exhilaration | Girly Stuff and Excessive Shopping and Friend Shit (I Mean Friendship)

So the first day of summer is... June 21, I believe?

No, actually, it's today.

It's too hot. I'm too hot.

I like warm weather. But too hot is too hot. Those clothes I bought a little while ago, for "when it gets really hot?" Yeah. Good decision. It's really hot.

Anyway. Erica has been wanting to do some girly things with me, and I have been continually turning her down. She really wants to, one, go to the beach. No. Two, lay out in the sun in her back yard. No. Three, go shopping at the mall. No. Four, Get our nails done in a salon. No.

Oh wait, did I just turn down shopping?

I take it back! I want to go to the mall! I have been wanting to go to the mall for ages!

We went to the Disney store and I bought cartoon Tshirts. We went to the Body Shop and I bought scented girly things like lotions and oils and stuff. We went to Macy's and I bought some jewelry. We went to H&M and I bought like the whole freakin' store. Lots of tank tops and thin tshirts, and I did actually buy a pair of linen capri pants and I bought a skirt, too. Cause... it is going to get really hot this summer. If it's really, really hot now, it's only going to get hotter. I'm gonna want to wear that stuff, even if I think I don't want to now. Like those sun dresses I bought before. For when it's really, really hot.

I am feeling... very guilty about this. I'm home now, I hung up my new clothes and put everything away and stuff, and I'm very happy about all my nice new stuff, and I made myself throw away more old and worn stuff (because that was part of my deal with myself, if I feel like I need new clothes, then I HAVE to get rid of old stuff that is coming apart/fading/ten years old), but... I spent almost five hundred dollars.

I don't have five hundred dollars. I don't have any money. I don't have any money at all. Everything I have is either plastic or the house loan. Yeah, I make my loan payments, and yeah, I make my credit card payments, and yeah, I'm making bigger payments now that I have a bigger income, but still. When it all boils down, actually, I don't have any money. I'm in the negative. By a practically inconceivable amount.

So... is five hundred dollars really that big of a deal, if it's just like a drop in the bucket compared to anything else?

I'm not really sure about that one. It doesn't feel quite right, it really doesn't. On the other hand, though... is it really such a bad thing to buy new clothes? Really, all my clothes were about five years old, or even older. They're old. They're coming apart. They're faded and worn and don't look nice anymore. I can buy new stuff... right

Whatever. I did buy new stuff. What's done is done.

And shopping with Erica was pretty fun, too. She over-shopped too. But not really, cause she got a whole lot of graduation money and she was just spending that.

Earlier today she was here at my house while we were deciding what we wanted to do for the day. It's so hot and humid today that I didn't straighten my hair, and when I opened the door she was all "omg you have curly hair!"

Ah, yeah, my hair... right before I went to visit Krissy I soaked my hair in toner again, because I really, really didn't want to look blonde. I wanted to look platinum. I ended up with vaguely blue-violet tinted hair. Oops. You know, like old ladies who "blue" their hair so it doesn't look yellow? Yeah, that. I'm figuring that if I go out in the sun maybe the sun will bleach the tint out? But again with me not wanting to lay around in the sun. But it is kind of sort of starting to fade.

I like to think that with my hair curly I've got a bit of a Roxie Hart thing going on. That would be cute, right? Haha.

So... Erica. Erica the beautiful girl I met one night at the diner, and figured I'd never see again. Erica who says she has no friends here actually has a few friends - I work with two of them at the restaurant in fact. That makes me feel a lot better. Her whole "I don't have any friends here" thing was making me feel uneasy. Why wouldn't she have friends? What's the matter with her? But, yeah, she was just exaggerating. She seems to do that quite a bit.

I like that Erica goes out of her way to try to spend time with me. I think that's pretty cool. I like that she can drive - gets me out of the house and stuff. I get that she wants to spend so much time with me cause she doesn't have a job or school or anything to take up her time and it's true, she went from being surrounded by her friends at college to plopping right back down here where there's not much going on. So... she's going out of her way to hang out with me cause she's bored, I get that. But I think she genuinely likes me, too, I don't think she's just jerking me around. I mean, we can spend hours talking - she asks me stuff about myself, asks me my opinions on stuff, you know, besides going on and on and on about her ex boyfriend. Yeah, she does ask me my opinion on that too, but I don't have much to offer. I've never dated a guy, and guys are different from girls, and I've never really had a "successful" relationship anyway. Well, I have an ex girlfriend. And I've told her that, and a little about our relationship. But it doesn't really help me relate to her situation.

Anyway. Yes, I like hanging out with Erica because she can be exciting. But also I just genuinely like her.

I keep getting teased about her. I've been being teased by Matt over IM - Matt can be a bit rude and crude anyway, so I've pretty much dismissed his teasing. But I get it at work, too. Erica comes into the coffee shop sometimes when she knows I'm about to get off, and so my co-workers there are always like, "Lara, it's your girlfriend!" And I'm always like, "she's just a friend." And their always like, "if you say so," but, you know, it a way that really means "yeah right." I get it at the restaurant about ten-fold, since there are so many people working there. And I get her friend who's a server there pulling me aside and being like, "you know, she's hooked up with girls before, in college and stuff, she told me about it," as if to, I don't know, encourage me or something?

Thing is, one, I already knew that about Erica. Erica has told me pretty much her entire life story already. She talks a lot. But also, two, I don't have any intentions of trying to date Erica. I don't want a girlfriend. I don't want to be in any kind of relationship. I fuck up every relationship I attempt. I'm attracted to Erica, yeah, because she's attractive. I said that. She looks like a model. She's pretty much the "type" I seem to go for, too, tall, long hair, very outspoken, strong opinions on things, stubborn, intelligent - she's going to law school, she says, she's just taking a year off. But I'm not trying to date her or hook up with her or anything. And I don't believe she really likes girls anyway, I'm sure she just experimented while drunk or something - otherwise she would have told me she was bi. She told me she's straight and I don't have any reason not to believe her.

I get teased by Bevan about her, too, though, and that bothers me on a totally different level. Even if she was my girlfriend, I don't make cracks about his girlfriend. I pretty much talk to him only at work, but... he does make a specific point to talk to me. It's not like I'm suddenly off his list or anything. When I come in to work he always comes over to me, asks me what's up, how I am, whatever... and how's Erica or how are things with Erica. Which is kind of... weird. They know each other - they went to school together, high school, I mean, but - I don't know. I just think it's weird.

And Bevan did kind of corner me at work after the second night I left without closing up the bar with him and ask me if I was mad at him. I just said maybe Jury could help him close up the bar or something, since I seem to annoy her so much. I didn't say it very nicely, either, cause I was still pissed. I'm not pissed at him, I was pissed at her, she's the one who clearly doesn't like me and finds me annoying. I didn't come out and say that I heard her say it, but Bevan told me that she was just in a bad mood that night or something and that really she's a nice girl and probably thinks that I don't like her because her feelings get hurt really easily and I've been being mean to her and he couldn't figure out what my deal is.

I wasn't deliberatelybeing mean to her, I really wasn't. But I certainly haven't been going out of my way to be nice to her when I see her either.

So... we're all supposed to hang out some time. Not me, Bevan, and Jury. Me, Bevan, Jury, and Erica. He specifically said Erica, and still, I think that's weird. It was like, "you should hang out with us soon, it'll be fun. Bring Erica." Like either Erica is my girlfriend and it's a double date, or Erica has replaced him as my favorite person to drink with. Either way, neither one is true. Erica is not my girlfriend, and if I had the choice, I'd go to the bar with Bevan and sit and drink beer and talk and chill out rather than go to the bar with Erica and watch her get everything all riled up, watch her flirt with everything that moves, do shots with her and then let her drive me home when she's half-hammered, and then finally listen to her bemoan breaking up with her ex-boyfriend for the forty-bazillionth time.

Friendship is just... not my thing.

I second guess everything these days. Maybe I should just chill out.

Erica did say something to me, though, today while we were grabbing something to eat at the mall. She was kind of drilling me about my aversion to the beach and my aversion to laying out by her pool and my aversion to wearing a bathing suit in general.

She was like, "You're self conscious? Seriously? You?"

As if that was totally unheard of. Whatever. She obviously hasn't known me very long. And unlike her, I don't feel compelled to tell my entire life story to everyone I befriend.

I am self conscious. I just am. Sometimes I feel like I shouldn't be, I should try not to be, whatever, but sometimes I feel like it's okay if I am. Whatever, those are my issues, I'll deal with them if I deal with them, and I won't if I won't. It's not exactly a high priority for me right now.

But I found it incredibly cool that Erica found it so hard to believe that I would be self-conscious. Like she automatically assumed that of course I'm better than that.

I'm not, though, of course. But it is the thought that counts, isn't it?