You Are The Life I Needed All Along
Glasgow cont./Futile Devices
I want to start with something more recent, then we'll skip back. It's a pretty annoying method of story telling that is kind of over-used. I know I'm tired of How To Get Away With Murder using it, although they have no other way of formatting that one- you know, because you gotta start with the murder they're eventually going to get away with.
That's not the case here. This is not essential. I just like this moment the best, for all it's cheesy glory. It's the moment that properly convinced me I had every chance of succeeding in wearing Collin down to finally properly dating me.
It's a very simple moment: Shortly after I initially reached out to him, after about an 8 year hiatus, one of us mentioned my manic pixie dream girl tendencies. You know I'm sort of annoyingly the type: I worked at a pet store, I sometimes dream of running a quirky bakery, I jump into fountains and generally chase experiences. The biggest indicator being that I gave myself my own positive nickname and was able to convince everyone I'm close with to use it. I took over an entirely new identity on a whim. So, it became a running "joke" in a not particularly jokey sense that I would mention doing something particularly manic pixie, or he would note that I was being so manic pixie, and he talked a little about his exes and his prospects and how it's hard to find a manic pixie like me and hold onto them. Then, one day, sort of out of the blue he let loose the the kind of singularly charming and moderately affectionate comment someone employs with the knowledge that it was endear them to their target for all time. I adore it. I obsess it. All the time. He said this to me. No one has ever dared. My quiet little scientist with no need for art and romance dared....
I said I was doing something manic pixie, and had been shortening the label to just those two words, and he said, "Also don't think I don't notice you not using your full title."
To which I respond, appropriately, "nightmare woman?"
Then, he responded with something I will die with in the halls of my mind palace, "Dream girl, Hope"
With one particularly absurd and economic response, the dumb baby invaded and captured my icy hateful heart space...
Now we can get back to where we left off- with the promise of getting back to this and all the other ridiculous displays of affection you're going to hate to read and for which you will abandon this blog.
***************
In 2009 I was adrift. While I was in Houston, despite far-reaching petals bloomed from the center, life didn't feel any larger than myself. I knew there was more to the world, and I wanted to see it- but it never occurred to me at that time that I would ever feel out of place. It never occurred to me how lonely I would be traveling alone.
With this mindset I found myself on campus at the University of Texas. I had no one to talk to, and everyone else seemed to have arrived in pairs if not gaggles. I had my first run in with what I would later understand to be pretty severe social anxiety when my thoughts approached a plan to navigate this new life. So, when I found a little group to cling on to, I was incredibly needy. Needy, but tactless and untidy. The perfect combination one would like as they attempt to complete their own degrees. Exactly the sort of dramatic mess I'm sure anyone in their late teens would be thrilled to have to care for... a mangy binge-drinking feral animal crying out in the night, and often the day, navigating several breakdowns as she refuses to do communal dishes or pick up after herself in any way.
That is a lengthy paragraph to remind you who I am, and what I do/have done. To explain why it was pretty reasonable that I get a stern talking to about my behavior around this friend group, and sort of ghosted by them before that was even a thing. It sucked to be alone again - with a much smaller chance of making new friends organically because I was no longer living in the dorms- which is how I met Issa who met everyone else, because she's very good at making friends. So I worked, and went to class half the time. I started to try to make friends with the girls I worked with at Toy Joy, but they were all pretty intense and high strung. They're the true MPDG MVPs- lives dedicated to living theatre - costumes, fire dancing, ukulele (of course.) I had only one friend among them and she was their least friend. The resting position of her face was the wide-eyed acknowledgement of the will to bring mayhem - and if she could somehow tie her sexuality into it all the better. Not long after we became friends she quit and I almost killed someone there after I vacuumed over an extension cord and exposed the wire. This is the reason I got fired. I took it very personally, although I should not have. I think it just felt like the world was becoming more distant. Also, the managers had strangely intimate relationships with a specific group of workers that led to a lot of speculation. Anyway, while I was working there I met a regular who came in to get toys for the drunk college kids to play with as they waited for their table at Kerbey Lane. He had nice hair, too. A little wispy. Kind of brushed over in that naughts emo way that would seem no less fashionable with a streak of pink in it. This was Scott. And he was a little closer to my type. He was tall-ish, wore corduroy and blazers, spoke for hours about the obscure music he listened to from the indie labels that might call Asthmatic Kitty a group of sell-outs pandering to the Top 100. Later, in an established relationship, he sent a meme that just said Sufjan Stevens was overrated. I truly have no way of defending this relationship....
Although, alone, in new city that seems so suffocatingly small, when you find a branch in the stream to hold on to there's little more to consider beyond survival. People do better in packs...I have been told by many a junk science. Untethered as I was to society, employment, university and my family and friends in Houston I began doing interesting things on my own. I played with electric poi in the parking lot of my apartment complex that looked out to the street. One day someone stopped by as they were driving through the city, we chatted for a bit, I let him in my apartment. As far as I know I was not murdered. I went to Carnivale with my one Toy Joy friend, wearing a sheer dress and brightly colored underwear (this would/will not be last time I employ sheer fabrics in festive wear.) That night we went to Kerbey Lane after I was denied the opportunity to go home with some guy with dark features I was dancing with for a while. This was the night, much drunker than I should have been, as legally I could not drink, I gave Scott my number.
This has been a very Scott-centric post, I'm sorry. This has been hashed out from many sides before and never seems more interesting or like a better choice.
Yet- it is important.
Elizabeth did not like Scott. She had met a guy around the same time who looked a little like the guy from My Chemical Romance and she hated him. We went on at least one date together that her boyfriend drove us to- but I have no idea where. So, I started to develop a relationship with Elizabeth that ran somewhat counter to the one with Scott. Both of them wanted a lot of attention, and neither liked the other... so I went out with her to see Michael Ian Black, I think, which was surprising because she at one point said she did not like comedy.
Here is the intersection that makes everything else important.
After maybe 6 months of my (probably largely self-imposed) exile - I saw Issa at this show. A mix of emotions bled poison into every vital organ and I was scared, angry, sick. It was a lonely poison. It was the type of unintentional meeting that could be ignored and everyone would be allowed to return to their separate paths- or where someone makes a point to hop back into someone else's trail. I'm 50% sure that I did the latter. It's entirely possible Issa saw me first and got my attention. I think we managed to exchange numbers again- maybe make a play date- maybe nothing came of that initial run-in beyond a reminder that the other person existed and could be an interesting time.
So- Elizabeth got me to Scott, who upset Elizabeth enough that she insisted on alone time, which is where I ran into Issa who led back to Collin. While I was dating Scott. A Collin I had largely forgotten about because I missed the female friendships I had been building more, and we hadn't had a lot of time together on our own yet. A Collin dressed as terribly as ever, but clearly, slowly, finding himself in the safety of this rag-tag shrewdness of young adult apes.
A Collin I knew was more right for me than anything else.
The next part I need help with is the sequence of events that led to Collin and I being alone together all the time.
I know after the first time I pushed him away I came back not out of a need for security, but because I missed him. It wasn't the same game. I wasn't trying to get him to chase me. I knew where things stood and what I wanted and when negotiations halted I walked away.
I just don't remember how we got to the point of being alone in the first place. I can speculate- and none of that would be a great look for me...this post is hella long as it is tho...so I'll go chop open my boyfriend's brain to get the next bit for you and return.
I want to start with something more recent, then we'll skip back. It's a pretty annoying method of story telling that is kind of over-used. I know I'm tired of How To Get Away With Murder using it, although they have no other way of formatting that one- you know, because you gotta start with the murder they're eventually going to get away with.
That's not the case here. This is not essential. I just like this moment the best, for all it's cheesy glory. It's the moment that properly convinced me I had every chance of succeeding in wearing Collin down to finally properly dating me.
It's a very simple moment: Shortly after I initially reached out to him, after about an 8 year hiatus, one of us mentioned my manic pixie dream girl tendencies. You know I'm sort of annoyingly the type: I worked at a pet store, I sometimes dream of running a quirky bakery, I jump into fountains and generally chase experiences. The biggest indicator being that I gave myself my own positive nickname and was able to convince everyone I'm close with to use it. I took over an entirely new identity on a whim. So, it became a running "joke" in a not particularly jokey sense that I would mention doing something particularly manic pixie, or he would note that I was being so manic pixie, and he talked a little about his exes and his prospects and how it's hard to find a manic pixie like me and hold onto them. Then, one day, sort of out of the blue he let loose the the kind of singularly charming and moderately affectionate comment someone employs with the knowledge that it was endear them to their target for all time. I adore it. I obsess it. All the time. He said this to me. No one has ever dared. My quiet little scientist with no need for art and romance dared....
I said I was doing something manic pixie, and had been shortening the label to just those two words, and he said, "Also don't think I don't notice you not using your full title."
To which I respond, appropriately, "nightmare woman?"
Then, he responded with something I will die with in the halls of my mind palace, "Dream girl, Hope"
With one particularly absurd and economic response, the dumb baby invaded and captured my icy hateful heart space...
Now we can get back to where we left off- with the promise of getting back to this and all the other ridiculous displays of affection you're going to hate to read and for which you will abandon this blog.
***************
In 2009 I was adrift. While I was in Houston, despite far-reaching petals bloomed from the center, life didn't feel any larger than myself. I knew there was more to the world, and I wanted to see it- but it never occurred to me at that time that I would ever feel out of place. It never occurred to me how lonely I would be traveling alone.
With this mindset I found myself on campus at the University of Texas. I had no one to talk to, and everyone else seemed to have arrived in pairs if not gaggles. I had my first run in with what I would later understand to be pretty severe social anxiety when my thoughts approached a plan to navigate this new life. So, when I found a little group to cling on to, I was incredibly needy. Needy, but tactless and untidy. The perfect combination one would like as they attempt to complete their own degrees. Exactly the sort of dramatic mess I'm sure anyone in their late teens would be thrilled to have to care for... a mangy binge-drinking feral animal crying out in the night, and often the day, navigating several breakdowns as she refuses to do communal dishes or pick up after herself in any way.
That is a lengthy paragraph to remind you who I am, and what I do/have done. To explain why it was pretty reasonable that I get a stern talking to about my behavior around this friend group, and sort of ghosted by them before that was even a thing. It sucked to be alone again - with a much smaller chance of making new friends organically because I was no longer living in the dorms- which is how I met Issa who met everyone else, because she's very good at making friends. So I worked, and went to class half the time. I started to try to make friends with the girls I worked with at Toy Joy, but they were all pretty intense and high strung. They're the true MPDG MVPs- lives dedicated to living theatre - costumes, fire dancing, ukulele (of course.) I had only one friend among them and she was their least friend. The resting position of her face was the wide-eyed acknowledgement of the will to bring mayhem - and if she could somehow tie her sexuality into it all the better. Not long after we became friends she quit and I almost killed someone there after I vacuumed over an extension cord and exposed the wire. This is the reason I got fired. I took it very personally, although I should not have. I think it just felt like the world was becoming more distant. Also, the managers had strangely intimate relationships with a specific group of workers that led to a lot of speculation. Anyway, while I was working there I met a regular who came in to get toys for the drunk college kids to play with as they waited for their table at Kerbey Lane. He had nice hair, too. A little wispy. Kind of brushed over in that naughts emo way that would seem no less fashionable with a streak of pink in it. This was Scott. And he was a little closer to my type. He was tall-ish, wore corduroy and blazers, spoke for hours about the obscure music he listened to from the indie labels that might call Asthmatic Kitty a group of sell-outs pandering to the Top 100. Later, in an established relationship, he sent a meme that just said Sufjan Stevens was overrated. I truly have no way of defending this relationship....
Although, alone, in new city that seems so suffocatingly small, when you find a branch in the stream to hold on to there's little more to consider beyond survival. People do better in packs...I have been told by many a junk science. Untethered as I was to society, employment, university and my family and friends in Houston I began doing interesting things on my own. I played with electric poi in the parking lot of my apartment complex that looked out to the street. One day someone stopped by as they were driving through the city, we chatted for a bit, I let him in my apartment. As far as I know I was not murdered. I went to Carnivale with my one Toy Joy friend, wearing a sheer dress and brightly colored underwear (this would/will not be last time I employ sheer fabrics in festive wear.) That night we went to Kerbey Lane after I was denied the opportunity to go home with some guy with dark features I was dancing with for a while. This was the night, much drunker than I should have been, as legally I could not drink, I gave Scott my number.
This has been a very Scott-centric post, I'm sorry. This has been hashed out from many sides before and never seems more interesting or like a better choice.
Yet- it is important.
Elizabeth did not like Scott. She had met a guy around the same time who looked a little like the guy from My Chemical Romance and she hated him. We went on at least one date together that her boyfriend drove us to- but I have no idea where. So, I started to develop a relationship with Elizabeth that ran somewhat counter to the one with Scott. Both of them wanted a lot of attention, and neither liked the other... so I went out with her to see Michael Ian Black, I think, which was surprising because she at one point said she did not like comedy.
Here is the intersection that makes everything else important.
After maybe 6 months of my (probably largely self-imposed) exile - I saw Issa at this show. A mix of emotions bled poison into every vital organ and I was scared, angry, sick. It was a lonely poison. It was the type of unintentional meeting that could be ignored and everyone would be allowed to return to their separate paths- or where someone makes a point to hop back into someone else's trail. I'm 50% sure that I did the latter. It's entirely possible Issa saw me first and got my attention. I think we managed to exchange numbers again- maybe make a play date- maybe nothing came of that initial run-in beyond a reminder that the other person existed and could be an interesting time.
So- Elizabeth got me to Scott, who upset Elizabeth enough that she insisted on alone time, which is where I ran into Issa who led back to Collin. While I was dating Scott. A Collin I had largely forgotten about because I missed the female friendships I had been building more, and we hadn't had a lot of time together on our own yet. A Collin dressed as terribly as ever, but clearly, slowly, finding himself in the safety of this rag-tag shrewdness of young adult apes.
A Collin I knew was more right for me than anything else.
The next part I need help with is the sequence of events that led to Collin and I being alone together all the time.
I know after the first time I pushed him away I came back not out of a need for security, but because I missed him. It wasn't the same game. I wasn't trying to get him to chase me. I knew where things stood and what I wanted and when negotiations halted I walked away.
I just don't remember how we got to the point of being alone in the first place. I can speculate- and none of that would be a great look for me...this post is hella long as it is tho...so I'll go chop open my boyfriend's brain to get the next bit for you and return.
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