Broken Doll

When I was 23, my father tried to kick me out of the house for the crime of getting up from the dinner table before he did so I could look for work.  This was a culmination of a lot of bad shit in my life, including though not limited to a lifetime of verbal abuse from him.

I locked myself in my bedroom, took out my razor blade, and slashed my thigh open.  I screamed.  The pain in my head was so intense that I didn’t even feel the pain in my skin.  Blood flowed like water and I couldn’t even see it.

And then I stopped, and held the razor blade to my wrist.  I meant to do it.  I wasn’t even afraid anymore.

Except I realized that I didn’t want to.  For the first time in memory I wanted to live.  I wanted to prove him wrong.  I looked at myself, and saw a turning point.

Years later, I’m not so certain it was.

Years later, I’m still trying, and failing, to find someone who is able — and willing — to love me.  Years later, I’m still trying, and failing, to make an impact on the world.  Years later, I’m still trying, and failing, to succeed at the things I work so hard to achieve.

Years later, whenever I make an intimate emotional connection with another human being, he changes his mind, cuts me off, pushes me away, and feeds me the pretty little lie that we’ll still be friends.  But not the kind of friends that talk to each other, mind you.  Years later, no matter what I do, I am never Good Enough.  And whether I choose to trust, or not to trust, it is always, always, the wrong choice.

Years later, wanting to live is no longer a feature of my daily life.

Is it my fault, then?  Should I not expect someone to understand that when I say I want a serious relationship, I really do mean that I want a serious relationship?  I didn’t ask because I thought he understood where I was coming from and was okay with that.  I had said it, after all.  So is it my fault?  How many times, how many ways do I have to say it?  When am I finally allowed to believe that they really do understand what I’ve said?

There is always that question that I don’t think to ask.  Saying what I want and what I need and what I expect isn’t Good Enough, so I have to think of all these questions on my own, have to remember to ask them, even though there are hundreds of these potential questions and I have no way of knowing which one of them that it’s absolutely vital for me to ask.

Is the entire burden on me then?  I say what I want, but I have to check and double check that I was understood, and try to figure out — try to guess at — which damn question it’s going to be this time? I am damned no matter what I do.  I can’t possibly think of everything.

It’s my fault then.  And that is fucking one-sided; and it is fucking not fair.

Years later… nothing really has changed.

I don’t know if I’m going to make it. The gears of the Universe appear determined to crush me.

I would give anything just to have someone to say that to.

so let go, just get in
oh, it’s so amazing here
it’s alright
’cause there’s beauty in the breakdown

So. Turns out I was right and that blurring the line between personal friend and work colleague is a fantastically stupid idea.

Sarah sold me out. Sarah who drunkenly claimed to love me on any number of occassions. Sarah whom I used to respect as a colleague and used to consider a friend.

Just because I don’t look sick doesn’t mean that I am not. I mean, jesus. Would you have preferred that I bitch and moan and whine constantly about how bad I feel? Did you want me to curl up on the floor and whimper every time I got the shakes, or my chest hurt, or I couldn’t catch my breath even though I was just sitting down? Did you want me to chuck the wig in a box and come to work looking like a decaying skull with my thin, scraggly hair falling out all over the place? Do you really think that would have been better? Or would I have made you fucking uncomfortable?

Show a little fucking gratitude that you only had to watch this happen to someone else.

Sarah claimed to be my friend, but hasn’t attempted to contact me in any way since July 9 to explain herself or even to tell me to fuck off and die. If she’d called or emailed to apologize and say that he made the decision against her wishes that would be one thing.

Which only serves to emphasize the point that no one gets this. At all. Because they can’t, even if they want to (and even less so if you can’t be arsed to think beyond yourself). No one has any idea what this is like. I could explain til I’m blue in the face — and did, frankly, on the updates I sent out — and Sarah watched it happen and she still sold me out anyway.

There is nothing more despicable than a liar. Deceit and greed are the foundation of every other sin.

I can’t make anyone understand this. I am, ultimately, completely alone.

By 2pm today I was exhausted — not ordinary I’d-like-to-take-a-five-minute-brain-break exhausted, but to the point where I couldn’t put complete sentences together. Couldn’t follow a train of thought. My hands shook. I wasn’t sure I could stand up without falling. And here I am trying to carry almost half of a small company on my shoulders, no one else who can do it, and I can’t. I can’t keep up. It’s too damn much.

I can’t even walk the three blocks to work without breathing hard.

And Sunday night I spent an hour on the phone with my mom crying because I was afraid to wash my hair. Afraid of how much of it would wash down the drain. Another fistful gone and how thin would it look? And it turned out that despite the golf-ball sized mass of (now-short, no less) hair, it’s still hard to tell. So of course I’ll be doing this again tonight. My hair is dirty and needs a wash and how much of it will go down the drain? How visible will it be?

I’m too tired. Too tired to deal with this. I get home and can barely move, can’t pack for moving house, I feel like I’m way behind on everything. There’s no one here but me. And I can’t keep up. And tomorrow I may wake up feeling okay like this morning but then go to work and do it all over again until I can’t even move by early afternoon.

My nose bled all over the bathroom sink tonight. I blew my nose because I couldn’t breathe with all the blood clots in there and it just came loose and bled like a river. And here I’m thinking that if I tell my nurses about this, I don’t have the time to give them if they want to see me.

I need to wash my hair. I don’t have the energy to deal with the wig. I want to cry.

Waiting in line to pay at the Heartland, I got to chatting with the guy ahead of me who happened to also be a local actor, currently doing work on Prison Break (I’m running into quite a few of these people lately). He gave me the phone number of the show’s casting office, I thanked him and we introduced ourselves. Whereupon he says, “Oh, I’ve heard of you. Heard good things about you.”

Hee. Rather a surprise, I didn’t think I was known at all within the local theatre scene — much less having someone I’ve never met before who’s not only heard of me, but heard well of me. Nice. I’ll take what I can get.

And yes, I’ve already called the casting office and left a message. So with a little luck you may see me on your TV soon.

Everything is shallow, and everything is a lie.

Walk into rehersal Tuesday, sit down at the table and over introductions realize that I am older than the entire cast but one by at least seven or so years. Suddenly feel so old, and I know I am just watching time slip away from me like water through a sieve. Almost two years gone, in only an instant, and nothing is better, nothing is accomplished, and jesus my entire life will vanish, I will be old and decayed, and no matter how fast or single-mindedly I work for it the joy and peace I seek, I need, will be forever just beyond my grasp. I am going to grow old like this, grow physically frail like this, die like this, miserable, unfulfilled, alone. And I look around the table, paint a lying smile on my face, and secretly wonder just what in hell we’re all doing here. What does it accomplish? What does it mean? Why bother?

Deep disconnect. Deep, black alienation. And this is what it means to see the world clearly — truly clearly — for the first time.

Thursday. The munch. Walk into a room and see that fully half of the people there are currently not speaking to me. And why? Because I had the audacity to admit to being hurt and angry at being wronged — by them, or by others, or by fucked up circumstance outside of anyone’s control. I was tired already going in — and absolutely exhausted going out. I am hated and have no idea why. I sat right across from David and for the entire time he wouldn’t even look at me. Not once. What the hell has he become?

And interaction is distant and conversation revolves about stupid things like “bad” porn versus “good” porn and I am secretly thinking just what the fuck is all this for? It’s babbling, verbal space-filler, devoid of meaning, devoid of any genuine connection. And this is the truth I’ve been seeing, this gathering storm, this extinction. I can hardly articulate it, but I feel it and know it. I’ve had friends who claimed to love me who then stabbed me in the back. I see people at the munch who make nice to me while I’m there while professing love for those who seek to destroy me. I see a boy who once loved me with his entire being turn his back on that deep connection, on me, on even a cordial friendship, in favor of a girl who doesn’t even trust him. Is this real? Is this genuine? Is this truth?

I don’t know what this is. But it is not good enough for living. It creates this gigantic black hole of need. How can anyone live this way?

Everything is disconnected. Everything is shallow. Everything is a lie.

And apparently I’m the only one who sees it.