Once and Future

I'm online shopping right now--I've had two tests last week and one more on Monday, and I'm fantasizing about ways to spend money I don't have. Life is stressful, right now, and one of the best ways to cope is to look at minidresses online and think about places I could wear them.

I don't really know how to dress, right now, because this time in my life is so ill-defined. I'm in graduate school, so I'm a student, and it should be okay to dress like one, in jeans and t-shirts or sweaters. But I've graduated from college, I'm tired of jeans and flip flops, and I want to dress like a freaking adult. I'm twenty-three, after all. But twenty-three isn't old. It's young. I should be dressing young-ly now, while I can.

As shallow as the clothing debate may seem, I really can't decide if I'm grown up or not. Yes, I'm living on my own and supporting myself. Yes, I'm preparing for my career. I can't seem to come to grips with the fact that this is it, my real life, and I keep dragging my feet on every major decision. I wonder, often, if it's normal to feel this disconnected from the everyday. One of the things that came up in therapy a lot was a feeling that life was happening to someone else, or that you were observing yourself go through daily actions. While my disconnect isn't quite that bad, it's definite, and has seeped from my private life to nearly every area. I also wonder if it's a sign that I'm not happy and should be pursuing something else.

The things that make me consistently happy, though are not things that people generally get paid for. Like reading, noodling on the internet, rock climbing, being sassy with friends. Or I could, finally, put my ass on the line, drop out of school, and open a restaurant. In my apartment.

Maybe I should just buy another minidress and stop worrying so much. Life is good.

Why Do I Still See You In Every Mirrored Window, In All That I Could Never Overcome?

I'll just start by saying that I'll be surprised if this entry ever actually hits the internet. It's deeply, deeply personal and I usually end up deleting these things before they're half finished.

But here's the thing. New circumstances, right? Which means a whole new set of people to whom I have to explain why I freak out if people walk where I can hear them but not see them. Which means telling The Story, capital letters and all, complete with missing memories, and six years of depression, repression, and brokenness. No matter how much better I get, no matter how much stronger I feel, telling the story always breaks me a little bit.

I worry that people will see me as broken, and it's so important that they not. It's so important that people know I'm much more than a victim. Because if I can convince them, then I can convince myself for one more day that I'm okay. That I'm more than a statistic. That I am not defined by my story.

The thing is, though, that I am defined by what happened (and to be fair and less mysterious, I will tell this damn story if it kills me. I just have to prevaricate first) in a way that's not bad at all. If I didn't have this need to prove myself not broken, I don't know where or who I would be. If I didn't need to show that one man did not define my life forever, I might be less driven. I might care less. I would not be who I am today. I would give up easier.

There is something that makes me feel physically ill about realizing that my rapist has done good things for my life. That anything good at all could have come out of that summer.

Here is the story that has been deleted a thousand times.

The summer I was seventeen, I went away to college for high schoolers. It was a somewhat prestigious program; we got to take college classes and live in the dorms and be college-esque students for six weeks or so. While I was away, four hours from home, a classmate of mine died suddenly, and I was understandably upset. And I did what I was supposed to do: I confided in one of the counselor/RA type people. He responded by systematically alienating me from my friends in the program, my parents, and anyone else who could have helped me, and then raping me for three weeks. I don't remember much from this period of time except two things: the statement "sorry I couldn't last longer, but the struggle was so hot," and bleeding through a dorm-style mattress. This last boggles my mind. That's a lot of blood. How did I lose so much blood and not notice? Or care? I just went about my business, attended class, and came back to hell every day. I went home at the end of the program and he tried to kidnap me; came to my high school with the intention of taking me away.

I have been so determined not to be defined by this, not to give him any more power over my life than he already had. I ended up being defined by it anyway, but in a completely opposite way.

"If this job is in a well, then I don't want it."

I have stopped trying to invent a styrofoam-titanium alloy to make a car out of. This is a good sign as it means that I no longer wish to express my displeasure with the world by hitting people with a car, albeit one that will not kill/damage their vehicle, passengers, or me.

Earlier this summer when I was particularly down I made my mother drive with me to Best Buy and, on impulse, purchased Seasons One and Two of The Office. Although many people have pointed out that The Office is arguably the best show on television these days, or ever, they neglected to tell me the most important part: it is scientifically impossible to be sad while you watch The Office. Just you try. There are so many quirks (and I love quirks) and so much self-reference.

This weekend, I downloaded and watched all of Season Three. I intend to purchase it soon, just as soon as I figure out how much it's going to cost to fix the damage someone did to my car and then didn't leave a note.

In other words, I'm feeling pretty good. Or better, at least.