You say he's just a friend...

Is it possible to be “just friends” with someone you are “in love” with?  That is today’s Question of the Day on FB, and interestingly is not getting a ton of responses.

I can confidently tell you that there are very few feelings that are quite as brutal as unrequited love.  Here let wiki define it for you:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unrequited_love

Urban Dictionary has a much better definition of it though and it is probably closer to the truth.  “Only the most painful thing a young adult can go through up to and including shitting out a lego.”  My argument to that statement would be it doesn't matter what age a person is, you can experience this gut wrenching phenomenon at any age.  Most of my friends are married with children, and have been for the duration of our friendship, so they have no clue what I am speaking of and kudos to them.  But it is slightly akin to a root canal without the numbing shot.  You feel like someone punched you in the gut.  You feel like you can’t breathe.  You are confident that your heart is cracking and you actually experience physical pain in your chest.  Tears form from some cavernous place you didn't know you even possessed.  You get the idea.

Here is my answer to that question…

Yes it is possible to be just friends with someone you are in love with.  If you don’t mind beating the shit out of yourself.  Is it healthy?  No…because you cannot make someone be in love with you, you just can’t.  I have been on both ends of this and I will say it’s a lot worse to be the one “in love” than the one who cannot love that way back…regardless it stinks.  It hurts.  I don’t care who you are or what you say.  It hurts.  If you can accomplish this and you don’t mind hurting, then good for you, but it still hurts. 

I honestly think it depends on the persons involved.  Some people would rather have something over nothing.  Kind of like that stupid phrase “tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”  Bullshit.  Not always it isn't.  Time eventually heals that, but I promise no person ever in history who just lost someone says, oh well, at least I had them for awhile.  Later they may say that, but not immediately. 

Anyway, this was my personal opinion.  Yes it is.  It happens every single day.  And it’s a very unhealthy thing for the person who is in love but I think it’s something they have to decide if they can handle or not.  If you are in love with someone and they are not with you or do not want that back, why would you want to continue feeling this way about someone who doesn't and never will?  It’s simple.  Torture.  We love to torture ourselves.  We love pain.  We love fighting through shit.  Human emotions being one of the top things we love to battle.  Some of us enjoy it more than others.  This is all assuming that the person you are in love with KNOWS how you feel.  You have to be on a level playing field.  If you express your feelings and they say, ok, I am flattered but I don’t feel that way back, then you know where you stand and you can decide if you want to remain friends or if space is better for you.  How can you possibly make a decision if only one of you knows what the other one feels?  If you can’t tell them because you think it will ruin “the friendship” you have then are you really that good of friends to begin with?

I want to marry, fall in love, be with, and grow old with, my best friend.  That means at some point we both said and agreed that we were in love with one another.  Now, this bit me in the ass once, because it was said and I meant it but she didn't and then what do you do?  Well you die a little inside and you feel like you are breathing under water and then before you know it, one day, you just won’t think about it anymore. 

I guess the bottom line is if you are not honest with your feelings towards someone how can you know?  I personally would rather a person know and be honest with me about NOT wanting that back, then never knowing?

Clean Slate...

I've always loved this day. Always. It feels like one of those dry erase boards and you get to just wipe all of the past year off. If I were to show you a picture of last years board, it would like like a giant black smudge I imagine. A lot happened. As my friend Nicki said, "it was not the best year, it was not the worst year." I'm definitely ready for a NEW year though.

The usual things need to take place. Lose weight, get more sleep, eat better, etc. but I think the biggest thing that needs to happen is that I stop allowing myself to be treated like a doormat.

Because of my past I don't trust easily. In fact it's extremely rare to believe anything that comes out of someone's mouth. I typically don't believe a person until they can follow through their words with actions. Very few have. So I guess it should make it easier right? To just assume people don't mean what they say? Because I'm planning on them failing with the follow through? The truth is its getting better. Once in awhile though I put myself out there and allow myself to be vulnerable. And not once has it worked. So 2013 is going to bring some changes. It will be harder for me to do this than lose weight.

Starting today I'm not going to be the one who does all the work. This goes for my whole life. There are people who count on me "showing up" but who can't do the same. Well good for them, but I'm not carrying the load anymore. The foundation of all relationships is trust. Respect. One person alone cannot build it. Not if it's supposed to hold more than themselves.

If you want to be a part of my life it's very simple. Show me. If you want my help with something help me back. If you need a friend be one back when I need one. I honestly do not care if you don't like me. It took me twenty odd years to like myself I don't have that kind of time to worry about others.

I guess in summary. Starting today I'm going to treat some of you EXACTLY the way you treat me. And sadly you aren't going to like it. It won't be easy for me because when I make a promise or a statement I follow through. It's going to be hard for me to not do that. To get someone's hopes up and let them down. It's not who I am. But I think it's what I have to do to stop allowing myself to get hurt.

In the meantime you can find me over here polishing my slate. Blank clear canvas. Untouched. No marks. No scribbles. Just a whole new page to a whole new chapter. Waiting to see who wants to be in this years book. And who's capable of showing they mean it.

My reason to be brave...

Why is it that when some people pass, even if we do not know these people personally, the grief is overwhelming?  Or that it hurts your heart?  Like truly, your heart hurts.

I was sad when my Grandpa passed.  But it was, as we say in our oh so articulate world we live in (sarcasm) "a blessing." A blessing?  We say a blessing before we eat.  We receive the blessing (if you are Catholic) at Mass.  The very word blessing means the following:

the act or words of a person who blesses
a special favor, mercy or benefit
a favor or gift bestowed by God
the invoking of God's favor upon a person
praise, devotion or worship, especially grace, said before a meal

Ok...so who receives the favor or gift from God?  The person who passes?  Or those who are left to grieve?  I honestly have no idea, but we sure do say it a lot.  And yes, I suppose when a person is suffering and that suffering ends, that is a gift, for everyone involved.  Personally I want to know why there has to be suffering in the first place, because it seems to me that incredibly wonderful people suffer the most.  Is it a blessing when someone passes quickly and unexpectedly?  What do we call that?  When we have no warning?

I suppose you could call cancer one of the biggest warnings of all.  Although, it is generally complications of the disease that eventually take a persons life.  I don't really care what happens in the process of cancer, I just know that I hate its life and the cells it rides in on.  And yes, I said hate.  Because I do hate it.  I have lost my fair share of friends and family to the son of a bitch.  Some went peacefully, others did not.  Some had it entirely too young, some older.  It is the only thing that exists in this world that is not prejudice.  Interesting no?  Cancer doesn't give a fat rats ass who it hurts.  Or the people it leaves behind to pick up the pieces.  I have friends and family dealing with cancer right now.  Is it a "blessing" that they "know" what may or may not take their existence from this earth?  I guess I would have to ask them that.  I can't imagine having that information being a blessing, but that kind of thing is different for everyone.

I did not host a benefit for my cousin Jetty because he is my cousin.  Or because his mother and I were close when we were younger.  Or because we spent our summers together growing up.  Or because our grandfathers were brothers.  I did it because I could.  It was that simple.  But I promise you this, the minute he showed up in the yard that day, my life was forever changed.  Cancer had a face.  Cancer was 5.  Cancer wanted to play ball and run and scream and giggle and paint his face. And in that minute, you don't hate cancer...because you cannot imagine that anything so horrible could ever take any of that innocence from that child.  But cancer is tricky.  Cancer is devious.  Cancer is a conniving asshole.  (By the way Jetty is doing good...I just like to express my hatred of cancer as brutally honest as possible.)

Cancer took someone else I knew, recently.  I didn't know her well, but her mother was my favorite teacher, ever.  And I have had a lot of teachers.  I got to meet Alissa once, at Target actually, I think they may have been getting stuff to go on their trip to Florida.  I remember thinking in that moment, first, I hate you cancer, second, Alissa looks so tired, but happy to be going on a trip and third, that Nancy looked as I always remembered her, ready to take on whatever came her way.  She was probably one of the most empathetic people I had ever met and let me tell you in 5th grade you don't even know what that means, but you will later.  And it will mean everything to you.

To be honest, I thought Alissa was doing well.  I hadn't heard any good or bad.  Then out of nowhere the news came flooding in.  Why? How? What? Where?  All the usual suspects showed up...mostly though, dear God...at Christmas?  Nancy, I am so sorry...even at 21 years old she is still your baby...how do you tell someone you are sorry that they have to say goodbye to their baby?  AT CHRISTMAS?  And why in the hell is this hitting me so hard in the solar plexus?  Maybe because at 21 I never gave one thought to never seeing 22.  Did she wonder when?  Did she wake up everyday and think, this could be the last day?  I will never know and frankly it's none of my business...but it is stuff that goes through your head...

I will attend another visitation tonight.  And I will tell a family I am sorry.  Sorry that this and every single Christmas after this will never be the same.  And I will go, not only to show my love and support, but to comfort myself.  And I really don't understand how comforting oneself can happen by watching others hurting, but that is just how it works...

Her mom posted on FB this morning, how grateful she was for her family and friends and the prayers...and how Alissa would have wanted her life celebrated and I think to myself, here she is comforting others, when it should be the other way around, but perhaps that is what is comforting to her.

I don't believe I have what it takes to be a nurse that helps children, hell, anyone with cancer.  I just don't.  I don't know how I could not take that stuff home with me.  So, I will do the only other thing I know how.  I will volunteer.  And I will build houses, or I will help at the hospital, or I will deliver toys, or I will host more benefits, but I will not walk away from this.  I can't.  I have been in contact with St. Jude and I can promise you that when I get my assignments, everyone I know will know about them.  Because every single person I know has been affected by cancer, either personally, or through someone they know.  I don't want to know how many different types of cancer there is, because it is unfathomable to me...too damn many...but everywhere you turn, there it is.  So cancer?  Since I have no other way to kill your ass, I will just get in your face.  You can take lives.  Day in and day out, you can take them.  But you cannot take a persons spirit.  Nothing can. And if something does?  Well then I hate that too.  So...this begins my crusade against cancer.  The most prejudice biggest ass bully I know.  And I have never liked a bully.

Nancy, you and yours are in my thoughts today and tomorrow.  Actually, you haven't left them since I heard the news...but I want to thank you.  Thank you for making us all feel better about what you have to endure the next two days because frankly I cannot imagine it.

Last Saturday I believe I said to my mother, that I think I know why God didn't give me any children.  You don't stop being a parent.  Ever.  So they are adults at 18?  So what.  You still ache and break and bend for your child...and I personally don't know that I could survive losing a child.  I really don't.  He did give me the ability to fight for children though.  And so I will...

Bring it on cancer...bring. it. on.

When you stand up and hold out your hand...

in the face of what I don't understand...

My reason to be brave.