Secret High School Romance or What Will Everyone Think?

Obvious admission: I spend a lot of time roaming around in my own brain. I think that writers become so because their minds just won’t shut up and it’s the only way to quiet themself down. My mind has a frequent mantra: “What will everyone think?”

I hate that mantra, even more than I hate What Would Jesus Do?

“What will everyone think?” is something I’ve repeated in my head so often and for so long that it’s actually had a deep affect on my life. Some of it’s good like, “what would people think if I shaved a bald spot onto the top of my head just to see what it would be like?”

But then that same annoying thought has stopped me from other things like: “What would people think if I didn’t do all the things I’m supposed to? What would people think if I hurt someone’s feelings by saying no? What would people think if I lived exactly the way I want to…”

What would people think if you became the Authentic You? If you stopped pleasing everyone and started pleasing yourself? Huh. Not talking masturbation, here, but you know what I mean. What if instead of taking the tiny overcooked piece of turkey on the plate, you took the most succulent, the one you’d usually save for someone else? You know what would happen? You’d have a great dinner that you didn’t have to drown in gravy.

I’ve got lost in my own metaphor here.

FLASHBACK:

High school. Me. Poetic girl trying to hide in baggy clothes with half my hair shaved, the other half long and covering my eyes. (I looked like the guy from Simply Red, and that was not hot, let me tell you.)

I could hide behind my hair, my clothes. I could be quiet. Because, you know, what if someone saw me? What if they knew what kind of family I had? What if they saw how scared I was all the time?

In my senior year, I met a boy. He was two years younger, which seemed an impassable ocean of time. We had Spanish together. We hated each other in public. In private, I’d drive over to his house at night, sneak past his parents’ window and creep up to his room. We’d make-out for hours. Every time I felt nervous and sick with the thought of “What would people think if they knew?” I also felt alive because for once, I was doing something I wanted to do.

One night, lying in his bed, he lifted the hair from my eyes, pushed it back so he could stare at me. He said nothing. I was terrified of what he was thinking. What would he think of me? “What?” I asked. It was all I could manage. I couldn’t say: “What are you thinking about me?” All I could say was “What?” my voice quiet as a butterfly fluttering, as if the words themselves hurt.

“You’re beautiful,” he said.

It was the first time anyone had ever called me that. And I felt like it was the first time someone really saw me and told me not what they thought of me, but what I wanted to think of myself.

I’ve learned over the years that it doesn’t really matter what people think. What matters is what you think about yourself and your actions. There are so many ways we can be controlled: by rules, by families, by our passions. It’s all outside stuff. So that constant mantra in my head—I’ve reworded it. Now I say: “What do you think, Tanya? Are you okay with this?” And it’s transformed me. It really has.

Random Thoughts: Best with Depressing Music

I know. I know. It’s bad form to double-post. But the previous post was from writer-Tanya and this post is from whining-Tanya. They are two entirely different people (on good days). My DVD player is broken and I drank too much wine and then waited and took a valium for the dentist tomorrow (per prescription. Don’t worry about the wine. I ate and waited first) and now I feel all wobbly. And I feel old. And lonely. Whaaaahh!!!

*insert pathetic babyish crying here*

Random Thoughts

#1 Two weeks ago I went to Comedy Monday at Dog Story. I’m not currently performing there because organizning and producing the radio plays took too much energy for very little reward. I just can’t keep doing it. So I was there to run box office and to help out. It was a fun night, though people seemed to look through me since I was “Box Office Staff” and not “A Real Person”. And then I was going to stay and do the open improv jam and I looked at all the people staying and they were all in their twenties. A few were in their thirties, but they’re still single and I felt…well….really, really old.

When you’re single, divorced, a single parent, it does something to you. First, it makes you unreliable because there are always issues with babysitters and the kids and family and job obligations. Second, you just can’t seem to shake a constant sense of responsibility. Third, it makes your boobs droop.

So I looked at all the young people and single-no-kids people and I thought “We don’t have a thing in common”. And then I drove home.

#2  I love my house. I love it. My kids love it. And now they’re at their dad’s. He lives, now, a couple of blocks away. His fiancée now answers his phone when I call to talk about the kids. He needed to pick up some things for our daughter and sent his soon-to-be-step-daughter to pick it up for him. And I sat on my deck and had a glass of wine and I thought “Huh. 6 years ago we were married and now I talk more to his fiancée than I do to him.” Our would-be-anniversary was yesterday. The whole day passed and I didn’t realize it until today.

#3 I decided to stop online dating. By stopping online dating and waiting to meet that Special Someone naturally, I’m now not dating at all. And I want to be. I’ve had a few offers from very nice men but I can’t…I just….I need someone who’s my age or older. Who knows about life and struggles.

#4 I miss kissing. I miss lying next to a man in bed and falling asleep with our bodies touching. I miss cooking for someone and adding just a little bit of sexiness into a meal. Food is sensual after all. I miss phone calls and texts. I miss someone thinking about me during the day. I miss daydreaming about coming home to a man and kissing him before he can say a word.

#5 Even food isn’t appealing anymore, though I eat a lot of it.

#6 My pants are tight. My broken foot caused me to gain weight, and though I’m trying to up my activity level, the weight stays on. It’s like a bad memory I can’t shake, because it’s not a memory at all. It’s with me all the time.

#7 I don’t know what I’m doing anymore in my career. I want my teaching to be permanent. I want health insurance.

#8 While life is varied and complex and mysterious, I also wish it weren’t so blasted lonely and hard.

#9 I want to buy a sundress and wear it for someone special.

#10 I want my fantasy life for just a while to match my real life.

I think I’m depressed. I need a good cry. I need to go for a run. I need to make out. I’m not kidding. A good old-fashioned makeout session would cure all of this.

Maybe it’s back to online dating after all. God help me.