Cool or Happy

Resisting the worms from eating away at my ability to be happy by hating everything. Declan called me a professional hater once and I laughed. Hating is the easiest way to exist but it is definitely not the best way. Maybe that makes it the hardest. To be happy is to be full, to not be crawling across the floor begging for a crumb of temporary satisfaction. Love can bring you that. Love can also accentuate what's missing from your fullness; when no one is relying on you in that intimate and vulnerable way, what's missing can feel less shameful. I never wanted the people I loved to know what was missing. Living in these false realities can feel like you're on a 50-foot tower made out of toothpicks; looking above the dirty truths that lie below, but knowing that you will be crashing down into them any moment. And that fall hurts. I don't know when I'll be ready to be in a relationship again. The emotions that I feel in relationships feel real because everything I feel will be seen and internalized by someone else, someone I care about. I get so terrified of that responsibility. I have been able to live more presently since being alone which has been allowing me to sift through the truths of my shortcomings and my more admirable qualities. All of which have been ignored by me and anyone who wants to believe in the facade of my strength and fortitude, however thin.

I search for things other than relationships that can make me feel full: creative expression, a sense of place, spiritual fulfillment. Nothing scratches that itch that relationships or companionship does. I wish I had the strength to feel full on my own. I wish I wasn't willing to subjugate myself for relationships, blow up my life for a warm smile.

I tell myself while writing poems or these little posts or exploring my faith that these can justify my existence. The pursuit of something unknown can be life-affirming and it can make me feel cool, but it has never made me happy. I return to the garden when I feel content in a relationship and I no longer care about these transient aspects of life I chase down. My perception of the world leaves good and bad and goes into true and untrue. I stop hating to justify my coolness, I enter into the unchanging tranquility.