twenty-two going on something

I wrote this over a month ago and forgot about posting it until now. Happy late birthday present to me...

My best friend texted me at 9am to say "Happy Birthday. Don't feel old because you aren't." Well too fucking bad. I spotted a crowsfoot and my back hurt when I woke up this morning. I get roaring hangovers from any more than 3 drinks. I have fucking life insurance. I pay bills. The impending doom of aging is upon me. It's not that I truly feel that old (because I'm not, duh), but I'm aware of the years ahead of me being closer than they might appear. The crowsfeet just at the corners of my eyes took 22 years to assemble themselves and will burrow themselves so deep within my face in the next 3 years that they will be vast enough to store some of my plentiful emotional baggage in. 

On the more deepinsidemyownhead side of things, I'm unsure of whether this birthday is a welcome advancement or not. I've felt somewhere between having been 30 for the past 5 years and having never left 16. I still waffle about what I want to be when I grow up and wish I lived with my parents. I love wine and have a life insurance policy (that bears repeating). I read magazines for life advice and have also considered seeing a therapist. I'm on this cusp of growing up while already having been an adult for a little while. Things are suddenly seeming degrees more serious than they ever have before. My old-soul/pensive nature lends itself well to coping with this reality. But the other side of me - the one that says OMG too often and loves a good gossip session - is flipping a shit. Everything was easy and low stakes and then, suddenly, HELP I DON'T THINK I CAN HANDLE REALITY. Things are important now. I have to make real decisions about my future (granted, I've bought myself two more years of no commitment with grad school) and start thinking forward. When will I get married? How do I budget for moving to London? What really matters in life? What should I do to get away from the gun nuts? My pragmatic side has always dealt with these things just fine but now that side is more in demand than it has ever been before which is where the freak out is stemming from. 

I don't know how to handle it. I never do. But that's life, yo. C'est la vie. Carpe Diem. Carpe Birth-diem? At least I am doing better than the ladies from Sex and the City. I've got that to fall back on.

sos

SO I am pretty sure someone read my blog. This blog. This blog where I just write down the stock ticker of emotional crap running through my head. And a lot of it was about being lonely. Fuck.

I don't know who it was. Some match from Bumble? A friend? Some recruiter? We can never know. We can, however, know their IP address but let me tell you how much good that does. 

I'm thinking this inner monologue shouldn't be living anywhere where anyone else can find it or read it or experience it in any way. Am I happy to be writing more? Absolutely. But maybe it was a mistake to just put it out there in the internet-world. 

Are you there God? It's me, Margaret. I need to know who read my blog.

exploration, party of 1

By myself in a big, big city.

Exploring by yourself is a transformative experience. You only have one person's whims to cater to. The pace is set. A Ventra card and no place to be other than where you want to go. 

I spent the weekend wandering the streets of Chicago. Being alone makes you appreciate and relish in the time you get to spend with friends. But I didn't feel alone out there amongst the crowds of tourists - myself being one. I honed into my own mind for hours on end. I let myself do that weird thing where you try to fit the same amount of footsteps into each sidewalk paver as you walk. I listened to the world and didn't try to rush. Through museums and stores and metallic beans and relics of architecture, I let myself revert to my neutral state of introversion. 

But being by yourself has a funny way of pushing you to other people. Asking strangers to take your pictures. Talking to baristas for just a bit too long. Making quips to fellow line-standers. Telling the statue street performers how dumb their job is (just kidding). In being alone and enjoying it, I also found that it's ok to not like being alone. 

Fuck. All of this introspection and all I've determined is that I need a boyfriend.  

melting point

The other day, Microsoft Excel made me cry. 

I can't fully blame it on Excel, but it was the straw that broke this camel's back. I'm taking a stats class for what seems like the 5th time in my life and it makes me want to put something sharp through my neck. Being as it's a graduate level stats class, it involves intricate use of Excel - something I never learned how to use. So, as I laid in bed, trying to decipher the many little boxes and functions, I cried.

I cried because I like to pile up a bunch of tiny little stressful things until I reach my breaking point. I cried a "Why did I decide to go to grad school?" cry. I cried a "I need more friends" cry. I cried a "Why doesn't he love me?" cry (I've been watching too many Nora Ephron movies). I cried a "I don't know what to do" cry. I cried a "I've never felt dumb before," cry (this is in reference to the Excel bit). I had myself a big ol' blubbering fest. Life, love, school, mental health, physical health; all of it had built up to the point that it had liquified and was uncontrollably spilling out of my tear ducts.

It felt good. Having a good hard cry felt good. Getting to acknowledge that trivial things can make you feel shitty feels really good. Letting yourself feel like a human when you usually walk around resembling some cold, heartless woman-thing feels good. 

So thanks, Excel.

days daze: a tuesday in late august

This is going to be one of those days where the only human interaction I have is ordering coffee (small, black, room for cream just so I don't spill it).

Living alone, while great, really forces you to become the person who always suggests happy hour. It's lovely to not see anybody first thing in the morning. You can handle your morning breath at whatever pace suits you. You do all of the weird stretching and adjusting while making your first of many cups of tea without having to force conversation. But along with the beauty of silence and privacy in the first 20 minutes of the day comes the realization that you will in fact need to leave your apartment if you want to maintain your sanity in any way. So here I am, at 10 in the morning, already suggesting happy hour.

I thought I'd be all talked out after this weekend, but alas. I find myself filling the notes section of my phone with observations I want to send to the person I saw every day, Friday through Sunday. But for the sake of keeping up the appearance that they aren't friends with a crazy person, I am not sending them on to them.

The objects on my agenda today include relearning statistical analysis for what I believe is the fourth time in my life, conducting interviews about Dust Off (welcome to Texas Creative), planning ways to fill my time when I visit Chicago this weekend, and ignoring the general upkeep of my apartment. Oh, and happy hour. 

Currently, I'm sitting in the establishment where the aforementioned coffee was ordered. Watching people scroll through their phone, couples share a lunchtime cupcake, and a gorgeous guy who probably didn't notice me order some iced latte thing. I still haven't touched anything on my to-do list. 

-skk

welcome.

Hello from my new internet hole in the ground. Sometimes I want to write shit just to write shit (as if I wasn't already spending enough time on Twitter already doing this). But here will lie the dumping ground of my most mundane thoughts and personal ramblings. 

-skk