keeping with the honesty, even if it’s scary.

you could say it’s my instinct, yes, I still have one. there’s no time to second guess it. yes there are things that i’m still so afraid of … but my courage is roaring like the sound of the sun.

here it is, what seems like the requisite “airplane ride home from new orleans processing life” post.

recently, i’ve had a few separate things happen which i described later as “not knowing how much i needed that until it was given to me.” and i’m sure this stems from working through my minor issues around ‘feeling’ and ‘needing.’ the thing about these silly issues that that there are two levels to actually work through. first, there is actually allowing and admitting to myself the feeling or need. second, the conversation about or expression of those needs and feelings with whom you hope to validate or fulfill them. and all of this plays out practically in my life as me trying to stop my ‘play it cool’ (ie: have no needs) attitude with people i care about.

that’s where getting something i didn’t even know i needed comes in this time: the initiation of a tricky, feelingful conversation that needed to be had (that i never would have actually had if not for his initiation). mostly because it was a conversation about a need (that i wasn’t allowing my self to need).

anyway, in this feeling centric conversation i reacted with my typical mode of operation: play it cool. i didn’t respond, in the conversation. i reacted. without conscious choice in the matter (i even thought, ugh, why am i saying this?). but in this conversation, my ‘play it cool’ flat out lie (to myself and him) was not taken at face value. it was actually met with understanding. and then i was called on my bullshit.

he didn’t take ‘play it cool’ as an option. and he called me on my bullshit in a perfectly kind and understanding way that actually allowed me to open up. and discuss my feelings honestly. and he cared enough to get to that point. he didn’t take the easy way out, initiate a conversation about needs and feelings because he knew it was the right thing- but then jump on any chance to end the conversation before having to discuss them. Read the rest of this entry »

breakable girls and boys

we are so fragile and our cracking bones make noise and we are just breakable girls and boys.

so i am sitting on a plane listening to music that i am sure is about to kill me. i am about to lose it, and have no idea why. well, i have about seventy ideas. all of them lead me to a place where i have no control. and the more and more people start to read these ramblings i call writing the more i feel like i should some how alter the content of this blog to be less personal, more analytical, less crazy about to lose it on a plane steph. but right now, at thirty thousand feet above real life, i just don’t want to do that.

i’m sad. and confused. and connected. supported. and alone. and leaving an amazing vacation and an amazing city to return to amazing friends in an amazing city. and i am wholeheartedly bawl my eyes out sad. i’m sad to leave vacation, a fantasy world, to return to real life unemployment and dating drought. i am sad that someone is going to read this and not get me. and sad at the honest and unbelievably positive response i have received for writing. there is just something missing in it right now. and i am scared that i am leaning on past good things to fill this void. and when those past good things don’t work, or end for the same reason they did then, i am left feeling a little less sure that this all will work out.  and how do you process something that you know you want but just cannot have. where do you turn when you have no control over something. something you want so badly it breaks your heart. and since you can’t have it, how are you supposed know that it truly is that something that you want so badly.

how is it that six months after leaving my job, friends, home and life and moving across the country to start anew, i am already feeling restless. why am i reveling in this weekend’s discussion of grad school and a work routine that lead to a missed chance to connect one more time before i left. why do i long for all the things i was so excited to have already accomplished. ready for new. maybe it is unemployment, feeling one hundred percent undesired, or unsure of what my next steps are but i feel restless and stagnant and worthless and sad. and heartbroken. for reasons i just cannot figure out.

heartbreak. the feeling that you have no idea how to continuing moving through life due to a lack of the returned love, desire, spark and presence of the one thing you feel you cannot breathe without. here i am, on this plane, simply heartbroken. for seventy different reasons. all uncontrollable by me. because that’s what heartbreak is. something you would put all the power in your mind, body and soul to combat. and it still wins. leaving you feeling defeated, at loss of energy, hope, and worth all while simultaneously smothering you in the memories of what you had prior to the loss that made you realize that it was the only thing you ever needed.

this is a real life glimpse of the story of a twentysomething midwestern girl overwhelmed with love, honest connection, distance, friendship, accomplishment, and pure old fashioned heartbreak.

but i finally saw the piece of love in your face, that bathed me in regret then you drove me to places i’ll never forget