Communication

Contrary to what most people believe, there are actually three types of communication. There are the two you already know, the verbal and the physical, and then there is the emotional. This kind of interaction is constantly being referred to as the non-verbal part of communication, like touching or making eye contact etc, but it actually has everything to do with tone of voice, actual topics of conversation being broached, and the inevitable syncing of the minds that comes from it. By no means is it not heavily dependent upon the verbal parts of communication (IE: Saying what you mean or not what you mean, blah blah) or the physical (IE: touching, holding hands, etc) but it is markedly different from either of those two things. Verbal communication has everything to do with what's being said, the actual words you're speaking. Emotional connection comes from the tones of voice used, and whether or not you're believable in what you're saying. Then, intimacy is established through body language. True intimacy (and Oxtocin, the bane of my existence) is established by creating warmth in your voice, openness in your body language, and love in your eyes. All of these are very easily faked if you know how.

My favorite show in the world is The Pickup Artist. Why, you ask? Why would an interesting-looking 20-something like a show that shows men how to pick up women that are sooooo out of their leagues, just to elevate their social status and make themselves feel better about their mediocre looks? Because it shows us how easily people can be manipulated into feeling something out of ONE social interaction. It also makes it easier to sort out who's after sex and who's after a relationship. If he touches your arm, holds your hand, and looks deeply into your eyes on the first or second date, with no previous relationship to back up these feelings (you didn't know each other and weren't friends first) then he's only after your sexy self. IF he does any of these things by the third or fourth date, then he's probably a keeper. This philosophy has never done me wrong, when I've listened to it.

When I haven't listened to it I've found myself in situations like the one mentioned in my previous post. Big be damned, love be damned, I'm tired of trying to connect with people that just aren't my intellectual, social or emotional equals. Maybe if I had more confidence and was less insecure I wouldn't let myself be taken for a ride by people who pretend to matter.

And he did matter.
More than even he knew.

Too bad for him.

Social Interaction fail...

So I officially fail at social interaction. Every time I try to establish a connection with another human being I either don't say enough and people get annoyed with my inability to articulate myself, or I say way too fucking much and just end up pushing people away.

Getting closer to another person is like trying to get closer to the stars: futile and inevitably foolish. Human beings have no clear understanding or conception about what love is, except that its a feeling and its intangible. I have known love in every possible facet, from the abusive to the reckless to the fruitless, and to this day I cannot explain coherently exactly why I felt that way about any one of the men that I have loved so deeply. What I can tell you for certain is that we're all so goddamn desperate to connect with each other that we convince ourselves that there is meaning where there is none, and that there is intimacy where there is only understanding.

I'm tired and impatient and I don't see the point in any of it anymore. It isn't love that I'm after, its truth, because I've recently come to the conclusion that without truth, blunt and absolute and tactless, there is absolutely no hope of love.

The ramblings of an idiot fool

4 AM again... and I'm still awake. I'm all adrenalin-y from the haunted houses and the lively conversation, and somehow, as always, I'm finding myself staring off into Infinity, seeing every possible outcome and every possible future and I can't bear it. There was more to this post, a discourse on the human condition and about how we're all greedy, insufferable bastards, but I deleted.... You know, in the interest of keeping things positive.

I found an old story I wrote waaay back when.... Back when I was "good" as my mind seems so inclined to think. It wasn't that it was a terribly bad story, just hideously underdeveloped and juvenile. Well... I was so young then, wasn't I? That's the point of art to a certain extent; it reflects the soul of the artist. I'm a huge believer in the idea that the artist and the art are so inescapibly bound that there is very little room for the spectator, the person who's enjoying the art, in the whole artistic experience. That is to say, when you look at a Jackson Pollock painting, what you're seeing is a reflection of himself. It's such a huge thing, to stand in the room with something so great and profound as a person's soul on canvas, and the experience itself is so profound that there's very little room for yourself in the experience. Suddenly, there's this moment of clarity and you realize that what you are experiencing is something so completely unlike anything you, yourself, are capable of conjuring, that you become what Jackson Pollock was when he painted it, and you catch glimpses of his madness and his genius and his beauty.

It's the same moment that comes over you when you're truly experiencing music in its most perfect, undiluted form, when you're standing among a sea of other people, entranced with the musicians on stage, wrapped up in something so beautiful and so intangible that you can't separate yourself from the person next to you, and you're all one breathing, sweating, weeping thing, overcome and overwhelmed and drenched completely in the auditory.

It's the same moment that comes over you when you read a verse that brings tears to your eyes and you don't even know why. You never went walking in the woods in winter as he did, you never saw the rain or the stars or the human spirit the way the author did, and yet you're there, with the author, weeping over a choice that was not your own and you could not make, and yet you were so heavily invested in that choice that you couldn't help but cry out when our hero made the wrong turn.

There is no such thing as bad art. There are bad artists; artists incapable of evoking the artistic experience. I blame Twilight on Stephanie Meyer, and I blame Piss Christ on Andres Serrano and I blame you for having not experienced the perfection of true genius.

Insomnia + MSN + One Cranky Independent

So I got into an interesting debate one time with an Australian. Basically, his whole shtick was that Americans are stupid because we don't have Universal Health Care and we're stupid if we don't put it into effect. You know, be more like Australia, New Zealand, Spain, England, Canada and Mexico....

His logic was flawed; it's based on the idea that America can afford Universal Health Care and doesn't want to pay for it. America is, first and foremost, in tremendous debt and can't afford to pay for Universal Health Care. Blame who you like, we can't afford it. I can't afford a new car, or to buy a house, or even a new winter coat, so I don't buy those things. Mr. President is not thinking this through even a little. Right now in the US if you go to the ER and and you're sick, you will be helped. End of discussion, we're not the animals the rest of the world seems to think we are. When the bill comes and you can't pay? Believe it or not, Hospitals can't refuse to care for you even if you're foodstamped and homeless. They just can't.

I told him that. I mentioned that I thought it would be nice to have the government regulate the healthcare industry a little more, instead of finding new and creative ways to tax us. He LOL'ed at me, and patted me on the head, saying "It's so cute when Americans try to think."

I then pointed out that... um... not for nothing, but Australia isn't the first country that the UN NATO and everyone else shouts for as soon as there's a tragedy or an attack. I also pointed out that Australia isn't supporting inordinate amounts of unemployed masses.... You know, like America is? Australia isn't in the debt we're in, nor are they expected to offer all manner of humanitarian and tragedy relief every time someone somewhere gets a booboo or can't handle their local dictator. Not to minimize the world's suffering, we're all a little broken.

Then I got really annoyed with myself because I only ever defend America when it's a non-American criticizing it. Most days I'm so frustrated with the idiotic way this country is being run and the ridiculous ideas being thrown around by people who obviously slept through Logic 101 Freshman year that social interaction becomes a chore rather than a pleasure.

Thing is, just because I can't wrap my head around the ideas doesn't mean I haven't tried. It doesn't mean I don't WANT to believe that the Big Man in the White House has our best interests at heart.

One of the worst things ever was when my Republican BFF called me a Freedom Moocher because I dared to criticize our predominately Republican government back in the day. I pointed out that if I hadn't traveled abroad then I'd just be an educated, frustrated citizen voicing my concern. Then I'd turn around and tell my British friends to please STFU because, yeah, Bush wasn't a superhero, but when 911 hit, he pulled it together and said "We're gonna get through this, it'll be okay." He insisted that we not let terror rule us. He was a reassuring presence during a black black period in our modern history.

And yeah, he kind of screwed the pooch in a lot of areas, but look at it this way: Mr. Obama's plan will send America into 9 Trillion dollars further into debt over the next... I think it was 10 years. I THINK. It's almost 4AM and I can't be bothered to look up the exact timeline. Do NOT blame that debt on the Republican's you Liberal B-tards. They're only responsible for 3 Trillion of it.

And you Republican Ijots, can we please just admit that this was a war over oil? Please?! It's OKAY that it was a war for oil. Wealth is just as good a reason to go to war as morality, at least the American people will have something tangible to think about while they're enduring price gouging at the gas pumps and laughably unnecessary inflation.

Right, my powerful brain is tired of this text window. Here endeth the rant.

Amusing when no one's looking

It always seems to happen that some of my best hair days and some of my most amusing stories come from days that had absolutely nothing going on. Today was a rehearsal before the recital thingy, which I'm only 76.34% embarrassed about, and that went pretty well. The highlight of the day was the super awesome service we got at the D'n'D in Tewksbury. It annoys me more than I can describe that it was refreshing to find a place where minimum wage people were actually nice and pleasant. I totally tipped way more than necessary just because.

Also picked up the neatest eyeshadow I've seen in ages -- looks just like crystal on the skin. So pretty, can't wait to rock it soon. (With photos!)

Have been nursing an unhealthy addiction to pop music of late, mostly because my own thoughts have been so dark (my brain is an unpleasant place to be sometimes) and I enjoy something that moves me in an up, happy way. It's hard to do that with metal or rock because I experience it viscerally and can't separate myself from the music. It's a pleasant little vacation from my brain, which is almost always working overtime, and I do so hate to work hard.

I turned my eyes inside out so I could see what it was that made me so different from everyone else

Because I've never seen what everyone else saw
Or felt what everyone else felt
And I thought that maybe I was the problem.

As it turns out, my brain is made of glitter
And my soul is made of sunshine

And then I couldn't get my eyes back to normal
So now my eyes are inside out and I don't know how to look at the world....

Because all I see is my own radiance and how easy it is for others to be out shined by it

And then I decided that it was all too self-indulgent

So I plucked my eyes out and gave them to you so that you could see how radiant I was and maybe you'd love me too.

But my eyes are still inside out, and you're blinder than I ever was.

And I'd rather be some waning false thing than anything that ever looked upon you with kindness.

The End

Final thoughts on the Gibraltar Matter...

The general rule of thumb is that for every 6 months you're in a relationship you get 3 months of wallowing/depression. That means that I should get a good a year in which I cannot be judged for my tears over the loss of "Doug". That's not good enough for me. My sadness only feels profound because its my own. It isn't any more or less important than that of anyone else and, frankly, I'm tired of luxuriating in it.

I'd rather be petty, shallow and pathetic than be bound to a man who'd rather lie to me and feel good about himself than accept that he's just as depthless and cruel as the people he despises.

The simple truth of the matter is, I would have moved the stars for him. I would have given up everything: My country, my ties here, my art, my whole life if only it meant that we had a future. It's the most tragic thing I've ever heard, because what does that say about me? It says that I'm so eager to find something spectacular that I see it in people who simply are not. He was like poetry... really bad poetry. The kind that makes you wince while you're reading it because it sounds so much like something you've read so many times before, and you can't connect to the words because it's all one big cliche.

I don't regret any of the time I spent with him; he was the instrument through which I learned a new melody. That does not, however, make our parting any less than what it is: something that was bound to happen one way or another.

I can't give so much of myself to people who do not and cannot appreciate it. Love, like death, is only best understood through hindsight, and nothing of beauty ever came from reactionary movements. Perhaps that's why my infamous "You Don't Know It" series has failed so many times over. I only ever write it when I'm reacting to the loss of one great love or another. It is only through quiet reflection and understanding that we can learn about ourselves and our loved ones... Even if our loved ones reside across an ocean and deep inside a Rock, without thought or feeling for what it was that they left behind.

I used to liken myself to an opal, something beautiful but fragile and easily cracked and crazed and made useless when exposed to too much wear and tear. That's still true, I think, but I'd also like to think that I'm not some pale, milky thing that must be kept hidden in darkness. I'd like to think that my beauty comes from some dazzling kaleidoscope, like the one I wear around my neck. My madness and my light and my quietness are all too easily misunderstood and too quickly misinterpreted for something else, so when it is time for us to part ways it is rarely with more than a nod and a smile.

I cannot be angry with him. I can't even think about him because thinking about him reminds me of that terrible weekend in which my grief overwhelmed my good sense and I prayed (for the first time since my father's hospitalization) that maybe he'd see something in me worth holding on to. My grief is what embarrasses me, not any lingering feelings of tenderness or even bitterness. It is my grief that makes me want to turn myself to stone and forget that there was ever any connection to us. It is my grief that makes me hate myself for believing him when he told me that he wanted to spend his whole life with me.

I can tell you with perfect clarity the moment at which I knew that I loved him above all others and with my whole heart. I wonder if he could tell you the same -- about anyone. I wonder if there's a single person living who can tell you what that moment was like for them. Some people go their whole lives without ever knowing it, I think. If you want to know, it's like a storm has settled, and whatever lightning or thunder you carried around before that point is suddenly dissipated, and you're seeing the sun for the first time. Its a swelling of the heart and spirit that makes your cheeks hurt from smiling too much.

That's what it was like for me the moment I knew that I wanted to spend my life with him. It was like tasting really good chocolate for the first time and knowing that I'd never forget that sudden sharp, almost bitter sweetness. And even though a huge part of me wants to forget that perfect moment that (I realize now) I was alone in, I don't think I ever will and I have to content myself with that.

These will be my last words on the subject. I will not trouble any of my faithful readers any longer with my horrific musings of a love that should have been forgotten the moment it was ended. Perhaps I am just sad because I found those old photos. Maybe I'm sad because I know he's got someone new. I'd like to think it's none of those, and that I'm sad because I can feel the grief ebbing away and if I don't even grieve what we used to have then there's really nothing left to say on the matter.

If two people break up and neither one even thinks about the other, and neither is even affected by the others absence, then does that mean the whole relationship never happened? And if that's true, then does that mean that the perfect moment I only just spoke of never happened? That it didn't mean anything? Not even to me?

Does it matter either way?