The Switfly Tilting Planet

I don't know why invoking Madeline L'Engle seems appropriate for my mood, but wtf.

My cousin (K) picked on me tonight about my aversion to relationships. It was meant to be constructive, but it came off as condescending. Actually, it didn't, but I found myself furious at everyone for no reason in the hours following. So, yeah, it was fucked up.

I think she was trying to push me into (re)trying therapy. But if came off as "you're fucked up, don't you realize that you should do something about it?"

I don't feel particularly fucked up. I've been in the zone for awhile, actually. There are hiccups, sure, but I've been chill -- as evidenced, by nothing else, but the infrequency of my posts. I suppose you could argue that I've just been filling up my life with bullshit so I don't have to deal with things that are important, but well, fuck you. I think K. would agree to some degree.

Feel free to re-read the last paragraph. Especially the sentence that begins with "I suppose".

So why am I angry?

Well, let's see... the insinuation that I'm too dumb to realize that I have issues that need to be handled. Um, I'm handling them. Perhaps it's via dissonance and redirection, but you know what? Fuck drugs. Fuck anti-depressants, fuck pharma, fuck self-medicating, and fuck paying to have someone almost smile at you for $150 an hour. I'll take a beer (just one or two) and a textarea any day over that bullshit.

I don't recall being unhappy very often in the last three months. Or angry. Or depressed. Oh, yeah, until just now, when someone decided to tell me I was fucked up.

I never said I wasn't. Let me deal with it in my own way. If you want to suggest a tool, fine, do so. Hell, do it once a quarter for a year or three until you get tired of the routine and give up. Then go ahead and assume (or even hope) that I find my own way to nirvana.

I might even suggest (gasp) that you trust that I'll figure it out. I've done pretty good on my own, all by myself, without you, or your god, or your therapist, or your goddamn opinion thus far. One might even say, objectively, that I've done pretty well for myself. Imagine that.

In fact, if you need to divorce yourself from me because you can't handle "the negativity", or otherwise want to hang out with me less, that's even ok. I'll be pissed at you, I'll think you're kinduv a pussy (or, perhaps, just an idiot), I may flame you in this blog, and I'll miss you, but wtf. I will, at least, still respect you.

(Well, mostly.)

But don't hop up on a high horse and tell me that my life sucks. I already think that my life sucks often enough without any reminders. I mean, really! What the fuck was she thinking?

--

She accused me of being scared. Of girls. Well, no, more accurately, of an intimate relationship with a girl.

(Excuse me while I pick up my jaw from the floor.) You really think so? You don't say!

I'm sorry... ahem. So what?

(Never mind that I've been trying in recent memory despite that reticence. Jeez.)

--

While I'm ranting, can I point out that the presentation seemed an awful lot like "hey! you need to go to therapy so that you'll settle for some bimbo that you'd otherwise reject out of hand!"

So. In the several months that have passed since my return from vacation -- er, I mean, school (and anyone who thinks they worked harder in school than I do now clearly didn't deserve whatever degree they received. Privileged fuck!) -- I've come to the conclusion that, in spite my incessant question about the location of that strange book club where all the attractive, gym frequenting, articulate, educated, emotionally available, sexual, sensual, understanding twenty-something women of moderate maintenance level happens to be, there are, in fact, plenty of "almost" girls out there. I've been dating one for four months, in fact. Scratch the good-in-bed part, the gym bunny part, and... ok, she's got 'em covered. So, not too shabby. Solid settling material. Hell, I even think she'd be loyal and not cheat on me! Fancy that.

(Part of it was moving out of the valley. Sigh. Too bad I kinda like it there.)

Still, when did my mental health come into question as a reason to settle or not?

I'm sorry, did I miss something? I'm mentally handicapped because I want someone, oh let's see... who is like me? When did that become a sign of mental illness?

So, again, I ask, what the fuck was she thinking?