Good Evening.

Do you have friends?

I do. And you do too, because we are friends, in a dissociative, mean-on-the-internet, who are you, did I meet you on tour way.

Lately I am very good at friends. The less I suffer fools or hang out in a situation that  in any way makes me uncomfortable, the happier I am. The less I question WHY I’m uncomfortable, and do that kind of therapy (some) women and gay people love, which boils down to: “If I could just override the instincts of my shitty existence and bully myself into a self-hating definition of “being open” I could really make myself tolerate something I knew right off the bat was wrong.” the happier I am. Who cares what dysfunction (IF ANY) is behind my resistance? It is such an all-or-nothing question anyway! I’m not going to be friends with my turd of an ex and I’m good with that! Isn’t it true that we all just do some weird stuff and have some blind spots and if you just let yourself merrily roll along, you’ll get a sense over time what is working and what isn’t and you can just sorta gently shift what’s not working as needed/stop eating grilled cheese for every meal.

Bold woman of letters Beth Lisick hashed this over beautifully in her book Helping Me Help Myself and I have thought about it relentlessly ever since. I feel like so much of my self-loathing in the past has just been self-indulgent distraction, a way of not participating in the greater arc of MY LIFE. Which is probably the same thing as saying, “youth is wasted on the young.” (I think I mention that in every post.) Because who in the throes of great skin will ever check themselves and say, “This moment is actually not everything.”???? Maybe self-absorption is a necessary developmental element of being in your 20’s, and if you’re lucky, you move past it and realize it feels great not to think about yourself ever, wear sweatpants all the time and order meals from smiling women in filthy uniforms at a strip mall in San Pedro. Hopefully you never sink as low as ole Hannah on Girls, who seems to have disintegrated into a despicable jerk party. It’s going to take a lot of expensive therapy and shopping to get back on track, gurl!! Wait she would never do that. Shopping is for those unrelatable SATC galz, practically in the top ring of No One is Like That!!

Did you read that article in the New York Times (a newspaper that is also on the internet) about how a person could benefit from being real about what it means to talk shit about/pick apart your friends? I love it so much. Like how does a person worry about real shit like being kidnapped by pirates and starving babies and everything depicted in The Lovely Bones (movie, not book) and not feel like they have to walk around with a dedicated crutch for each limb and an absorbent pad on a furniture dolly below them to soak up the tears?? Do people obsess about little shit because it is wonderfully easier and such a mellow jam next to sex trafficking? Maybe. Humans can’t be faulted for trying to have a functional, or even happy life. And plenty of us are forced by circumstance to face way heavy shit. There is no luxury of battening down the hatches while we figure out what is causing this minor rash. But maybe there is relief in creating more inner stability, less anxiety. Maybe we don’t all have to worry some certain amount which can be directed at various points on the meaningful to frivolous continuum. Broken nail/war. Maybe some kind of human Dyson holds the wounds of the world in their heart and mind in a certain fashion such that they can wake up at 11, go to the dentist, play tennis (indoors), read a book and cook dinner and feel great about it as a lifestyle. Or maybe the effort to sort these things out is our humanity, and the point is not to be an Edible Arrangement.

I don’t know.

But I know I say lots of stupid shit, and I’m going to live with it and love it about myself. I hope you still want to date.