Fizzy Time…

Time is messing with me. On any given day, I’ll forget that this dimension of me and my parent’s relationship is quite old. I forget because before this – this tenderness and affection and deeper sharing – there was a friendship where we communicated a lot and regularly hung out for dinner and casual visits to our relatives. And while back then it was that and nothing more, with no idea that it would blossom into this – this so sweet, so exciting, so hopeful – the truth, it is clear now, is that we were building something that in this new stage of our relationship has given us a sense of comfort and knowing that makes it feel like “we” may be new, but we have some good roots sown beneath us. The relationship has now entered the phase where parents are your best friends. No strictness and No Nagging.

My memory of some friends does not go back just a couple of months; it goes back further, to all the personal things we’ve shared, the fun nights grabbing some drinks, the meals we relished, the adventures we took together, the times when a simple idea (i.e., “dinner”) turned into hours and hours and hours of us talking, talking, talking. There are hundreds of email exchanges, and – at last count – well over 4,000 text messages between us. These people are called the FAMOUS SIX. There are words, so many words – covering the mundane, gossiping, expressing hurt and anger and uncertainty and wonder and shock and giddiness.

There all these things – things that ultimately can’t be quantified even as I try to do so here – that give me this sense that we are solid and further along, from a closeness/knowing each other’s perspective, than might otherwise be true of people who have been hanging out for a couple of months and now I could challenge anybody “we are die hard friends”

Ah, that blasted damage. I could easily tell myself a lot of rational stuff about that damage, and how it was central to one (very, very messed up) individual; but the thing about the damage is that it went deep. It was too many years of hearing the same shit over and over, of being treated a certain way – and after a while, the damage won. I was utterly defeated when I lost hope. I didn’t believe shit of what my luck and hopes had devoted so many years to drilling into me, but the effects of those words and the treatment of life broke me. I’ve been shadowed – even as I’ve felt better and stronger and less stressed and more hopeful than I have in many, many years (possibly ever) – by that damage, and by this big, scary question: what if everyone else will always see me as these people did? From there, it expands: what if I’m silently being judged? What if I’m undesirable? What if I’m too talkative, too bossy, too boring? What if I’m unlovable because my room is a mess? What if I’m not interesting enough or my interests are lame? What if my annoying habits are just too unbearable? etc., etc., etc… The paragraph was coded but concerned people would understand as I don’t intend to reveal everything on this open forum.

This is the thing I’ve been able to conclude about the life that was mine: it was made clear, in every possible way, that every single thing about me was judged, and that I was rejected in various ways for those very things. I’m not even exaggerating that. I could give a list of specific examples, but honestly, it would be too humiliating.

Does no one ever get truly accepted for who they are; and is everyone seriously judged for every. Damn. Thing. – For choosing long hair over short, or for not possessing about being thin, or for lavishing too much attention on technology and not dogs?

I gotta tell you, I’m wondering if I’m crazy right about now.

Time. A real chance. As we grow into our relationship with friends and family, as our feelings deepen, I have faith that the damage will continue to diminish.

Because surely, I can’t ask people to staple a sign to their forehead, assuring me that there’s no judging going on, no intent to reject?

Or can I? Would that be too weird?

I heard people quoting:

People are never bad…it’s just the time that makes them bad.