acheive nothing
September 26, 2005 / 4:06 p.m.
september 12th:
"ritchey,
i am tired and wondering why i went all the way downtown just to check my email and be bored. i have been sick the last week, although midly and so that i can still function, but also with slightly sore lymph nodes and also an impending dizzy feeling.
it's disappointing, too, because i've been eating better, and i really feel the same as when i was eating macaroni and cheese every day, with spaghetti at night, and no difference.
your entry about human weakness touched my heart. it's true. we are all so afraid of real life, and we're all so caught up in maintaining our levels of comfortability, even if it needs to be changed for the sake of our long-term sanity. humans are very good at not seeing the big picture, even when they say they are and believe they are. it is sad. i am the number one culprit.
for instance (kind of long story). my friend, sara, who i met in pioneer square, and who i wrote about (which you referenced last week. So she goes to europe for a month and a half. and writes me the entire time, telling me how much she misses me, how much she is looking forward to seeing me again and hanging out. she gets back to portland almost a month ago, and in that entire time i have accidently run into her twice, and made plans to hang out about five times, all of which she stood me up on. all with no explanation at all.
anyway, i was hesitating to get really pissed at her, just because i have ABSOLUTELY no idea what is going on with her, what she might be dealing with, anything. so i'm hanging out with my friend andie on saturday, who is sara's next door neighbor, and we're getting coffee and we're walking along belmont. but then andie says 'we should go back to my place'. and i'm like, in my head 'uggh, might see sara, she stood me up again today, might be awkward'. but i just had like three 16 ounce cups of coffee, and i decide to tag along regardless.
anyway, i'm sitting in andie's living room, talking to her boyfriend, while andie's next door talking to sara (who i still haven't seen), and i decide i'll go over to say hi.
i walk out the front door, and sara's boyfriend (who i also haven't seen in a month and a half) is sitting on the steps smoking, and i see him and smile and say hi, and he just nods his head and looks away. like basically a non-verbal 'you're a piece of shit, i don't wanna acknowledge you', but without the effort or actual confrontation.
anyway, so i go in and sara's talking to andie, and this is already as awkward as it can get, but i dont' really feel like just storming home, somehow thinking things will magically repair themselves? anyway, sara doesn't say hi to me as i sit down, doesn't acknowlege my presence, doesn't look at me, the entire time she's talking with andie with me sitting there. and then basically gets up and takes a shower.
okay, so a non coward would, first of all, have called her boyfriend out for that completely unfounded passive aggressive bullshit, and asked him what his problem was, and then he would have confronted sara for standing him up repeatededly, and would have said 'i don't think real friends should have to wait a month after you return from europe to see you. and go through being stood up 15 times before you actually feel like showing up somewhere. call me when you feel like graduating 7th grade.'
but i did none of these things, and just walked off home. completely stressed out, knowing i didn't want to be friends with this person at this point, trying to figure out why she (or they) were acting like that.
the one thing i could come up with is that jon, her boyfriend, has convinced himself that i'm trying to steal sara or am interested in her, and so he puts her feet to the fire about hanging out with me, and has that kind of reaction when he sees me.
which is, i guess, in the huge realm of possibility, possible.
but still, i never fail to dissapoint myself when it comes to chickening out of things that I am CLEARLY in need of confronting head on. I just let it drift. and it's SO not healty.
i guess anybody would probably react in the same way, or fail to really call people on their shit, just because it's so disorienting when people act like that, and when there's no logical explaination for it. and then if you do come up with an explaination, it's usually something that's really emotionally based, and you get enraged and jump to conclusions that probalby aren't true. and it just turns into something worse.
i don't know, what's your opinion?
sorry for the long story.
hmm, what's up with me. my friend becky, who i was dating for a little bit (the one who did heroin), is going to leave portland today, and wants me to drive her to the airport tonight, and wants me to keep her car while she's in minnesota for a month. which will be nice. or would be nice if it wasn't broken down. i would be able to get places, i wouldn't have to work up a sweat on my bike. i wouldn't have to pay insurance. i could just drive. and go broke affording gas. :( seriously, how the hell do you afford gas? how does anybody afford it? i was sitting at the bus stop today, watching people drive by, and i was trying to understand how people afford to eat, pay rent, etc., on top of paying hundreds of dollars a month in insurance, gas, repairs, loan payments, etc.
it just doesn't make any sense to me.
drop some knowledge.
and good luck studying.
lyle "