I have come to the realization that my life has yet to start.  That I am waiting for that one day, that one day where I start living.

I went home this weekend.  It has been dramatic.  It has been chaotic.  It has been better.  It has been nice.  It has been sad.  It has been inspiring.  

Now, I won't get into the nitty gritty details of the drama.  I'm sure it will come up again when I get frustrated with mom's immaturity, Sam's attitude, or when I am sad about the fact that our family is so incredibly fragmented to the point where we are just three separate individuals nowadays.  However, that is not concerning me at the moment.  Or frankly maybe I am just tired of the relentless mental turmoil it has put me through this weekend.

No, I am sad at selfish reasons.  My own reasons.  The fact that I feel like I have not lived yet.  

This weekend I met up with Janelle, who has been residing in Belgium and from her count 15 other countries for the past year, and Shohei, who has been in London and several other places for the semester.  It was nice seeing their faces and it was exciting hearing their stories, at first.  I was in awe hearing their adventures of couch surfing, their overjoyed excitement of the people they met, the gloating of the spontaneous encounterings.  The hikes that turned into 12 hours of solitude in a cabin that had no water or food, the pinot and homemade almond wines of their hosts, the cafes, the food, the existence they built in which they abandoned their reservations and just let go, embraced what the world had to offer, came out of their shells and changed.  I could see it Dad.  Both of them, they changed.  They are more worldly, they know that what is out there and how much is out there, what is worth living for, is outside the lines, outside the boundaries, that the place to be is the unknown as the world really is open to all.  It was exciting to hear these stories.  But just at first.  Then it got tiring.  Then it got annoying.  And then, it simply made me sad.  

I could not relate.  I couldn't add to their fascinating lives.  All I could do was sit there, rotting in jealousy thinking of what I have been doing:  wasting my time being sad or caught up in the drama of my sob story life.  While almost all of my friends are in Europe or India or Australia, I was on my couch crying to myself, missing you, ignoring my friends and school.  My escape wasn't the temples in Nepal, eating my way through Italy or prancing around in the dream like Cinque Terre.  My escape was in shitty television.

It's hard watching all of your friends travel, see the world, open up their eyes and ultimately change.  Oh, I have changed.  But through the toughest way, the way no one wants to change.  I have changed through loss, through sadness, through anger, through confusion.  I have changed in slow motion.  Sitting on a couch.  Pondering my thoughts.  Being by myself.  It is the worse way to change.  But I have changed.  I know I have changed for the better.  But right now I feel like I have changed for the worse.  I feel like I am more cynical, I am more realistic, I am more hopeless.  I really do hope this is just a phase, and I am sure it is.  The outcome from this mess will be rewarding one day I am sure.  But to be honest I just feel like it is unfair.  I want to change the way all my abroad friends changed.  I want the out of the body experiences.  I want to be cultured.  I want to be worldly.  I want to let go of my thoughts opposed to sitting in them and just live.  I want to be care free.

It's funny because when I was listening to their stories I would just be in shock about how friendly people are or how for some ungodly reason they didn't get raped.  The thing is I am scared, I am inhibited.  As if I am just a cynical, skeptical, never spontaneous American.  Where my way of being carefree was going to bars and getting drunk.  Ohhhhhh coachella livin the life!  Outside Lands 2012 here I come!  Woohooo let's go to Vegas for my 21st!  Oh I just feel childish now.  It's not that I am not appreciative and I am sure my experiences are dreams to others.  But I want a different dream, I want the dream of building myself, evolving, not through death or loss or vulnerability but through people, places and the world.  I want to meet people I never thought I'd meet.  I want to be in situations in which I don't think but just do.  I want to ditch my Trader Joe's salad every day and sit and eat the best pasta I will ever have.  I want to stop being so insecure and socially awkward and just let go and meet interesting people.  I want to stop and know what's going on in the world and not just focus on what's in my head!  The politics!  The customs! The realization that hey you are not the only one in the world, look around at what's going on!

Now I know I can do all of this here, but then again I really can't.  But I feel like I am so mentally damaged that I need that push.  I need to be somewhere completely out of my element.  I need to grow up, not through this mess that's been going on.  Janelle and Shohei have matured so much.  I know I have too, but it is just different.  I know I have matured in a way they will never be able to experience, and their experiences are reachable for me.  But I want that now.  I feel like I deserve it now.  It's just not fair.  I have been dying to study abroad since before I came to college.  Never stepping outside of the US.  Hardly even traveling throughout the US.  I took Italian so I can study in Italy for christ sake!  So how come I can't go.  How come I am life has given me this crappy situation, where my family is financially and mentally broke/broken.  

Funkytown

Dear Dad,
I don't know what is wrong with me.  This quarter I have been in a funk and I can't seem to get out of it.  I have my good days, and then I have my really bad ones, and then most of the time it is just... I don't even know how to describe it... it's just BLAH.  Like I am not myself.  I am just an existence.  I can't determine how I feel or why I feel or certain way.  I can't get excited, I can't get happy.  I can't do things by myself without feeling extremely depressed.  And even when I do do things I feel extremely depressed.  You know what, I don't even know if it's depression.  It's just like... I can't get happy.  I can't make up my mind.  My emotions are everywhere.  I'm just in a haze.  Maybe it's because I have been on a major come down from the E I took the other night and perhaps one of the symptoms is depression, but I have been feeling like this all quarter.  It's as if I can't enjoy myself entirely.  At coachella, it was fun, but I found myself crying, sad, missing you and at times extremely underwhelmed.  Stef just visited, and again I was underwhelmed.  It's not like I wasn't doing anything fun, I should be having a fun time.  But I don't feel like I'm fully there, everything is just okay and it is annoying.  At times I just want to yell at myself.  To scream at myself to appreciate things.  Hey look, your cousin is here have fun.  Hey look, Sami is visiting we're at a bar yayyyy.  Hey look, you're at fucking coachella.  There are moments of excitement, of happiness, but it is quick and the feeling wears off fast.  There are also moments of extreme sadness.  It is often when I am alone.  I've been having complete melt downs and anxiety attacks.  But mostly I am just underwhelmed, where my body and mind can't decide if it is happy or extremely extremely sad.

For instance, here is an example of what I am thinking right now.  I am in a funk, I know I am.  I am dizzy from the come down.  I know I have work again at 4 and I have the option to opt out of it because I told my boss  I am dizzy but I know I probably can handle it, so am I dizzy or just lazy?  Maybe working will bring my spirits up.  Or maybe I just need a day to do nothing.  But I've been doing nothing this entire weekend.  I've just been cracked out.  Lying on the couch unable to sleep, feeling nauseous and dizzy every time I got off of the couch.  And it just made me sad, not doing anything.  Stef was here and I felt so guilty I couldn't do anything.  And right now, there is a huge part of me that doesn't want to do anything but not doing anything makes me sad.  I don't know if I want to come home this weekend, because I feel like I need it.  But also I don't want to miss Kym being home.  She's been gone lately and she's leaving in a month and being with her and jamie is nice and it makes me so sad at the thought of her not being there.  And then also I might finally have some plans with Caitlin.  And I might need to stay to work on my holocaust video.  But I want to go home.  I might need it. But then again maybe I don't  And part of me doesn't feel like going home.

See that's the thing.  Feeling.  Right now I am so lost I can't establish how I am feeling.  I know I am not happy.  And it's frustrating.  Because my life isn't entirely bad.  I have the option to not be lonely, to hang out with the small amount of friends I have, to go to work and have fun with kids, to go to class and get my mind off of everything.  But I can't decide if I want to or not.  And I know that lying on the couch will make me depressed.  And I know that doing the other stuff will make me feel underwhelmed.  Because when I have activities I find myself sad there too.

It's just like I want to scream at myself to wake up.  HEY MONICA YOU ARE LOSING YOURSELF!  YOU ARE LOSING YOUR FRIENDS.  YOU ARE LOSING YOUR TIME.  I just feel wasteful.  All I want to do is talk to somebody.  Maybe that will help.  But no one understands.  I feel like I've tried.  I just want answers.  But I feel like my mind is so complicated there is no way I could fully express how I am feeling, especially when I don't even know myself.  So then how can someone else know?  The real question is when will this all end.  I just need motivation.  I need true pure excitement.  I need a wake up call.  I need someone to be there for me.  To not forget me, to realize that I am drowning.  Because I can't do it by myself.  I am forgetting myself.  I am making myself drown.  It is all me.  And I want to make myself better.  I want to be happy.  But I just can't, and I don't know why and it is scaring me.

Gonna take you away from home.

Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom.
Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom.



-(No response.)


Hi.(No laugher)



Stewie knew something all right--getting one's attention with repetitious droning serves quite purposeful. But in my case, the only annoyance I hear is the silence at your end.

We've laughed about this family guy scene numerous times together; I wish that we could once more.







What a monotonous stream of consciousness. I didn't mean to make you cry. Sorry for bringing it up.





Oh, and again, Happy Mother's Day.



I know I sent you a card, as I always do, but this year celebrating you proved to be twice as heart wrenching. I had to go through it over two days this year. Firstly in my physical time in Australia, and lastly whence all my North American counterparts came to. It was like the wave of emotion was never-ending. I went to sleep crying the night before, woke up in tears, stirred in this puddle by my pillow, then back to sleep and awake again in tears.

I am so over crying. You would think, it's been four years, I should be okay by now, or at least that's how I feel everyone else rationalizes it for me. The rawness of this gaping hole in my life, you, or your absence better yet, is no less as fresh as it was the day I watched you give your last breath. But people around me don't usually tap into that. I think we are all in denial, honestly. We aren't promised tomorrow, so why do I feel like they are ignoring me today? A day that I need the support more. I don't know whats harder sometimes, either--feeling like I'm forgetting you or that people forget me, as I remember you. I just might be hyper conscious now of everyone with their mothers around me, but man, it sucks. Friends who only spoil their moms on maybe a few days during the year, when I crave every second just to give you the world.

You were right. You always told me I would miss you when you were gone.



It seems, somehow, that the days seem to blend together and as they stretch across the months and flood the years they blur my memories of you. I have no sense of time. In one minute I can hear your voice waking me from my sleep, and in the next second when everything is silent but my breath I wane for it to lull me back into my dreams of you. I can't tell whether they are nightmares or not, knowing that in the motions of my everyday you won't be there. Its as if I'm always asleep; I'm always longing for you, to dream of you.

Lately, you've on my mind in a way that I am not sure how to describe. Like you are lingering behind me. Trying to hold me up through the day. I've been very tired lately. Not like I was before when I really never got to sleep, but tired, lethargic, empty. Its not like I'm doing nothing either; I am keeping busy, but it's a bit unfulfilling at times to even be around people who make you happy. I'm not putting on a face for them, I do enjoy our time together. It's just a lost feeling. I guess I just wish I could pin point what I'm trying to say so that I could understand what I mean, and just move on from it.

I wish you were here to just tell me what I need to do. I wish I listened better whenever you offered the answers.



It's weird being thousands of miles away from home. I'm not sure if it makes it any harder or easier. The way you feel follows you wherever you are, there really is no running away. At least not for good. I hope that me being here, in this different place, is enough of a gift for mother's day. I am somewhere I've only ever dreamed of being, and I imagine that you are here with me, so maybe I'm giving us both something?



I love you. We'll be together again.
Remember you have my heart <3
Alex

Time nor mind

Since I don't have the time nor mind to figure out
The nursery rhymes that helped us out in making sense of our lives
The cruel uneventful state of apathy releases me
I value them but I won't cry every time one's wiped out

Dear Dad,
Today is mother's day and it is the first time there will not be roses on the table from you.  It is also the first time since Freshman year where I am not there to surprise her.  Remember freshman year when you picked me up and we went to Auntie Debbie's mother's day brunch and Auntie Jan screamed because I was there and it didn't even phase mom one bit?  Or last year when I hid behind the couch and scared the crap out of her.  We got her real good!  Then we went to Trattoria La Siciliana and then the yogurt place across the street, because we all know if there is a yogurt shop you are going to try it!

Today is mother's day and it is the first time the four of us are not together.  I am in San Diego, watching Harry Potter by myself.  Sam is at a play with her friend.  And mommy is at some treat yourself spa taking pictures with this creepy guy that has "FAG" painted on his belly...

Today is mother's day and it is the first time it doesn't feel like mother's day.  It doesn't feel like a day of closeness.  I feel like mom is distant from herself, forever in a funk.  I feel like my sister is so incredibly selfish for not even being there with mom on a day she needs it most.  I feel distant.  I feel like I can't do anything for mom.  I feel like a call or a text or even the gift I gave her will never make up for the fact that I am hundreds of miles away.  Our family feels almost separated.  We are fragmented, spread apart, distant.

I'm struggling Dad.  I'm struggling to pick up these pieces.  I am struggling coping with everything.  Loss is so hard.  You would think, someone who has dealt with loss, someone who grew up going to funerals, someone who grew up visiting hospitals and nursing homes on the daily, someone who grew up with a family full of sickness and disease would understand loss.  This is nothing compared to it.  I don't know how to deal with this Dad.  I DON'T WANT to deal with this.  Thinking about you is so incredibly difficult.  When you come into mind it feels like I am swallowing a balloon that's expanding in my stomach.  It's painful, so I push it away.  I try to keep myself busy.  I try to be numb.  In the holocaust, Herman told me that the Germans used to give them medicine in their soup that made them numb.  So instead of breaking down and crying over all the loss and misery they were going through, they didn't feel.  He said they walked around like zombies.  He said when his brother died, he didn't cry.  He couldn't cry, because being numb was better than feeling the pain.

I understand what he said.  I do exactly what he said.  But I'm not sure if I agree with him or myself.  I don't know if it is a good idea to be numb.  It feels wrong all the time, to ignore you, to push you away.  I want to appreciate you.  I want to celebrate you.  I want to be happy at you, not sad or angry. Today I thought about whether or not it would be better if you died earlier where I barely known you, or for you dying now - right on the cusp of having enough but not enough.  I know that is the most ridiculous question, and obviously the answer is the latter, but I can't help but think about it.  I can't but think about if it is better to live with loss or to live with wondering.

But the thing is, I am living with both.  There is so many things you are not going to get to see.  Already I have gotten an internship which turned into a producership with turned into an executive producership.  I have made so many projects that you would of been proud of.  I am figuring out what career I might pursue.  I turned 21.  I am going to bars.  I am also smoking A LOT more weed than I used to.  (I blame you for this... you and your evil tricks of coming into my dreams!).  I have gotten closer to 2 friends.  I have also grown distant to a lot more.  I have gotten a 4.0.  I have also been slacking this quarter.  I have gained weight.  I have lost weight.  And I have gained it back.  I have become a family with Kym and Jamie.  And I am also about to lose Kym to New York.  I have been to court as a witness to Micah's physical assault on Kym.  I have also been very very very lonely.

Loneliness, strength, optimism, are all things that I can change or acquire with will.  But when you are numb it's hard to be anything but numb.  Being numb is to survive but not to be happy.  I would like to be happy.  But currently I am having a hard time surviving.  Yesterday I told Herman about you.  I asked him all these questions.  I asked him how he did it, how he survived, how he eventually found happiness.  He said time.  TIME.  I guess that is my answer.  All good things come with time.  Time has the ability to heal.  Time has the ability to make all things better.  Only good things come to those who wait.  Well let me be honest.  Waiting sucks.  I feel like I've been waiting all my life.  Waiting for a boy to love me, waiting for my weight to just be stable and normal, waiting for me to get out of this teenager "figuring myself out" phase, waiting for friends.  Waiting.  Maybe waiting is just bullshit.  Maybe it's about action.  But in order to take action, there must be strength.  I had strength winter quarter, but it died easily.  I know my strength will come with time.  So for now I will add another component to my wait list.  When I am strong enough I will take action.

In the meantime I would love some help.  Some strength.  I know I don't talk to you much, because it's hard to deal with and it's hard to believe.  But a part of me will always believe that you are there for me.  That you are looking down, guiding me, making sure my life falls into place.  I'm putting all my trust in you, that you will put in a good word and make sure after all this waiting and strengthening that I will get my happy ending.

Love you pops,
Your round little girl.

PS.  Here is a pic a funny pic of me and a giant dog.  It had a huge head.  It was yesterday at Hunt and Gather, the place where I found my 70's ski jacket that everyone thinks is funny but I know you would of appreciated it. (/thought it was funny :p)