I spent the majority of my day painting. It's my first ever commissioned piece (pictures when it's done (watch for the March update)) and one that I am immediately proud of. The last time I sat down to paint something, it was the day after Scout and I broke up, not quite a year ago. Back then, I was working at almost a feverish pace and trying desperately to keep my mind off of him for fear I would call or text or do something equally as stupid. My heart was slowly breaking that night.
One of the interesting things about symmetry is the mirror-effect it has; things (paintings... or people) revolving around an axis (me) to complete a whole.
Though if something were to be complete around me that would mean it was finite. It doesn't seem to me, anymore at least, that anything is ever finite in my life. That would mean I'd step out my door tomorrow and meet the next person I was destined to fall for. The reason I'm talking about this is because as it always goes, I have plenty of time to think about things when I'm painting. I call it ambient time, because I don't really have to think about what I'm doing as I'm doing it and my mind can freely wander away.
A week ago, the final two of my three "bests" became engaged. Not to each other, of course, but independently from one another they are now betrothed. I knew it was coming (not an actual date, but more of an "I knew that'd happen!" kind of way) so in some way I'd been expecting it. But it doesn't happen and doesn't happen and then all of a sudden, it happens.
You sort of get... blind sided. And surprisingly, not in a good way. The news of these momentous, happy, life-changing events just hits you like car crashes on repeat.
We're getting married!
Boom.
He proposed!
Boom.
You're going to die alone!
BOOM!
BOOM!
BOOM!
BOOM!
The last part was just me in my head (or was it?) but you get the drift. It all happens at once.
Does it make me a bad person to wonder "what about me?"
What is at first hysterical and then touching when you think about it, "Bridesmaids" wasn't too far off from the truth. And search as I might for the clip of Kristen Wiig being told that Maya Rudolph is engaged, I couldn't find it. But her reaction is spot-on perfect. You smile because that's what you're supposed to do. You cry, because if you're emotional (like me) that's what you're supposed to do. But when the news is out and the initial excitement fades inside of you, your mind starts to tick.
You can't convey your disappointment in anything regarding the situation you (the single one) now find yourself in. Doing so will set off the sudden trip-wires surrounding these people who just days before you didn't have to have any sort of filter around. Suddenly you could very well say something that fucks it up. The "it" here being your friendship, because any sort of negativity conveyed is viewed as a big 'ol dump being tossed on their news.
I don't think it's fair... but then I'm not the one with a ring around my finger. Maybe what's "fair" to me means quintessentially nothing to anyone else. If it ever did to begin with.
In the aftermath of the joyous announcement of engagement you steadily begin to decay into this resentful person. And I truly hate that. Is it so hard to just hear something from a person you love so dearly, allow the smile to "flick on," and then feel nothing but pure happiness?
I'm beginning to think it is.
When I think about it, the biggest emotion raging inside of me is jealousy. When the news of these events broke, for some reason I turned to Scout for council. He had something kind of great to say to me.
"It makes me think of something you told me when we first started hanging out alone," he said, spinning his cup of decaf coffee because it was seven at night. "You told me jealousy was a good thing, because if you were jealous it showed you what you really wanted."
The jealousy comes because it was supposed to be me. How pathetically selfish is it to say that? If things had gone right with Ken and I, we'd have been married for two years this summer. I would have been first to the altar, the first to own a house, just... first. Not to say I'd rather I was married to Ken right now, because we both went our own ways and are both better for it. But whether those selfish thought come from growing up with two older siblings and always being the last to experience things on my own, I'll never know. It's just how I feel; I wanted to be first. At the rate life is progressing and at the rate I'm moping around, I'm going to be last.
It's like a two-lap marathon. Sometimes I feel like I'm going to be so far behind everyone else that I'll think I'm winning when they're coming up behind me, not realizing I've already been passed once before.
Miss T said something really nice, she told me that with everyone getting this "life" stuff out of the way now, it gives me the opportunity to have the sole limelight later down the line. I suppose that's true but it's a happy and sad thought all at the same time.
For days I thought I was being incredibly selfish about my feelings, and because of that I was staying silent about them save for the couple people I leaned on. I don't think I'm alone in the universe in feeling like this, and if I am, I suppose that's the torch I carry. They say your friends are the people who hold a mirror up to you, and if that's true, best friends getting engaged makes you look at your own life. I realize then that it's only logical to feel the way I do. It makes me look at my own surroundings and panic a little bit about the direction I've gone in. The direction I'm going in.
It's interesting.
The other night I was standing in the kitchen at @caitcd's house for her brothers birthday gathering and I was overcome with this wave of pure, unfiltered sadness. Not the kind I get when I think about the things or people I've lost, or the kind I get when I'm watching a movie or show and tear up. It was this pain in my heart that I hadn't felt in such a long time, just a dull throb. I didn't know if it was the combination of the music and the general atmosphere in the room, or the fact that nearly everyone in their was getting ready to start their lives and I was still watching from the sidelines. But I just felt it.
Someone told me the other day that I need to fix myself and then I can move on. I thought 2012 solved that but maybe it didn't? I dunno. Maybe we're never really fixed, we're just a little different for better or worse.
That's about all I've got for now. I was immediately happy for both @markstyleme and @caitcd, don't get me wrong. I was overcome with happiness for them both. It was when the shock set in that it sort of clouded over the feelings of elation, and it took a few days for the clouds to pass. But as with all thing, they scooted along, and I'm left to enjoy the notion of happy futures for two people I hold so close to me.
This isn't about me wanting to have kids and get married and fall in love... or whatever order that should happen in. Am I ready for love? Bet your keister I am. Am I fine being single? For now, yes. But to tie this up, it's important for me to note that I do believe in symmetry... I prefer it any day of the week over something disproportionate. And though I place a lot of doubt in people and things fairly often anymore, it would still be nice to meet my next great love tomorrow.
Then I think the universe and I would be just about square.
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