Wednesday 9 December 2015

Dazed


The heat of the summer and the unimportance of every task has left me afloat.  My life has become a series of lying on the floor with my phone held above me, my room hot and stuffy, with things to do but nothing urgent to be done.  Nothing matters for the next two months other than the bags I pack.

My birthday is in 3 days but I wish it wouldn't come.  I enjoy the lead up: the presents, the food, the attention - but then the day comes with high expectations and many disappointments, because tradition puts so much weight on this one insignificant day of the year.  I refuse to pack on my birthday, I refuse to check my phone, I refuse to play the piano, so what will I do?  Why do I need this day to be so perfect?  Most people don't remember my birthday for the day that it is.  They'll remember the date of my party, what they'll wear to it, the photo they might post, but they'll never actually remember the day.  And that's fair enough.  I don't remember very many people's actual birthdays either.  I'm just not looking forward to the disappointment of mine.

The past few weeks have been a cycle of eating too much and then working out in vain.  6 years of childhood spent on ballet has trained me to suck it in for hours, and this fools me into thinking it's all okay, but when I finally let go I see my love for food right there in its physical form.  Tonight I went out for dinner with my long-legged friend in her tight shorts, while I was wearing my loose long shorts, having just returned from three hours of non-stop eating at an all-you-can-eat buffet.  My skin was oily, on the verge of a breakout, and I felt like absolute trash.  I feel so unhealthy and I'm worried because I know that once I leave for Malaysia there'll be no chance to make a comeback.

Justin Bieber's album Purpose has been playing on repeat as I wrap Christmas presents and slowly clear my room then mess it up again.  My latest hobby has been collaging, and it's extremely messy.  The desk feels gluey, the paper is everywhere, and yet I'm proud of the final result.  The last collage I made was 21 inspired.  It's this movie about some boring MIT kid who joins a secret society that counts cards in Las Vegas.  The movie's called 21 because that's the magic number in the game Black Jack.


My dad taught my sister and I how to count cards the other day.  As a bragging card counter himself, he's told me that counting cards in casinos does not lead to beating up and scary security guards, but rather polite ones who politely tell you to stop and leave.  Although the theory behind counting cards is fairly easy, I can't seem to count fast enough.  It's simple addition and subtraction, but my level of concentration nowadays is so low it worries me.

It seems as if the only thing I really am concentrating on is social media.  I'm so unhealthily self conscious, or maybe I'm bored.  I check Instagram, get bored and check it again, and refresh and refresh and post in order to make myself paranoid, and then check out what everyone else seems to be liking.  I feel the need to share all the fun I theoretically should be having on snapchat, but in reality I'm not feeling a thing.

I think I'm living for the conversations nowadays.  Yesterday we ate candy by a lake and told some truths.  Today we walked along unfamiliar neighbourhoods and had the materialistic yet honest chats that seem to shape our shallow lives.  We sat in a smothering car sharing 20 seconds of our varying music tastes without an ounce of embarrassment.

I'm beginning to feel as if there are real friends and some who aren't worth respecting anymore - some who, after talking it out, you realise aren't healthy to be around.  They may be civil to your face, but there they go talking behind your back again.  They may put on a strained voice that makes you realise they're even more insecure than you are.  They may bring up topics specifically to show you their one area of superiority, even if all it does is reincarnate unwanted drama.  They may just be fake.  But then, maybe everyone's fake until you get to know them well enough.

I read a snippet of the play This is Our Youth yesterday.  It was in something Jessica, the character played by the idealistic Tavi Gevinson, said:

"Everything you think will be different, and the way you act, and all your most passionately held beliefs are all gonna be different, and it's really depressing... Because it just basically invalidates whoever you are right now... that there's these huge swaths of time in your life that didn't register at all, and that you might just as well have been dead during them for all the difference they make to you now."

Judging from the amount my perceptions on everything have changed this year, I can't imagine how much they will change in the year to come.  It feels somewhat sad knowing that everything I think now could be wrong, and that in a year all this analysis and writing will be meaningless to me, because I'll look back and see a lesser version of myself preaching unhealthy untruths.  

I don't seem to want to go to sleep at night.  Yesterday I watched an episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians from 2008 until midnight, and then planned on working on some presents.  Maybe excitement is what's keeping me awake at this exciting time of year.  Maybe I'm dazed because I'm happy and there's nothing to worry about.  Or maybe the fact that I've got no commitments has left my brain dopey and blank.

I don't feel very alive right now.

Love,
M

16 comments:

  1. Yeah I'm kinda feeling that way too..I hope you feel better (emotionally) <3

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    1. Thank you Addy. I feel fine emotionally, but fine isn't happy.

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  2. It's nice to know that I'm not alone.

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  3. Wow this is so so amazing, love these work,
    and the post is nicely written and deep,
    hope you will feel better soon.

    http://dreamland1234.blogspot.si/

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    1. Thanks Monika! When I make these collages I can't help but feel like a 12 year old discovering photoshop.

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  4. i hope you feel better soon. you write beautifully.

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    1. Thank you Maddy. Seeing as I'm now in a different country, my mood has also changed considerably ;)

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  5. I'm calculating time zone difference for your birthday. Is it today? Anyway, happy birthday!!!! I wish you all the best. I hope you feel better now.

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    1. It was the 12th so you were spot on! Thank you Jhecel!!

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  6. You're collage is so dope girl!You know,if your brain was an actual physical destination i think i would visit quite often.I don't even know what that means exactly,but i guess you always say something that resonates with me.Anyway, don't worry about your changing world views and ideologies that's what makes people like us so dope,the way we think,we analyze and are constantly changing our minds and making new conclusions.I bet you're gonna read your current diary entries at the end of next year and you're gonna be mind blown lol.Bye!xoxo

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    1. Ah thank you so much Maryam. I honestly wish someone, anyone, would be able to visit my brain as if it were a physical destination, but unfortunately we're all trapped in our own minds. Or maybe that's fortunate? Maybe mystery is something we all deserve, whether we want it or not. I do think reading back on all the writing and thinking I've done, I'll appreciate having done it all. It takes several conclusions to come to one more accurate, and I won't have gotten there if it weren't for the analysations of the past.

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  7. Ah, you don't sound too happy at all. I hope this feeling passes and you manage to have an amazing bhis post was beautifully written, as always.

    Corinne x
    www.skinnedcartree.com

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    1. Thank you Corinne. A lot of these feelings pass very quickly as new things keep me preoccupied.

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  8. What a lovely and honest post. I hope that you can try to enjoy your birthday this year. I think the problem is that like Christmas and New Years, people have such high expectations on their birthday, that even if the day is amazing, they will still feel let down. I guess the important part is to just know that being with loved ones is enough. Sorry to hear your struggles with food and the gym too. I hate that society makes us women feel guilty when we enjoy food, it really isn't right. I hope you can find a good balance between using social media and stepping away from it as well but I do think that social media is simply a part of the modern world now, which when used correctly can also be a beautiful and inspiring thing but it is so sad that it often makes us feel like we are missing out.

    Rae | Love from Berlin

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    1. Thank you Rae. It really is sad that all these good things have a negative side to them too, due to expectations and other societal human nature-ish interpretations. You'll be happy to hear that I'm pretty much satisfied with my birthday, although the whole food vs gym thing is still somewhat unhealthy and the social media thing is getting better. I just wish there were an easy way to solve these issues.

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