St. Valentine's Day

Today is St. Valentine's Day and I cannot get over how stinkin' excited and full of love I feel because of it. I really should make an effort to feel this way everyday so I can give my love to Zach everyday like he deserves!

Today when I left him to come to work, it was suckier than normal and all because today is the day everyone pines for their significant other. And I can't be with mine, despite his having the day off, because I'm at work. But I'm going to make every effort to get to him when I can. For example, on my 1 hour lunch break, I will be speedily driving to him so I can spend an extra 25 minutes with him today. :) ah, love.

About a year before I began dating Zach, I had ended an almost 5 year long relationship with my first ever serious boyfriend. As my time with Zach grew and grew (and keeps growing), I began noticing the differences between my and Zach's relationship and my and my ex's relationship. For example, I feel that I love Zach as much as he loves me. In my old relationship, I felt he loved me more than I loved him. It didn't feel balanced and equal. Furthermore, I feel that I am Zach's equal as a peer and I was not with my ex. This was due to differences in school, intelligence, love of reading, etc .

Basically, Zach is a better match.

But also, now, after being in a relationship with Zach for over a year and having a handful of gift giving experiences under my belt, I have also realized that I do not do special things for Zach the way I did in my first relationship. Whatever that excitement was that made me go out of my way and create a painting, a loving card, an entire journal's worth of adoration for my first relationship isn't apparent in my relationship with Zach.

For his birthday, I bought him what he asked me to buy him, but first, he had to go with me to the store to pick it out. He doesn't seemed bothered by this and really does love the gift I got him, but it felt so heartless and lazy, like I didn't have the time to put the deserved thought and care into his gift. This is basically how it's gone for Christmas and our Anniversary as well.

And now, it's Valentine's day and have I got anything special planned? Well..no. Partly because we had originally planned on NOT celebrating Valentine's day other than hanging out together because we have so many gift giving occasions at the beginning of the year (His birthday, followed within two weeks by Christmas, followed within about three weeks by our Anniversary.) and partly because I didn't really think it was going to be important for us.

So.. great. So now, I feel like I'm not putting enough effort into this relationship. I'm not conjuring up thoughtful, customized gift ideas for the man I love, and it's just.. not acceptable, because Zach is better than anyone I've ever met. He's funny and handsome and charming. He's logical and understands things on such a simple level that I can't seem to grasp and, as a result, always has the best advice for handling touchy situations. He's inventive and clever too. And talented! He does the things he loves without apology.

Not to mention, he started out as my best friend when we first met. He's everything that I've ever wanted and looked for in a person. Down to a T. Down to the very fact that I've always wanted to fall in love with someone who loved me before I loved him and didn't give up on pursuing me. And that is EXACTLY what Zach is.

He deserves the best. The very best. My very best. He deserves everything good that I could create and give him. He deserves my attention and care and adoration and love. He does not deserve indifference and stand-offishness. Though he's too patient to ever mention it.

I must make an effort to be as loving as I once was. I must make an effort to live every moment in this relationship exactly as I would have in my first. Because, despite the fact that I love him very very much, I simply feel I am not doing enough. Not doing my best. Not making him feel as amazing he is.

And so, this St. Valentine's Day, I will be turning the attention away from me and focusing all of my goodness and love on Zach. Making today the very best I can. Starting with my lunch break. And the 2nd step is a cheeseburger.

Zach, my love, you are amazing in a way I can never describe. I love you so much it's hard for me to comprehend and the very attempt of telling you makes me feel foolish because I can't imagine loving anyone this way, but I can feel it. I hope you know. I hope I tell you enough.

Happy St. Valentine's day!

Post Two: I want

I want, so badly. I want, I want, I want. Every day. Every night. I want.

What is it that I want? What will quell these nerves?

I don't know. I've been searching all my life. And I simply, do not know.

And with everything that's happened lately in life, I haven't really given myself the time and space to figure out what it is I want. And with the stifling job I have now, I can't imagine as well as I want to. I don't have the freedom to.

Without knowing what my future self will desire, I shall try to explain to you now what it is that I think I most want.

Freedom.

Freedom from society. From the tangles of jobs. Bills. Cars. Grocery stores. Garbage disposals. Turning signals. Gas stations.

All of those tiny things we created to help our lives be easier that, in turn, have only really created lives so simple we can't escape them and experience Lives. Lives vs lives. We can't. Why? Well..because, why would we? Why would we want to leave the comfort of our appliances, technology, steady paycheck, transportation? Why would we want to abandon stereotypes, fads, accessories? What else is there?

But..we should. We should. Sometimes, I long for a massive blow to civilization so that we'll be forced to start again. Forced to resume our positions as the controllers of our Lives, because with all of our inventions, we've lost control of our lives. I don't control my life. My job does. My car does. My apartment does. My relations do.

I merely nod and live through it. It's not my Life. It's a person's life. I'm not Juliana. I'm a person.

It's just not right. I'm having trouble working it all out. And frankly, I'm bitter. I doubt I'm alone in that.

Life has let me down. You go to school for a million and half years, you graduate, you go to some more school, you graduate, and for what? Your dreams? I don't think so, because I haven't seen my dreams since my senior year of college.

No. You go to school for society. So society will look upon you with favor. So society will grace you with a job you never wanted but will help you live through...society.

Well. I'm sick of it. I'm sick of myself in this state of mind. I'm sick of myself because this isn't myself. This is every one else's version of myself. Their support and their decision and their encouragement. And it's all led me to this. A customer service representative who's favorite hobbies are secret to her closest relatives.

And yes, okay, I'm being a bit dramatic. This isn't the end of the line. The end of the road. This isn't life as I will know it forever. In fact, I'm intending to change it at the very end of this year. Moving to a different place. Taking on an adventure I'm not even sure I'll begin and if I do begin, I'm not even sure I'll complete. But..for now, the thought is enough.

I want. I want. I want. I want to be free of this place. Be free of these ideas of who everyone thinks I am. I want to be my own person. I want to escape Charleston. Escape civilization. Regain myself in the solitude of outside. Outside cities, towns, airports, malls, parking lots, interstates, post offices, dmvs. Outside and away and up over it all.

Shed my skin, begin again.

If I have not created a life for myself in the next 10 years in which I am the sole controller. I am the one in charge. Then. I will just have to force myself to throw it all away and begin again.

Shed my skin and begin again.

Someday, I will have enough windows to wash my home in sunlight and fresh air. I will have enough space to spin about or lay on the ground and not run into anything. I will have enough of a yard to run and run and run until I can't see my starting point. I will have enough freedom to think and invent and create beyond anyone's expectations.

I will, someday, be who I want to be. But first.. I must shed my skin. And begin again.

And I will. In approximately 10 long months. Shackles.

Post One: The Start of the Secret

This blog is a secret. For now.

I'm starting it because I miss myself. I miss the girl who could write and who loved to read what she wrote. I'm trying to bring her back. That's why I'm here. And so.. here it goes:

Nine months ago, my best friend died. Everyone who knows me knows this. It's hard to not know it. It was the single most enormous tragedy of my life. How could anyone avoid it?

She died by combination of roller blades sans practice and hilly terrain. Oh.. and an unfortunately placed guardrail. She died suddenly. She died with only hours of warning. She died without having spoken to me that day. She died without having seen me in a week. Which, though it may seem long to some, is a really lucky thing. Because before the week before, I hadn't seen her in months.

But the point is, she died. She left. She went away, never ever to return, except for my dreams.

We had been friends for nine years. Probably almost ten, but who's checking the facts?

Nine years.

Think about it.

That is almost half of my life. Half of my life being best friends with her. Then.

We come to a screeching halt.

And it doesn't help that she died the day after I graduated from college and two days after she'd graduated. Life was already changing for the both of us. And then her's was taken and mine was mangled.

It took a really really really really really really long time for me to get over it. I'm still working on it, but for the most part, I've regained control of my life.

I've got a steady job, boring, but steady. And it pays well. I've got a really awesome boyfriend whom I live with. I'm making new friends. I'm regaining confidence in life.

But I'm not me. I'm not the girl I was 9 months ago. I'm a mutant version of her. And..that's okay. I don't think anyone expected me to be the same again. I know that Samantha's (for that is her name) death is largely to blame for my change, but graduating has a hand in it as well.

When she died, everything about my life changed. I wasn't in school anymore already, but I also quit working at the restaurant I'd worked at for the past two years in search for a more fulfilling job. I stopped making efforts to visit with my friends I'd earned in college and the professors who'd mentored me along the way. I moved out of my house I'd been in for over a year and moved into a two bedroom apartment with my boyfriend. I gave my pet away. (a rabbit, if you were curious). I delved more deeply into unnamable hobbies. And, for the first time ever in my happy life, I experienced the loneliness of grief. Subsequent depression. Etc. Etc. You know the story.

As a result, I lost my confidence. I lost my self. I lost my. .

self-confidence.

I lost it.

For anyone who's ever experienced it, I'm sure they'd agree when I say that it's a strange feeling to lose oneself. Because..without yourself, making decisions becomes a whole heck of a lot harder. And this is the time in my life when decisions must be made.

So, what have I done? Simply not made them.

But, fortunately, I can feel myself coming back around. No, I won't be the same. Duh.

No, I won't necessarily care for the same people I did before. (That largely depends on how they compare to my all time greatest friend. Which basically means, whether I stick with them is no longer in their power, but hers. But that's another story for another time.)

I can feel me becoming me again. Want to know why?

Because I'm starting to make my decisions. They aren't the same decisions I would have made before, but they are decisions. Personally, I think they're pretty good ones, but only time will tell.

Anyway. This blog is for me. Privately.To overcome the issues I've developed and come to know as my personality. To complain. To confess. To be myself. Whoever she is.

Because the only person who knew me for myself is gone. And it's too late to start being myself with everyone else.

So.
Welcome to the Ringlet Circus.
Enjoy your visit.