More than an Eternity…

That’s how long it feels like it’s been. I self-banned myself form my computer this past week, due to my exams. Damn those exams. The only good things about them were that I got an A (94) on my English IB-style essay (my highest essay grade this year in that class) and that my Computer Science exam was even easier than I thought it would be. All in all, the week was simply boring and draining.

I did come back to the land of technology today to find things a little changed. Okay, greatly changed. I got an e-mail from my old buddy Ayana (despite my avoidance of her for a while (did we ever actually argue? I’m not sure.), she’s a great chica (pronounced with a Spanish accent), and I’ve enjoyed reading about her in Micah and Sonny’s blogs and her own blog. Another major change is that Sonny is reading (or has read) my blog at some point this week. Now that I have a visitor or two, I feel kinda exposed, but not enough to take my blog down. It’s an interesting feeling. I don’t expose myself often.

I’m not much of a gossip generally, and I don’t really want to be one here, but there is something I simple must share for those who attended Harding (Micah, Ayana…). There is a very nasty (and I do mean nasty) rumor that M.K. and the Titty-Mongeror (check my spelling on that) are dating. I about had a seizure when I heard (for multiple reasons, unfortunately, although that’s a later discussion). I would rather clean up vomit on the floor of a clothing store than think of those two together. 🙂 Just for a little perspective.

This week, I’ve gone back to a CD I haven’t listened to in about two months, a CD of Syrian music (yes, the Middle-Eastern country) given to me by my physics teacher. I don’t speak Arabic at all, and have no idea what they are saying, but the music is kind of pop-ish, although the instruments are different. Lots of violin (which I love), acoustic Spanish-sounding geetar, and another instrument I can’t identify (some sort of woodwind-type instrument). My physics teacher tells me these are the kind of music middle-age people would listen to, like mellow jazz here (which I also love), but the music is very… “jaunty” isn’t the right word, but it’s the first that comes to mind (everyone should read Choke by Chuck Palahniuk). Most are obviously love songs (more in the style of Pink’s first CD than any slow R&B music). There are no songs on this CD I dislike. I am currently listening to two songs on repeat, and have been, 9 hours a day, for the past 7 days. I’m that type. Since I abstained from my computer this week, I fell even harder on my other addiction of music. I wonder if there is a Musiker’s Anonymous group. “Hi, my name is Melissa, and I’m an addict”?? It’s kinda sad. The only reason I hate work is that I can’t have music while I’m there. Songs play in my head all the time, including these Syrian songs that I can sing the words to. For how many other people is this a problem? Our music becomes harder, faster, more intense, more obscene, louder, more explicit about everything from sex to political protests, and it’s still not enough to satiate us. In Lullaby by Palahniuk (which I never got to finish), Palahniuk was dissecting Americans’ addiction to noise, how people listen to the TV louder than ever, or simply always have it on, or how people blast music just driving down the street, or simply always have the radio/CD player on. This struck a chord with me. I haven’t watched TV in about two months, but I am always listening to music. I like to think silence doesn’t bother me, and silence from talk never does, but silence from music does. I was reading this book around the time I went to stay the night over at my friend Eddie’s house (in order to watch movies, thank you very much), and found a similar trend with television in his house. He plays the TV loud (something which always bothers me anyway, whether my family does it or my friends) and somewhere in his house, a TV is on. In my own house, my father will be working at his desk and will have the TV on, although he isn’t watching it. For background noise, to help him think, he says. And when he settles down to watch movies at night with my mother, they play the TV so loud, I have to put on headphones with music to go to sleep. Friends whose cars I ride in always have music playing, and in the case of my buddy Michael, loud to the point where conversation is hardly possible for someone (such as myself) who tunes out voices automatically to hear music. And he still tries to have a conversation, and everyone is saying “huh?” every 5 secs. While I think that it’s also rude to play music that loud and try to have a conversation, that’s beside the point. Palahniuk knows of what he speaks, too well.

In case you haven’t been able to tell, I’m in need of a major catharsis right now, before I go in to work, so this is going to get longer.

I realized something about myself about a year ago, and that is that become easily saturated with people. I will be around someone (I like serially monogamous friendships) for a while, then I start to notice things about them that bug the hell out of me. And I find myself snappish and bitchy towards these unsuspecting people. Nothing about them changed, I just allowed myself to let their flaws (which I noticed from the beginning) annoy me. For instance, the guy that drives me to school is a very nice guy. He’s completely un-ambitious (his life goal is to go to UNCC and become a librarian), and is often labelled as gay (whether he is or not, I dunno, as I don’t know him that well). But he also tries to act with Michael’s assertiveness and outright arrogance at times. It’s a bad fit in such a guy. I know all this. I have known all this since he first offered to take me to school (“Hi, Melissa? Yeah, I’m coming by at 6:00 to pick you up for school, so be ready. … Uh, is that okay?”). Yet lately, his attitude and actions have made everything he says seem like a whiny, complaining little bitch. Once again, on one level I know things are no different, yet on another, it’s like, “Just shut the fuck up, you snivelling little fruity cowardly bastard….”. Yeah. But I do this with all my friends. With Michael, he called me everyday (make note that I said everyday) just to say hi. My parents thought it was odd, given that he is engaged, but I don’t automatically attribute that motive to males (for obvious reasons if you have ever seen me). But the thing is, he saw me everyday at school, and called me every night, usually a minumum of twice and up to ten times for help with schoolwork, his website, comp. sci. homework, computer problems of everyone he knows in the United States, or just to say good night. “Good night”?? WTF? I don’t even say good night to my parents! And while it’s very touching and everything, I found it rude and counterproductive to getting any work done in any subject or area, in fact. How can you read a good book if your phone is ringing off it’s goddamn hook eery fifteen minutes? Finally, over Thanksgiving break, I refused to answer my phone until the night before we went back to school. He didn’t understand that my vacations from school are vacations from school, friends, social life of any kind, everything. So I explained it to him. It was some day in December before he finally stopped calling me. I wrote in down on a calendar. It was the first day since August (maybe before) that Michael hadn’t called me. I wanted to cry in relief. But I digress. Around October, I became sick of Michael. I became sick of his arrogance in assuming that I was always available and wanted to talk and help him with his every little problem (although he always complained about how little time he had) and his rudeness in talking about my friends and former-friends-turned-mere-acquaintances to name a few reasons. He refused to search the Internet for help in building his website, refused to read the math book for help with his homework, etc. The climax occured at my birthday get-together in late October, in which several people, Dulin, Michael, Jenny, and a couple other people, were invited to my house for movies and McAlisters (and some computer oogling). My living room isn’t large, and has a couch (three cushions), a love-seat (two cushions) and a large not-a-recliner-but-it-looks-like-one chair. I had about 8 people over, not including myself. That’s not enough funiture, although there’s enough room for the extras to sit comfortably on the floor. Michael and Jenny took it upon themselves to stretch-out on the longer couch, reserving it for themselves. I still see red when I think about this. They walked into my fucking house, with their rude-ass PDA (public displays of affection), and lay down all over my couch, while three people sat on the floor. There are no words. Then, Michael took over my TV. I hate loud TV and love close-captioning so that I don’t have to turn it up loud, but since he’s deaf and hates closed-captioning, we all must accomodate ourselves to his desires, right? Remember this is my fucking house. And then I couldn’t get the remote back without causing a major scene, and looking like the complete bitch I am and wanted to be, because he wouldn’t just hand it over. I try to pass it off as a cultural difference, because when I go into someone’s house, I try to be as unobtrusive as possible and cause little disturbance, while Michael will go in and make himself quite at home. Different upbringings, you know? R. i. g. h. t. Fuck that. I sputtered in anger everytime he talked to me for while after that.

Whew. How did I get on that tangent? “Lower the blood pressure, now. It’s okay, now Lissa, it’s over…” I never learned to forgive or forget. I can shelve issues until I need then later, but I can’t forgive or forget. I would make a sucky Christian. Turn the other cheek, ha. More like open up a can…

Anyway, on the subject of saturation. I’ve noticed that I become saturated with anyone that hang around long enough, whether I know them well at all or not (for instance, I don’t know the guy that drives me to school well). It never fails. Even people like Eddie and Ayana, and especially people like Micah or Michael, who tend to be a little more… clingy. Yet it’s that clinginess that attracts me to them in many ways. Everyone wants to feel needed, and this is enhanced by the fact that I like to have only one good friend at a time, in a serially monogamous style, as I said before.

Subject change: the Military Ball. I was asked to go by Dulin, who must go, because he’s the Colonel, and thus the CO of the JROTC at Harding. He asked me two Thursdays ago. “Hey, Melissa. Will you go to the military ball with me on the eighth? I’m getting really desperate, and if I don’t find a date, I’ll be assigned to go with Sheniqua or Laqueequee. …. [my frowning, stunned silence] … See the thing is, I went with a whore and then with Shelly, so I was thinking I could go with someone, you know, cooler.” While that isn’t exactly a raving review (“I’m getting desparate”???), I went ahead and said yes. How does my decision fit into my existentialist views? In other words, how is this self-serving? I know, and Dulin knows, that he owes me now. Big. I loathe dressing up; I didn’t go to prom last year and am considering not going this year (a post for another day). I hate dresses, make-up, manicures, all that girly-stuff, and the military ball is a formal occasion, which means a prom dress. So when I found a dress, I gave him my official “yes” status and reminded him yet again of how much he owes me. I don’t when I’ll use my get-out-of-jail-free card, but I have it now.

I think I may be done catharsizing now (that’s not a word, I know). I’m off to read some blogs, and maybe, maybe figure out what this thing is between Micah and this Dustin guy… What ever happened to David, the guy from the New Year’s party?!