Post Ten: Isn't anyone out there?

Well, looks like I'm ten posts into this blog and how many months?Almost five months into this and I still have trouble finding the right words.

Right now, my life is pretty awesome. I have a good job and an AMAZING (this is one of the places where I can't find the right words) boyfriend. I'm consistently painting and drawing, though actually completing projects is slow going. I've reinstated my relationship with my college mentors and am actively writing up research for publication.

Life is good. All except for one thing.

I am friendless. Not in the sense that no one I know likes me or invites me places or would do things for me, but in the sense that on a daily basis, I see Zach Jones. And that's it. Especially now that I'm working from home. Not that I mind. I love Zach immensely in a way that I could never ever ever describe. But, he has his place in my life and it's not my friend. Yes, i would say he's my best friend, but he's so much more than that. Just calling him a friend leaves out every other wonderful thing about us and what he means to me. Moving on.

Back in January 2010, I saw this friendlessness occurring. But I didn't think it'd end up the way it did with no friends surviving. Now I'm here, a little over a year later, with none of the friends I started out with in the beginning of 2010.

Part of me regrets this. I really miss having friends who I can call to talk to about anything and who will be willing to go out with me just to hang out.

Part of me also feels it would have happened no matter what. The friends I had back then were not the types of friends I wanted. If they were...they'd be here, right? (This is something Zach has above everyone I knew when Sam died. He stood right by me through all my pain and sorrow and downright darkness and never left. He's still here today, still loving me, to prove it and I will never be able to thank him enough for that.)

But the parts of me and their feelings are not important, what's important is that now me, the whole of me, is finding herself indescribably lonely. When Zach leaves for work, I can literally feel my mentality sinking to a sad place. I have to fight it so that I don't get emotional. Because being lonely and crying really doesn't help you enjoy your day.

I've got to find people and soon. Good friends. My best friend died over a year ago. I knew when she died that everyone I was already friends with probably would not remain friends with me for very much longer. Sam's death made me selfish in that I retreated into myself, without the time to listen or care for anyone else. I simply didn't have the energy to do it. No happiness to spare.

Now that I'm back out in the world, only every now and again finding myself in the same selfish place, I really feel the effects of the damage my grief caused.

For a while, I didn't care. I took it in stride and owned my free time. I began painting again and planting and comic book writing and journal keeping and reading. And my home was my sanctuary away from work. A place for quiet and love and relaxation and imagination and creativity. With work being in my home now, it's harder to find those qualities in my house, because I'm here all the time and when I'm working, I'm only here for people to call and whine to me.

I don't know. Saturday night after I got off of work, I just stood in my kitchen and wept. I had my headphones on and no matter the mood of the song, no matter how happy and perky it was, I could not stop being sad. I feel like Samantha had a lot to do with it. One of her Clemson best friends is engaged and she wrote to Sam about how she wished she could tell Sam about her engagement and they could celebrate with one another.

And it hurts to read that, because I know and have known that some day I will be in the same situation.Some day I will be engaged. And if it happens soon, I have no real close friends to call for congratulations. Or to be my bridesmaids. It's a very.. lonely feeling.

*sigh* I know role models preach independence to women, but a girl needs her friends. She needs that support and release. Without friends, everything that makes her sad, embarrassed, or worried is holed up inside, mixing together in a chaotic soup.

It doesn't taste good, that soup. And it doesn't feel good.

I owe Zach everything for sticking by me. But he doesn't want everything, he just wants to be with me. The friends I lost were good while they lasted, but could not stand up to the kind of support I needed when my best friend died. No one will ever understand how supporting and caring she was to me. And because of that, they could not live up to what I had come to expect from friends. Though I regret not having friends, I do not regret their loss so much. It's a shame. But friends come and go. And as they say, there are only a precious few we should hold on to.



I just need a friend. I real, genuine friend. I know that I have what it takes to be one. I know it. I just don't know how to let anyone else out there know.

*sigh* okay. before I make myself sink back to that sad place, I will go. I have a painting to paint and a life to own. Some hopeful words for the road: I am atypical. I can achieve anything. And I will one day make someone a very happy best friend.