7/14/10

Gimme the Gatorade!

Gosh guys it feels like I've just run a marathon. And by 'marathon' I mean the last year. Maybe people who know me in real life haven't noticed it, I've actually tried to be pretty discreet about it, but for the last year I haven't really let people see me smile. Like, if I do grin it's been with my mouth closed. When I laugh or smile I've been covering my mouth. So anyways, I got my new tooth put in today, here you go:



Guess which one is fake? Honestly, you can't tell. I couldn't tell. If I didn't know, I wouldn't be able to tell. SO from here on out I just have a couple more check-up appointments for the implant, and tomorrow morning I get back to my regularly scheduled dental appointments at a NEW dentist, to get some fillings which I earned by chewing on the opposite side of my mouth for the last year. It's been such a trip. I can't even get over it at all.



And immediately after leaving the dental office this morning, feeling dazed and reeling, I called my mom and we talked about how the last year has been so weird. We got into a fight! I was telling her about how now, all of a sudden, it seemed like on one hand this huge weight had been lifted from me. But on the other hand, now that I didn't have this impending dental thing hanging over my head, the rest of my life needs tending to. I want to change my job maybe, I want to move out of the country, I want to be a more honest and happy person. I want to be able to feel like I'm actually alive, living my life, rather than bouncing from one catastrophe to one windfall and jumping between deadlines. I don't know. I feel like I'm always reacting, instead of responding.

So anyways the fight with my mom (you guys still with me?) went like this:
Billy: I just feel so... weird, now. Like now the last year of feeling shitty every single day is just now occurring to me. I guess it's always been occurring to me, the whole time.
Mom: I know what you mean. Sometimes, it's only after a really traumatic thing that I can cry about it. Like only once it's over can I let down my armor and really experience it.

And I totally lost it! I thought what my sainted mom was saying was "Well, here is how I experience it here is MY VERSION..." And I wanted to say MY OWN VERSION. I argued with her, like, "no it's not like that for me at all, I am experiencing this so differently you cannot even imagine how deep and private my pain about this whole thing is".

And I caught myself. This is exactly what I was talking about in my previous post, about how sometimes we think no one can understand our private pain or isolation or worry or something. And we think the problem is that no one can understand it. The distance we're indicating is, we think, the source of anguish. But that's wrong! Everybody's got problems! And when you have something which is causing you anguish it's actually a really fucking amazing opportunity to connect with other human beings! SO I realized this. Mom was totally right, again. Only now, after everything is more or less fixed, do I really feel bummed about it. It was the same way after I got really sick, in college. I remember after I recovered, like months after, being at some party where straight guys where being all menacing insulting to me and I just totally flipped out and broke down and Bobo had to take me to her room and I was sobbing hysterically and she said "but they were just joking!" about the guys teasing me but I was crying because I was, as I said, "Just. trying. not. to. die." It takes a while for the dust to settle and to see what's still there.



I think I need to drastically change my life in some fundamental way(s). Like maybe move to Europe. I am tempted to go to graduate school, but really only so that I can fix my student loans from private to federal. And so that I'd have time to work on writing about my feelings. These seem like bad reasons to go to graduate school. Right? Also I can't afford it, at all. And also I want to live somewhere where I can go to school and have a life.

So what now? It feels like I'm just now grieving for poor tooth number four. It just occurs to me that I've kind of put my life on hold for it. In the last year there were some awesome things that happened to me, but there was also a lot of deferral. And now I can move forward, I guess. And I'm really sad and I'm really scared. Stay tuned. Captain.

IN OTHER MORE EXCITING NEWS:

I started a band called B0DY H1GH a few months ago with my friend Perfect Little Daniel. Here is a photo of us we took with Jenna from the Gentle Laxatives. (You all know I have a Tumblr, too, where I post pictures of girls I think are rad, right?)



We're playing our first ever show, a short three-song set, TOMORROW NIGHT at Dixon Place! My rad room mate Ptrck has made a video we're gonna show while we groove. Info below!



Okay. Going BACK TO THE DENTIST tomorrow morning can't really wrap my head around that. Feel really freaked out so please be nice to me.

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