things are going a little weird. on thursday i had two friends over for dinner - syd and this one guy i've just gotten closer with. he has a girlfriend that he barely talks about and we get along great and also i do think he flirts with me but i'm not sure if he's aware of it. he's going to be a politician and you can tell because every time he talks to you or asks you a question you feel like you have his entire attention and he's actually interested. which i think is actually what is confusing me. if he didn't have a girlfriend i might fall a little bit in love with him -- he's so sweet to me. but i am not going to mistake kindness for that anymore.
last month i was talking to the forester guy and i told him that there are things he gets away with (including but not limited to having a slightly scary apartment and not texting me back and not knowing how to cook despite being 29) because i am 23 and i am not used to the people i date treating me well. and he is kind and sweet to me and kisses the back of my neck, so the other stuff is ok. which is a fucked up thing to say but also true. and i don't like that it's true. he could tell i was a little off all night and so when we got back to his apartment he turned off all the harsh lights and rubbed my back until i relaxed, sweet and tender and touching me just to make me feel better, not because he wanted anything from me. i cried into the arm of his couch and tried not to let him see. i haven't seen him in a month, he's off in the forest.
it's exciting when people don't treat me well - it's like playing a slot machine, the lightning of excitement hitting the bottom of my stomach every time my phone lights up. i spent so long in the monotony of a good and stable relationship, so i could blame it on that, but honestly i think i've always been like this. i always have to be working and trying and begging for affection, like a little dog up on its hind legs doing tricks. i tell my sister like once a month that i should just get "needy little freak" tattooed across my forehead.
i think i need to stop seeing love as something that i can play my way into, like a game, that i can joke and flirt my way into. because the truth is that i think most people don't want to be really kind to me when they know me. i also know that i need to stop letting them hurt me. i need to stop letting everyone see my bloody beating heart, because it's who i am but it's also fucking stupid.
on january 21st 2025 at 20:04 i typed into my notes app: "from my window tonight i can see a woman walking her dog. my laundry is in the machine. i think i should start writing poetry again."
sometimes i feel like holly hunter in broadcast news.
anyways when i had my friends over on thursday i felt like i was experiencing everything that i had wanted when i was a teenager -- to not be depressed and lonely in my parents' house in the suburbs, to be young and living in europe, having my friends over to my tiny warm candlelit apartment for dinner and red wine and hours of talking. syd slept over which made me so happy and we had such a good time, talking until 2:30 in the morning, drinking gin and tonics with orange peel syrup i made. and on friday nick took me to the grocery store and pushed my cart around and we talked about zionism in the refrigerated section, and he dropped me and my groceries off and then came over to help me cook. i panicked because he invited a bunch of people i didn't know, but it was fine and the people he brought were nice and it was fun. when syd came i leaned out the window and dropped my keys down to her and it felt like a moment from a movie. like my entire life, everything i want, could be encapsulated in this moment. love and light and so much more. when i left caden and blew up my life, it was because i knew that i could have this. and why would i want anything else?
next.