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[everything has been redacted]
I’m drunk, It happened, I’m over it. the thing is, I wander back to my computer to find these half written arguments to the internet. Thankfully, I notice them before I post them, mainly because I have practiced for this my entire life.
my drunk has gotten that good that I can drunkenly censor my drunkeness. suck it trebek. [i let this one stay becaues it made me giggle]
It’s funny, throughout my life I’ve always confided the thoughts I didn’t feel safe enough to share with the people in my life into a journal. Perhaps it’s because I’m generally a non-confrontational person who lacks the courage to face admitting something truly embarrassing to anyone I love and respect, or maybe it’s just that I’ve got better sense and I can reason which are the thoughts that I can share that will keep me out of the nut house. But even after purging the disgusting thoughts into the non-judgemental safety of white lined paper, I still felt it needed to be hidden. I became a master in hiding things, all spawning from trying to hide that loathsome part of me from all eyes— prying or accidental.
when I was in high school the younger sister of a classmate passed away in a motorcycle accident…afterwards people talked about how terribly sad it was, she was such a good, bright, wonderful kid- why even in her journals she wrote of the perfect husband, and what being a good christian meant to her. I remember thinking no one would have such kind things to say of me after they read what was in my journals.
Now, I realize that I was being silly for the most part. While the content was exactly what one would assume for a teen, ie: dramatic ramblings of who liked so-and-so and how that wasn’t fair because *I* liked so-and-so, but there was also the truly disturbing tidbits that can only be reasonable in the eyes of someone else who was exposed to the internet in those early days, and anyone else who experienced damaging things in their childhood. While it’s true that today there are popular webpages devoted to all sorts of unspeakable things, it still requires a bit of searching to find them. Back then, you stumbled upon that shit because the search engines of yesterday were brilliant at finding completely unrelated results- often something that piqued the curiosity of a disgusting teen’s mind.
For the most part these images and thoughts would flow over and past me never to be thought of again, but there were the times when my pubescent mind would dwell and dwell on the sick and seedy things- all dutifully confessed recorded in my journals. I WANTED that sick place I could go to- that no one would know about- where I could revel in my own perverted thoughts.
As it goes, the contents of any particular journal would slip from my memory and upon finding the journal, often years later, I would crack open with tepid curiosity as to what wonders I would find in how past-me thought.
To date, I have every journal I ever wrote in- but no one would ever know it. You can be sure I ripped out every page that I ever wrote to myself. Present-me couldn’t abide these thoughts to ever become my legacy and so I ripped them out, and destroyed that part of my past. Not just the gross things either, all of my ramblings- be they rants of the injustices suffered of a teenage girl who shared a room with her slightly younger sister, or the insights that while being writ were thought to be unparalleled in intelligence and transformative…I was making discoveries!
It used to make me sad, the fact I detested myself so much that I destroyed all trace of my thoughts. It doesn’t make me sad anymore, because I realized some time ago that I wasn’t destroying the memory of who I was- but rather purging the dark corners of concentrated filth, and clearing out the waste of moronic gushing- the crap I thought was a testament to my brilliance. And dammit, it made me feel better about myself. Of course, I do wish I had been more selective about what I destroyed. I should think I’d have liked to be able to go back and see when I learned the lessons that made me who I am today.
Over the years of having a public blog that I keep sharing too (no matter the times I tell myself I’m going to quit) I have wondered why is it that I can keep something filled with the same flaws and ramblings that I would have put in a journal? This morning, while ruminating over a bump in my relationship with my boyfriend I realized it’s because here I can find the acceptance I cannot give myself. And here, where just by knowing that someone else could read this and be INDIFFERENT makes me realize that I don’t HAVE to forgive myself, that I don’t even HAVE to accept myself, and that I certainly don’t have anything to be ashamed about—instead, that I can be indifferent and curious and perhaps even a little appreciative of the history I’ve left for my future self.
To be noted, on the bump with my boyfriend: In this moment of discovery that I felt compelled to share (even though now I am 2 hours late of leaving to visit a friend) I’ve come to the conclusion that he didn’t do anything to blame. Did he rip off a scab covering the painful bacteria of self-doubt and insecurities about body image? yes. Is that his fault? no. So, I’m going to the beach in an effort to finally clear up that nagging infection of weight related insecurity.
Missed my flight this morning, so now I’m staying in Miami for the weekend.
I think I’ll take the silver lining for a hot air balloon ride and dinner with friends in Tampa, and maybe drive down to the keys on Sunday and send my mom some really cool “wish I was there, but isn’t this kinda ok too” photos from the beautiful scenery!
I might be moving to DC. Many details yet to be hammered, but I’m more focused on what I’m going to say when I run into Josh Lyman.
seriously, i’m obsessed with this song.