Perks of the Wallflower Variety

Every so often, something comes along that changes a piece of you, or a piece of your life.  While I do not necessarily believe that a simple book can do just that, I do believe that something (be it a book, poem, painting, what have you) can have a profound impact on a person, during a specific point in your life.

I first read The Perks of Being A Wallflower during my senior year of high school - a year chock full of transitions, growing up, learning, and discovery.  The perfect year to read a book such as this (the only better year being your freshman year - though the subject matter may be a bit on the heavy side for a 14 year old).  Yesterday, I saw the movie adaptation, where the author of the book, Stephen Chbosky, not only wrote the screenplay, but also directed the film - something I doubt happens very much - and he did an absolutely superb job.  And the one thing it really brought back, for me?  Was this one sentiment:

We accept the love we think we deserve.

It seems crazy to me - a book that I found so inspirational as a 17 year old girl, is having an entirely new effect on me as a soon-to-be 27 year old woman.  I don't think I ever appreciated or understood the weight and the intensity that a simple statement about love would ever have on me, or how much it would apply to me at any point in my life.  I think it comes down to the fact that I have always sold myself short, and put far too much pressure on myself - thus effecting the way I view myself, and the people I choose to surround myself with and have in my life.  My step mom once said to me, "You are so mean to yourself.  Would you ever treat another person going through a rough time like this? You need to be nice to you, too".  And she was, and is, absolutely correct.

I am extremely lucky to come from and have an amazing support system.  For the most part, everyone in my life has always had the utmost confidence in me.  Sometimes, I wish I had a little more in myself, but that's one of those things I will probably always fight for.  I am in a place in my life where I believe many late twenty-somethings are probably in.  Not necessarily transitional, but figuring out the little things, the tougher stuff in between.  It's figuring out what is really important to you, and what is necessary to cut out.  I am falling in love with all the good and the positive life has to offer, and the wonderful people and experiences that come along with it.  The friends who make the time to call you to catch up; the roommates who share a bottle of wine and a bucket full of grapes with you; the nights on rooftops with people who matter; the family that, at the end of the day, is always there to pick you up from a bus station at 10pm in Massachusetts, or the little sister who sends you two thank you cards from her birthday party, just so you can have more mail.  These are the people and experiences I will carry with me always, while the petty ones fall to the wayside.  As I get older, I realize how unimportant the negative is, and how wonderful the good can be.  I am so excited to enter this new stage and new age in my life in a new and improved mindset, doing the things I love with the people I care the most about. 

I always thought of myself of a wallflower, and never thought any one ever noticed me.  I know now that while I am an observer, a wallflower I am not.  And I am ready to accept the love I know I deserve.

No One Is Alone

This past weekend was quite nice.  It was filled with cleaning, eating, movie watching, laughing, talking, friending, sleeping, resting, and eating some more.  I also spent a great deal of time with myself - something that, for the past few weeks, I've been truly terrified of doing.

I've been really fearful of being left alone with my thoughts, scared that they might have more control over me than I was willing to accept, or worse, that I would be overcome with things like heartache, sadness, fear, or loneliness.  All the debilitating feelings that make you want to curl up into your bed forever and never emerge (unless, of course, chocolate is involved).  It's not that these are things that have been present in my life consistently or in an overbearing fashion, but I have been so scared that they could be, that they might make an appearance - and then what?  How would I handle that?  I've come so far, I am reaching out in sheer desperation just to not go backwards.  Has a paranoia of feelings and emotions developed?

Then, I just did it.  I had been under the weather all week with a cold, so I spent a few hours alone on Saturday, and most of Sunday just resting.  I watched movies, I cleaned a little, played with Oliver, snacked, and painted my nails.  I took care of myself, physically and mentally, for an entire weekend - something I haven't done in far too long.  And I came out of it rested, a little overstuffed, and proud of myself.  Proud of myself for doing something that is, yes, oddly simple, but really tough.

Sometimes, it's the little battles that make the monumental wins in my book.  This weekend was a giant step in gaining back my independence and confidence in myself and my capabilities.

I also realize that it's okay to feel alone sometimes, but it is not the best idea to wallow in it.  Let it in momentarily, take a breath, and let it right back out.  You are not alone.  I leave you with that, and the wise words of Stephen Sondheim:

"Hard to see the light now
Just don't let it go
Things will come out right now
We can make it so
Someone is on your side
No one is alone
Believe me, no one is alone"

Pumpkin Spice and Everything Nice

Autumn.

When the leaves fall off the trees
The end of another number year
The death of the summer
And what I see as rebirth.

I have endless, boundless love for Fall.  Harvests, the vibrant reds and oranges and yellows, the cool breeze ushering in the cold to come, apple picking, pumpkin pie making, caramel apple eating, celebrations, hay rides, haunted houses, Halloween, jeans and sweaters, sweatshirts, and big comfy socks that cover your thighs.

In keeping with my current "loving the little things" mentality, I would just like to say thank you to the kind barista at Starbucks, for making my very first Pumpkin Hot Chocolate of the season today.  I would also like to thank the amazing weather for making my walk to work wonderfully chilly, the great book I've been reading on my morning train rides for being so fantastic (Bright Shiny Morning by James Fry - incredible), my super sore legs from running a relatively consistent 2 miles a day at the gym, and, most importantly, my pants - for today, when I put on the very pair I bought a mere 4 months ago, I was barely able to wear them because of how big they have gotten.  Over the past year, I have probably gained about 10 pounds - mostly due to lifestyle changes, going from dance jobs to a desk job, and living in an area surrounded by amazing food.  I finally decided I wasn't happy with my body the way it was, or with the way I felt, so I signed up for one (now, two!) 5k's and started running.  I'm not necessarily trying to simply drop pounds, but I'd like to be overall healthier, and back in the dancer-shape I was in.  It's a painstakingly slow process, but I'm starting to see results, and it makes me feel empowered.  I've lost about 6 pounds, but the changes in my body are what make the difference.  I've gained some muscle, my waist has gotten smaller, and I am starting to feel more confident - which I can feel simply in my slightly taller walk.  It's amazing what taking a little charge of a small thing can do for you.

In other news, I got a mood ring at a toy store.  I like taking it on and off and watching it change colors.  I also bought Play-Doh and built an alien.  I'm turning 27 in less than a month.

I am finding hope and inspiration in the little things that I do for myself, simply because I am doing things for myself.  I wasn't before.  I am now.  I should never have stopped.  I'm so amazed at how much learning and growing I have been able to do in the past few weeks.  I've felt so many emotions while riding this crazy roller coaster, and while I know I am not finished with this journey just yet, it feels good to look back and be able to notice definite milestones.  To see where I started, and see a significant difference in where I am now.  I don't mean to toot my own horn, but I'm kind of proud of myself.  Big steps are being made, and big things are coming.

Gandhi says we must be the change we wish to see in the world.  I believe we should be the change we wish to see in ourselves.

The Little Things

Lately, I've been trying to focus on the little things.

Walking to the L with confidence.

Blasting the new Regina on my morning commute.

Taking the ferry home from work.

New experiences.  New people.  New boundaries.  New mindset.

Eating a fresh beefsteak tomato - in one sitting.  Raw.

Accidentally spilling an entire waste container filled with bright blue, yellow, and pink ink from the copy machine all over myself.

A new phone cover, courtesy of Vera Bradley.

A Mr. Softee dip cone.

Having a conversation with a lonely older woman on the boat ride home.

Seeing my apartment building from the water.

Spending 3 hours eating and chatting in a famous-but-new-to-me pizza joint in a neighboring neighborhood.

Summer beers garnished with oranges.

Walking through the lit up park on a late summer night.

Stooping.  It's a thing.

The blue moon.

Rediscovering an old dress.

Rediscovering myself.

Driving with the windows down singing at the top of your lungs.

Walking past a kid playing with a 6 weeks old white kitten.  The same kid you walked past the week before, playing with the same kitten.  The kitten is bigger.

Watching Strong Bad Emails at work

Not changing the station when The Thong Song comes on the radio.  And remembering all the words.

Finding and loving new music.

Realizing you have 934 individual purchased songs in your iTunes.

Knowing where you are supposed to turn right, but going straight instead.  And continuing to drive.

Finding the entrance to a secret beer garden.

Learning about a secret bar, that is located behind a secret door in a secret phone booth with a secret dial code.

Retrieving the last thing that smells of you.

A sleeping kitten.

Learning that everything, and I do mean everything, is about timing.

A train ride to Moms new home.

A rainy train ride back with a good book and a new giraffe.

Finding the first fall leaf on the ground.

Noticing that the pink buildings I used to pass on my long NJ commute are still pink

Sitting on my giant roof, staring at the sky, the moon, the planes flying by.  Not seeing stars.  Knowing I know just where to go to find them.

Someone painting the word DREAM on the door to the roof in big bold capital letters.  DREAM.

Noticing the forgotten on my walks home, and finding the extraordinary in the ordinary - the things unseen or unnoticed.

Catching up with old friends.

Catching up with new friends.

A hug and a kiss from a Sweet Caraline

A hug and a kiss from Mommy.

How nothing ever changes.

How everything changes.

Spending the last summer weekend with family and friends, eating and drinking, barbecuing and laughing, getting eaten alive by mosquito's and not knowing it until the following morning.

Finding the moments of happiness in between all the rest.

Expunging the negative to make room for the positive.

Enjoying a night of complete inner peace, and hoping for many more to come.

Walking Through Memories

I did something today that may be considered, perhaps, slightly unorthodox.

Lately, I have been taking a different train to work - a different station, a different line, and in the completely opposite direction of him.  The fact that it is not a mere 2 blocks away from his apartment just adds to it's already growing appeal of being a little more ideal for work.  Today, however, I had a doctors appointment near that train.  That train that simply reeks with memories of him, completely saturated with a year and a half of wearing my heart on my sleeve for someone who simply couldn't handle it.  It took summoning a great deal of courage (I mean, ridiculous) just to enter that stop.  I even made an active decision to get on the train at the opposite end of where he would normally take it, just for fear of seeing him from a distance, or hearing his voice ringing through the subway cars.  As soon as the train reached my stop, I slipped out, and hurried up the stairs through the opposite entrance amongst rush hour traffic, and arrived safely at my destination, unscathed.

Then a funny thing happened.  I walked out of the office, and instead of taking the slightly longer, completely out-of-my-way, safe route home, I turned directly towards his street and walked.  I walked right down one street, and turned on to another, and found myself directly across from his apartment building.  I had no intention or urge to go near it, but I stood across from it, and I stared.  I stared at the green door and metal buzzer.  I stared at the elevator shaft notices and cracked window bars.  I stared at the crumbling bricks, the dripping water, the beat up air conditioners balancing out dirty windows.  I stared, and I breathed.  And I took it all in.  And then I let it all out.  I saw myself, bouncing towards his building, day after day, so excited to see him and climb the four flights of stairs, only to stop for a moment at the top to catch my breath so as not to seem tired when I finally got to lay eyes on him.  I saw myself, meeting him right outside, hoping he would grab me in a giant embrace, as if he hadn't seen me in weeks, and always being slightly disappointed when I had to ask or lean in for a kiss.  I stared, and I remembered, and then I moved on.  I walked away, feeling as though I had just conquered this tiny step, this little street I had been so scared to walk down.  I was nervous about seeing him and kept my eyes wide and peeled for the short time I stood there, but I knew that I needed to be there, just for that moment.  And then I needed to let that moment go.

I ended up walking home the way we would normally walk to my place together.  I stopped in front of places with our memories - the beer garden I threw his surprise party at and where we had our third date; the bar where we ate Cheese Puffs and Twizzlers, played pool and Risk and drank girly beer; the movie theatre we frequented and tried to go to far more than we ever ended up being able to; the building that was "so far away"; the old flea market-turned-outside-bar that we could never figure out how to enter.  I stopped at all these places for just a few moments to admire, and release.  And after feeling the memories, good and bad, I walked on.  It was painful, yet cleansing - as if I was saying goodbye to these memories for now because, just maybe, they are too painful to carry with me.  This neighborhood, this city, reminds me of him.  Everything screams his name, his voice, his smell, his movements - and it's all a little too much.  And since I can't run or move away from it all, I need to re-learn it.  Without him.  And it's really, really hard.

I'm absolutely still feeling the breakup pains - the "what is he..." thoughts plague me often, though maybe not as frequently as they did the first two weeks.  Not being able to talk to him hurts (my decision), and not seeing him or being held by him are probably some of the worst feelings in the world right now.  I hate missing someone all the time.  I hate feeling sad, ever.  But if I'm ever going to get through this to move past this, I have to.  I have to move on and let go - and I don't want to, but I have to.  Every day, though getting easier, has been a struggle.  Getting out of bed is the worst.  Falling asleep is the worst.  Missing him is the worst.  But it's all I can do.

I spent so much time trying to be enough, trying to be the best girlfriend and person I could be, feeling like I was always inadequate or not good enough, hoping that "maybe today, he'll love me", trying to be worthy enough of him and his ability to fall in love me, when really?  It was he who may not have been worthy of me, and my love.  I wanted so much from the relationship, and from him, and he was not capable of giving it to me.  And instead of taking that on as a fault of mine, I need to realize and truly understand that there was nothing I could do.  You can not draw blood from a stone, and you can not make a man who does not have it in him to love someone love you.  This is the challenge that I need to embrace, and move on, so that the person who can love me, and will love me, can come along.  Because I deserve to be loved.

"The truth is, you can only give a person so much time to realize what's standing right in front of them. You can only let a person chase you for so long before you realize that maybe, just maybe, they never intended to catch you at all.  The right one for you will always handle your heart with care and treasure it for the precious gift that it is" - Mandy Hale

"Someday you're gonna look back on this moment of your life as such a sweet time of grieving.  You'll see that you were in mourning and your heart was broken, but your life was changing" - Elizabeth Gilbert

Floating Advice

What if everything that's happened so far, Hilary, was just practice for when things get really, really good? 

Really, really soon - 
    The Universe

Dancing The Tightrope

I do not see my life as one long string of events - I see my life as a series, in compartments, segments, phases, if you will, joined together to create the person I am at the time.  I enjoy life as I live it, and dissect it as it passes.  I over think, overwhelm, and become completely immersed in various aspects I find I am the most passionate about.  I go in waves and stages, up hills and down valleys, and in the end, I try to be the best me that I can be, hoping that in the end, I come out stronger, wiser, possibly more flexible, but overall more rounded and experienced.  I yearn to learn and grow and find more and more about who I am and what I want.  That may be the best way I know to express who I am - a curious creature trying to learn and explore, make mistakes and fall, get up, try again, and embrace all I can pick up along the way, even if I don't see it at the time.

The thing of it is, I'm sure I will learn from this. I'm sure I will grow and this will help me become the person I one day will be, but in the meantime? I have no other way to tell you other than having your heart broken completely fucking sucks. This crawl into bed under the covers with a roll of toilet paper because you ran out of tissues can't wash your hair want to constantly vomit what is he doing who is he sleeping with why can't I sleep why can't I get out of bed why hasn't he called me is he thinking about me I'm thinking about him why doesn't he miss me why doesn't he love me where did my life go sucks.

Yes, I'm reading a self help book to self help myself.  Yes, I have Gilmore girls on marathon mode. No I'm not eating much. Yes, I cry in the shower. And in bed. And on the subway, and the on the sofa, and at my desk at work, and in the library with Mr. Mustard and the Wrench.  Yes, I loved him. No, he did not love me back. Ever, as it turns out. Yes, I feel wasted - learning experience or not, unrequited love sucks a giant rock. Yes, I feel awful about my self and self worth. Yes, I feel completely unloveable and rejected. Yes, getting out of bed is consistently difficult when all I want to do is hibernate, and come out when everything is better. And yes, having your heart broken is not a fun experience, especially when it is the same person duplicating the dumping.

It's hard for me to look at this objectively right now, as I am in the midst of some pretty serious sadness(which, for the record, is the absolute worst feeling in the world, as far as I'm concerned).  I don't necessarily regret things overall, because every experience is important and teaches you something about yourself, but I can't help but kick myself a little bit.  Maybe, the only reason you should ever take someone back is for love. Perhaps that was my big mistake - falling prey to the crawling back without a drop of the L word (no, not lesbian). I fell for the promise and maybe lines. The "I don't know if I'm going to fall in love with you, but I know that if I don't at least try, I will regret it for the rest of my life". That may be some serious bull shit, folks. I understand that some things take time, but if you are with someone for a year and a half and you don't know if you love them? Spoiler alert, you probably don't.  Is there a nicer way to say "shit or get off the pot"?  It's that, but prettier.  

I suppose I can look at this as wisdom to my future wiser self.  Next time, I will not wait for someone to come around. They probably will not. And even if they do, why would I want someone who is settling for me? I know on some level that I deserve to be loved. Do I feel that way right now? Of course not.  But I may soon.  The worst part about all this is that it takes time, and I am unbelievably extremely impatient.  Therefore, I am dealing with this as best as I can, for now.  I'm talking about it, writing about it, working out about it - exponging it from my system as best and as quickly as is humanly possible.  I feel like it just has to get out.  And the worst part is that in order to move on, I have to feel all the things I don't want to - and even worse than that, I have to do it while missing him.  Because doesnt that blow?  Missing someone you can't even have?  Or perhaps it is mourning the death of the relationship like the death of a family member, and knowing that you can't push it down to get past it - you have to mourn it to move on.  Now, if only I could figure out how to turn this mourning into a movie montage, complete with the part where I get it all together and have an amazing life and amazing body and run up the steps in Philly while punching my fist through the air.  Ah, goals.

The main thing that is really getting me through this right now?  My friends, and my family.  I honestly don't know what I would do without them.  Most of them are not near me, but it is the abundance of phone calls, text messages, Facebook messages, movie watching, bed talking, and hang-out time that is keeping me sane and helping me get through the heart break.  And it's incredibly hard to re-learn how to be okay with being alone.  Not alone in the single sense, but alone in the no-one-else-is-home sense.  It's frighteningly hard to be alone with your thoughts, especially when they can overwhelm and consume you, and this is probably the absolute toughest thing for me right now.  But I'm working on it.  I am also throwing myself into work - trying to pick up whatever projects and responsibilities I can (which is insanely tough since I'm still pretty new here).  I have signed up with my step mom to run a 5K in October to fight childhood obesity.  I'm signing up for a Volleyball league for the fall.  I'm making plans, keeping busy, and trying to find time in between to feel the things I'm supposed to without losing my mind.

So, that's that.  Welcome to the inner workings of a woman's mind during a break up, or as I like to call it, "Dancing the tightrope".  Because that is what I'm doing - walking a fine line between okay and not, riding emotional rollercoasters and trying to make sense of myself again.  Journey on.