me love you long time

darlings...

it's been too long.

i know, i know, i am the worst. i am the most inconsistent. or maybe the most consistently flaky. which is worse? i don't know. i'm posting from work because my internet is down in my apartment. i am exhausted. i have been putting in 14 hour days routinely. 8-4 at emerson and then 6-12 at the theater. ugh. of course i'm not getting overtime at either. and i have so many errands to run usually between 4 and 6 that it's not really a break. i mean it's the only time i have to myself, so i go to the post office or to pick up bathroom cleaner or to go to the bank. i've become such a homebody lately. you should see my place though. i put up a bunch of pictures and it looks much more like I live there, not just mle. :)

so my mom has moved out. like, almost completely. there are boxes everywhere and she's never home anymore. she's in bloomington with margaret right now. the wedding is august 7. i wish i could write more coherently/articulately about this but sorry, all i've got are disjointed thoughts.

speaking of which, here comes a rant. you know what i hate? when people decide that you are a certain thing and then don't ever let up about it. i mean, i know i am not a very attentive friend. i tend to get wrapped up in things like work and ignore things like hanging out. i'd probably describe myself as a workaholic if prompted. but am i really a bad friend? how does one define friendship? i suppose it's different for everyone. i recently got told, not kindly, that i took everyone for granted. in some way, i have always thought that's what good friends did. i honestly have never been challenged on this point (except by pookie), until this year. and i haven't been challenged in a friendly way, more like in a "how the fuck did you expect things to turn out, ya lousy no-good self-absorbed slob?" way. so please forgive me if i'm not the best friend you ever had. please forgive me if i am self-absorbed. i forgive you. i've been taken for granted plenty of times, enough to know what it feels like when it's really bad, and while my track record isn't perfect, i have always tried to be as honest as possible, to the point of making things a lot more difficult by immediately answering "i don't know" instead of deliberating and then saying "no". i have a lot to work on, i'll be the first to admit that. in a lot of ways i think i'm only just now starting to repair damage incurred over three years ago. and yes, sorry, my fault for not fixing my heart right away. my fault for following everyone's advice, which was, "Take as much time as you need." so maybe i'm still taking time. why is the time i've taken too much? i mean, when people say that, shouldn't they actually mean, live on your own terms, not someone else's? because what i feel like often is meant is, take as much time as you need, until it's too much, and then start to feel tremendous guilt for not being happy again.

perhaps i should have known better than to let love into my heart in these past few years. it seems that all i've done is hurt people. and for god's sake, nobody thinks i meant to, but why all the punishment? what happened to saying what you needed to say and then moving on? do i expect too much? i mean seriously. passive-aggressiveness is just cowardice. and so is passive-passiveness. and i have been a coward too but i expect people to expect that about me, not to expect that i'll be perfect. i don't expect people to be perfect, nobody is perfect. and everybody changes their mind. and that doesn't make them weak, or cruel, it makes them honest, and trying. the meaning is in the attempt. and i have always attempted, successfully or not, to be as consistent as possible. lately, i've been consistently non-existent with many of my friends, and the ones who will remain my friends are the ones who, when i do call, will understand that i made the best choice for myself, but will still demand an explanation. they will tell me what they need from me instead of waiting for me to ask. my friends are uplifting, ethical, and fair. my friends are generous and understanding. i try and sometimes fail to be those things too. i think i have always been generous and understanding. not always uplifting, usually ethical, not always fair. but my friends and i share those goals.

so to everyone and anyone reading this whom i have upset with my prolonged absence from their life, now hear this: i have been dealing with the most excruciating schedule contaminated with empty, crippling loneliness. and instead of turning to all of you, i decided, for once, to sort things out myself. and i'm not finished, but it's time for me to call on your help. i can only get myself so far, i've realized. i don't write this in the hope that you'll all leave me comments. i write this in the hope that, in reading it, you'll better understand why i don't always call right away, why i don't update every day, and why i take so long to answer an email. i know how perturbing it is. i'm improving. so we beat on, boats against the current, eh? take this to heart: i love you very much. that at least has always been true and i hope i've said it to you as often as you needed to hear it. i hope you all realize that your friendship does, in fact, mean the world to me.

all that being said, my phone is out of service until further notice. as is my home internet. i can usually find time to check gmail at work, though. so keep in touch, dear friends, and i will do the same.