A.D.D.) but more important.  Please girls, don't do this to guys.  It's hurtful.

I'm starting to see she likes to talk to me or be around me when it's easy for her.  But she wont' bother when it takes effort.  And that hurts.  And it reaffirms my belief that I invest more into people than they invest in me.  And that's why I don't even have relationships with people.  That's why I seem cold and distant.  It's because I don't want to get pulled into something and then torn out of it.

I have to admit, she roped me good.

Makes me want to withdraw from everyone.

I know it's such a small thing but this is the kind of behavior I've gotten from girls...and people in general...all my life.  I'm never special enough to be someone's number one.  I'm the backup.  I'm the guy people talk to when everyone else is busy.  I'm the last resort.  And that's cool.  I accept that.  It's just not fun to be reminded of it, especially by someone you might like slightly more than a friend.

All these little incidences have added up to the point of zero tolerance and all present and future violations against my heart means you're out!  I just don't have the time or temperament to feel crappy over a non-existent thing.  She can sleep easy because she has someone waiting for her when she gets home.  She's got her choice of men, taking something away from a guy who never had anything at all.

I never wanted to be the kind of guy who griped about...girls.  I don't do relationships.  I don't do liking people.  I don't do heart.  That's not me.  And this is a good example of why.  My circuits are sparking and I don't want to talk about her anymore.

fearfully and wonderfully slayed, part 2

"Just let your faith die..."
-AFI, Sacrilege

I hear people say that unanswered prayers are still answered.  I keep thinking of that stupid footprints story.  Maybe you've seen me through all the pain and I never realized it or maybe I just made it on my own.  How will I ever know because you'll never tell me!  How can I keep the faith when there's no sign, no feeling, no subtle recognition to keep me going, to let me know I'm doing the right thing?  Am I just wasting my time? 
 
I kept praying, turned away from my sins, tried to think positive thoughts, focused on you and nothing ever changed.  I was empty on the inside and disappointed with the nothing in the sky.  Why couldn't I get a sign or a feeling of reassurance?  Why was there such a disconnect between me and you?  Was I still doing something so wrong as to keep you so far away?
 
I looked for you and only saw sadness.  I saw confusion over the course my life had taken.  I saw this little boy who sat alone, teary-eyed, wondering where the love and comfort was that was promised to him in a big book with big words and big promises if only he would believe in it all.
 
I believed in you.  But you didn't believe in me.

I put everything into college and it was the biggest financial and emotional mistake of my life, one that I will likely pay for until I die, which will probably be sooner than later.  Not only did college not work out but I barely scraped through graduation with all of my limbs.  My mind was destroyed as well as my spirit.

fearfully and wonderfully slayed, part 1

"If I ask you 'what is truth' will you be silent still?
My questions and doubts made a chasm
That I fear you can not fill..."
-Showbread, The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things
 
I met up with God the other day.  He actually let me record our conversation and I have conveniently transcribed it for you.  We had a long talk, or actually I had a lot to say to him.  You might notice he was sparse with the responses, which wasn't surprising.  Below is our exchange.

Me:  What's up, Lord?  I know you're busy not answering prayers and and standing idly by as the world crumbles, yet somehow swooping in and saving certain individuals from damnation to propel the proselytizing of non-believers, but we need to have some tea and a chat.  You've been dodging me for twenty-six years so the very least you can do is spare me a few minutes. 

God:  *irritated, pointing to iPhone*

Me:  Sure, I'll let you finish your call.  Tell Jesus I said hi and that I miss him.

God hangs up after several minutes, looks at me, becomes morose.

Me:  Please, have a seat.  Can I get you a Snuggie?  Nescafe?  Comfortable?  Good.  This is gonna take a while.

God:  *rolls eyes*

Me:  I hate to be negative right from the start so let's get to the good stuff first, shall we?  First of all, I am an incredibly fortunate individual.  I guess you'd prefer the term "blessed".  Sure, we can use your terminology.  I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and say you played some part in the positive aspects of my life.  I've never starved because my family couldn't afford food.  I've never been beaten by my mother or molested by my father.  I've never been left out in the cold or went without adequate clothing.  I've never had loved ones torn away from me by death or divorce.

My life is easy.

But I am absolutely miserable.   

I know this doesn't make much sense but please hear me out, okay?  As much as you might want to lambast me, I've already beaten myself up about it plenty of times.  I feel guilty and selfish because there's no real reason why I should be so miserable.  Looking at me from an outsider's point of view, I have no reason to be sad or even complain at all.  There are people who struggle twice as much as I do and aren't half as unhappy.  It's not something I can explain.  Believe me, I've tried to figure it out.  It's just those small things I've mentioned before, the small slices of pain life inflicts, the paper cuts that add up to amputation.

graphic tease

While at work, a man came through my department.  He was in his fifties, salt and pepper hair underneath a worn red Alabama football team hat, his eyeglasses shining under the florescent lights.

"Hey, it's pastor John," he said into the phone.  "Just calling to check in on you..."  His voice trailed off as he walked away from me.  I turned around and watched him.

A pastor.

I haven't had the best experiences with pastors in the past at work and I wondered if this guy would be different.  In fact, I was counting on it.  So, when he eventually left the store, I turned to God.


"God, here's a sign for me," I silently prayed.  I had given up on God giving me straightforward reassurance through a peaceful feeling or a calming voice swirling through the concha of my ear so I hoped for signs, obvious objects that would soothe my skepticism.  A quote.  A song.  A person.  A pastor.

"Please God, just let that man come back.  Use him," I said.  I prayed the man would feel some overwhelming need to come to me, to tell me that I will be okay.  God would use him as my sign, my assurance.  "I'll give it five minutes.  Please, have him come back within five minutes to let me know you're with me."

I watched the clock and counted down the minutes.  I felt stupid doing this but people witnessed miracles every day so would it really be that out of the ordinary for this pastor to come back to give me a sign I've been so desperate for for so long now?  The best part was no one would know.  It would be between me and God.  My own little miracle in the men's department.

Five minutes passed.  He didn't show.

I was a little disappointed but I wasn't all that surprised.  I know it was a silly request and it's not like my faith was resting on whether or not the pastor showed up.  But, hey, never hurt's to ask, right?  I thought I'd give it a shot.

I grabbed a bunch of strewn shirts and went back to my counter to fold them.  I zoned out as I stacked the perfectly folded shirts and when I looked up, the pastor was coming toward me.

My heart swelled.  He was coming back after all, just a little later than I laid out.  We were playing on God's time.  That was fine by me, as long as I received my affirmation.

As he got closer, I couldn't keep the smile from blooming across my face.  I looked up to greet him and he walked right past me.

My heart shrank back to its original shriveled prune size.

I stood among the graphic tees and witnessed God's graphic tease, dangling hope in front of me and pulling it away, constantly pulling it away, magnifying the hurt swirling inside me.  Like I said, I know it was a silly prayer and kind of a dumb thing to ask but it was one thing to let the man just walk away the first time and never see him again but having him come back in my sight only to walk away again just felt cruel.

I wished I hadn't even brought it up.  I did it on myself.  Stupid prayers on a whim that turned into more of a hassle than they were worth.  I should have put the pastor out of my mind and went on about my day without bringing myself down.      

It's the way God and I roll these days.  I ask for guidance and get gutted.  I ask for good days and receive depression.  It's in those moments that it doesn't feel like the actions and circumstances that I encounter are due to free will.  It feels like God is directly linked to my lacerations.  Are those my signs?  I don't know if I should be relieved that God is finally presenting himself or dismayed that he's proving his existence by eviscerating me.

I know I have it wrong.  My perspective is off.  I'm making too much of a not-so-close encounter with an unaware man of God.  I'm making too much of God's lack of involvement in my life.  Doesn't mean it doesn't still hurt.  

He keeps holding onto my head, keeping me at arm's length so I can't reach around his waist and hold tight.  I struggle, fighting to have faith in him and all I can feel is that hand, pushing away, rejecting me, maybe testing me, maybe seeing how long it'll take before the fight finally falls out of me.

It won't be much longer.

connection II

"I have no need of friendship, friendship causes pain, 
it's laughter and it's loving I disdain,
I am a rock, I am an island..."
-Simon and Garfunkel, I am a Rock

"I'm not a popsicle, I won't melt away..."
-Zolof the Rock and Roll Destroyer, Popsicle

The funny thing is, a lot of the time these people come to me.  They seek me out and tell me it will be okay and they're going to stick around and as soon as I believe it, they peace out.  I think it would be one thing if I went looking for that kind of pain but it often falls right into my lap.

I have enough trouble making connections with people and I usually try to keep my guard up but once I think someone is in it for the long haul, I allow them in.  People unnerve me enough as it is even when my guard is up so imagine how they invade my senses when I allow it.  But they tear down my insides and slip out of my skin and leave this kind of emptiness in their wake.  And I'm left dumbfounded.  What just happened?  Where did they go?  Why did they do this to me?

When someone says they will stick around, that's pretty much the kiss of death for me.  That's my signal.  My warning sign.  Exit immediately to your left!  Pain approaches!  Get out while you still can!

I've mentioned this before but it bears repeating.  In high school, many acquaintances entangled in messy relationships often told me they contemplated putting up impenetrable walls forever because of the hurt and rejection they endured in past relationships.  I thought that was silly and told them such.  You can't shut everyone out because you'll end up blocking someone special.

But I understand their defense mechanisms now.

No, I am not going to build a wall forever.  Maybe for just a little while.  Or maybe at least pull back.  If I had my crap together, I wouldn't go through these highs and lows with other people.  I wouldn't need anyone's confidence or affirmations because I would be self-sufficient but because I'm not, I have to rely on other people to feel like anything at all and that is a dangerous position to be in because people are not perfect.  They're fickle and unpredictable and it's no one's job to make you feel better about yourself.  I think in my case, most don't even know they're doing it and once they stop doing it, I feel bitter.  Why did you stop?  Why did you go away?  Don't you know how bad I need you?  But there's no way to win because I need them to define me but once I allow them to, they go in and cause me a lot of mayhem.

I just kind of stand around and do my thing and people come and pick me up.  I don't try to be swept away with their kindness.  I can't help if I'm an easy sell.  Maybe it's because I'm so desperate for companionship in just about any form I can get that I'll go for whatever someone's throwing my way.  Naturally, the insecurities set in long before that person really has any resonance in my life but once they do, I'm hooked.  I'm trusting.

I'm doomed.

I don't know how to resolve this problem.  I suppose if I was stronger, that would be resolution enough.  Another douche ditched me?  No big.  I can move on because my worth does not stem from their opinion of me.  Bah, if only it were that simple.  It is, really, if only I actually believed it.  But I can work on that.  And I should, pronto, before I pull one of those high school moves and shut everyone down to protect myself from hit-and-run relationships.

The really embarrassing thing is I'm not even talking about romantic relationships but also friendships.  Any kind of connection I have with someone, whether it be a special girl or a guy friend.  I like to feel wanted, needed.  Like I'm cared about, however I can get it.  But it never lasts and the first sign of sour things to come is when they tell me they're not going anywhere.  I can think of four people just right off the top of my head who have fed me that line and I don't think they lasted more than a month or so after their declaration.

I'm becoming more and more convinced that I'm simply a loner.  My mind is too fractured to form healthy relationships with anyone, whether it be friend or girlfriend.  It doesn't mean I can't be friendly with people.  It doesn't mean I can't elicit a smile or a chuckle.  Just not love.  Just not loyalty.  Just not anything deeper than a fart joke or conversations where I try to keep up with intellectual discussions and pretend I know what they are talking about.

I'm not even blaming anyone.  There comes a point where you can think that it's someone else's problem, that everyone else is screwing things up but when you consistently face failed relationships, you have to sit back and wonder if you aren't at least contributing a little bit.  Here is where I fully admit that I probably contribute a ton of trouble and therefore run people off.  That's cool.  I don't mean to.  I can't help it.  My head won't allow me to just be comfortable with the way things are.  I'm paranoid, never trusting anyone.  Why do they want to be friends with a fraud like me?  Why haven't they responded to my text?  Are they laughing with me or at me?

I don't know what's going to change my mentality.  I've realized over the years that mental damage is not easily treatable.  That's not to say it's impossible but it's hard enough to even recognize there's a problem in your brain.  We are often unaware of how we behave...or at least I'm usually unaware.  It's only through my lonely introspection do I begin to decipher the day and realize I screw up continuously.  But that introspection only takes me so far, only helps me identify what I think my problems might be.  But where does the resolution come in?  Therapy?  Prayer?  Friendship?  I've tried it all without success.

I often feel that I'll be stuck like this and I often don't even mind.  I've gone so long without really knowing someone on a deep, personal, and intimate level that it almost doesn't matter if I ever do.  You never know what you're missing until you get it but if I never get it, I'll never know.  Blissfully unaware?  

I used to feel the pull of people but now the call of the great void is the only comfort I can find.  

you is we

I'm perplexed.

Sometimes I feel like people don't understand my writing.  One of the reasons I write such long entries is because I try to explain myself so thoroughly so as to be as clear as possible.  As I write, I always try to keep the reader in mind, always try to come up with questions they may have or points they want to bring up and then address those questions/points right there in the entry.

Sometimes I think this helps convey a deeper, more well-rounded comprehension of the topic at hand and other times I think I end up making my thoughts more muddled.  I wonder if, because of the length of my entries, some people just skim to get a general idea of what I'm writing and then throw a note my way, which happens to bring up a point already covered in the entry.  And I get confused because I think to myself, I already covered that.  It can get frustrating sometimes because I second guess myself, wondering if I did indeed properly convey my message.

But then I get notes from diarists who say they can relate, that I wrote exactly what they would have written had they covered the same topic.  And it feels so good.  I think to myself, Hey, I just made a connection there.  It feels good to be able to share a feeling or thought or opinion and even better to know that someone gets it because a lot of the time, I don't think anyone does.

But that's a silly way to feel.  I keep struggling to realize that no one is really alone as far as their thoughts and feelings go.  No one has ever felt a unique emotion.  Circumstances and individual experiences will differ, of course, but the feelings are all the same.  We all feel the desire, the hunger, the joy, the fear, the lust, the anticipation.  We've all gone through that a time or two (or a million).

When you strip away the backgrounds and upbringings, the religion and the prejudices, we are all alike.  We are all human.  We all bleed the same and love the same and hurt the same.  We are all connected.  We are all each other.  Our differences are minimal in comparison to our similarities.  But it's those insignificant differences that drive us apart so many times and it helps us to forget that we all want the same stuff.  We all want love.  We all want to be happy.  We all want to be accepted and recognized and it hurts me when I see those who don't get the recognition they deserve.   

I browse random people's diaries and Tumblrs and other blog-type social websites and my chest grows heavy with all the pain and despondency I come across.  We're all hurting to some degree.  We are all lacking something in our lives and I wonder if that's what's supposed to drive to keep us going.  What if that pain is supposed to propel us forward?  But it often causes us to back peddle.  Maybe we are meant to keep seeking until we find it is what we are looking for.  But do we ever find it?

It amazes we how we can be so mean to each other when all we want is to feel like we belong, to find someone to love and love us and keep us safe.  You want it and I want it so why is it that I ignore you and you tear me down?  Why do we pull apart when we are each others solution?  We tear at each other and sometimes tear at ourselves.

It seems so simple but I suppose we want it all.  People get so specific about their saviors.  They have to act the perfect way and say just the right thing and look attractive throughout.  There's been a few occasions where I could have been there for others but I didn't quite work for them, whether it was physically or emotionally, etc.  I wasn't a perfect match but I was a good fit. 

Even recently, I reached my hand out to someone only to have it slapped away because it wasn't manicured enough.  But what else can I do?  I tried.  I won't continue to seek out someone who doesn't want my help because I can't be their "everything."  There's a good chance you'll never find your "everything" in one person.  Isn't that why humans are social creatures.  To expand their limbs and touch multiple people, to find comfort in one, humor in another?

I couldn't have made all the pain go away but I could have taken away some of it because I feel that same pain.  We're all alike, remember?  I knew what the other person didn't about taking away some of the hurt but it hurt me more knowing they didn't want to hear it from me because I wasn't what they were looking for.  It's pretty typical.  I try to help people and end up hurting more.  And that's the way it goes with a lot of people.  We try, we genuinely try.  And then get torn apart and so we learn to keep our hands and opinions to ourselves.

The trick is to unhinge our hands from our bodies and reach out again, despite the possibility of more pain, despite the fear of rejection.  We can assuage the agony so why don't we?  What holds us back?  Someone else's standards?  Our own?  It makes no sense to stand in a room full of people starved of love and keep our distance with our arms folded across our chests so tight like a flesh and bone straight jacket.

We have hurt ourselves.  We have hurt each other.  We fire off words and weary like machine guns.  We spread the blood and debasement like finger paint.  We don't hug.  We don't help.  We only condition each other to hurt.

We are not monsters.  We are not animals.  We are humans.  With fragile hearts.  With fragile heads.  And the pain sets in and fogs everything until we lash inward and outward.  We separate from each other when we should pull toward each other.  It makes so much sense but it's the hardest thing in the world.