People change.

I've (re)learned this lesson recently. And like most life lessons, it wasn't terribly pleasant. Fairly painful, in fact. 

People change. 

And not just change their looks, their habits, their lifestyles...

People change right to their very core. 

Everything (you thought) you knew about someone, every single piece of their being, however intimately and completely, can all change. So drastically, that they become an entirely new person all together. 

And in many cases (such as this), the change is not favorable. It's not progress or evolving. It's not a positive change. For you, or for them. 

They wouldn't recognize it, though, because they've changed. They don't see this odd and unusual person they've become. 

Or maybe they do. 

But because they've changed so drastically, they simply don't care. 

People change. 

And as luck would have it, the people who change are the people you have loved, sometimes for years, your whole life. 

Perhaps the person you held dearest to you, in the highest regard, closest to your soul, they change. 

And all of a sudden, you are left holding a love for someone who doesn't even exist anymore. 

So, what do you do with it?

Let go, move on, all the things people normally do when they lose someone close to them. 

But it's not the same. It's more complicated and difficult than the typical letting go. 

Because you know that person existed once. And human nature curses you with hope (Hope is an evil thing). The hope that that person will suddenly reappear. The hope that the person with whom you shared an indescribable bond, isn't totally lost. 

But they are. You know this to be true. 

They've changed. 

So you tuck away your love, into a tiny corner. You shut it away, in hopes that it will change too one day. 

That it will turn into something less powerful, less consuming. Into something  meaningless. A vague memory that doesn't elicit any feeling at all. 

Slowly, but eventually, you wait for it to change. 

And hope that one day, finally, it doesn't exist, right along with the person you once knew. 

  

I already know I should wait to write until tomorrow morning. I'll have had (hopefully) a decent night sleep, I'll have had some coffee (instead of Angry Orchard), I'll be looking at the lake in the light of day, and things won't seem quite as dreadful as they do tonight. I'll be in a better space, tomorrow.
I should just wait and write. Until tomorrow.
But I need to vent, to "talk", so to speak. And since I seem to be running low in the friend and/or companion department, I'll just sit here and bang on this keyboard until I feel better.
Although, I really should wait till tomorrow to write.
But, I've never been very good at waiting.

Some days (weeks, months, years), I really, really despise the service industry.
Today (this week) has been one of them.
I heard, more than once this week, people (customers), state that being a bartender isn't really "work". Forget that I'm the manager.. no, just bartending isn't actually work.
I heard things like... "You don't really consider this a job, do you?" Or, "This isn't actually work, to you, is it?" And today's fucking cocker (I was very, very busy).. "How's it feel to actually work for a living?"
I wanted to reach out and punch the source, every time something like this escaped their lips. And yet, I bite my tongue. Go about my business. Laugh it off. Smile and serve. All the while cursing them under my breath and hoping they get nailed for OUI on their way home.
I could go on and on and ON, for HOURS, about how much fucking work this job actually is. How physically and mentally draining it can be. How much fucking bullshit comes along with it.  I could go on, and on, and fucking ON. But I don't have the energy; I actually worked for a living today, and I'm too fucking tired to explain it to the morons of the world.
Oh, and let's not forget the customer this week who had several happy hour priced shots for himself and his friends, all ordered by yelling it across the bar from the corner table, (while I was "actually working for a living"), cashed out with a tab of $33.75, and left me a dollar and a fucking quarter, while saying "sorry I can't leave you more"... I felt like throwing it back in his face and screaming- "Keep it! You obviously need it more than I do, you cheap son of a bitch!"
Ah, but No. Laugh it off. Smile and serve.
Fuck you, service industry.

Added to the stress of "work" this week was the move. Yes, it was "just across the street", but it's still moving. And it still fucking sucks. Especially when you're essentially doing it alone.
Minus the help of my "man friend", and two sweet friends from the bar. Without their help, I have no idea how I actually would have done it. No help, no offers, no nothing. Thanks for them, then. Thank gawd for them.
I'm still living out of totes and baskets and boxes. But I can now step outside and the water is at my feet. I look out my windows, and it's all around me. I am lakeside. And it is amazing. It is the only peace I've found, in a long, long time. However fleeting.

Speaking of friends, though... I'm pretty sure I don't actually have any. Ok, maybe I have like, two. Or maybe one? Maybe? Jeezus, I don't even know.
I have lots of people who I'm "friends" with. Probably dozens and dozens and dozens. Over the years, I've made hundreds of these "friends".  You know, the kinds of friends who will hang around with you when you're out in a bar, or say hello when they see you at Walmart, or comment on your facebook posts, or even text you once in a while. They might send flowers if you were hospitalized. They'd attend your funeral service; they'd probably even have some nice things to say about you.
But... I don't really have any close personal relationships that go beyond that. And I'm not quite sure why.
I see other women who go shopping together, do lunch, do dinners, get their nails done. Their children hang out together, or at least know each other. They are close. They're tight. They're sisters.
I had a sister once. I mean, a real one, not a friend...
But I digress..
So anyway, those unfamiliar female ties. Or even male, for that matter. I'd make a damn good wing man. Guys need pedicures, too, right?
Or even something more than a friendship. How novel that would be. A companion. A close personal companionship. A life partner.  I might have had one of those once, too. Maybe twice. Or three times? I have been married three times, right? I lose count...
But, anyway... no close personal relationships. Like I said, I've had them. Once, maybe twice. But people grow apart, geographically, emotionally. Shit happens. Life happens. And then, what are you left with?
A handful, or a hundred, "friends".
So, if a human being has no close personal ties, what does that mean? What does that say? Somehow I think it says more about me than it says about others.
Sigh.

So many things happening in my life, and yet no one to fully take part in any of it. So many things in my mind (constantly, running rampant, uncontrollably), and no one to really share it all with.
Seems like a silly example, but.. I had that psychiatric "work-up" a couple weeks ago, and had no one to talk to about it (other than my therapist).. how it went, what the "result" was, how I felt about it all... Even my "man friend" and I don't talk about things like that. How unusual that is. How odd. That you can be so intimately involved with a person, and yet so emotionally/mentally disconnected. How very odd. But then again, nothing about this current relationship has been anywhere near normal.

Addendum; After tonight, I'm not even sure it qualifies as a relationship at all. 
Again, I digress...
Anyway..
I can't honestly say I have a close personal relationship, at all, with anyone.
With the exception of perhaps my therapist, my children, and my mother (occasionally).
And this keyboard.
But even those relationships have their limitations.
Essentially, I am alone. Perhaps.. I am responsible for that.
Seriously, who sits home on a Saturday night and gets drunk by themselves and talks to their beta fish?
Jeezus.

(My calluses aren't tough enough. I keep forgetting Angry Orchards aren't twist offs.)

Backing up a bit... as far as that psychiatric thing.. I have decided to try his/their recommendation of the Abilify. As my therapist said- "It may not help, but what can it hurt to try?"
And so, off I went to the local pharmacy to fill my new prescription. My anti-psychotic. Diagnoses and script in hand, ponytail, hat, sunglasses. Incognito; no one can attach the stigma to me if I'm not recognizable.
It sits on my counter still, in it's unopened bag. And this week alone I've had such ups.. And such downs (as is blatantly obvious by tonight's blog), and on the edge of an anger that's only barely contained by a thin veil of wavering self control.
And still I tell myself I don't really need it.
And it sits on my counter.
Maybe I'll start it tomorrow.

Tomorrow.. The boy comes home from his Dad's tomorrow. I always feel better when he is home. I probably smother him too much, rely on him too much to fulfill my own emotional needs.
Norman Bates's friggin mother.

Tomorrow.
I'll see my boy tomorrow. I'll start my prescription tomorrow. I'll finish unpacking tomorrow. I'll talk to someone other than this keyboard or my beta fish, tomorrow.
I'll feel better, tomorrow.

I'll rise up, I'll rise like the day
I'll rise up, I'll rise unafraid
I'll rise up, and I'll do it a thousand times again
And I'll rise up, high like the waves
I'll rise up, in spite of the ache
I'll rise up, and I'll do it a thousand times again

Tomorrow.