Dips

I'm having a slight emotional dip. I'm not sure why. This is 10,000 times better than it used to be. It used to be that the norm would be a dip, and the unusual would be a feeling of well-being. Those were in the dark days of things long since past. Now, I operate, especially lately, on a plane several stories above the emotional wasteland that I used to exist upon. It's nice and warm and fuzzy up here, but sometimes there are the dips.

I'm not sure what precipitated this one. It's not even a full dip, but I find myself hanging on with my fingernails, scared that I might slide down all the way. I don't like the emotional wasteland. It involves feeling of isolation, being overwhelmed and anxiety. It feels a little like things are flying apart, like there's no sense of purpose, nothing concrete to hold on to. It evokes the desire to binge. It evokes a feeling of need. Need. Need for what?

Not cool, creamy, chocolaty goodness. Despite what I feel.

But, as I was saying, we're not in a full-blown dip. I think it started from a series of seemingly small, inconsequential things. I had to deal with the psycho-actress that I rent from about bills. Every time that happens it's a source of stress and I think why am I still living here? The apartment suddenly looks dingy again, I hate the lack of bath tub, my room looks like a chaotic mess. I think, I'm not together. I don't have the apartment of a woman who is together, sophisticated. My mom's coming in to town and I'm excited to see her, but it's also stressful. I have to think of what to do, where to go, will she be happy, will she be warm. I need to work because of something that came up last minute on Friday. I feel guilty. I also feel stressed about work.

And then, last night, I met the boyfriend of one of my new friends. She's white, he's Indian. Sound familiar? Well, it turns out that Indian boy, after dating this White girl for 4 years, finally told his parents that he was dating a white girl. Ooooooh. Yes, I intended that mocking tone - not to him, not to my friend, but to the past - my own past. It was a big deal for Indian boy to finally tell his parents, and of course he didn't tell the whole truth. He told them he had been dating her for 1 year (not 4). The mother cried, the father wrote an email asking him why he made his mother cry. They both asked him why he couldn't just date an Indian girl.

God, it's all so stupid.

Exbf's parents didn't want me to be with him at first either for everything that I was not. I wasn't Indian, I wasn't Hindu, I hadn't grown up in the Indian culture. Never mind that I'm respectful, culturally aware, and that I was genuinely interested in embracing their background and culture. My dad's an immigrant. I get it.

The funny thing was that eventually his parents did accept me. It actually got to the point that his father gave him his blessing to marry me. The funny thing is that it happened a few weeks before we finally broke up. That's hysterical. His parents came to accept me, actually embraced - to the extent that they could - the idea of us marrying, just before we broke up.

I have to admit that hearing my friend's story last night, I felt a tiny flicker of hollowness laced with a tinge of bitterness inside of me. An edge of harshness. I guess it's anger, maybe hurt. Still. I don't want to be with him. I haven't wanted to be with him or talk to him since the day, almost a year ago, that we broke up. But, things that I experienced with him still affect me now and then. Remembering still evokes some negative emotions.

I guess maybe this emotion is something like: You never saw how wonderful and special I was. And, that makes me mad. It makes me want to throw a plate at him. I tried really hard. His parents - people totally dead set against me from the beginning b/c of things completely out of my control - came to appreciate and accept me. But, not him. He was too selfish, too small, too weak, too insensitive, too self-involved, too cowardly, too insecure, too pathetic, and he had way too little to give.

Every time I remember these things it take me back to this: The re-realization and re-confirmation that he was not good for me and not good enough for me. He sucked.

So, why the lingering emotions that pick at the edges of the almost-healed scabs on my heart? I should be joyous, filled with elation that I'm not with him, that I didn't end up with him, that I was spared from spending one more year with him and his bullshit. And, I am. Truly. A day ago, two days ago, I was filled with joy. The world was warm and fuzzy, and I was so incredibly happy to be me, on my own, safe from that kind of negativity. But, as I'm learning, things are not black and white. I can be joyous about not being with him at the same time that I still feel, on occasion, sad about how he acted and what I experienced while I was with him.

(I was just thinking, as I was writing, you should not be feeling this; it is over a year ago! But then I thought, Fuck it, I'm purging. This is how I feel. This is what I will write. So there.)