Numero Uno

I have had enough with bitching about my estranged bestfriend. I am letting the whole thing go.

As a teenager/young adult, I have always envied people who had chums that went back decades. Friends with whom they hung out as kids. Learned the times table together. Had sleep-overs. Figured out how to precisely apply lip-liner together. Share 21st birthdays by getting shitfaced drunk. Read good books and share them.

Until I arrived at Glendale, I moved frequently. Even after I had arrived at my permanent home of Glendale, I had gone from one group of friends to another, because people changed over summer vacation, and I changed also. I never really had a permanent set of friends that my brother had -- his friends go back to elementary school years -- some as early as the 2nd grade. When I met my bestfriend, I wished that this would be it. She would be the bestfriend that would accompany me through life. I'd be her bridesmaid and she'd be mine, and we even wanted to be roomies someday. I suppose that can be catagorized as a youthful idealism.

While talking to my cousin over wine and sushi, she told me not to confuse quality with quantity. Just because the friendship lasted numerous years does not make it the best. She added with examples of her own experiences -- good friends she made from work, and so on. She also told me that I am still very very young. I'm not too old to start new relationships with many more people, and it will happen.

As you can tell from the apathetic way I am writing, I'm not very excited over this situation. It's not like we fought or even had an argument. She just disappeared. She e-mailed me about two to three weeks ago, but it was all too brief with no explanations.

I am just basically sick and tired, and extremely pained, to provide a one way friendship. I've heard people thank their friends for sticking by them during their times of trouble, such as drug addiction or whatever. You know... "None of this would have been possible without the support of my friend blah blah blah." And I'd love to be that friend. But so far, this isn't the first time I've felt as though all she was concerned about was numero uno. Cynically and realistically speaking, that's the very first thing on their list of priorities, isn't it? I'd be lying if I didn't look out for myself, and that the most important thing in life is to watch my ass. So I don't blame her. I can't blame her if our natural inclination is to be faithful to ourselves first and foremost and rest comes later. That's all she's doing.

Always, in times like this, I retreat into my cave of cynical hermitage. Also known as the crazy old lady who lived in a shoe with her nine cats. It takes months, if not years, for me to be able to invest my love in another human being. I hate that I am so easily inflicted, so easy victimized -- but I suppose vulnerability is an integral part of forming new relationships.

On a completely different topic... When I went to the FDR memorial, I had to run into the small bookstore (gift shop-like bookstore) because it started to rain. There, I saw a large poster of Eleanor Roosevelt, and a quote from her in large letters: "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." I've had such frequent bouts of inferiority complexes that they were becoming a part of my life. It has been a large chunk of my "mid-twenties" crisis -- feeling inferior because I didn't get to go to a big name university, because I don't have college degrees (yet) while my peers have gone on to bigger and such better things. Because I'm not an American, because I wasn't 110lbs, because I drove a used car, because I felt stupid and ignorant. Because, because, because, of many things, it seems. But Eleanor Roosevelt snapped at my inferiority complex and slapped my sense back to me. I had given consent to be made to feel inferior.

I had always been a confident person -- many peers, especially young women, found it so marvelous that I was never concerned about my outward appearances -- I mean, I was concerned, but never obsessed about it negatively. And I had no qualms about the level of my intelligence or how I appeared to others. I loved myself and was proud of who I had been. But that started to wane, perhaps two to three years ago. Who knows why, but it did. And with it, low self-esteem crept in, and so did the inferiority complex.

Well, that stops now. It's not as though I've suffered from anorexia or was suicidal, or hated myself in any way, yet I can't say that I'll be the headstrong, don't-start-shit-with-me, love-me-as-I-am type of girl tomorrow. But feeling down and unhappy, thinking, "only if I were ___(fill in blank with positive images)" stops now. And I will work on feeling inferior -- I have no doubt that it will take as long, if not longer, to build up my self-love as it did to deconstruct it, but the process starts now. Another quote, a favorite of mine (along with Eleanor's) is, "It is never too late to be what you might have been." Which is from George Eliot. And it's true. I believe it.

I think this is a good way to finish the week, and it leaves me with a good mindset to kick off a good week on Monday. Goodness knows I need mental prepping, especially since some thief of a neighbor decided to take my Sunday paper again! Next Sunday, I will disguise myself with green clothing and hide in the bushes and catch the culprit red-handed -- if I can get up so early. Damn you, paper thief! (Shaking fist in air)