zana16

Had stomach cramps for months that time...

Sometimes I wish life wouldn't hit me over the head with my weaknesses.

I figure if I'm ever in a good marriage it'll be a lot like Buddhism is for me today: it'll be good and healthy and stabilizing for me so that I know I have to stay, even though I'll want to run screaming from the hard parts every day. The hard parts where I have to face myself. I've gotten so good at running away that I'm not sure I know how to stay and negotiate new terms.

/cryptic

want to curl in a ball and read fanfiction under the covers. dharma isn't an escape anymore, and it's scaring the fuck out of me. i hate it when the gods decide it's time to give me a kick in the ass in the right direction.

Sounds about right... depending on what day it is... tomorrow it will be totally different.

Seriously bizarre thing happened at work today... I was over at the other store, bringing them an order of cheese and picking up an order of tofu (and when did this become my exciting life?) and there's a woman there I'm friendly with, we talk supplements and the Local 400 and sunshine every once in a while. But she's never touched me before, and today she got really really close into my personal bubble and while I'm a touchy-feely person with those I know well it completely freaked me out because I don't know her well, and usually I'm the person to initiate touch, and there's a certain control to that. And she's easily twice my age and although upon consideration I would totally dig aging hippies I was totally not prepared for that kind of come-on. At work.

Anyways. Unprocessed thoughts. Kinda freaked out. Made me reconsider my personal stance on touch. Which I seem to need a lot more than many people I know, or maybe I'm just starved for it, but I'm just now realizing that I can count on one hand the number of people I let touch me. Two hands if you count the people I see once a year or less. Huh.

It's been the most bizarre day off. First off, I woke up at 7 AM and could not get back to sleep. Finally I got up, took some herbal calming stuff, and wrote out a list of all the things I've got hanging over my head that need doing. I read till eight, did three of the ones I could do today, and managed to get some more sleep. One of the things I needed to do is buy a dress for Daniel's wedding (where I will know no one, omg), so I actually went clothes shopping today. For the first time in about two years. It wasn't horrible, either. It wasn't fun, but it wasn't horrible. Except when it comes to finding decent plus-size dresses... I mean, really, fat chicks have one thing going for them: ample breasts. So why is it that every single dress out there seems designed to show off the tummy roll I don't want noticed and to totally cover up my chest??. Seriously, folks. I am not a sexless blob. Basic capitalism: give me some decent-looking clothes and I will spend money on them. The demand is there, now where's the supply??

I found a decent top to go with a skirt I already have, for the wedding dinner, and for the wedding itself I tentatively have a dress, pending Heather's verdict. My dad will hate whatever I wear, so maybe I just need to get over that.

Shopping, though, is a seriously bizarre experience for me, and it made me sufficiently off-kilter that when a random guy came up to me and asked for my phone number, I didn't even think about it until after he'd walked away with it, and then I was in this headspace of what the fuck just happened? Seriously weird. Also I bought a pair of jeans since all the ones I own have holes in embarrassing places, and once the weather doesn't call for long underwear anymore I'm not going to be able to get away with that.

Also went to the Bethesda Coop today, just to check out the competition, and it was pretty cool. It's more traditional-coop than Silver Spring Coop, with the healthfood store smell that I remember from the coops we went to when I was a kid. Much more laid-back than my workplace... that's another story.

Part of starting to get my head sorted out is trying to get to know the person that I've become while I wasn't paying attention.

You wouldn't think it was hard to get to know yourself, but then you're not me. I'm no good at getting to know people, and to suddenly realize that I can't count on my mainstays--am I really a writer if I haven't put anything to paper in almost a year, am I really a mathy type when I go whole weeks without even thinking about integrals and differential equations, am I really a workaholic now I've found more fun things to hide myself in, am I really that responsible one now that my friends have grown up and I don't have to be the designated driver anymore?--anyways, it's disorienting. I'm not my history, not anymore, but it is a part of me, I guess.

So I'm trying to get to know myself, and it doesn't help that I'm running away constantly. It's like I'm afraid to get to know myself cause hey, maybe I won't like myself. So it comes down to little factoids:


SUBJECT: Zana

LIKES: avacados, dark chocolate, good fiction with complex characters, philosophy, slash, ecology, amusing conspiracy theories

DISLIKES: the Maryland DMV, buying clothes, projectile ketchup, cleaning my room, the medical establishment


Doesn't give me much of an idea of what makes me tick.

And it's not much use trying to get to know me through my friends. The other night H, in the middle of a discussion about smoking pot with one's parents (I haven't, she has), said to me, "Anyways, it's been a few years. You're the person I'd go to if I wanted to smoke out now." I looked back at her and said, "But you're my go-to person for illicit substances. Well, shit." And then we felt old. Apparently, old is when you've gone so long not smoking out that you don't have a source when you want to.

On a related note, a friend has learned how to make ice cream and looked up on the internet how to make pot ice cream. Only he can't find a source, either. We all suck.

Erm, lost the thread there. Oh right: getting to know myself. My point is: I spend so much time in my own head, you'd think I'd know myself pretty well by now. But I don't.

I keep reading fiction revolving around "How well can one person really know another?" Even if you're related, even if you're married, you only get a slice. But with myself, I don't know who the fuck I am. This may be an indication that I need to get the fuck back into therapy. But first I need to get to the point where I know that I actually want to get to know myself.

...I swear, I can't have a normal nervous breakdown like anyone else, can I? Noooo, I have to be the one with issues nobody else seems to share. Where am I supposed to find a support group for "coming out of years of depression, not sure whether I'm an interesting human being now that I'm not navel-gazing anymore"???