America's Death Culture

I've noticed this trend emerging in multiple spheres of existence.  Different types of people are seeking to normalize, glamorize, or demonize death.  These iterations have various repercussions, and it's interesting to see how they all play together.

The universal division I've seen is between celebration and acceptance vs lingering and extended mourning.

Skulls reminiscent of día de los muertes have become pop culture icons, showing up on all sorts of items ranging from booty shorts to stationary to corporate logos.  This normalization of human fatality is a kind of acceptance--everybody dies and it's not horrible or mysterious.

This acceptance of this has shown to be empowering to people.  Accepting the inevitable and having realistic expectations has allowed people to embrace life more--their own and their descendents.  In a growing trend of "death dinners," families are coming together and discussing death seriously.  Many have found the experience relieving--looming and ethereal mortality has been made real and becomes a dealt with instead of vaguely though about.

On the other hand, I was struck at the morbidity of many of our national holidays.  News reports on September 11th are excessively haunting.  There seems to be a fear of moving on.  Instead of focusing on how we've grown as a nation and on the good that has come from this terrible event, we replay in all the vivid glory the traumatic crashes.  It is important to remember the tragedy, but it shouldn't be paraded so grotesquely.  We're torturing ourselves and promoting fear.

This fear of death yet acceptance of it creates recklessness; it births the idea of protecting life at the cost of life. I'm scared about the state of the world right now.  War with Syria is a threat, and many Americans are feeling defensive, which translates into offensive bombing and invasive military action.

As the death culture grows, it's being torn in multiple directions.  Every aspect has an influence on the way we interact with the world.  It will be interesting to see how it develops us as individuals and as a nation.

On Trust and Good Conversation

I don't trust people.  I don't let them in because I feel it wouldn't work.  I deeply fear being misunderstood yet it's what happens regardless.  The rest is understandings of only a part of me.

Part of it is that I don't think many are primed to listen.  It takes a while to chip away at someone so that I can learn how to speak to them and be able to guess what they understand.  Despite speaking relatively anonymously on blogs, what I really want is someone receptive.

Last night someone tried to convince me that no one like that exists and that if I don't change my hopes, I will just be miserable all my life. 

I feel the need to treat everyone differently, based on what I see of their personality.  Some of me comes through, but it's through a personalized filter so everyone knows a different me.  Maybe that's why a lot of people think I'm cool--I pick up on bits of them that many overlook.  But what that does is make me feel fragmented and alone.

Sometimes when I do try to fill in the cracks, I end up doing it with someone unwilling to listen or who just doesn't care about all those extra parts.  People can be very picky especially in the world of customizable experiences we have.  So should I say "fuck them" or continue with what I can get?

***

The top part is from a couple of months ago, back in CA.  I'm having some similar feelings now.   Right now I've got a big, swelling wish.  I want to use the word urge, but it doesn't quite fit here.  I really want someone I can dump on.  I want to have a giant Conversation (not one-sided blog post) where I can get some feedback on what's going on in my head and life and maybe even some insight.  But I locked people out for a long time, so there's a lot of context that people don't know about.  It's hard to analyze the data I'm giving people since they don't have the foundation built since I've been so fucking quiet and misleading for so long.

I can't rely on S and for most of the friends I'm close with, I'm the ear and that's hard to change once people get used to it.  I have some newer relationships growing, but I don't want to be super intense and wigged out right from the get-go.  I want someone who will listen to me start to rant, help me when I stumble, not wig out if I cry, and maybe give me a hug.

But...

But.

Moving on...?

"Confusion and Frustration" would also be a good title for this article.

So S and I have broken up.  But we're still staying at his parents' house and we've found that being around each other all the time, sharing a bed, etc is a little too much for us to handle.  So we called a sort of truce. 

We're still allowing ourselves to give into some of the relationship urges that haven't been able to dissipate.  We still talk (sort of--we never did much anyway) and make out etc. 

Ever since we called this truce, we've both been pretty happy.  A lot of tension disappeared and we've both just been really enjoying each others' company.  But today I've noticed a problem--the weird not-honeymoon is over.

We've fallen into snapping at each other and having dumb communication breakdowns.  I don't want to care and I want to let things go, but again, things are tough while we're still so crammed together.  It's hard to avoid crossing into the conversational territory of relationships--it's no longer mine to deal with so I should let it go, but I'm still annoyed by the same things and I'm still dealing with them all the time.

I think we did our best when I was content with not talking to him at all.  With not relying on him for things.  With not hoping he would grow out of his 16 year old self.  I need to stop caring.  I need to enforce distance.

If specifics are needed, here's something that happened today:  after noticing that he coated the bathroom mirror with soap, I asked him why.  Faced with my questioning, he grew defensive and eventually called me dumb.  It's a little thing, but I'm sensitive about it, so that didn't go over well.  He left the room right after he said that and we did a pretty good job of avoiding each other for the better part of the day.  Every once in a while we'd try to be around each other, but something would set it off again.

When we went out so I could go to the bank/so he could have a smoke, I told him that the way he handed me my keys made it hard for me to grab them.  Again, a little thing, but apparently something he's sensitive about.  Instead of doing nearly anything else, he got defensive about how he handed me my keys.  The way he put it is that he was just trying to explain his action--his thought process behind why he did it the way he did.  But that's pointless, because no matter what he thought about it, it still made the keys hard to grab. 

I questioned him more (since for whatever reason I was unable to let go of it) and he would tell me no real reason why he felt the need to explain himself.   The way I see it, he felt hurt that I said he handed me my keys wrong, and wanted to seem a little more in the right.  That's called being defensive.  It's something he does all the time and it blinds him.

And bam!--a reason we shouldn't be together.   He's consistently defensive when I mention things like that, no matter how little, because he's incredibly sensitive to "being wrong."  Either I have to deal with him shoving his head up his ass all the time through either some sort of weird complaisance ("ok honey, you're right") or I have to not care.  And if I don't care, then I shouldn't be in a relationship with him.

I guess the conclusion should be that I have decided to move on and I need to act like it.  The situation and my own decisions have been making this difficult and I'm getting sucked back into some of the bad parts of being in a relationship.  But as long as I keep my wits about me and keep it in my pants better, I should be able to change the situation.  Yes, it can be tough, but there are ways around it.  I need to learn to stop wanting things from him, because he is not the person to give them.  I also need to remind myself that it is no longer my obligation to keep an eye on him.  When he annoys me or could be doing something better, it is not up to me to do something about him, it's up to me to remove myself from the situation.  I am not tied down any more, and I need to act like it.

An End

S and I broke up a few days ago.  We've been rocky since just before we left for Costa Rica and I think this has been building up since then--we were only incapable of doing anything about it because we were too reliant on each other.

In Costa Rica, we tried to make a life.  The goal was to get established and actually live there.  I should have recognized sooner how much this was S's goal more than mine.  After the rich mental stimulation of Berlin, I couldn't handle the palace-purgatory of physicality that is Costa Rica.  California had it's good, but we had trouble getting our footing.  Every endeavor was an uphill battle and it's very hard feeling good about life while living with a loud pessimist.

We left California on August 31st and were in Louisiana until a couple of days ago--Sunday.  Sunday night we arrived, and Monday, S broke up with me.  I know it's real this time because he's the one who did it; he sees my point of view.

At the moment, we're staying at S's parents, trying to figure out our own next steps--looking for jobs and places to live.  We don't know how much we should rely on old plans.  Though we're being civil, I think we need space.  Both of us keep wanting to be affectionate or angry as the moments dictate, but it's not for us to do that to/with each other any more.

Figuring out what to say has been an interesting challenge.  And how to say, too.  If things don't go well, that puts me on rocky footing w/r/t where I'll sleep at night, and if things go well, it hurts because I just want to touch him.

I've never had a breakup that wasn't explosive, so I don't know what to expect.  I'm sad, scared, and happy, all coming in waves.  I hope things work out for both of us.