We Now Present Al, Being Sad

I wasn't going to do a blog post this week.  For one thing, I've been working on a series of posts directed at the, shall we say, "newly hirsute."  It's requiring some looking back at my old posts, reorganizing tags, and flipping through my own medical files as some of the tests I've done have gotten hazy as time goes by.  It's taken a lot more time than I thought.

For another, I've just been feeling kind of down lately, with no energy or focus.  It's one of those "blue" patches everyone gets for a couple of days or a week or so but that eventually fades on its own.  I get annoyed, though, when this happens to me, because though I know it is perfectly normal, I hate to witness myself wallowing in self pity.  It makes me mad at myself!

There are several reasons I've been feeling sorry for myself.  Yes, hirsutism is one.  Or rather, at the moment, I'm going through another rough skin patch--chin's all angry and wants a holiday from shaving, and is expressing its displeasure by developing scales of dry skin that feel as prickly as stubble. And there's this enormous zit that started as an ingrown beard hair and now refuses to heal because I shave over it accidentally every morning and open it right up again.  Always nice.

I'm also having some issues at work.  Nothing really bad, but some personality clashes with some coworkers and situational nonsense which I would never deign to react to on the outside are, on the inside, getting me frustrated enough to cry. 

And I'm lonely.  Not for a man; what I really miss is having a friend.  Being a reserved person, I don't connect easily with people, so I've only ever had a few close friends.  These have eventually drifted away, or had to move away--and I don't wish to blame anyone for that, life happens, and that's why I've found myself blogging about it on a forum I use to talk about body hair instead if a place where they might read it and feel bad.  And I'm not looking for reassurance, I'm just expressing myself, because I kind of have nowhere else "safe" to do it where it won't make someone I know incorrectly feel responsible.   

Not long ago, with spring on the air and events ramping up throughout my city, I realized I no longer had anyone to share the things I really enjoyed.  Blowing money in used book stores, tea houses, artisan soap shops, bakeries, or mocking artwork in galleries, smelling old things in museums, getting lost and wandering helplessly for ages... all these things I now must do alone.  There's nothing wrong with that, and I do like being alone.  But some things are just more fun with someone else.  Someone you trust, and who appreciates the same things you do.  I have no one like that in my life anymore, and no one I would feel comfortable bringing into that circle.

There's a particular festival coming up that I look forward to every year.  I was counting down to it for months before it hit me that I have no one to go with.  I've inquired of a few people, who have quite honestly expressed their disinterest, and I respect that.  I feel intimidated going alone, terrified of the commute to get there, and just plain sad that I'll have no one at my side to turn to so I can express my excitement over something I see--or at my back to protect me from the awkward and unwelcome advances of some of the very strange people who will be there.

But I was driving home from work today in the fog and the drizzle (perhaps also a reason for these blues) and remembered all the things I have accomplished my own.  I mean, come on woman, you went on a bloody business trip to another country by yourself!  And I was driving to and from work by myself, a job I got completely under my own power by my own merit, something I never imagined myself doing a year ago.  I am not only capable, I am pretty darn strong inside.  And I deserve to surround myself in the things I love, even if no one is there to love them with me.  Lack of self confidence prevents me from doing so much, and it really needs to stop!

I told myself I am going to go to that festival tomorrow, and then to a pub to meet some acquaintances I haven't seen in a long time.  I've spent the evening practicing a new hair style to overcompensate for my self consciousness with my face right now.  I intend to go out, do my thing, and look smashing while I do it.

(Why do I feel like hyperventilating right now?)