Over the Influence

 

           I was trying to figure out how I’d make a certain point in this essay and – ta da!  – Christina Lopes, DPT, MPH posted something to her YouTube account that helps to get me started. On the image are the words, “Non-attachment is the most loving thing you can do”, and the post goes on to say,

“Why do we cling so hard to people, things and titles?

It’s not just because we love them.

It’s because they hold our self-image together – like emotional superglue.”

 

I Don’t Like Your Mom (Confronting My Own Defensiveness)

          

            Sometimes, just sometimes, she gets on my nerves. It can irritate me to the point of shifting in my chair, looking around the room, fantasizing about escaping with the excuse of heading “to the bathroom”, but please know that I haven’t yet made that escape during a visit because I realize that this other person isn’t at fault entirely, if at all.

            (Oh! That’s right, I’m sorry, I forgot – My friend’s name is Meaghan and we’re gonna call her mom Lena.)

            Lena seems to me like she’s quite confident, which has to be a key part of her close, special friendship with her daughter, but I personally find her to be a little too pushy. It’s understandable that if you combine this with other details, Lena and I are just very different people who would not associate if it weren’t for the wonderfully nerdy Meaghan, and we only see each other every once in a while, anyway, so when Lena pisses me off, I have more than one reason for keeping my mouth shut, and instead of being immature, overreacting and blaming her, I remind myself to accept the challenge that these moments present.

Don't Call Me Your Best Friend

          Don’t call me your best friend. I don’t trust that term. What does it even mean?

Anna Howard Shaw Day: A Quick Thought About My Love Life

          First off, I apologize to the blog itself for that long hiatus!!!!! There's no excuse for it. 
I missed you. *pets blog*

           Since it's St Valentine's Day, I got reflective about certain ways I've spent the holiday in the past, having a boyfriend who wanted to celebrate it, and...well, so much has happened since then, and I'm looking forward to a better future relationship.

           If you'd like to see a photo of a handmade valentine I once got from the aforementioned then-boyfriend, read on!

Tectonic Plates (AKA Goldie Reunion)

So on July 20th, I had my reunion with Goldie. It was predictably anticlimactic. Prepare yourself.

A Wedding, a Grudge & Miss Havisham.

          So one of those aforementioned ex-friends is getting married this year. Let's call her Goldie.

          I knew it was coming, since I've met her fiancé and he's a fantastic match for her, blah blah, but...still, it's quite the moment when you hear about a major upcoming event in the life of someone you used to care about very much who is now a stranger. You can be struck by a memory or two without any preparation. It makes me wish I wasn't sentimental. By the way, I don't have many ex-pals but to you, dear readers, I've spoken at length about one and mentioned one or two more. Some of them I went to school with for ages, so our history, good and bad, is now ancient but still profound, and Goldie is one of those people.

When Asked About Marriage

Hint: The lead singer of Every Time I Die writes amusing short essays that answer reader questions, and he once compared those unpleasant moments where you're pressured about marriage to the movie Gremlins.

Verbal Abuse You Don't Fall For

 -If every/almost every time you make a smart decision for yourself, your very insecure boyfriend/girlfriend/just friend is upset, going on and on about you being selfish. Every time.

-You find that they’re carefully editing stories they tell about social interactions they’ve had when you weren’t around, playing underdog or hero in each one.

I See Your Holiday Shopping Stress & I Raise It With Holiday Grieving Stress

          It sucks that with love comes loss, but that's unavoidable, I think. When I get emotional about the December 20th passing of one of my loved ones, I repeat to myself a mantra that I've been very lucky to know him, to be influenced by him. He was is was a wonderful person who, along with his wife and son, permeated my outlook on family and community and milking the wonderful, simple moments out of life. 

Recovering From a Friendship Breakup REDUX: Recent Toxicity

Time to cut ties with the recent past and not write about it for a long, long time:

          The hardest part of letting a longtime pal fall away has, for me, been the struggle to end my long obsession with the other person’s wrongdoings. If someone I really like and respect screws up badly enough, I’ll cut off all communication with them until I have thoroughly processed recent events, which can take months or even years.  The majority of the time, the person from whom I’m gaining distance is needy;

Recovering From a Friendship Breakup

The hardest part of letting a longtime pal fall away has, for me, been the struggle to end my long obsession with the other person’s wrongdoings. If someone I really like and respect screws up badly enough, I’ll cut off all communication with them until I have processed recent events and compared them to very similar memories, which can take months or even years. Young people still have so much to learn that some kind of reaction is to be expected.
 Usually, the person from whom I’m parting is needy; maybe they’re a narcissist or deeply ashamed of themselves to the point of unintentional secrecy, or maybe they were transformed by a hard childhood into someone who didn’t want to get to know me so much as to give themselves a personification of things they felt they’d been cheated out of. I have a lot of embarrassing history of trying to be buddies with people whose favorite hobbies are their emotional issues. 

What Could Happen Now That We're Not Close

          You’re going to live in a city where you can start over, befriending new people at grad school with your literary know-it-all personality, meeting them for coffee at some hip, relaxed café, and you’ll be charming in a blue pea coat and red-orange scarf. Over time, as you work hard and meet people, some of them will be well-intentioned, romantically interested guys for whom you’ll set aside your negativity long enough to learn something new about dating and about yourself.

          School is going to kick your ass, but the people whose very presences make life harder by triggering your anger and jealousy will be hundreds of miles away, including me.