My financial aid finally came in. That’s a big sigh of relief right there. As in, I’m no longer in dire financial straights.
Today I bought ice cream, carrot juice, a coffee, and soup. And it was awesome.
Last night, I got slightly tipsy at a mini rock concert and talked music with a bunch of music guys about music, especially South by Southwest. And it was awesome. Except that I had to stumble home, and only had five hours of sleep even though I had absolutely NO reason not to sleep in whatsoever. I couldn’t help it… I was feeling strange, horny, contemplative, lonely, and restless.
I think I have a bad habit of flirting with feminine people without realizing. There’s this person at the Walgreen’s, in fact, who is called “David.” I say “person” instead of “man” because I get big “girl” vibes from David. Also, David thoroughly travels through the realm of androgyny; from a distance David could just as easily be a soft butch dyke with subtle, budding breasts and chin-length, smoothe hair. If David one day came up to me and told me s/he was trans, I wouldn’t be remotely surprised.
That said, I somehow find myself very lightly and casually flirting with David in spite of myself almost every time I visit Walgreen’s… and David smiles and flirts back (how does David see me, I wonder?). Because somehow, in the depths of my own psyche and biases, I’ve already labeled David as more in the girl category. This is not the first time I’ve done this, either. Interesting? Gender is interesting. Life is interesting.
I am decidedly very attracted to gender-queer folk. And nerds. But for some reason, the female body in others still does it for me over the male, and overwhelmingly so. With guys, there’s just some strange disconnect between the romantic and sexual. With girls, everything is everything, intense and often beyond my control. I don’t know why I’m programmed this way, but I am. If something were to happen between me and someone like David, in spite of all of my (and our) best intentions, I think things would get awkward the moment we became physically intimate. I hate that I can’t be more open about who I like, but somehow, I’m just not. I don’t know. Maybe if I loved the person enough… I just don’t know…
Today was the GLAD’s annual start-of-the-semester ice cream social. I had mixed feelings about attending and continued to have mixed feelings when I got there. An insanely large crowd of queer folk was there, which should’ve been comforting (I guess) but it wasn’t. I felt awkward and out-of-place the whole time. I think it was the age difference. I think it was because I didn’t know 90% of the people who were there, and didn’t know how I could have anything in common with them, except that we were all, apparently, queer (apparently, being queer isn’t enough). But there’s the age difference, among other things…
I’m just… this odd combination of social and shy. Always have been, I guess.
Also, many suggested that the ice cream social is much more of an informal dating service than the actual GLAD meetings. I thought of this and looked around at all the people who were there. If was disconcerting to me, somehow, when I realized I had absolutely no desire to date anyone there. Here and there were girls I thought were attractive, and I thought, “maybe, at another time, in another life… but not now.” I just couldn’t even bring myself to even entertain the idea, much less talk to them. There was too much of a gap, a distance between them and me…
I felt very much this way at last year’s ice cream social, too. Last year I did the same thing I did this year: escape the chaos inside the shop and hang out with the older, quieter folks outside. These are the people, the handful, who have been around for several years already (the “veterans,” if you will), and a number are already in the grad or doctorate programs. These are also usually the fellow socially-awkward nerds. These were people I could actually talk to, people who were already my friends.
Sometimes, I bore myself, disappoint myself. I used to have an incredible desire to meet new people, to connect and all that. These days, however, I feel much more reserved and settled. I don’t need, nor want, to be friends with everyone. I have my friends, and I have just enough. Sure, I’ll make new acquaintances and new casual friends but a million of them won’t ever be worth one Lindsay, Melody, Orlando, Liz, Lacey, Mikee, or any of the “Kohl’s Fakkers,” for that matter.
I think part of this is because I’m getting older, and my experiences have taught me to put very little faith in the longevity of my relationships with most people. Most people move in and out of our lives easily, without much consequence at all. Only a few people last, and only a few people really, truly matter.
Jess was there, too, with her good ol’ hound Charlie… as well as a couple of guys and a cute girl with medium-tanned skin, dark hair, a quirky and energetic way of talking, a nice blend of androgyny, and to top it all off, an awesome hat. This new girl and I hit it off right away, it seemed. We geeked out in a mildly disconnected, A.D.D. fashion about comic books and eccentric old films. Out of all the new people there, this probably the only person there I actually felt any desire to get to know.
Even better, I found her attractive. And, even though I had know idea how she saw me, I felt that… that potential. Like the strings representing our lives could come together again in the future, if that makes sense. I could almost feel the story unfolding in the palm of my hands… something cheesy about how we first met, how we exchanged looks, and little did we know…
But I also realized that, as much I saw my own temptation to nibble at the bait, I wouldn’t actually bite or clamp down on any possible opportunity with her. Well, likely not, anyway, even if she felt the same thing I did and something WAS possible there. I just don’t want to…
I also found out today that Jess and April broke up three weeks ago. I don’t know why it shocked me, because that is just like April. Every six months or so, she seems to simply fall in-love with someone else. That’s just how she lives her life, which is okay for her, but I’d never want to be a part of it, not in that way. We are just two very different people… in that way.
This is just one big rambling about my lack of relationships, isn’t it? Haha, well, I’m really okay with not being in a relationship, though. I mean, I think if I really tried, I could be in one, but it wouldn’t be fair to the other person at all. My heart has already been claimed. My heart has been claimed for a good four years now. There’s just not any more room in there for anyone else, and so I lack the desire to even try. I focus on school, on books, on finding out who I am and what I’m doing and where I’m going, and that’s enough for me right now. One day, I’ll be able to move on, to open myself up to the possibilities of being with a new, other person. One day, I won’t be in limbo anymore, and it won’t hurt anymore, the distance and all of the mind-numbing improbabilities. But for now it’s just a secret-that’s-not-quite-a-secret and I’ll continue to carry it silently with me as I grow and learn and fight and live my life. It is my friendly little shadow. That is all.
