I no longer understand what is happening. I've directed my energies to too many places at once and I can't comprehend all the information. I've overloaded myself. I can't filter or make meaning of any of it. All I know is how I feel, but I can't even trust that I have correctly interpreted the things that made me feel that way in the first place, or whether the "why" even matters. I should probably also issue a blanket apology for past, present, and future transgressions. Sometimes, too many conflicting forces will cause a rigid mind to shatter. Reassemble, and remember how to flow.

(I wrote most of the following on December 23) i am utterly confused by what i perceive as mixed messages. what i hear and what i read say two different things. trying to reconcile the two is driving me mad. it's my own fault for choosing to over-analyze. i can't help it. it's in my nature. again, i probably need to step back and out of whatever place this is in my mind, since i seem to have trouble distinguishing the real from the imaginary. there are pictures on my phone that i don't recall taking. the subject matter is certainly not something i would like to be reminded of. but how did they get there? did i leave my phone unlocked in a drunken blackout and you and your friends took some pictures with my phone for the hell of it? or did i, eager to please you though pained by your actions, voluntarily take the pictures under your direction? either way, i am disturbed by the implications. as she crept closer to you on my couch my irritation turned to anger; i tried to play good hostess while at the same time watching the way you touched her so i could think about it later. i found thinking about it only made me sad. the party the previous night had been almost exactly what i wanted: you wore the first thing i ever gave you, you made me laugh and played perfect songs for hours, you chose my gift whether intentionally or by chance, we listened to records with friends and i was too high to talk but content to be in the same room as you. the following night was almost everything i do not want at all. i can deal with the original girl--if you ended up together, i would have been sad, but it would have been a welcome relief from this hell i have willingly and foolishly subjected myself to. seeing you with another just made me angry and sad enough to get blackout drunk and thoroughly drugged. this is why i need to step back and quit interfering with your life (or at least quit thinking that i even have the ability to interfere). nothing in this situation should affect me so strongly, and there is no reason i should allow myself to act this way. also, seeing you with other girls helps expose the illusion a little bit so i can come back to reality, or at least as close to reality as i ever get. when i see you again, i hope it feels more like the christmas party, and not like the following day in which i somehow end up with pictures of you and another girl on my phone.

finally dropped her millstone. I tried to write about that yesterday for three hours, sitting in my car in a department store parking lot, but nothing sounded right. I guess I should bow out, and I know I should be glad that you can pursue someone who is free to return your affection openly, but although I am trying to be happy, I am not. I thought I would be jealous, but it's not even jealousy. Just utter despair. I feel nauseous; I'm crying at work again. You were so close, and I never quite was able to hold on to you. She is there to fill the void, as I was when she was not free. But you were never really mine to begin with. I realize now that I was just a surrogate, a placeholder for you to direct that emotion until she could be yours. Am I wrong? Please tell me that I am.

I will miss what I liked to pretend was your way of communicating with me. I would guess that you won't have much need of it or much time for it anymore. It's been a year and a week since I saw you talking to my cat at that party. Although the outcome is not what I wanted it to be, and I am sick with regret, I wouldn't trade that insane year of joy and pain for anything. I wish I could tell you that I want you to go be happy with her, but that wouldn't be honest. I am crushed. This loss was what I was trying to avoid feeling during those six weeks over the summer, after the sudden dissolution of the band and what I thought was the end of any hope to ever see you play again, when I routinely got so high that I had to remind myself to breathe. I wrote a lot then that I was afraid to let out, all about despair and desire. I don't think if you had seen it, it would make any difference now, because she can be with you and that's what you wanted from the start, right? Even if I left to come find you right this second, anything I could do is done too late. Also, I am afraid to come find you, but now for different reasons: I suspect she's been with you and I can't handle seeing that.

when I found out I missed the set. You can ask your friends. They all looked at me like I was crazy, or like they knew but politely pretended it wasn't painfully obvious that I am in love with you. And I thought, or at least I hoped, that I was special, or somehow above reproach. Stupid me. You treat me just like the rest of them--with derision and contempt. All I wanted was to talk to you for more than five seconds at a time without being told you wanted to leave and get away from me. I don't understand why you treat me like this. I love you, you stupid jerk. This is why I wanted to keep this situation out of reality, so what I feel could never be diminished by cruelty, and so we would never have the opportunity to be disappointed in one another. However, when you *did* let me hold you, and I could feel you and breathe you in (you smelled very nice)--that was the best I've felt in a very long time. I want more of that. I want it on your bedroom floor.

Before I got to the show,I was convinced that you were going to find a way to kiss me tonight. I had it all worked out in my mind. How naive I am! I'd better just stick to what I know is real. I am drunk and my pride is hurt; maybe tomorrow this will seem like no big deal--or maybe I will still be angry. I don't understand why it has to be like this. This is fucked up and stupid. Why can't we love w1thout consequence? This is why I am jaded and withdrawn and put walls up. I'm tired of being hurt. I thought maybe you could change that; that's why I let you in.

Some elements of that story make me think of how this seems to be unfolding, except with music, and you're much better at it than I am.

"And so I gave you my keys
So you could let yourself in
But I freeze at the sight of one of these
Sure things"

i'm not certain it is a sure thing, even

 

I am usually wary of defining or naming things because I feel like that immediately limits the potential of whatever it was that was coming into being. I hope I didn't just fuck that up, too.