The World Is Wide, The Song Is Long

[exhilaration]

I've about had it with Erica. She's officially off the list now. I don't have to have a big explosion with her - she's just done.

There's really only one time Erica and I really truly had a fight over something, and it was when she called me crazy. She also stole pills from me, but that part I could have let go (kinda) if it wasn't for the fact that she tried to get out of it by saying that I'm crazy. I'm not. She was in my meds basket and saw the stuff I take and that's where she got the idea I guess, but I'm not crazy. I know I'm not. I never thought I was, and no doctor, psychiatrist or psychologist or neurologist, ever thought I was, and I've seen plenty.

And I don't believe I'm really bipolar. I understand what bipolar is - and I don't think I'm that. No doctor has ever diagnosed me as bipolar except the one I see now, and that's because I lied to get that diagnosis because I wanted the drugs for it. I'm angry, impulsive, irresponsible, immature - sometimes I feel like the drugs help, sometimes I'm not really sure about that, but at this point, I'm afraid to try to go off them, judging by what I do when I'm unmedicated. But I'm not bipolar.

Erica... well, at work over the weekend, she was sitting at the employee table and so was I, and we were both having some lunch during the mid-afternoon kinda-slow period, and I asked her if it was all right if I sat there, and she said it was fine, and I tried to say something about Hanna and she was like, "I don't care about Hanna, just don't worry about it," and "it doesn't bother me, really, I don't care." So I figured, okay, then, I guess whatever the fuck this was, it's blown over and at least while we're at work together we can be normal again, even if I'm wary of actually being friends outside of work.

It has recently gotten back to me that Erica has been telling people that I'm bipolar and that's why I freak out "all the time" (no - the truth is, that I'm just an angry person, and when something sets me off... yeah. Even if it's a small thing, it's setting off something big, because it's like inside I'm already really angry. That's called having issues, sure, but it's not bipolar) and also that she can't stay mad at me because she doesn't want to upset me too badly or I might try to kill myself.

Suuuurrrreeee. I'd really wanna kill myself over something fucking Erica says or does.

Is nothing sacred? What right does she have to take something she knows about me and twist it into something so trivial - yeah. Yeah, I did try to kill myself. A long time ago. Believe me, it's not something I can forget. But not over something stupid that happened. I'm not one of those emo kids who threatens to slit her wrists every time she doesn't get her way - every time someone's mean to her - come the fuck on. That's not who I am, that's not what I do!

Do I have a chemical imbalance? I don't know - maybe? The drugs seem to help - honestly, I'm always a little terrified that it'll happen again, that I'll plunge down into this horrible despair that seems like it just comes from nowhere - and that's the thing. It just comes from nowhere. Not from fighting with fucking Erica!

I scare myself sometimes. I look back at things I've done and the effects they've had - and it scares me. Sometimes I feel like the world is huge and I want to see it all, do everything, everything is possible - and sometimes I feel like life just goes on forever, and all I do is fuck it up worse and worse and worse - I feel like I'm not fully appreciating being alive, that I'm wasting time screwing things up - I don't know. It scares me how completely I gave myself over to a fistful of pills. And how badly massive amounts of drugs messed up my system. I could have died then - almost definitely, had I not stopped (been forced to stop) I'd be dead by now. I don't want to die, and it scares me how thoughtlessly I continue to destroy myself.

And I'm scared shitless to try to go off the meds I lied to get.

This is not a trivial thing - this is very, very serious and central to my core of being and very personal and how fucking dare she even bring any of this shit up.

Erica. Is off the list.

Erica's my "type." I saw her, I was drawn right to her - it was like I recognized her, like, "ah, there's one!" Like, "yep, that's for me!" Maybe this is what people mistake love at first sight for, I don't know. She's super-smart and super-confident and loud and vocal and tall and beautiful - that's my "type."

Except - I was going over and over this with Bevan at the bar last night - we don't do that much anymore, go talk over beers after work. It's more like we go right home and watch some TV or have some crazy (or not so crazy) sex (or both) and then go to bed. It's weird to go out for a beer and catch up a bit with, you know, the person you're sleeping with. But so it goes -

Bevan had maintained for quite a while that I have a crush on Erica - he says it's so obvious and how could I possibly deny it - and while ignoring my beer and going on and on about her and her (what I consider) complete betrayal - okay, maybe. So how messed up is that, that I'm going on and on about my supposed crush to my supposed boyfriend and expecting exactly what from him?

I love my boyfriend.

I mean, I know I do, but sometimes, that fact just hits me, like a scene from a corny movie where the character realizes something, and all of a sudden light shines down from above and there's this chorus of "ahhhhhh" and whatever.

I love how he thinks. I love that I can take the things he says and believe them. Sometimes I wish and wish I could see things differently, but wishing is nothing if I can't figure any other way to see them. I can't count how many times something he's said has just changed my whole perspective on something and made me just that much more at ease with life.

According to Bevan, Erica is not my "type." She is my anti-type. She is the kind of girl I need to stay the fuck away from.

I do, actually, have a lot to say about going out with Hanna, but I'm not going to go into that right now. Bevan's kinda iffy about the fact that that even happened, too. I mean, he was very bothered by how dressed up I got to see her - how come I don't dress up like that with him? Well, where do we ever go besides home or to a bar? About a day after my, uh, non-date with Hanna he was back on the whole "are you sure you're really attracted to me" thing - I AM SURE. I AM VERY, VERY SURE.

And yes, I know I just complicated my life even worse by getting even a tiny bit involved with this girl.

But anyway. She's nothing like Erica, I think is what I was going for with bringing her up.

It's so simple to say it that way, that what I thought was my type was really my anti-type. Why did I not recognize this personality in Erica and think "no way" - Bevan said awhile ago that it seems like I deliberately put myself around people I know are going to treat me like shit - maybe I do.

So... what, then, is my "type," anyway?

B says he's my type.

XD

In my head I've been thinking that after the whole China expedition - still, I really don't know how that's all going to work out, I can't even imagine it, but, it is happening, so there will be a time in my future when I'm returning from China - after China, I'm not coming back here.

I'm fucking done with this town. There's nothing here. This is an unhealthy place. Everyone my age is just a pathetic, burn-out, drop-out, drunk-driving, go-nowhere piece of shit. I know, that sounds really harsh, and I sound like a complete bitch. Maybe I am, but it's all true. What do I keep saying everyone does around here? They all go to bars. They all drive home drunk. They do drugs. They work shitty jobs. There are no good jobs and there is nothing else to do here. I came here because I had no other options at the time.

Now I have plenty of fucking options and I'm going to use them. I do not have to stay here, and I won't. When I return to this side of the world, I'm leaving here.

I think, also, that in my head I've also kind of been assuming that me and B are sort of "just for now." Just for now, we enjoy each other's company, we really like each other, and that's that, and eventually, we'll both move on. I've been wondering, in my head, how it's going to end. Am I going to move away and he's going to stay here, is it going to be like that, like me and Krissy? Am I going to cheat on him (even if it isn't cheating if I'm not lying about it) and just kind of get involved with someone else and then decide I like them better and that will be that? Is he going to cheat on me? Is he going to meet some other girl, some nice, normal, together, very pretty and not at all messed up girl and that will be that?

I've been wondering if I'll ever sleep with another guy - if this means I'm, in fact, bisexual, and I'll continue, for the rest of my life, to date either gender? I don't think I will - I don't really look at guys that way, I can't imagine meeting any guy and thinking about him that way - but what if I do? What if I don't?

And then I started to wonder something else: what if this is it?

What if this doesn't end? What if he's THE ONE, and we stay with each other forever, side by side, going through this long, long life together?

I try so hard to keep this relationship in the category of "it's nothing, it's just for fun" cause anything else I find pretty terrifying. But it's kind of sneaking up on me, I think. Cause this hasn't been "just for fun" in a long time.

What is, really, my type?

Someone who's interesting, someone I can talk with, someone who listens and remembers and takes care, someone who balances me out and finds some kind of balance in me - someone who isn't batshit unstable, someone who doesn't find me exasperating or impossible to deal with - someone who gets excited about the same things that excite me - someone who's happiness makes me happy -

I don't know. What the fuck is my type, anyway?