Deep thoughts on a Friday night.

I started writing something dogging on myself, but I decided not to do that.  I spend plenty of time feeling bad about things I've said or done or not done or mistakes I've made- I don't really need to rehash or delve into it here.  No one really cares, and it'll just make me feel like shit.  Why do that? 

Why do we do that?  Wallow in our imperfections?  Or is it only me?  I think it's probably not - lots of people are making money off of other people feeling bad about themselves.

Ugh.  I don't even want to talk about this.  Why do I keep talking about it?  Let's change the subject.

Once upon a time, in another life, I had a best friend.  Her name was Kat, I've mentioned her here before, but I'm not going to link to any of that shit because who really cares and I know how it all went down, so whatever.  The thing is, I don't know if Kat and I ever actually liked each other.  That's not completely true.  It sort of is.  I don't really want to rehash all the details -

the tl:dr of it is that I was always jealous of her, from the very beginning. Everyone liked her more than they liked me.  Her hair was prettier than mine.  She had big boobs. 

People wanted to be her friend, whereas I desperately wanted people to want to be my friend. 

This angle just occurred to me, and is so deeply true and raw that it brought me to tears.  No shit.  Mainly because I'm still that little girl inside, the one who just wants someone to play with her, to be her friend...


(there's a rabbit hole!  let's go down it...)
  If I were to go to therapy, this is the part where I'd talk about how it probably goes back to when I moved into the advanced program in 4th grade - brand new school, no friends, and as it turned out, I was the dumb one in the class.  All of the kids had gone to school, at an advanced level, their entire (4th grade level) educational careers.  Then here I came, with my suburban middle-class public school run-of-the-mill education, and I didn't understand their new math or Spanish teacher who spoke actual paragraphs and expected you to not only understand but also respond.  WTF, this world was brand new and I was really bad at adapting to it.  None of the kids liked me, and none of them wanted to be my friends.  I was round and freckled and awkward with too-short badly permed hair and I was a tattle tale and a goody two shoes and wanted to be teacher's pet, but I think even Mrs. Vittitow didn't much care for me.

I was thinking of fourth grade the other day.  I'd heard a story of a kid who lost her mom to some sort of prolonged illness when she was 10, so her only memories of her mom weren't good ones, because her mom was sick and dying for two years, and so her temper and patience were in short supply and she often reacted poorly to the little girl being a little girl.  It made me so sad; my heart breaks for the little girl who grew up without her mom to hold her and sing to her and teach her things and who doesn't remember good things about her mom. But my heart is also broken for the mom, because you know that's not how she'd want her daughter to remember her.  She was sick. I don't know the details and I wasn't there, but I know most moms really love their kids and only want the best for them, and wouldn't want their only memories to be bad ones. 

Anyhow, so i'd heard this story, and I couldn't stop thinking about how lonely and sad I was in fourth grade, when I was about 9 or 10, and my mom was my only friend.  No kidding.  My mom. The one who said she couldn't be my friend BECAUSE she's my mom.  I was so overwhelmed with the love, I had to call her.

"I was thinking about that time you went on my class trip with me to Huntsville AL because if you didn't I wouldn't have had any friends at all and it would have been an awful trip for me."

"I don't remember anything like that.  I remember the trip, but I don't remember going because you didn't have friends."

"I probably never admitted that to you until just now.  It's the sort of thing I wouldn't have wanted to say anything about because I was too embarrassed.  But I didn't have a single friend in fourth grade.  If you hadn't gone on that trip with me, I would've been miserable.  I'm so glad you were my only friend, Momma.  I love you."

Let's come back to present day.

Oh goodness.  It took some effort to remember where I was going with this when I started out. 

I have some really awesome women in my life right now.  Women with whom I feel no competition, because I know that I am enough and I do not have to compete.  Women who are beautiful, but I am not jealous of them because I am beautiful too.  Women who are brilliant and intimidate the fuck out of me with their massive expensive brains, but who I am not afraid of because they teach me awesome things and will only help create a more interesting and amazing village for my daughters.  Women who live life to the fullest and inspire me to make the most of every day.  Women who work so hard to make loving homes and happy memories for their families. 

The part that blows my mind is that I genuinely feel like these want to be my friends.  I think they actually like me.  I know i'm not supposed to care what people think, but anyone who says they don't feel better when someone likes them is a liar.  The fact that these women like me makes me feel awesome.

It's really late, I've lost my point a hundred times and i'm still not sure I ever got back there, but i'm tired and I have to go to sleep.  Sweet dreams internet world. 

Now tell me how awesome I am.  ;)