Compliments

Yesterday, I went out to lunch with my boss to a small Chinese fake meat cafe (on his dime) and he said I reminded him of a girl he used to date in college.  She was a contributing writer to The Sun.

I am slightly mortified by this, but I think he gave me a compliment.  He needs to work on those.

Sometimes, I just want to be alone (I think)

One of the nicer, yet ambigous parts of being a member of the working world are the fast days and weeks. When I was a student it seemed like time was either doing a slow bump and grind to an R. Kelly song, or it was on crack.  Now, it seems like my life moves past me at the speed of a quickstep, and by the time I turn around it’s the end of the workday, and it’s almost Friday.  Which is good times because this past week was pretty emotional.  I had a volunteer who’s taking a leave of absence because her mom is in her final months of life.  I cried because she’s my favorite volunteer and we’re losing her, and she shouldn’t have to lose her mother.

Fortunately the pain wasn’t felt for that long.  I’ve been emotionally sucked into this work stuff, that I barely had the time to realize that I’m spending a lot of my non work time alone.  It seems like whenever I get off work I’m relieved, more than happy to run back into the sanctuary of my closed in periwinkle walls and makeshift desk.  And to my bed, my wonderful cozy bed.  My roommate Erica pointed out that I haven’t said much to her or anyone else in the house lately, and asked if I was angry.  I assured her that I wasn’t when she invited me to go to the movies with them.  I’m just so drained from the LOA work drama that I wouldn’t have been much fun.  I just needed some time to hang out, watch What Not to Wear, and eat cereal out of a box.

I notice that I tend to spend a lot of time alone.  I’m not always in the house, but I go shopping alone, I eat alone, I volunteer alone, I go to yoga alone.  Even in my newswriting class, where I’m surrounded by people where I have at least one thing in common with them, I don’t talk to anyone else there.   I want to, but it’s hard.  It seems like everyone else knows who they want to know, and I’m not quite in that circle for whatever reason.  It’s usually because I got there too late and they don’t know me as well as they know everyone else.

I know it sounds like I’m pouting so I’m going to stop that.  There are moments, much like today, when I want to be alone.  My roommates are currently laughing it up, and it’s really nice out, but I can’t seem to bring myself to get out of my room and mingle with people.  Even being around another people is difficult.  I’m sure I have some sort of social anxiety disorder because being around other people is so strange for me.

Last week I went to a WOC spoken word and for the finale, vocalist Jennifer Johns asked people to come dance on the stage, and I wanted to, but I couldn’t join them.  It seemed so sad. It defined my college experience.  I wanted to find friends, go to parties, and do stuff like that, but I just felt trapped and stifled.  Like I was asking for something I could never have, since most of the potential friends I talked to didn’t express an interest in being my friend.  And it is like that even now, which might be why I tend to isolate myself from others.  Being around people isn’t fun, or exciting.  Talking to people and having to answer the same questions about where I grew up, what I do for fun, how many friends I have isn’t enlightening.  It feels like something I’ve done many times before like an interview.  It feels like a job.

And I’d like to stay away from things that feel like work.  So I spend most time alone because it’s easy, and it doesn’t feel like work.  When I am alone though, I miss connecting to people.  You know how some people daydream about the perfect partner?  What they’d look like, their tastes and prefereneces, what this person could provide them and vice versa?  I find myself thinking a lot about the friends I’d like to have in the future.  The thing is that I don’t know if those types of friends exist, so I daydream about them alone.  My loneliness is consistent and familiar, and feels better than rejection.  Although it’s numbing, and isolating and really depressing.

I think I want to be alone.  It’s easier, but some days I’m not sure.

Unpacking

I’m at work and I really shouldn’t be doing this, but I have ten minutes before I go off to another meeting on how to improve volunteer recruitment and appeal to potentials…yada yada yada.  Whether it’s capacity building or situaional leadership, all these workshops and trainings sound the same.  All have key words, and language usage and strategies and statistics on why these methods work.  Maybe I’m just not as excited about all this as I was six months ago, since it all seems so, routine.  And weekends are never long enough.  I spend more time doing nothing rather than enjoying what I’m doing.  Maybe I need more time off.  Maybe I need a mental health day.

 This wasn’t supposed to be a lament on work though.  I wanted to give some updates on what life has been like for the past six weeks or so, when I mysteriously stopped blogging.  It was because my internet connection was scetchy, and even though I had plenty to write about, I didn’t want anyone else to see it.  Which is why I moved over to wordpress, since some of the postings can be private.  Yay!  But I manage to move out and into a house with three other people around my age, and a dog that’s twice as strong as me.  I started volunteering at an animal shelter.  I joined a book club.  I’m in a newswriting class.  I wanted to run the AIDS marathon, but I don’t have resources needed to do that until next year, so I had to abandon that project.  I’m seeing a therapist, I’m still cooking, I’m still doing yoga, but oddly enough, even though I’m not in the house nearly as often, I’m still having the same problems.

Maybe problems is a little too strong.  I’m still tackling the same issues.  And even though I’m putting myself out there, and trying new things, and whatever other cliche I can think of, I still haven’t met my goal.  I haven’t quite “met” anyone.  I mean, I’m meeting lots of people but they’re one time meetings.  It’s not quite sticking to where I can play a greater role in someone’s life.  And even though I like what I’m doing, still feel isolated from the rest of the world.  Then again, the only time I feel any real peace is when I’m alone.  But peace is very much tied in with relief.  A relief I don’t have to do anything when I’m around myself, besides be me.

 I’ll probably write more about this in the future, since one of other things I want to do is get back into writing.  Like seriously into writing.   But I just wanted to take this moment to space out and unpack.

And I did all of that in eleven minutes.  See you soon.

Thought of the day: Proximity

The other day my roommate Dory made a pretty, double chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and strawberry icing.  I didn’t know what it was for, since he does eat sweets.  Later on that night, after coming from Will’s office, and feeling oddly tired, I made cookies because I figured it would make me feel better, and afterward my psyche crawled back into my SSB  — secret single behavior, where I indulge in all my little silly activities I’d dare not do around another human being, like lounge around in my pajamas, eat cereal straight out of the box and watch “Intervention” on demand.  So while I was engaging in my SSB, Dory walked in with this pretty girl, each of them in dark colors, and I was so engrossed in my SSB that I brushed her off.  She told me she was a music teacher, her dad was a teacher, her grandfather was a principal, and with each sentence her voice went up like she was asking a question.  Then she told me she taught at an elementary school and the odd thing is that she teaches at one of the school sites that my non-profit coordinates for.  Talk about a small world.   Dory then told her that he made her a cake, and he got the wine for her, and she blushed, regarding how moist the cake was, and how special it was that he did that for her.

It was really sweet that he went out of his way to impress her.  They talked and the space of the couple got smaller for me to engage in my SSB, which was no longer a secret.  At least I didn’t work with her directly.   Now that would’ve been embarrassing.   But my single space was taken, so I went back to my room to sleep.   It was great that her opinion, her impression of him mattered to him.  I didn’t think anyone let that matter to them anymore.  I wish I had someone in my life who could do that, but I know it’s ego driven.  And even knowing all that, I looked at them and how happy they seemed.  They are close to my age, one lives with me, one is once removed from my job.  How hard could it be to find or accept love, if someone so physically close to me could?

Seeing them together in the first stages of what could be Love, almost made me wish I was dating someone again.  Almost.