"You should have bargained." But I refuse to bargain when it could cause a hitch and backfire
As back-assward as I often think Boise State is, I'm in the library right next to a book called Anal Health and Pleasure. Maybe I oughta take it out. Who knows? It might teach me a trick or two. For writing, that is. You perverts. Thought I was finally gonna engage in illicit activities for myself? You've got another thing coming (and it won't be me).
Spending time at home while my mom is awake has become a chore, so with increasing frequency, Zelly and I find excuses to get out of there for as many hours at a time as possible, or hole ourselves up in our room. Sometimes, we don't bother with the excuses. Where my mom used to interrogate me when I left the house, she now ignores me entirely or waves me out with an apathetic attitude; a few times, she's outright said, "Whatever," or, "Fine, go." More often, she doesn't try to feign apathy and says, "Okay, then get out," refusing to look at me - not even at my feet, not even at a spot above my head. I half wish I could accept the hackneyed, overused excuse that she's too depressed to respond positively to other people, much less herself, and I almost wish I were able to sit down and try to talk to her. She makes it so unbearable, though, that I feel like fleeing within the first five minutes of talking to her. We can't have conversations anymore, not even meaningless, silly ones in which we're both joking - probably because she can't take a joke anymore, can't understand sarcasm, and is determined to take everything personally. That, in turn, makes me take it personally when she glares me out of the room, as if I'm the failure here. Yes, the person who's determined to make something of her life is the failure.
I may not always go about it the right way - in fact, I'm usually wrong - but I try. To Yoda's chagrin, I try, Hynedammit.
Though there's an obvious discrepancy between the title of the song and my actual biological relationship to my mom (namely, she's not my little sister. I know, crazy!), the song Little Sister reminds me all too strongly of my mom. I was listening to Jewel the other day and the song popped up on my playlist, and then again today, it came up just now. Well, it makes my mouth go sour to think that this is my mom: "My [little sister] is a zombie in a body / With no soul, in a role she has learned to play / In a world today where nothing else matters, / But it matters; we gotta start feeding our souls, / Not our addictions or afflictions of pain / To avoid the same questions we must / Ask ourselves to get any answers, / We gotta start feeding our souls." And yet she would rather drink herself into a coma than talk to me, look at me, acknowledge the fact that I'm in her house as anything other than a person who dares to eat the food out of the fridge and who comes and goes as she pleases rather than reporting in to her like she's my commanding officer.
Well, hell, Mom, you always wanted me to move out. About the time you get your wish, you shut down so you can't even gloat about the fact that I'm finally getting our; you can't even be proud that Zelly and I want to make our own life. Our own lives. (As intertwined as we are, I can't say we have exactly the same life goals, one hundred percent, down to the mitochondria and midichlorians.)
Sorry to sound so bitter. I know that family shapes us, but we choose to become who we are. I believe in destiny, but I believe that it's our destiny to shape, like clay or a quilt or a story we're writing. I don't think my mom has forced me into any roles, but she's certainly influenced my choices, perhaps relegating me to hinterlands when I wanted to be in the foreground, or pushing me into the spotlight when I wanted to be the lighting tech. Now that I'm standing up and being my own person, whether she likes it or not and whether I like it or not, she's not even mentally here to see it. At least my dad is; I swear I don't do things merely to get attention or praise, but it helps to have someone standing by me to encourage what I'm doing when I'm getting it at least mostly right.
Sometimes, I feel like my only friend is the Zelly I live in, the Zelly of angels; fruity as I am, together we're dorks.
All that ranting makes me wish I hadn't dumped it on you. I feel like a bitch every time I start, well, bitching about my mom and family situation. As I said last night to Zelly, somebody always has it worse than you do, and if we go by that standard, no one has the right to complain. However, I think everyone needs to complain and vent, unless they're miraculously patient and serene, able to release their every frustration as if it never mattered. I definitely overdo it, taking my allotted complaining and running so overtime that every fan in the stadium has stormed out, forgoing the overpriced hot dogs in favor of something a little more nutritious and filling.
But at least the more I complain, the more determined I am to keep my shoulders strong and to bear whatever weight I'm handed. I'm not strong, but if I need to be, I'll make myself strong. As Shishio says, the strong eat the weak. I don't wanna be eaten like that overpriced hot dog. I'm gonna take my happiness in hand, and grab Zelly with the other hand, and we're gonna run to the end of the world.
We'll take that book about anal sex with us, too, as a reference. Just call me Straight-O.
"Happiness is in the heart, not in the circumstances."
Spending time at home while my mom is awake has become a chore, so with increasing frequency, Zelly and I find excuses to get out of there for as many hours at a time as possible, or hole ourselves up in our room. Sometimes, we don't bother with the excuses. Where my mom used to interrogate me when I left the house, she now ignores me entirely or waves me out with an apathetic attitude; a few times, she's outright said, "Whatever," or, "Fine, go." More often, she doesn't try to feign apathy and says, "Okay, then get out," refusing to look at me - not even at my feet, not even at a spot above my head. I half wish I could accept the hackneyed, overused excuse that she's too depressed to respond positively to other people, much less herself, and I almost wish I were able to sit down and try to talk to her. She makes it so unbearable, though, that I feel like fleeing within the first five minutes of talking to her. We can't have conversations anymore, not even meaningless, silly ones in which we're both joking - probably because she can't take a joke anymore, can't understand sarcasm, and is determined to take everything personally. That, in turn, makes me take it personally when she glares me out of the room, as if I'm the failure here. Yes, the person who's determined to make something of her life is the failure.
I may not always go about it the right way - in fact, I'm usually wrong - but I try. To Yoda's chagrin, I try, Hynedammit.
Though there's an obvious discrepancy between the title of the song and my actual biological relationship to my mom (namely, she's not my little sister. I know, crazy!), the song Little Sister reminds me all too strongly of my mom. I was listening to Jewel the other day and the song popped up on my playlist, and then again today, it came up just now. Well, it makes my mouth go sour to think that this is my mom: "My [little sister] is a zombie in a body / With no soul, in a role she has learned to play / In a world today where nothing else matters, / But it matters; we gotta start feeding our souls, / Not our addictions or afflictions of pain / To avoid the same questions we must / Ask ourselves to get any answers, / We gotta start feeding our souls." And yet she would rather drink herself into a coma than talk to me, look at me, acknowledge the fact that I'm in her house as anything other than a person who dares to eat the food out of the fridge and who comes and goes as she pleases rather than reporting in to her like she's my commanding officer.
Well, hell, Mom, you always wanted me to move out. About the time you get your wish, you shut down so you can't even gloat about the fact that I'm finally getting our; you can't even be proud that Zelly and I want to make our own life. Our own lives. (As intertwined as we are, I can't say we have exactly the same life goals, one hundred percent, down to the mitochondria and midichlorians.)
Sorry to sound so bitter. I know that family shapes us, but we choose to become who we are. I believe in destiny, but I believe that it's our destiny to shape, like clay or a quilt or a story we're writing. I don't think my mom has forced me into any roles, but she's certainly influenced my choices, perhaps relegating me to hinterlands when I wanted to be in the foreground, or pushing me into the spotlight when I wanted to be the lighting tech. Now that I'm standing up and being my own person, whether she likes it or not and whether I like it or not, she's not even mentally here to see it. At least my dad is; I swear I don't do things merely to get attention or praise, but it helps to have someone standing by me to encourage what I'm doing when I'm getting it at least mostly right.
Sometimes, I feel like my only friend is the Zelly I live in, the Zelly of angels; fruity as I am, together we're dorks.
All that ranting makes me wish I hadn't dumped it on you. I feel like a bitch every time I start, well, bitching about my mom and family situation. As I said last night to Zelly, somebody always has it worse than you do, and if we go by that standard, no one has the right to complain. However, I think everyone needs to complain and vent, unless they're miraculously patient and serene, able to release their every frustration as if it never mattered. I definitely overdo it, taking my allotted complaining and running so overtime that every fan in the stadium has stormed out, forgoing the overpriced hot dogs in favor of something a little more nutritious and filling.
But at least the more I complain, the more determined I am to keep my shoulders strong and to bear whatever weight I'm handed. I'm not strong, but if I need to be, I'll make myself strong. As Shishio says, the strong eat the weak. I don't wanna be eaten like that overpriced hot dog. I'm gonna take my happiness in hand, and grab Zelly with the other hand, and we're gonna run to the end of the world.
We'll take that book about anal sex with us, too, as a reference. Just call me Straight-O.
"Happiness is in the heart, not in the circumstances."