shitisendskye

[shitisendskye]

My email account, nearly 18 years old, is almost out of storage. In odd moments I find the time to scroll through folders, delete subscriptions and ads. How many times I appeared in such-and-such linkedin search. Invitations from google+, ello, taco shops and pinterest boards, going back in time.

The last time I did this must've been in 2021 because that's where the ads and expired coupon codes abruptly stop and I'm pedaling in midair, Wile E Coyote style, over a digital cliff and land in a pile of wordpress notifications from 2014. It's B's old blog. Poetry and diary. From her year in Minnesota when the Mississippi beckoned and she hid razors in her mattress and her arms. Reading through the archive, I have to keep reminding myself she made it. I saw her last fall. She has a loving partner, a community, a fulfilling job. But god we got so close to losing her. I had my own trauma, my own shit I was working through, but fuck! The guilt's more scabbed than scarred. I legitimized the predator, left footsteps leading right into the trap. Would I have lost S if I turned away? Maybe. Maybe even probably. But I might have saved B and Z, kept them safe, kept them away, stood firm in disbelief rather than bowing to the promise of adventure.

I don't know where Z is now or how they're doing, what name they use or where they ended up. S looks happy, thriving, at least publicly. B too. We all survived. It's been over a decade. We're solidly adults now, all of us, and stable, having dug our roots into the lives we want.

Maybe it's bc I'm returning to VT for the first time in 4 years in a few weeks, maybe it's just the effect of rereading B's posts and poems and remembering how close she was to wading to her death. You don't read stuff like that and expect a happy ending. I'm so proud of her, so lucky that she beat it then and now. I don't know how to tell her that without being condescending. Maybe it's as simple as, "I'm glad that you're alive."

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Notes from talking to my brother:

Keep reading

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Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Repetitive Pattern (slide), 1975 [Art Collection, UC Berkeley, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, CA. Calisphere, UC Libraries, California Digital Library. Theresa Hak Kyung Cha Memorial Foundation]

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Am I not autistic or am I just less autistic than my brother

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Jenny Richardson

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Andrea Salvatori 

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My friend’s Halloween lunch has fucking broken me as a person.

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Examples of the Emetsound/“My friends 接招吧 (Come join us)” trend on douyin, which began with the Emetsound dance crew (first/last group seen in the compilation).

Video compiled by me :)

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@dazedfashion on Instagram

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🎶"Toss a coin to your Hisser

Oh, valley of plenty

Oh, valley of plenty, oh

Toss a coin to your Hisser…"🎶

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Went to an al-anon meeting bc my therapist suggested it as a less scary alternative to AA and

boy, this space isn't for me, huh

I spent the whole time hoping I'd hid my shit well enough not to impact those I love, the way the group members were describing, and knowing for sure I hadn't.

Knowing that their version of healing and moving on was letting go of the addict in their life. Knowing I'm the addict.

They were running out of speakers and the part of me that wants to facilitate any social event almost added me to the queue but what would I say?

I'm your nightmare, the person you love but can't control. The person whose urges fuck up your life. The person who's hurting but too selfish not to indulge. The one who can check out while you can't. Won't let yourself. Because someone has to be the adult and it sure as shit aint me.

By being an addict I have abdicated responsibility for the very hard shit of living and unfortunately unless I live in a cave that becomes other people's problem. And they have enough to deal with already.

I just spent an hour with those who shoulder other people's burdens and while I relate - oh how I relate - I'm a step beyond. I'm someone who tried to hoist the burdens of others and definitively fell into the mud. I'm someone who tried and didn't know what I was dealing with, or tried and knew and somehow thought it would be fine - bc I do impossible things all the time, right? - and now the people I love the most have to pick up the pieces of me. Sharp and shattered and a goddamn hazard bc addicts aren't reliable, that's a big part of the whole damn problem. We promise and we fall though.

Keep trying. Keep trying. I don't want to tell you I'm trying still. I want you to think I'm already better, so it's not your responsibility. I want you to think, despite your better judgement, that I'm saved.