001.

Sometime last week my phone was vibrating next to me and when I looked to see who the phone call was from, it said Eva. It was thoroughly unexpected, but I excitedly answered anyways to a call from a friend far away. She then told me she missed me and said she was sitting at her house with Sascha, Marissa, Heather, September, and Nick. She passed the phone around and everyone told me they loved and missed me.

Tonight Amanda told me that while at a pot luck at Houston St house, she heard almost everyone there mention me at some point, asking someone else if they've heard from me at all, etc. Simultaneous to this conversation, Marissa texted me to ask when I'm coming home. A few minutes later Sascha called me to talk before he went to bed like most nights.

I really only have vague ideas of what my plans are; Where I really want to be, what I want to do "long term". I have so many people I love in so many different places; But not as many in one place as I do in Asheville. Things were never perfect this past year I lived there, but if those people, those phone calls, those words, don't sound like the closest thing I have to "home" right now, I don't know what possibly could.

twee

Sometime last week I realized for the first time that my waiting it out method isn't working this time around. In the past two years I've had some of the most amazing experiences of my life, I've become a person who I think cares about things worth caring about, a person who I'm going to be for a long time, and feel like I know where my place in the world is (to an extent). But I've progressively felt worse and worse through it all. The things that used to make me happy, well they still do, but the feelings pale in comparison. I don't smile, I don't laugh. When I do laugh, it takes me aback; I'm aware of it because it's something that's become unfamiliar. I feel terrible all of the time, to the point where feeling physically sick has become my permanent state the past year and a half.

Every other time in my life, the process has always been to push through it. Sure, complain a little and feel hopeless during, but I always had the thought in the back of my mind that knew one morning I was going to wake up and it wouldn't matter so much anymore. Since August 2010, I've been waiting to feel better. And sometimes I do, sometimes I have really great nights, sometimes I feel content for a few days, sometimes I take trips and feel home and have really amazing experiences that remind me of what I love and remember the feeling of awe that used to be my entire life. But most of the time I'm over come with a sick feeing, I'm just never happy.

And it keeps progressing in that direction. I've progressively gotten worse and worse and I have no idea where to start to help myself. It's getting to the point where I'm unaware of my actions. Today I was sitting at the dinner table at my mom's house alone, playing solitaire, and next thing I know my head is in my hands and arms and I'm crying and I don't remember getting from a to b. I had no motivation to keep holding my head up, I'm losing the ability to push through and go through the motions anyways, to fake it, to prevent submitting to it. I feel like I lose more and more control every day.

All I want is to be happy, and in a place surrounded by people and things that leave me smiling and laughing on a regular basis. Laughing shouldn't be a special occasion. All I want is to be happy and I no longer hold the capacity to count how many times I've said that.