Nothing too new to put up here. Still busy with school, still having drama with "friends." Same old, same old.

Although, I am going on a date tomorrow night :) More on that later.

An Open Letter

You don't know who I am yet. But I'm that girl. You know...the one. I dance across your dreams at night, and I make you wake up with a smile on your face. You see me out of the corner of your eye sometimes, but when you turn your head to look at me full-on, I'm gone. I'm an escape artist, flitting around the outskirts of your world, close enough to feel, but too far to touch. Someone somewhere decided that you and I are it. The yin-yang combo, the two halves, the whole, the completeness we've been looking for.

Ready when you are.

Beauty?

You would think that being swarmed by a pack of drunk guys after last call, all asking for my number, would be enough to make me actually think I was attractive.

...it wasn't. Why the hell can't I just appreciate myself for the person that I am? It's like I'm waiting for Prince Charming to swoop in and tell me the same damn things those drunk guys were saying. I wonder, though. Would I believe it then?

The whole experience just left me feeling totally freaked out. I'm not sure what I would have done if I hadn't spent the whole drive home talking to L. At least she was there to diffuse the situation for me. I felt like I had been initiated into some grown-up world where people 5 or 6 years your elder come up and talk to you. I don't want to sound completely ignorant, but I guess I just had never given the adult bar scene that much thought. At least in my college town, I know that the people there are around my age, and I'm totally okay with that!

I feel like a total nerd for being so weirded out...but when you go your entire life not really believing that you LOOKED like anything special...well, hearing it from so many people all at once? Yeah, it was too much.

I've always been the nerdy, quiet girl in the back of the classroom who dated people who were always my friends first. I think I took some solace in the fact that they had already judged me, and I assumed that they wouldn't actually be with me if they didn't want to be. In middle school, I remember being the girl that the boys would use as an example for someone they didn't want to "like."

"You like L H!" "Ew, no way!" And yes, I was always right there when it went down. So I guess I don't have much of a foundation to build off of in the first place.

I've just never felt pretty or hot or attractive or any of those things that apparently other people see in me. I don't know how to fix it so that I feel okay in my own skin. And I hate that I'm so insecure because I KNOW I'm being dumb. It's always been a problem for me in relationships too. I go out with the guy somewhere and I see someone that I'm sure looks better than me and I just feel so...inadequate. My poopiness ruins the date...and tends to ruin the relationship too.

Am I destined to never feel good enough? Is there a way out of here that maybe I'm just not seeing? Apparently, I've been blind to quite a lot these days.

I'm lonely.

The sunlight crashes down over me as I step out from the threshold of that shadowy overhang. I am overwhelmed feeling my mind collide with this shining ball of external happiness. I extend my arm, stretching every nerve, down to my finger, reaching, so that every inch of me absorbs the light. My cells explode with that forgotten energy, like a small child who has stepped on his first balloon and made it pop, scaring everybody around him, laughing because he pulled the simplest of pranks and got away with it. I can't help but giggle and grin like I used to. Before him. Before that. Before that phone call that changed everything.

Or maybe it didn't? Maybe I'm forgetting something. There is a higher order to this world and we can't fully understand why things happen, especially not when we are in the midst of the ensuing chaos. If I hadn't gone through all this shit, I never would have gotten as close to L, spent as much time with my roommates, or met other guys who have proved to me that there is still a lot of good out there. We are taken through periods of pain so that we value the great things that we do have, so that we'll be more appreciative of what's left at the end.

I smile because I know that at moments like these, well, I know there is enough magic in this world for me to get my share. And I know that I will be inspired. Inspired to write this. And press on. And move away from the dark filth of my past. Setbacks? Yes, of course. Will I let them knock me off my ultimate course, keep me from doing what I know will be best for me? The answer is simple. Hell. No.