'Irrational' is not a dirty word

I am artistic. I am one of those people. I can't paint, and I'm not a dancer. But some of my happiest moments are witnessing the creation or performance of those mediums of art. I'm one of those sit-on-the-beach-and-watch-the-sunset-and-then-write-a-poem-about-it kinda people. I love reading beautiful words that capture how some experience made me feel. Music makes me feel like I'm flying, and if I can contribute to its creation with my voice - oh wow, I am a happy girl.

I feel intensely; I sometimes cry thinking about things that didn't even happen to me. Just thinking about a story my mom told me from when she was younger, or something hurtful that happened to a friend can make me very sad. I've watched documentaries and broken down crying in public. *sigh* I really don't like crying in public.... But what can I do? It's who I am. But I can also take a walk some days when even something small has made me happy - sometimes just the fact that I bought myself some especially beautiful lilies - and feel like the sun is shining just for me. I might be thinking of something a friend said recently, or a conversation with mom and laugh out loud in sheer pleasure. Strangers may think I'm crazy. But what can I do? It's who I am. I have pain, and I feel it; I can't pretend and make it go away. I have happiness and I can feel it shooting out of every pore. I have moments of stillness and reflection, too. Yeah it sucks to hurt so deeply when I'm hurt, but it makes the other side of those tears so much sweeter once I've come through it. I embarrass myself sometimes by how I allow myself to be hurt by people and things in my life, but I'm forgiving myself of that. It only makes it harder not to accept who I am. I'm going to be wrong about people sometimes, but I can't blame myself for wanting to believe in someone I liked or cared about. I've learned from those experiences, and all I can do is not allow myself to be treated badly once I am aware - but I can't start to think that I can pre-empt every potential hurt. I can’t; I'm going to get hurt sometimes. I am not happy about this realization, but trying constantly to protect myself from it is exhausting - and ineffective! The important thing is to keep moving forward, and to keep taking a chance on people sometimes. I'm going to feel sad about things - our environment, society, my place in this world - and I'm going to tear up in the grocery store sometimes because that is who I am. It is not rational. I wouldn't want to always be; the most beautiful things in this world are driven by irrational emotions. Loving someone isn't rational. Who in their right mind would let themselves be completely vulnerable to another human being knowing how imperfect we all are? If we reasoned out everything in our minimal capacity as human beings to understand, there would be no room for faith. Faith in other people, faith in God, faith in ourselves. If I wanted to rely on statistics and logic, a black girl raised in a single-parent home in Chicago wouldn't be where I am. But God brought me nonetheless. It wasn't logic that made my mom make a way to take care of my brother and me by herself, finish her graduate degree and still make time to take us to museums and read to us at night. Honestly, I can't find a logical reason for how she was actually able to do that. And furthermore, I can't find the logic in her trying. She tried to do the logically impossible, but make it a possible and definite reality anyway. Trust isn't rational. Not when you've been betrayed and hurt repeatedly. But you can't stop trusting everyone.

I'm going to let myself see a cookie and laugh because of the joke I have with Stan that just popped into my head, and I'll laugh until my cheeks hurt if I feel it. I'm going to let myself sit at my desk and cry for whoever it is that has touched me that night, and I'll even give myself permission to cry just for me. And I'll let myself feel every quiet moment in between where I just watch the snow fall outside my window and feel the warmth of my blanket. Because when I decide I want to live my life to its fullest, I've already accepted that I can't always be rational. And that's just fine by me.

On Instincts

The other morning I woke up to a loud, rhythmic bed-creaking sound coming through the wall from my neighbor's apartment. It was not the first time. Glancing at the clock, I noticed that it was 7 am. My instinct was to yell loudly "I can hear you having sex!" repeatedly and bang on the wall like a crazy person until they stopped. But I quickly realized that would only make me look ridiculous, and make our exchanges by the mailboxes awkward and uncomfortable. Plus it would've really hurt my hand.

Sometimes you can't go with your instincts.

While it was clear to me that I shouldn't make things worse by screaming through my bedroom wall, it's not always so easy to know what's a good instinct and what's not. In the past, I have had a lot of trouble when it came to this and friendships. But now, through a combination of holding back in my friendships at first (yay for building walls!), and actually having a few good people who I can really bare my soul to, I have learned how to let friendships form or pass away depending on how life works out. But romantic relationships are different. I've never had a good one, so it's not like friendship where I can say "This is what a good friendship looks like" and act accordingly. I have no frame of reference. And while I've grown when it comes to being able to trust people as friends, I'm still pretty wary of guys, which makes it even harder to trust my instincts with them. Because with them it comes down to the question of whether it's truly instinct, or just fear.

Every time something has gone wrong with a guy in the past 6 years, I've felt like I saw it coming. I had a dream the night before I discovered my ex cheated on me. I guess God was like, '*Sigh* It's time for you to know. You're not going to find out any other way *shakes head*. So I'm just going to spell it out for you'. Other times were more subtle. It was just a pause in a conversation, or a tone of voice, or an excuse that could have been completely valid that just didn't sit right. Or a pat-hug. HA. (I hate pat-hugs) Friends would tell me I was 'Girling'; stressing too hard about nothing. But then it happened. Herein lies the problem. I kinda have a sense when it's about to go down.

But I wonder…do I really?? I am constantly aware of the potential for disaster when I date a guy these days. Even if nothing is wrong yet. It drives my friends crazy, but what can I say? The last time I wasn't constantly aware was in my college relationship and whoooooa did that teach me a lesson. And my experiences since then have affirmed that you have to be prepared; don’t be surprised at what's coming out of nowhere. I know now that no matter WHAT's happening right now - no matter how cute the email or text is that I just got, or how much we laughed or marveled at *gasp* how much we have in common, or how sincere his eyes seemed when I looked up at him and smiled - tomorrow it could all be different. My friends ask if I have plans for the weekend, and I can't just say 'yeah'; it's 'yea. unless he doesn't call' or 'yea, if we're still dating' or 'yea...if he's still interested' and they think that I am ridiculous. They ask, 'what about you, what about if you're still interested'. I say, I'm steady. I know who I like, who I don't like. And if I don't know, I'm figuring it out pretty fast. And I realize that my desire to take things slow is not so much so I can figure out what I want, as much as it is for me to figure out if the other person is crazy. I expect the Crazy to come out at any moment. And I want to be as far away emotionally as possible when it does. My friends marvel at how I can go around thinking that so much could change in just a day. And on the occasions where a friend has been able to get me to think that maybe I am just stressing unnecessarily and being silly….I give it 48 hours. Tops. Then I have to call them to share the newest let-down news of the un-dateable guy who was merely dressing up and playing the role of someone I could actually like, and they don't know what to say. I mumble ‘…see? …I called it…’ through my disappointment. The sad part is it doesn't make it feel any better to have been right. But adding a caveat to every answer to any question about the guy I'm dating/seeing so that I can't ever say "Yes. I have a lunch date tomorrow. Tomorrow at 1pm, I will be at lunch." ...doesn't sound like instinct. Sounds like fear. But what do you call fear...when it keeps coming true?

Spring Break '07: My Apartment

I cannot believe it's almost April and my 1L year is almost over. I've decided to use this break to try and get a balance of rest and work. I've given myself allllll weekend to do nothing but sit in my apartment and eat, watch movies, take the occaisional walk when it's decent outside etc. No work. It's only been a day and a half (no Friday classes! yay!) and already I feel better. Between that link to the website with all the scrubs episodes from every season, sex and the city and movies on demand, and quickly diminshing reserves of ice cream, I am having a great time. When the weekend is over I might have to make a trip to the gym because right now I reek of sloth, but I deserve a break. I think I will also use this time to write a little, because I don't feel as if I really wrote enough in here during my 1L year and now it's almost over. I'm surprised to feel sadness at writing that line. How long ago was it when I was considering leaving law school for a year and teaching English in some random country?

Currently I am watching Batman Begins and wondering how in the world it is that Christian Bale got so hot. Quickly my mind thinks to the statistical probability of ever encountering a man like that in real life.

Anyway, I feel that I should write something about Parody since it took up so much of my life this past month. It was great. I think I showed my legs more during the run of the show than I have in the last 17 years of my life (I think it was at approximately 7 that I got shame.) The short of it is that I survived. And now random people come up to me around the law school and tell me how incredibly long my legs are. I usually replace 'incredibly' with 'ridiculously' when I think about them, but it's nice that I took a risk and no one mocked me openly lol. I suppose they (the legs) are not so bad.

Ok, enough for now. Christian's doing push-ups.