To enjoy something earnestly without regard for how people perceive you for liking it is one of the sincerest acts of authenticity. I try to push myself out of my comfort zone when it's possible by doing things even when I fear being judged for it. I hope that by building up my confidence little by little it will expand to bigger things and allow me to be more of the person I want to be. I did it the other day by wearing his huge silly hat I have that's really warm to the Student Center.
This has been on my mind a lot lately because for some reason I've become really insecure about my poetry. But it's not even so much about my poetry itself (even though it somewhat is) but mostly about the fact I write poetry at all. Writing and reading poetry is something I really love even if I'm not good at it, and I engage with it because it brings me peace and happiness. It's just perceived as such a soft boy pretentious douchebag thing to do that sometimes I'm apprehensive about doing it/sharing it. I want to show my friends and the people important to me what I'm working on, but at the same time I don't want to seem like I'm "showing off" how "deep" I am. This relates back to how I'm kind of insecure about the poetry itself. Because, simultaneously, I don't want to be showing someone something I've written that isn't good and/or is laughable.
Someone important to me told me the other day I'm a really skilled writer and should consider publishing my works, and I was flattered they thought so, but it was kind of like a face mask cleaning out the pores of the walls I've built up and they came crashing with a flood of previously unsurfaced emotions like after a dam breaks. That sentence has like three metaphors I tried to cram into one and I don't really think it's working but that's the only way I can think to say it. Wait. It was kind of like a face mask bringing all my previously unnoticed and unsurfaced insecurities out of my pores and to the surface. Bam. Okay. Now that that's settled... now that they're on the surface at least it allows me to deal with and try to work through them. Also, I feel like none of this has or is going to make any sense because most, if not all, of these sentences are poorly constructed and/or run-ons. There's also little flow. This chapter is just a mess.
I'm gonna take a break from this topic because something just happened and I'm really sad about it so maybe writing will help me get it out. I've been incredibly sick for the past three days. I had to go out at 1 am in the snow to walk to a gas station to get cough drops because my throat hurt so bad. My throat is better but everything else just keeps getting worse. I started cramping, got some canker sores, pimples, my lips chapped really badly, and my septum is dry and cracked and won't stop bleeding because the friction has destroyed it from how many times I've blown my nose. Thankfully the polar vortex caused classes to be cancelled so I didn't have to miss anything. It's my first time being sick in a long time, especially this badly, and it's my first time being sick away from home. It's hard to have to take care of myself, twofold when I'm feeling this bad. I was just going to tough it out but my grandpa offered to come get me and take me home for the weekend. I pushed it off another day just to see if I'd feel better, but I haven't made any progress, so he is going to come get me tomorrow.
TW:// dead moms
My grandma called to see how I was doing and make sure I texted my mom to ask her if she wanted to get me or if my grandpa should just come. I really didn't want to have a chance at spending any time with her because she's been back on her bullshit hard recently. The other day she kept texting me about how my stepmom wasn't really my stepmom or a part of my family after my dad shared a Facebook memory of when we got my dog Finn. She started texting my dad rude things about Tia and then he started texting me about it, and I really don't enjoy when he informs me of whatever he and my mom are fighting about because it's always fucking stupid and I don't want it put on me. I know it had to be really hard and angering for my dad to be hearing that, but he needs to find somebody else to tell besides me and I don't know how to tell him that.
Anyways, she kept saying things like how Tia wasn't in my family or important to me and when I said that wasn't the case she just said it for Caiti, saying that she had said those things. I'm sure Caiti hadn't said it in the way my mom implied and was coerced into saying it for her safety. I worry about how she is doing having to stay with my mom all alone, especially when I'm not there to be able to come get her and my dad can't drive. My mom also got a job offer in Florida she's considering taking that I strongly tried to get her to reject for the sake that then Caiti would be isolated across the country with an abusive parent.
So yeah, I didn't want to spend time with my mom. Which means instead of asking, I just let her know that my grandpa would be coming to get me tomorrow. She started freaking out saying that my grandparents always try to act like they're my parents and overstep their boundaries. To some extent I can understand how she is upset, because she feels like their care for me implies that she isn't a good parent and she's offended by that. She's wrong though. My grandparents just absolutely adore and love wholeheartedly me and my sister, and since we're the only grandchildren within immediate driving distance who don't have super active grandparents on our other parent's side they love to give us attention. My mom feels offended when they say things like that I shouldn't be taking the train back to Chicago because it's unsafe, since she feels like that's a parents decision. Frankly, my grandparents are sometimes a little overboard when it comes to my safety, but it's only from worry and it comes from the purest of intentions.
Anyways, so, she started freaking out. I tried texting and explaining that I texted her in the first place checking in because my grandma asked me to, and that I asked them in the first place because I assumed she would be working (the last part was a bit of a lie, but for good reason). She texted me saying she was going to go pick up Caiti from their house tonight because they're always trying to pull this shit, so I called her trying to explain. Immediately I could hear she was drunk and relaying this information to her, "friend," in Peoria. Drunk and with a guy, got it. Eventually I just told her the reason I wanted to stay with my grandparents this weekend and not with her or my dad is because I felt like I'd be stressed out with them. Then she hung up on me.
It's a really specific feeling when your mom hangs up the phone on you, because that's just not how things are supposed to happen. They're supposed to call you too much and nag out of love and care about you genuinely. Teenagers hang up the phone on their moms when they're really mad and then they get grounded. I would rather have any sort of normal rebellion against an overbearing but supportive mom and be punished accordingly than have my mom hang up on me. I lost the mom I knew as a child. I lost the person who I really viewed as my mom. Then I lost the next mother-like figure in my life. And now what I have is the person who gave birth to me and can't stand me.
She keeps saying if I prefer them so much then I should just have them pay for my college and that she'll tell my dad that too. She always threatens to not pay for my college but it's in the divorce agreement that she'll pay for a third of it. At this point I'm just kind of numb to it, so I don't really care. I just told her to not drive drunk and that I'll talk to her tomorrow.
Yeah, so, that's this chapter I guess.
11:23 pm
1504 words
1/31/19
