Just how much of "normal" human conventions are an illusion?
Yes, the fact that there is no such thing as an ordinary human is a good thing in general for humanity because an "ordinary" human sounds absolutely dismal and depressing, but then again, there are some aspects of "normal human life" that do seem...nice.
You know, once I started writing down my thoughts again, it's kind of flooding non-stop now. Maybe the whole "rambling when tired" isn't helping, but this I know is one of those things I've had on my mind a lot lately.
There is a lot of reasons why Wilbury is my Internets last name. Even though I don't really physically travel all around like I did when I was a kid, the "traveler/drifter" part is still pretty much intact. Including the fact I'm so used to people coming in and out of my life, real life and online. I just got reminded of it again looking at all the abandoned old accounts of people I used to be really close to. The fact is I think I've pretty much trained myself to be ready to say goodbye to someone, no matter how close I get. Doesn't mean I don't get miserable, but it doesn't really surprise me, either? Like I've gotten attached to so many CSS workers who hung out with me every week and tried to help me get my life back on my feet, my last three...one lasted for several years, suddenly had to say bye, it was fine, I had another one for about half a year this year, got close to, 'cause we shared a lot of the same sensibilities, she suddenly had to go to provide a Spanish-speaking social worker, said goodbye, and now have my current one who hasn't really given me much reason to get attached to them. Don't get me started on therapists. Not that I've had a therapist for years now, after being lucky and being assigned therapists that I got along with from the get-go (WHICH IS REALLY SORT OF IMPORTANT), all the ones I try I never get along with and now despite whatever my psych says I've made it clear I feel like therapists are a waste of time, energy, money, and of course, emotion.
Online, sometimes I feel like re-evaluating the whole dedication to the idea that "online friendships are just as real"...just because a person can drop away or just slowly fade away into RL and with most people...it doesn't phase them. It always becomes more a "hey, remember them? Man, what happened to them?" Should this be okay? I know this shouldn't be okay in RL friendships, although it's pretty much how all of my friendships with people IRL have gone, either I move away and people forget me or we just drift...slowly..apart. Should it be okay for close online friendships, then? I guess that's where the "clingy" problem often comes in, I've had too many people who said they felt they were my best friend go in and out (and sometimes back in, then out, then back in...) of my life and while in the past I've never complained (unless they did for so for stupid reasons, like deciding to cut themselves off from everyone they know and drown themselves in sorrow and booze and basically just start to waste away their life...I wish they weren't still doing that, even without booze...) and I guess sometime in the past couple years I realized that hey, usually this isn't how this sort of stuff is supposed to work?
But then again, for all the romantics BFF junk we hear, is it really much more common for things to be like that all around? To put it into a fannish and fantastic way, would any companion who was left by the Doctor and "forgotten" who sees him again rails at him a bit for just completely dropping them and disappearing into time and space and not even checking back up on them? There's always been a part of me that responded (in my mind) to fans saying he's an asshole for that by thinking "...but isn't that how a lot of relationships work in completely normal lives, anyway?" Or is my opinion tainted by sub-par personal experience?
(And of course the Doctor is an asshole, every incarnation has the capability to be a total asshole at times the way I see it, but that's kind of beyond the point I'm trying to make with this comparison. And in case you didn't pick it up, yes, I do identify with the Doctor that way, at least in that all people in my life are temporal and there is no such thing as "friends/lovers forever" in my mind.)
I guess I really dunno how a lot of interpersonal things are 'supposed' to work. But then there's the whole "humans are weird-ass creatures" things that reminds me that any "supposed to be" or "normal" view of something is in all likelihood, an illusion.
On the other hand, that would mean, that yeah, my mindset is right, there IS no such thing as BFFs or people who bond their whole life in reality, and...I don't really want that to be true. Not only does it sound horribly misanthropic and like I have "abandonment syndrome" or whatever, it's...just a very sobering, depressing, and lonely idea. But I dunno if I can really honestly reach a conclusion until, well, I die, and if there's an afterlife that would allow me to look back on my life itself.
And the way things like best friends and lovers...there seems to be the "ideal" that people hold to and the reality. Am I an idealist for wishing the well, ideal to be a reality, or a pessimist with an "abandonment problem" that needs "help" if I accept the reality as what is most likely the truth in life?
I do know this:
I need to get my head out of my navel and should probably go to bed and work on trying to put back together the pieces tomorrow.
You know, once I started writing down my thoughts again, it's kind of flooding non-stop now. Maybe the whole "rambling when tired" isn't helping, but this I know is one of those things I've had on my mind a lot lately.
There is a lot of reasons why Wilbury is my Internets last name. Even though I don't really physically travel all around like I did when I was a kid, the "traveler/drifter" part is still pretty much intact. Including the fact I'm so used to people coming in and out of my life, real life and online. I just got reminded of it again looking at all the abandoned old accounts of people I used to be really close to. The fact is I think I've pretty much trained myself to be ready to say goodbye to someone, no matter how close I get. Doesn't mean I don't get miserable, but it doesn't really surprise me, either? Like I've gotten attached to so many CSS workers who hung out with me every week and tried to help me get my life back on my feet, my last three...one lasted for several years, suddenly had to say bye, it was fine, I had another one for about half a year this year, got close to, 'cause we shared a lot of the same sensibilities, she suddenly had to go to provide a Spanish-speaking social worker, said goodbye, and now have my current one who hasn't really given me much reason to get attached to them. Don't get me started on therapists. Not that I've had a therapist for years now, after being lucky and being assigned therapists that I got along with from the get-go (WHICH IS REALLY SORT OF IMPORTANT), all the ones I try I never get along with and now despite whatever my psych says I've made it clear I feel like therapists are a waste of time, energy, money, and of course, emotion.
Online, sometimes I feel like re-evaluating the whole dedication to the idea that "online friendships are just as real"...just because a person can drop away or just slowly fade away into RL and with most people...it doesn't phase them. It always becomes more a "hey, remember them? Man, what happened to them?" Should this be okay? I know this shouldn't be okay in RL friendships, although it's pretty much how all of my friendships with people IRL have gone, either I move away and people forget me or we just drift...slowly..apart. Should it be okay for close online friendships, then? I guess that's where the "clingy" problem often comes in, I've had too many people who said they felt they were my best friend go in and out (and sometimes back in, then out, then back in...) of my life and while in the past I've never complained (unless they did for so for stupid reasons, like deciding to cut themselves off from everyone they know and drown themselves in sorrow and booze and basically just start to waste away their life...I wish they weren't still doing that, even without booze...) and I guess sometime in the past couple years I realized that hey, usually this isn't how this sort of stuff is supposed to work?
But then again, for all the romantics BFF junk we hear, is it really much more common for things to be like that all around? To put it into a fannish and fantastic way, would any companion who was left by the Doctor and "forgotten" who sees him again rails at him a bit for just completely dropping them and disappearing into time and space and not even checking back up on them? There's always been a part of me that responded (in my mind) to fans saying he's an asshole for that by thinking "...but isn't that how a lot of relationships work in completely normal lives, anyway?" Or is my opinion tainted by sub-par personal experience?
(And of course the Doctor is an asshole, every incarnation has the capability to be a total asshole at times the way I see it, but that's kind of beyond the point I'm trying to make with this comparison. And in case you didn't pick it up, yes, I do identify with the Doctor that way, at least in that all people in my life are temporal and there is no such thing as "friends/lovers forever" in my mind.)
I guess I really dunno how a lot of interpersonal things are 'supposed' to work. But then there's the whole "humans are weird-ass creatures" things that reminds me that any "supposed to be" or "normal" view of something is in all likelihood, an illusion.
On the other hand, that would mean, that yeah, my mindset is right, there IS no such thing as BFFs or people who bond their whole life in reality, and...I don't really want that to be true. Not only does it sound horribly misanthropic and like I have "abandonment syndrome" or whatever, it's...just a very sobering, depressing, and lonely idea. But I dunno if I can really honestly reach a conclusion until, well, I die, and if there's an afterlife that would allow me to look back on my life itself.
And the way things like best friends and lovers...there seems to be the "ideal" that people hold to and the reality. Am I an idealist for wishing the well, ideal to be a reality, or a pessimist with an "abandonment problem" that needs "help" if I accept the reality as what is most likely the truth in life?
I do know this:
I need to get my head out of my navel and should probably go to bed and work on trying to put back together the pieces tomorrow.