a very unnecessary update

!! okayyyyyy !! 

here am i. here i am. i am here. am i here ?

i have been long gone and likely, unmissed ~she said regretfully~.

uh, basically, this year has been...odd (probably one of my most used words and a close cousin of the perennially convenient "interesting").

i've learned a lot about myself this year - what i want, what i just DON'T want, what other people want, and how that intersects (or very commonly doesn't intersect) with what i want.

and i haven't liked what i've learned. some things, i suppose, i already knew but it got really REAL this year and i've been grappling so much with this idea that people can be really horrid to me, yet i still crave human connection. 

there were times when i felt okay with not being around people after feeling burned but...that's not my natural state - i still ~want~ to be friends with people. there's a lot more i could say on that score, but maybe another day when i feel more open.

sometimes the only solution to the friends issue seems to be putting up with certain bad behaviors in others and just resigning myself to playing it close to the vest so i stay safe enough and still get to talk to people.

another issue, is having nothing in common with very nice people. i seem to run into the problem a lot. some people are kind/affable/just the sort of person i would trust and we can still have absolutely nothing to talk about and nothing to do. you wouldn't simply marry someone because they were nice...and i have my doubts about building deep friendships on nothing but niceness.

as regards interests - i'm not unique in my interests however i don't run into people who would get me. i know they're out there. i've told myself that my whole life. it does feel bleak when year after year passes by and nothing changes.

so this year has been sad, enlightening, sometimes even hopeful, especially after some really miserable times. the worst moment so far was this month (October) when a few things all happened at the same time and i realized that it was absolutely essential to change how i think about everything that has occurred.

one thing that occurred to me either yesterday or today was that i might be a lot happier, if i didn't think so much about the past or the future. the past is done and the future is unknown, uncertain. but now...perhaps my responsibilities are not so heavy when viewed through the lens of "now". 

i get stuck in this idea of making the past mean something in the present, though. it's true that things have happened that i wish i could change and sometimes, it feels as though i could make the meaning of the past change for the better if i could just get things right now. maybe that makes things too complicated in the now, too heavy.

anyhow, the theme of this moment is that i miss connecting with people over things i love. it's been so long.