I woke up in a sweat with my heart beating out of my chest this morning. My dream, or, more accurately, my nightmare scared me awake. I dreamt I was a contestant on a new season of The Bachelor. We were in the mountains of Malibu, introducing ourselves and laying down the ground work, when all of a sudden I heard what sounded like a dull roar, like hundreds of voices screaming from a distance. So I climbed one of the mountains to the top, and saw an army of what looked like thousands of men all dressed in blue running out of the ocean and killing anything that crossed their paths. I start running for it, and before I know it, I'm running and climbing up mountains, jumping off cliffs to lower surfaces, and all of a sudden it is an army of thousands versus me. I somehow find a mall in the middle of the jagged mountains of Malibu, and once I get inside I realize these men have the place surrounded, and I'm virtually trapped. So basically I'm going to be killed in this mall and all I can think of is "this is what I get for signing up for The Bachelor."
If that isn't a clear indicator for how my love life is going right now, I don't know what is.
Every February is weird. I don't think I'm solitary in thinking that. Everyone's already over their New Year's Resolutions. People have stopped going to the gym. If you're in the restaurant industry, you're completely dead and and making zero money in February. If you don't live in SoCal, then you've gotten over the beauty of winter and you're counting down the days to spring because if you wake up to snowflakes falling outside your window ONE MORE TIME you're going to scream. Oh also, let's throw the most romantic holiday of the year smack dab in the middle of all of this so everyone who already has Seasonal Affective Disorder feels like they're being pointed at and laughed at.
I'm not bitter about Valentine's Day. I think it's beautiful to celebrate loved ones, even though I think it is a bit stupid to dedicate one day to that, since it should be an everyday practice. I'm not just some single girl who hates all happy couples thus hating a holiday celebrating them. It's just that I don't like what it's become. If you are single, you can't leave your house in February without being reminded of the fact. If you're in a relationship, there is all this pressure to do some over the top romantic gesture for your significant other, and where there's pressure, there's no spontaneity and genuineness. (It's a real word I just looked it up.) I've always said, if I was in a relationship, I'd rather a gesture on any other day, that way I know it came from his heart rather than commercials and window displays.
I'm not even sad that I'm single. I'm not! It's been a choice I've made for a long time now. The last relationship I was in was kind of a huge mess, and that ended three years ago. Don't get me wrong, I've been having my fun, which is essential (sorry parents), but there's this brick wall in my head that protects against anything further. I would just rather get the other areas of my life in order before I can give any part of my heart to someone. I mean, I'm currently sleeping in my best friends living room. It would be stupid and irresponsible to get into a relationship with anyone right now, because I would never be able to give them what they need. That's pretty much been my mantra for the last three years. So yeah, it's an absolute choice that I'm single.
But somehow, February has this way of taking everything I know and throwing it all over the place leaving me scrambling trying to make sense of it all. February now has me questioning whether I've actually been choosing to be single or just telling myself that because it's better than facing the fact that no one wants me. February has me comparing myself to every other girl I see, hating what I see in the mirror, binging on junk food, not leaving the house for an entire day, avoiding even the simplest of responsibilities like doing laundry. Like, it's fucking with me big time.
When I post a selfie, it's because I feel like I look REALLY good that day. Say what you want about the selfie, but it's a celebration of confidence and self-love, so I'm all about it, as long as it's not too gratuitous. If you could see all my days in a row on a timeline, and see just how many days I've taken a selfie, it would be an extremely small percentage. Some days I feel really great about the features on my face. There are days when I wake up, see myself in a mirror and am pretty pleased with what's looking back at me. But then there are days when I wake up, go into the bathroom and, in seconds, have a long list of things about my body that make me cringe. I won't lie, February even has me going into that stupid stupid app that NO ONE should use called FaceTune, and making minute little tweaks to my face and body to make it look the way I want it to.
Yesterday, I was feeling awful about myself. Just awful. Sat in a onesie all day, watched over an entire season of The Office, (a show I've already watched in full about 4 times), finished a bottle of wine, and went to bed, not having spoken to a single person all day. I wanted to see what posting a selfie from a day that week when I felt beautiful would do to my confidence, just for a little experiment. I got 100 likes on that photo, and 11 incredibly sweet comments that should have made me feel great about myself. And somehow that made me feel..worse? I felt like a fraud. There was a filter on the photo. I had tweaked the edges of my lips because I realized after I took the photo that my lipstick wasn't applied fully in the lines. I made it look like I had gotten ready for the day and left the apartment and taken that photo, but in reality I was just sitting on my ass drinking wine and eating ice cream asking for attention.
I know my mom is reading this, and getting upset and worried for me, but that's not what I wanted to write this for. I don't want anyone worrying about me or trying to make me feel better, because all that comes from within. I do feel better. Writing makes me feel better. Yoga makes me feel better. Sunshine and playing guitar, and eating good food makes me feel better. Today, I'm going to do all those things, and tonight I will feel better.
I wanted to write this because I know I can't be the only one who feels like February hit them like a downtown A train. I feel like everyone thinks since moving to Los Angeles, my life has been nothing but sunshine and Beverly Hills and celebrity sightings, and following my dreams, and laughter and smiles and blah blah blah. There's been so much more to it, and so much going on inside myself that I can't (or am unwilling to) exactly portray on my social media outlets. This is just my way of saying, you can't move across the country from your internal struggles. They will follow you. You have to learn your struggles as if they are a new friend. You have to learn their triggers, their sensitivities, their strengths, their weaknesses, what calms them, what excites them. I am very familiar with what February does to me. Having written it all down, I feel a lot better, and can go forth into the rest of my weekend with my head held high, while remaining prepared to take another blow.
I just want more people to be aware of what goes on behind Instagrams and tweets and blog posts, and maybe not judge what a person decides to broadcast so harshly. I wanted to share something real, in between the braggy photos of sunsets and love letters to my new home. While that is all real, because I will never not be myself, this is also real. Next time you're on someone's Instagram who you totally envy, think about this and think about what might have been going on behind all the filtered photos, and maybe don't judge yourself so harshly for not living their life, because you never know what struggles they may be dealing with. Also, you're exactly where you need to be. If you weren't where you needed to be, you wouldn't be there. I think we all could use a little bit of a reminder of that. Because now the next time I get all moody because no one wants me, all I have to do is thank goodness that I'm not getting chased by an army of ocean-dwelling savages all because I decided to go on The Bachelor.
February's almost over, chin up Charlie. :)
