I love my silly little walks.
They provide a lot of clarity. I have always been aware of the importance of just getting outside to break up the day and for the most part, I made sure I got outside so that I didn’t go crazy.
This obviously became a lot more important when the pandemi lovato was at its worst and you could only leave your house for an hour a day.
So I love my silly little walks.
But I also hate them.
The monotony of my walking routes, and the fact that for the most part the music blasting in my ears is almost white noise most of the time and is only there so I’m not in total silence, means that my mind wanders.
Sometimes it wanders in a positive way and I make creative breakthroughs that I can squirrel away onto a page and suddenly what once felt stagnant now has new life breathing through it. Sometimes the beginnings of a newsletter start to take root in my brain and after a few walks the roots have blossomed into a fully-fledged thing and then I just need to get it down. The point is they do give.
But then they also do truly bat shit crazy things.
I was on the homeward stretch from a walk recently and it was one of those weird days where there was rain falling from the sky but I also felt like I was wearing too many layers because the humidity was moving truly mad.
Taylor Swift - London Boy came up on shuffle (I say shuffle, it’s my good ol’ Apple Music radio station so the order of songs is truly bat shit crazy, although this song is actually in my music library) and I didn’t really think much of it. I’ve heard that song plenty in the last couple of years.
But my brain was clear from all the nature and the greenery and shit and suddenly I was straight back in a car on the way to Eastbourne listening to the Lover album and having someone sat next to me doing the driving talking about how I was his London Girl. His fingers were loosely linking with mine when we got stuck in traffic on the motorways. Or they were trailing up my thigh absentmindedly as he terribly sang along to whatever song was playing at that moment.
It was a montage of shit that you get in a film when the lead character is remembering somebody that died. The lighting is all bright, a golden hue attached to everything to let you know that it’s a memory. The smiles are too big and the eyes are glistening unnaturally. Everything is just a little bit too good to be true and that is the only thing that lets you know that you’re viewing it with rose-tinted glasses on. The spinning top keeps spinning.
When I got home that day the spinning top did stop spinning and I was just stuck with the reality of the situation.
The reality of the situation comes with a weird sense of anger. It’s a combination of anger at him and also anger at myself.
In fact, it’s mostly anger at myself. And it’s mostly anger that I have worked through, but on this particular day, I realised that I hadn’t quite gotten rid of it all.
If you had asked 26 year old me if she liked, or even loved, herself then I would have said yes. Sure, there were days when things weren’t great and there was a small part of me that felt a little bit broken, but for the most part, I felt pretty content with myself.
I genuinely believed that. Except for the fact that the day that I downloaded a bunch of dating apps I was doing it because I was not in a good space and I just needed some external validation and on a purely superficial level there is something quite nice about seeing all those likes coming in. I found it interesting what photos exactly people reacted to and it was always amusing to see what vaguely racist thing might come up (I lost count of how many times someone liked my ‘wild’ hair).
I didn’t go into anything that day with the intention of going on a date with anyone. But… as I said, I went in with the worst of intentions and at some point during that moment of need I was struck by the fact that I was 26 and had yet to have that so called great young love that everyone always seemed to be going on about. There was a weird narrative when I was younger that I would probably break some boys’ hearts and well…I didn’t. There were no boys interested in me and on that particular day I just felt like I was a bit broken.
I pretended that it wasn’t, but the foundations on which I ended up entering that relationship were shaky at best. I’m angry at myself because a lot of damage could have been avoided if I had just followed my gut and not gone with the small part of my brain that just wanted to not feel broken.
I am about 80% certain that I can no longer say that I haven’t broken any boys’ hearts.
I say 80% because it’s really hard to gauge how he felt by the end. We hadn’t seen each other in 4 months (lockdown) and we didn’t speak to each other in the dying moments of our relationship. I’m pretty sure that it’s because he didn’t want to hear me say it was over and by that point, I had no desire to actually talk to him. In a lot of ways, it had been over for a while.
I'm angry at myself for the way that I handled it and the way that I just left him in limbo without really addressing it. I had my reasons, I was honestly just trying to get through the days most of the time. White people had just realised that racism was still alive and well and I was exhausted by the conversations and the unearthed/repressed racial trauma coming back to the forefront of my mind, I put the work into maintaining the relationships that were serving me through that time. The one where he felt like he needed to be congratulated by his black girlfriend for suddenly giving a shit was not one that was serving me. I didn’t want to be cruel about it but I still was, just in a different way.
I did however 100% break my own.
Now I have done that before. It is one of the reasons that I knew that I needed to work on at least liking myself more than I did at the time. But this one was worse because once the dust settled I realised that the person that I thought I was had just been burned to ashes because I fully lost myself in the midst of that relationship.
I put up with a lot of shit in that relationship that I didn’t think I ever would. He was cagey about a lot of stuff. He was quietly possessive in a way that I didn’t really notice at the time fully, but have done in my subconscious because there was some shit that I never told him because I knew he would react poorly. I kind of morphed into a weird version of myself who was almost always sad and self-conscious and thought like I was going crazy because he would avoid answering questions outright but would expect me to bare my soul 24/7. My anxiety was always through the damn roof. There was a part of me that was secretly really happy when I was faced with the prospect of not having to see him because lockdown was imminent. I know that is not how you’re supposed ton feel when faced with the prospect of not seeing someone that you supposedly love, but that was where I was at that point. And I wasn’t strong enough to just call it there, I know that now.
The demise of that relationship and the months that followed made me certain of a couple of things. One, I have gotta be a better person and call shit quits or call it out if it is no longer serving me, leaving someone in limbo is shitty and disrespectful. And two, I don’t actually need to be in a relationship all that urgently. There is very little that I cannot just do on my own, it’s hella cliche but dating myself is pretty much the best thing for me and I am thoroughly enjoying it.
Oh, I have also learned that dating apps are really just not for me. Not for looking for someone to date. Not for just seeking external validation. Just not for me.
It does mean that I have a running joke that I am basically pulling some Rapunzel inspired shit and just expecting them to rock up to my window because I don’t really leave the house.
But that is all that is. A Disney princess based joke. The actual truth of the matter is that I no longer feel like my worth is tied up in whether someone else finds me attractive or interesting or whatever. It isn’t. I like me just fine. I am perfectly fine just doing stuff on my own, sometimes I enjoy it. I’m not closed to the idea completely, but I’m also putting no energy into it. I am just vibing and going where my heart/soul guides me (can I just say that it is currently guiding me to buy a lot of fancy dresses and also to go and see Dear Evan Hansen, which I will do, but please believe that I am studying my cycle tracking app so I can time the trip when I am mid-cycle and therefore feeling less emotionally fraught).
Most importantly though, I’m content and happy and I know what my standards are now and they aren’t going to change for anybody.
Jumpin’ Jumpin’
What I’m reading - Hilariously given what I’ve banged on about this week I have been reading non-stop romance novels. April was a drought and it was a self inflicted drought yes, but now that I can partake in that genre again I have been guzzling it all. This week’s roll call is also a long one because the romance novel is a quick read in my life and I go through them like chocolate digestives (quickly). And also, I’m probably going to enter a period of abstinence again next month, so let me just get it in while I can.
Firstly, I finished Insatiable. Then I read You and Me on Vacation and Beach Read by Emily Henry (I found a new author to enjoy and so in typical me fashion, I devoured all that I could). Then I read A Brush with Love - Mazey Eddings and Wolf Gone Wild - Juliette Cross. Busy week book-wise. May is shaping up to be the biggest month in terms of books finished. Love that for me. (as always these are affiliate links)
What I’m watching - The only thing that is softening the blow of the Lizzie McGuire reboot being cancelled is the fact that I can watch my forever fave, Hilary Duff, in How I Met Your Father. Which I have been doing.
What I’m listening to - If you think the answer is anything but Harry’s House (special shoutout to Music for a Sushi Restaurant) then I am sorry to disappoint. Oh also, I didn't mention it last week but Mr Morale and the Big Steppers - Kendrick Lamar is also on heavy rotation. As is The Heart Part 5, mostly because I am obsessed with that section when the drums cut out and then I could quite happily live in the last couple minutes of that song. Oh and also, my little emo heart made a comeback with new MCR. New MCR???? Insane.
Title Inspiration - Every Day a Little Death - Eleri Ward (Sondheim yet again *pretends to be shocked*)
I LOOOOOOVE THIS
I so feel you on the dating apps not being for me, either.
Some truly powerful takeaways from this. Thanks for sharing these thoughts and feelings as always!