We’re Okay Now (I Think)

I feel a lot less angry than I did a month ago. Or even a week ago when I was waking up in Northern California and still feeling weird for being there and feeling angry at myself (and at him) for being an idiot and not being able to feel numbness towards the situation. I would scrub my face in the bathroom mirror thinking that it would translate to me scrubbing out all of these stupid fucking thoughts. I hate feeling angry all the time. I’m not entirely numb, but I’m definitely closer to it. And California always inevitably does something to me, as if I’m taking a break from being real.

I’ve calmed down a lot within the span of just two weeks. I have a tendency to crawl into a hole when things get bad for me and to just lazily exist through the inevitable valleys of being a regular person, lethargically waiting for it to slightly crescendo into a peak again. I am terrible at correcting things for myself, I usually try to ride it all out because the thought of fighting it is too exhausting. So I was feeling rather SMUG over pushing myself back to California, even though I felt like dyyyyyyyyyyying at the thought of it.

I wrote down in my diary on August 6th that, after re-reading some things I had written in college, I am much better at containing my anger over things I shouldn’t feel angry about. (He did not, does not love me.) I’m still exploding and yelling, but I think it’s a lot less destructive. Is this maturity? Fun.

Not Drinking is a weird statement these days that, for whatever reason, can’t properly be justified with “I just don’t want to.” Someone in my office once joked that sober is the new drunk; meaning it’s such a Cool Thing to do now—be sober. I remember going to a bizarre Sober Day Party in Brooklyn last September that made me feel like I was naked in front of a crowd because I was probably the only person uncomfortable with the idea that nobody was drinking. I grabbed drinks to catch up with friends last night and announced that it was my first drink since the end of July and, honestly, me gouging out the waitress’s eyes with my keys would’ve elicited a less dramatic and concerned reaction.

Also, nobody believed me at first, which sort of made me panic.

But I spent two weeks without any alcohol—I slowly gravitated towards ordering a Regular Coke with dinner, just for fun!—and my head stopped hurting in the morning and I didn’t throw up in any kitchen sinks and I didn’t have to make any phone calls to apologize and I didn’t eat a spring roll while sitting on the floor of my shower and I didn’t ever at all think it was an appropriate idea to FaceTime the guy I used to like three times at 3:34AM. I just felt fine.

Instead, I cut all my hair off and tried to be nicer to my parents and finished two books and didn’t implode over the screaming baby who sat behind me on my flight back.

So. I think we’re okay now.