Nashville

It's that time of year again.  

Burnt orange leaves are my drive through Tennessee.  Gray, windy days are the cold blanket around me as I walked the streets of Nashville in my own private bubble of pain.  

The songs I played, the food I ate, the view from my downtown hotel:  all vivid memories that start to replay when the weather turns like this.  

And then there's last night, when I'm watching the new show Nashville on ABC, unprepared for each shot of the city's sights to be a trigger.  

I was thinking drama...and romance...and country music...

Instead, the characters walk the Shelby Street Bridge, and I'm back on it. 

I'm staring into the water wondering how many people have looked over this same ledge, wanting to end it.  

So I go back, but I don't.   At least, not all the way in.  There's a dividing line you have to create, where you can open the door and look in the room, but not shut yourself in there.  I don't want to remember what that feels like.  

A few months have gone by now in which I don't think about killing myself every day.  I wasn't sure life would ever surpass my secrets and my plans.  Yet, here I am.  

Every day I talk to people who are exactly where I was, sometimes to an eerie degree.  

The other day I worked with a man who had gone from independence and a career ... to losing everything and living in chronic pain that hurts with each step he takes.  He didn't see any hope for his situation to change, couldn't remember what it was like to be proud of his life.  

It felt familiar.  

Trapped without a way out, abandoned by your friends, betrayed by those you love...everyone thinks they're above suicide, until suddenly it becomes the most rational option you can think of.  

The question is: how do we survive our own minds with the torture of constant pain?  

How do we hold onto the 1/10th of 1 percent that wants to believe that the pain might someday end, when 99.99999% of our brain is trying to kill us?  

Do we gamble on the unknown that is the future, or wear the certainty of death?  

Thankfully, thankfully, the future is always a mystery.  Thankfully, I found a way to hold on during the 1/10th.  

"Faith is the bird that sings when the dawn is still dark."  

-Rabindranath Tagore

Top 10 Reasons Why Facebook Is The Devil

Does anybody like me? 

Does anyone give a flying rip what goes on in my life?

How (un)popular am I?

These are all questions we entrust Facebook to answer for us: from how cool we are (not), to how many people hang on our everyday happenings.  At this point in history, our very worth as human beings comes down to that number in parenthesis after the word “Friends.”

Despite posting recently about us being “the generation with 742 Facebook friends,” my own current number is a lot closer to 7+4+2.  Somewhere there is a rock in Indonesia with more FB fans than me.    

For one, I have deleted my entire Friends-list more times than anyone would probably believe….behavior that was a byproduct of my “no one gives a sh*t about me” suicidal mentality. 

Secondly, I end up removing nearly half of the people I add because I either:

A) accept their request out of curiosity, then spy on them for a day before deciding I don’t really know or like the person 

OR 

B) decide this person doesn’t need to know my thoughts or gawk at my profile out of mentally ill paranoia 

OR

C) they’ve pissed me off and can now proceed to go f*ck themselves.  

Third, I don’t participate in whatever competition the world has going to see how many acquaintences-of-acquaintances-of-acquaintences-of-friends (i.e. stuh-RANGERS!!!) I can collect in order to impress people whose opinions I could care less about. 

Lastly, If 1-3 sounded like pathetic excuses for why I am a loser with no friends, I’ll just come right out and demystify the issue: I AM a loser and I DON’T really have any friends.  I’ve chucked them all.

As you can tell, I simultaneously imbue Facebook with both waaaaay too much meaning and no importance whatsoever….what’s that quote to the effect of:

“You wouldn’t care so much what people thought about you if you knew how seldom they did.”  

But then, that’s also precisely the point!  No one thinks about me!  I have tons of shit I want to say, and no one to say it to.  Every time something hilarious or annoying or awesome or disturbing happens, I think of who I could tell and come up with – you guessed it – nobody.  I could always post it on Facebook and then feel more pathetic when nobody bothers to comment on it, right?!?!

Top 10 Reasons Why Facebook Is The Devil:

1. It does nothing but incite envy.  There will always be people with more good times in their photo albums, more smiling beer-holding friends in their pictures, and more exciting sh*t going on in their lives.
2. It does nothing but incite fake-ness.  You invest hours concocting the perfect online persona, with carefully selected pictures and quotes and descriptions to make yourself appear happier, cooler, hotter, smarter, funnier, and more interesting than you really are.
3. It does nothing but incite impulsivity.  In a split second you tell 375 people something you reeeeallly should’ve kept to yourself. 
4. It does nothing but incite over-disclosure.  You broadcast your least intelligent thoughts to the world.  For some of us, this reveals that we are illiterate backwoods dingdongs who can’t spell or string together a coherent sentence (and by this I mean family).  And I quote: “It is better to keep your mouth shut and let people think you’re stupid, than to open it and remove all doubt."
5. It does nothing but incite jealousy.  You now have the ultimate spy tool to track every fool your friends and (ex)boyfriends are in contact with and how much more attention they pay to them than you. 
6. It does nothing but incite rage.  Seriously, that bitch does something every other week with so-and-so but never has time for ME?  Screw her.  “Unfriend.”     
7. It does nothing but incite picture-taking. I swear to GOD I cannot figure out how a camera is present in every conceivable life situation and WHO the hell is spending every waking moment taking pictures of the dumbest stuff imaginable. 
8. It does nothing but incite loneliness.  Despite hundreds of connections, you couldn’t possibly feel more alone.  
9. It does nothing but incite hatred.  I fucking hate Facebook, don’t YOU?
10. It does nothing but incite desperation.  So follow downfromtheledge on Facebook.  Please? 

The World’s Too Effing Small.

My friends from high school married their high school boyfriends, moved into houses in the same zip codes where their parents lived, but I, I could never follow….okay, okay, that’s a Dixie Chicks song, but that doesn’t make it any less true, right down to the zip code part.  They’ve never lived on their own, much less outside of the city where they grew up, and have had but 1 single relationship with a man in their entire lives.  They’ve never known heartbreak, or independence, or all the other crap I used to wish I’d never know, either. 

This post was written in my head Saturday evening at 5 pm as my family and I sat down to dinner at my favorite Mexican restaurant, only to see my ex-best-friend parade in with her husband, toddler, and infant….landing at a table 4 feet diagonal from me.  This is the kind of bullsh*t that happens to me all the time.  I can’t leave my house without being punished with a bitch former co-worker I never wanted to lay eyes on again, a former screwoff classmate who’s now rich while I’m poor, or basically any human that knew me before this day today.  I don’t want to see any of them.  I want to pretend that was all nightmares, or science-fiction-esque life memories implanted into my brain to terrorize me.  But apparently I am doomed to literally run into my past at every instance I believe I’ve outrun it. 

So there she was; the girl I went to summer camp with, the friend I watched SNL and Mystery Science Theater 3000 with until our stomachs practically broke from laughing so hard, my best friend from age 13 to 29…who I stopped speaking to three years ago. 

In all honesty, our friendship was over long before that.  When I left my fiancé at age 23, she wasn’t there for me, and I never really forgot it.  She didn’t ask me what happened, or rally support, or do basically anything you would expect a friend to do at the worst moment of your life.  When I quit my job and ended up unemployed for 4 years, she was nowhere to be found.  When the second most important relationship of my life ended, she was mysteriously absent once again.  And when I was in Nashville carrying out a plan to kill myself, she didn’t even know I was gone. 

Writing all of this makes me wonder how I still considered her my “Best Friend.”  Is it because she just always was, and I never thought to re-title her?  Or because I was maid of honor at her nuptials?  Maybe it was because I was the one she called when her baby was in the hospital with pneumonia.  I don’t know what I was hanging onto for so long, but I eventually DID let go.

I let go of the idea that she was going to one day become the friend that I needed.  The friend who would be there for me.  The friend who is there in good times…or bad times…or either, really, cuz she sucked at both.  It’s not that I didn’t give her chances.  Many.  It’s not that I didn’t tell her how I felt; this was my reward for doing that:

“The fact is, that like most adult friendships, I don't have a lot of time to give.  I'm sorry, but my job consumes 90% of my life during the school year.  What little energy I have left I have to give to my son and my husband. I feel incredibly guilty that my son spends 9 1/2 hours of his day at daycare.  I want to give him every free moment I have.  So, unfortunately, dinner every once in awhile is all I have to give.  I don't think this is all that uncommon among adult friendships.”

And STILL I gave it one more year after THAT!!!  God, I am such a doormat.  The final straw had to do with Austin, the place I moved to in the first place because none of my friends back home gave two fu*ks about me.  At my little going-away get-together, my 2 high school friends basically invited themselves to come stay with me over Spring Break.  Come November, one backed out; whatever.  Then a month before she was set to come, my ex-bestie tells me she can’t afford the trip. 

Bulllllllllllllshit, is what I say.  $300 bucks to come stay at my apartment for free, a luxury beyond her grasp?  As she posts on Facebook about getting a mani/pedi with the friend she’s blowing thousands to go on a Hawaii couples’ vacation with, forking over hundreds to do Ferrell’s and dye her hair blond in preparation for?  The same friend she goes to midnight showings of Twilight with, you know, who couldn’t be bothered for an hour dinner with me once a year? 

And why am I still angry about this sh*t?  I haven’t seen her in 4 years, and I would have been content for it to have been much longer.  A friend-ship is like any other relation-ship: there is the person who is actually before us (who we are usually incapable of seeing), and the person we wish-want-hope would be before us.  And there comes a day of reckoning when we accept that the image is hollow. 

Her last e-mail to me stated, “Now you've decided to shut me out for whatever reason, but I feel I deserve one last communication.”  SHE deserves?  She never got that last communication. 

I don’t mind being the petty one, or the stone cold bitch; I’ll be the one with the problem.  Cuz you know what, I don’t have to sit around wondering why she doesn’t give a sh*t about me anymore, and she doesn’t have to come up with excuses to blow me off.  Win-win.

Is it better to have sucky friends, or no friends at all?

Right now I have a "chat" open on Facebook with a "friend" I have known for years, but never been all that close with.  I think I figured out why today.  It started with a feeling that I was asking-asking-asking too many questions; how's this?  How's that?  I just read through our entire interaction, which consists of me asking or commenting about something in her life.  At no point can I draw the conclusion that she is interested in anything going on in my life.  Not that there's much, but that's not the point! 

I find this pattern often in my life, and it irritates me.  Part of me wants to personalize it and assume, damn, I am the boring-est person on the planet; no one ever asks me how I'M doing!  However, I've spent my life as an observer, and concluded that - for MOST people - that stupid Toby Keith song is overly on-target: "Wanna talk about ME wanna talk about -I- wanna talk about NUMBER ONE..." 

And, really:  If I weren't so concerned about myself, I wouldn't feel so slighted...right? 

I'm USED to my life being about other people.  I grew up being the family toilet, on which everyone else dumps their proverbial crap.  I know all too well the feeling of people taking all you have to give, and handing nothing back.  And I think I've written a time or two about how fed up I am with that role.  It's so entrenched in my personality (and my gender?) that I don't know how *not* to focus on what others need and want...and yet that little voice that asks, "What about me?" is not completely suffocated.  Yet. 

So is it possible to be a giver and not attract takers?  Do takers ever stop sucking the life force out of you, and realize all you've done for them, suddenly overtaken with appreciation and a desire to return in kind?  Ummm....doubtful.  So how does the person who continually sets up this pattern change the dynamic of their relationships without changing their nature?  (That is, for those of us who aren't Mother Theresa, and don't give 100% selflessly.)

I have to recognize how I'm setting it up this way.  The fact that I hate talking about myself means I inherently choose to focus on others to deflect being the center of attention.  There are also a great many topics I'd rather not disclose on, so people probably learn quickly not to ask.  It's also difficult for people when you're not in a relationship - or seeking one - to withhold asking about your love life.  Everyone wants to know who you're dating, for how long, if you're getting married, then when, how many kids you'll have once you do, and so on till Kingdom Come.  So if that's not a focus in your life, they may feel at a loss as to what to talk to you about.  I get it.  Sometimes I wonder what I would ask myself about if I were anybody else. I could see how it might be difficult.  But there are also a thousand neutral subjects you can talk to any stranger about....if you choose to make an effort. 

And so, because she is doing what the rest of humankind does every hour of every day, I will try not to fault my friend for her egotism.  If I start to think about all the ways in which (the few friends I have left) fail to give a sh*t about me, I'll get into the mentality I was in a few years ago.  I moved across the friggin' country because no one in my life seemed to give a crap that I existed.  I stopped speaking to people who never seemed to have the time of day for me, like they did for their married friends or their rich friends or their cool friends...or whatever magical quality I imagined those people possessing which made them a more appealing companion than me. 

Because I can't *get* more from others, I try to *need* less.  And because it's really kind of impossible to need less than any other human being does, I settle for expecting less and squashing my own needs.  Or covering them up.  Or substituting things that really don't fill the void of what we're supposed to be getting from other people. 

"I expect more, but I get less."  (Says my grandpa the other day, in the nursing home)
"Well, maybe you should try expecting less, and you'll get more!"  (Responds my dad)

Therein lies the answer to all life's problems, methinks.

Knowing when to give up

I've never been great at letting go.  At times, the refusal to quit is a great trait to have.  But there are those other moments in life when the line between persevering ... and trying to force something to happen ... gets blurry.  When is enough enough?  When you're satisfied that you've given it your best last shot?  When you're foolishly clinging to something that is probably not meant to be?

Being a person who has immense difficulty accepting failure, I've certainly held fast to many a thing long past its expiration date.  I've doled out too many chances to people who didn't deserve it.  I've given friends the benefit of the doubt, when clearly calling to see how I'm doing never crosses their minds.  But what's really weighing heavily on me at the moment is my career path.

I have a useless master's degree that hasn't been put to use in nearly 4 years.  I invested 7 years of my life in college, worked 2 years in my field, and now can't even get a job close to what my degree should be worth.  Am I desperately clinging to my "investment" because of what it *should* have earned me by now, under some delusion that the seven hundredth job application-resume-cover letter-transcript-reference letter sent out will pay off with a position after all this time?

Ironically, I DID give up on this career 3 years ago.  I gave away all of my books and resources and 99% of the materials I had spent years gathering.  But after trying in vain to get any kind of other job, I have found my degree essentially useless for that purpose.  In fact, I could have gotten more job offers with JUST a high school diploma.  So I tried once again to get the job I am licensed to do and loved at one time.  It's not happening.

Honestly, I just want to say "f**k it."  I am so blessed tired of begging for a job I don't even know if I want anymore.  I have screwed the whole daggone thing up: life, love, work, home, friendship.  *sigh*

“Anytime you need a friend....

I will be here...”  So sings Mariah Carey. 

But some words are only true in a song.

“A real friend is one who walks in when the rest of the world walks out.”

Maybe those are the kind of friendships other people have.

Lucky bastards.

In the real world, you don’t always get back what you give. 

“Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don't walk behind me, I may not lead. Walk beside me and be my friend.” -Albert Camus

In my life’s darkest times, no one has “shown up” for me. 

If I wanted to hit the bars, there are a bazillion people, friends-cousins-acquaintances, I could call up.

If I wanted ditzy bimbo friends to gossip with about who’s sleeping with who, I could go be another dime-a-dozen trollop down at the bar all hoed up with my group of girls. 

But when your life’s falling apart:

• Do you call the friend who’s not there for the little things to be there for the big things?
• Who can’t be burdened for an hour lunch...for a life crisis?
• Should you unload on someone too busy to post back on Facebook, much less reply to an e-mail?

My so-called “best friends” have known about all the major losses in these past several years of my life ... and not bothered to call or see how I’m doing, or even if I’m alive or dead. 

“Everyone hears what you say. Friends listen to what you say. Best friends listen to what you don't say.”

For a time you continue to reach out anyway, to act normal, hiding your pain so as not to be a burden.  You try to be the kind of friend you wish you had, until that nagging question in the back of your mind one day leaps to the forefront: where WERE you?

Where were you when life was kicking my ass?

When I couldn't get out of bed?

When I had no one?

I didn’t even show you the darkness, I pretended for you...wasn’t I a good enough actor?

I know, I know: it’s always more fun to knock back a few margaritas with the happy, laughing bunch.

Failure might be contagious.  Despair is catching. 

And I...am a leper? 

So before you shut me out completely, best friend, I will throw you out along with the rest of the world. 

I never wanted you to feel sorry for me.  I didn’t need your pity.  I did need to look in your eyes and see that I was the same person you called “friend” before this bulldozer ran over my life. 

"When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares." ~Henri Nouwen 

"But oh! the blessing it is to have a friend to whom one can speak fearlessly on any subject; with whom one's deepest as well as one's most foolish thoughts come out simply and safely. Oh, the comfort - the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person - having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring them all right out, just as they are, chaff and grain together; certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then with the breath of kindness blow the rest away." ~Dinah Craik, A Life for a Life, 1859

"A friend is a person with whom I may be sincere. Before him I may think aloud. I am arrived at last in the presence of a man so real and equal, that I may drop even those undermost garments of dissimulation, courtesy, and second thought, which men never put off, and may deal with him with the simplicity and wholeness with which one chemical atom meets another." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson