Song Challenge Day 10: A Song That Makes You Sad

Sorry, y'all, but since day 10 is "A song that makes you sad," today's entry in this song challenge is going to be kind of depressing. I'm going to go ahead now and say

Content Warning: Suicide

I'm going with this one; this is the official music video, but for the full version, go here. As a small aside, I never understood why Amos looks... turned on? during the video, given 1) the subject matter, and 2) how sad/emotional she sounds in the recording.

You can probably guess if you know me or have followed my blog for a while, but this song makes me think of my dad for myriad reasons. No, we didn't have ice and snow everywhere in Las Vegas when I was growing up (although yes, we did actually go to indoor ice skating rinks sometimes), and I never needed mittens. But a few things aside from it being about the relationship between a father and child, things from the general to the specific, make this song hit me hard.

-The general melancholic sound, and the regretful tone and implication from the lyrics as a whole, parallel my feelings about Dad. I regret never repairing the damage that had been done, bridging the gap that opened when he and my mom got divorced. It is a wound I will carry until I die, and I know there was nothing I could have done, not really- he made his own choices, and they led to his untimely death. But I'll always wonder, what would have happened if I had reached out? What if I had tried to help him in that last year or two? Etc. And this line of questioning will haunt me the rest of my life. Thinking of Dad can sometimes lead to a smile, but it still more often than not just makes me sad. So, too, does the song, then.

-The path the music follows parallels the trajectory of Dad's decline. It starts subtle, gets more and more profound, reaches a high point of drama and bombast, and then fades away. Dad's end started when I was a teenager, as his drinking gradually increased and his behavior became more and more erratic and toxic. At its worst, its peak, he ended his life in the most violent way possible, a gun to the head. And in the aftermath, he didn't even have a memorial service because the way in which he died was too traumatic for his mom or sister (the latter of which found him) to hold one. It's objectively sad (as objective as "sad" can be, anyway), and ultimately, the way the song ends reflects the way my dad's story ended- quietly, nigh imperceptibly. 

-The line in the chorus, "When you gonna love you as much as I do?" basically speaks for itself. I never stopped loving him, and I wish to God he had loved himself enough to not do what he did. Half. If he had loved himself half as much as I did, as I do, he very well may be here still. And I think that's one of the parts that makes it hurt the most. That he was in so much pain, had that much hate for himself and his life, that he felt the best course was to end it. The Dad that broke his toe to avoid stepping on and snapping my Barbie in half. The same Dad that kept me home from school to play video games with him. The same Dad that loved me so much he refinanced his house to help me pay for college. It breaks my heart over and over to think of it.

-"So many dreams on the shelf...You say I wanted you to be proud of me." Of course I wanted him to be proud. And as he started fading, it seemed harder and harder to do. There was one instance where I felt I let him down completely: During my sophomore year, I was accepted into an exchange program with American University in D.C. to study government and civics, and I was also offered an internship in then-Senator Harry Reid's D.C. office for the duration of the exchange. In the end, despite my dean of students personally talking to my college's financial aid as well as American University's, our family just couldn't afford it because AU was that much more expensive and that much more stingy with financial aid. So, I declined both offers. And I remember one evening, my first break home after the decision, where Dad, having been drinking, told me how disappointed he was that I didn't go, and how sorry he was that we couldn't find a way to afford it. He didn't blame me specifically, but I felt like by not agreeing to triple my loans in order to make it possible, I had disappointed him more than anyone else ever had. He said he wanted me to do great things, knew I could, if I "just tried." He was sure I would be super successful someday, and someday soon, and not going to D.C. made him question that assertion, out loud and in front of me, no less. And it always felt to me that that conversation was the tipping point where he started to disdain me, too. And I'll forever wonder what would have happened between us if I had worked it out somehow, had taken more loans to cover living expenses and food and had actually gone to D.C. (never mind the different path my career could have taken). I gave up on that dream, and it disappointed him. This is just one example, but overall, considering I'm still working retail and in school, I have no doubt he'd still be disappointed in me, at least a little. And that makes me feel gross about myself.

I could go on, but I'm so damn sick of being sad, I need to end this post now. But yeah, "Winter" is my go-to "I-wanna-be-sad" song. I miss my Dad. I regret how things ended. My mind and heart are awash with a million "what-if"s. I miss my Dad. And I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry for so many things I could have done differently. I know I can't change them, but if I could, I would. 

Song Challenge Day 4: A Song That Reminds You of Someone You'd Rather Forget

Time for Day 4 of the Song Challenge, "A song that reminds you of someone you'd rather forget."

I'm going with this one:

If you've been following this blog for a while, or know me in person, you know who this song is about- I wrote about our breakup before.

Gomez sings about a man who started out wonderful, but whose narcissism took over her world, whose behavior trained her to put his needs before hers at all times. A man who had a somewhat carnal need to cause her pain, who would sabotage things she cared about simply because she cared about them. A man that kept holding her back and tearing her down.

And she sings about herself, a woman who tried. A woman whose idealism kept her hanging on, only causing her more pain. But who eventually lets go and realizes she's none of the things he made her think. That she's worth more.

Funny enough, the only part that's off is the, "In two months you replaced us," bit- in actuality, I found someone new in about two months, and he's the best thing that has ever happened to me. 

I left that ex out of self-preservation. But getting away from his toxicity has helped me gain a new perspective about myself, and started me on a journey with more self-love than I've ever felt for myself before. I still struggle with my self-image, but knowing I did my best but still made the best choice I could, helps me lean in a positive direction. 

Still, I don't really like thinking of him, if for no other reason than I've moved on and am in an astronomically better relationship, and dwelling on my abuser can lead to some pretty low lows. Thinking of him frequently takes me to dark places, so I try not to.  

Happy Birthday, My Princess, My General

I'm a grownass woman, yeah, but I love Disney movies, always have, always will. 

As an adult, I've had to separate the content they create from the shenanigans their company gets into, like how they recently got greedy with Spider-Man and caused Sony to yeet out of there. This article does a great job talking about that distinction (and how some fans seem to willfully blind themselves from the dirty truth about Disney as a company), and I loved this line in particular: 

"I can tell you as a Disney fan that being excited about what it's offering while also being aware of the company's great appetite are not mutually exclusive terms."


Even though I loved the movies I was watching as a kid, there was frequently some dissonance between how much I liked the female characters and how much I was supposed to like them. Ariel annoyed me because I knew, even when I was five, that she was being disobedient and reckless and just ended up lucky that things worked out for her. Belle, I related to in the sense that she didn't really have any friends, but I also recognized when I was little that she gave up her dreams of "adventure in the great wide somewhere" for a dude; plus, I was made fun of for being fat and ugly, while she was admired for her beauty by the people being assholes to her. Jasmine was just too underdeveloped for me and didn't really have much to do in her movie except get captured and rescued by dudes (although her owning a goddamned tiger as a pet certainly helped). Cinderella, Snow White, and Aurora were just flat-out boring to me*. I loved Mulan, but she's not a princess (even though the Disney Princes Line™  has been including her as kind of a supporting character since its launch in 2000, and she was also part of the princess ensemble in Ralph Breaks the Internet) and Megara (they started including her in the Princess Line™ later, also more background/tangential, and she was not in Ralph), but she also wasn't a princess, and anyway, she wasn't even the star of her movie.

It isn't that I didn't like the movies, let me reiterate. Even as a little kid, I was already picking the things I enjoyed apart and finding problematic aspects of things such as plot, character development, etc., much like I do now. So yeah, I had Beauty and the Beast stuff all over my room as a kid, since that was my favorite Disney movie (still ranks pretty high, too), even though I knew it was a plothole that Belle never really did anything "adventurous" in her movie. I'd reenact the big "Part of Your World" moment where Ariel rises up and the wave splashes behind her in the bathroom all the time (much to my mom's chagrin), even while bemoaning how she was a "bad girl." I just wasn't big into the whole Princess thing because I hadn't come across a princess that seemed worth really admiring. 

Then George Lucas released that VHS box set of the "special edition" in 1997. You know the one. The one where Han doesn't shoot first, the one everybody had been waiting over a decade for because they thought it was going to include cut scenes and stuff (oh how wrong they were...).

And I met Leia. 

Here was a princess that, even when she was held hostage, didn't take shit from the dude keeping her. She was sassy. She was smart. She kicked ass. She was a great tactician. She was brave. She cared about the people around her. She ended up saving the dude! And, yes, she was absolutely stunning, legit one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen onscreen, and I would still say that about her now.

And did I say that she was sassy?

I loved her, wanted to be her in a way I never had with any of the then-canonical Disney Princesses™.

I don't know if my dad even realized what happened when he got that box set for us (I think for Christmas? That was a rough year for our family, so it's hard to pinpoint; he may have just bought it Because), but I watched those tapes every chance I got when I was home alone so I could spend time with her. And I had to do it alone because those tapes were Dad's, and he usually said no when I asked him if I could watch them when he was around. So yeah, I had to basically sneak my Leia fixes. I would fast-forward to her scenes, watch them in slow-mo, pause the tapes and try to pose like her. I even tried to put my hair in those signature side-buns of hers a few times- failing miserably, of course. I even renamed my favorite Barbie doll "Leia" in her honor.** And I'd do the doll's hair like Leia's (with more success than when I tried on myself, I should add) and pretend she was my Jedi master. And I'd sometimes try to use the Force to knock shit over or make it come to me, knowing in my heart of hearts that Leia was probably a secret Jedi or something. 

I was a kid back then, so I didn't think too much about the actress playing her, and it wouldn't be until I was in late high school/college-ish until I gave M'lady Carrie Fisher any room in my headspace. I don't remember exactly what I was watching- perhaps some documentary about the making of the OG trilogy (because the prequels were out by this point, or at least wrapping up), but she opened up about her anorexia while making the movies, and that... hit.

I've never been anorexic, but God, I have never been happy with my body. It didn't help that I was constantly made fun of for it, too, up until I started college. So to hear about her "failed bulimia" just struck a nerve. I was a late teen at this point, but still. How could my Leia, my Leia, be so insecure? If she was made to feel that way, what the fuck do people WANT, anyway? It pissed me off- for her sake, for the sake of other women and girls. 

It's silly, but it made me feel "close" to Carrie, because I could relate. I imagined meeting her and saying, "See? At least I'm a fat-ass! They have NO excuse for being such assholes to you! Who's dicks are we cutting off?" (I get the feeling she would have laughed a bit, then told me to be kinder to myself.)

And when I saw the HBO version of her Broadway one-person show, Wishful Drinking, I felt seen. In the way that only she could do, she had me laugh-crying with her during the whole special. And I felt even closer to her, and while maybe some of it was wishful thinking, I wanted to believe we were kind of similar in a lot of ways, new ones, aside from the body image issues. The penchant for drama to find her (and legit drama, like the waking-up-next-to-a-dead-body kind of drama, not the "I spilled my latte oh NOES!" drama of your everyday Becky or the Mean Cashier drama for the Karens of the world). The mental illness. The heartache. The feeling of being an outsider, even when you're part of the group. 

The gallows humor. I have legit made people UPSET cracking jokes about my situations sometimes. So her making funnies out of her past? Totally my jam, my way of storytelling, to this day.

Carrie was like the cool aunt I never realized I needed. It's ridiculous, but I honestly would sometimes think about how she'd respond to the things I'd say to myself in my head, and I'd stop being so cruel to myself at times. I'd picture her punching my own "Dark Side" in the kisser. I still do it now.

I watched others of her works, and while of course I found her wonderful in all of them, I think it makes sense that Leia is the one I felt the strongest about- I was what they call "impressionable" when I met Leia, after all, and she imprinted on me.

Having endured the prequels in theaters a decade ago, the biggest reason I saw The Force Awakens in theaters was that Carrie was back. I liked it way more than I thought I would, but you bet your boots I fist-pumped and "YESSSS!"-ed when it was announced (onscreen) Leia is now the general of "The Resistance." 

Buttercup was another princess I found EXTREMELY
boring, but I was super stoked when I found out she
was going to be an Amazonian general in Wonder Woman

When she died, my heart broke a little. And it's ridiculous, since I never met the woman, but I missed her- missed her presence online, in the cultural zeitgeist. So I recently listened to her autobiographical works on audiobook to get a fix, I guess- she read them herself. I was laughing and laugh-crying right along with her the whole time, once again. And sometimes, when she talked about her mental illness, I again felt seen, and wanted to hug her, and knew she would want to do so for me if I needed it. 

It's silly, but her strength was something for me to emulate. I don't want to say "admire," since that comes close to supercripping her, but being in a pretty low place and knowing she came out on top, at least in terms of claiming and taking her life back, gave me hope. A new one, if you will. 

I know I'll cry during her scenses in The Rise of Skywalker. I just know it. And that's okay. I'll get to say goodbye one more time.

So, Carrie, my Princess, my General. I hope your birthday was amazeballs. I'm sure you were partying hard with the likes of Freddie Murcury and your own mama. And I know you know this, but we still love you and miss you, and our lives are better because you were a part of this world.

Love,
A Cracked, But Not Broken, Fan

Epilogue:

When Disney bought the Star Wars franchise, I was excited because I knew the brand and knew that, eventually, we'd get what we now have: Star Wars: Galaxie's Edge. An entire park (section) devoted exclusively to the world of Star Wars. And sure, I love the Star Wars franchise, but Leia always has been, and always will be, my favorite part of it. So when and if I go (provided it doesn't close down), I'll have fun, but I'll be most interested in seeing what they do with Leia- how they portray her, what they do with her character, etc. Like they BETTER not make a ride where the goal is to save her. Amirite?

Plus, she's a gorram Disney Princess now. WHERE IS MY LEIA DISNEY PRINCESS™ MERCH, DISNEY, WHERE IS IT, I SAY!??!?!!?!??!?!?!? I want a gorram meet-and-greet with a "Leia" at Disneyland for my fortieth birthday, people. 

*Although I will say, I at least mildly enjoyed Cinderella because of the mice, and adored Sleeping Beauty because of the fairies and Maleficent, and even Prince Phillip a little. But I never liked the dwarfs (Grumpy was ok, but not enough to carry the whole movie for me) and thought the Evil Queen was a stupid villain ("She's prettier than me so she needs to die!"), and of course the Prince Charming in that one doesn't do anything, and holy crap Snow White's voice is ANNOYING AF AND I WILL DIE ON THAT HILL. So I didn't like Snow White. At all. Go ahead and @ me. But you have to admit, those older Disney movies don't even really try to develop the "heroins" and spent more time and energy characterizing the people surrounding them, be they allies or antagonists. I'm sure Lindsay Ellis talks about this in one of her videos critiquing Disney, but I don't have the time to dig through her entire video history.

**Anybody that has ever owned a toy they "named" would get how this was a BFD. 

Spooning and "Just"ing

I've been sort of on a mental health kick lately here, but I've got another topic I want to talk about; it's been in the back of my mind for a while, and a conversation with someone I love the other day made me decide to just get it out of my system.

Let's start with that lovely Spoon Theory, started by Christine Merisandino. While she came up with it on the fly to describe what it's like living with lupus to a friend, the idea has been carried over into other areas of disability and (in)capacity to "even," as it were. So although depression and anxiety are, at least in theory, mental/emotional disorders (because keep in mind, mental and emotional exhaustion pretty much always ends up leading to physical exhaustion after a point), the metaphysical "spoons" needed to carry out one's day whilst living with conditions like these translate similarly to those of a physical condition, like Merisandino's lupus. But essentially, the idea is, you have a finite amount of resources (the "spoons") to use throughout the day in order to do... everything. Everything from getting up in the morning, to showering, to getting dressed, going to work/school, eating, errands... Everything. And if you run out, you're basically fucked. So you have to kind of prioritize and decide what you absolutely must do sometimes, what you can put off until tomorrow, etc., if you have enough spoons to see a friend, treat yourself to a dinner out, etc. She also points out how sure, you can essentially take out an "advance" on your spoons and pull from the next day's supply, but you also can't be sure something won't crop up that will make that day all the harder.

While no analogy is perfect ("Why a spoon?" "What if you had a few huge spoons?" etc., for example), especially when acted out physically, as she did with her friend, it actually really can drive the point home. A few years ago, I simulated it with a colleague that genuinely wanted to understand my depression and anxiety (we used hangars 😂), and her reaction was pretty similar to Merisandino's friend.

So what?

Well, I've talked before about how best to comfort someone going through a hard time. I still use the bad behaviors I talk about there as an indication as to whether or not I should confide in someone. But another thing I use is what I (and the friend I talked to) call the "Why don't you just __?" Litmus Test.

And the reason this is related to the spoons is that if I'm out of spoons, no, I can't  "just" do anything. I'm out. My supply is empty.

And, if I'm out of spoons, I can't even begin to think about the "just" or coming up with a plan to "just" in the first place. It takes spoons to even start contemplating how to use spoons, let alone actually using one.

Sometimes, I just need the chance to wash and recuperate my spoons before I can think of what comes next. We all do. So even though it would be great if you "just could" whatever, even though a part of you knows there's something you "could" be doing, the idea of even thinking of it is just so not happening, because the prospect of the spoon cost in even that endeavor is just overwhelming.

And this. This is something that doesn't really get brought up enough, not in this capacity, anyway. Because there's a difference between not being ready to do something, and not being ready to think about doing something. And while I see discussions of the former, I don't see many, if any that I can recall, of the latter. How it takes spoons to think about how to use more spoons.

In other words, spooning is hard.

And I think this is especially important to consider vis a vis Millenial Burnout. We're so busy spinning our wheels and working our asses off (whether it be juggling multiple jobs to make ends meet, or the constant connectivity to our workplaces, generated by social media, email, and smartphones, that translates to never really, truly being off the clock), that we feel like "simple, mundane" stuff takes up more spoons than we can spare- so we put it off. A huge part of that comes from how Peterson talks about debt not just being about student loans, but the lies we were conditioning our lives around: "It’s also about the psychological toll of realizing that something you’d been told, and came to believe yourself, would be 'worth it' — worth the loans, worth the labor, worth all that self-optimization — isn’t." But because we've been, again, conditioned to go with it, since it's all we know, we keep spinning those wheels. And while both simultaneously becoming more and more disillusioned and continuing to believe, we are damaging our very psyches. As she goes on to say, "We put up with companies treating us poorly because we don’t see another option. We don’t quit. We internalize that we’re not striving hard enough. And we get a second gig."

And this fucks with the spoon supply.

For me personally, too, Petersen's discussion of how being poor taps into your spoons has stuck with me since the article first came out. 

"In recent years, new scientific research has demonstrated the “massive cognitive load” on those who are financially insecure. Living in poverty is akin to losing 13 IQ points. Millions of millennial Americans live in poverty; millions of others straddle the line, getting by but barely so, often working contingent jobs, with nothing left over for the sort of security blanket that could lighten that cognitive load. To be poor is to have very little mental bandwidth to make decisions, “good” or otherwise — as a parent, as a worker, as a partner, as a citizen. The steadier our lives, the more likely we are to make decisions that will make them even steadier."

It's important to bring up financial insecurity when talking about burnout, then- juggling multiple jobs to make ends meet and living paycheck to paycheck isn't just physically exhausting, but mentally so. For people like me, whose anxiety can get the best of them sometimes, the fact that I don't make enough to save yet- when I'm in my mid-thirties, nonetheless- is a huge drain on my capacity to even, often because I (we) fear both the costs of handling things I/we know I/we should and the repercussions of not handling them. This isn't new to Millenials, but it's not restricted just to people living on SNAP and in Section 8 housing- it happens to the people that make juuuuust enough to cover their stuff, but not enough to save, too. I have a roof over my head, my bills get paid on time, etc., but there isn't enough money leftover after each pay cycle for me to invest, drop into savings, etc., so shit freaks me out. 

Example: The light on the air filter button in my car hasn't been on for a month, indicating to me the filter probably needs to be changed. But I'm too scared to see how much the fix would cost/ actually go get it done because the last three times I took my car in for something routine, I was out an entire paycheck and still needed to borrow money because lo, that other thing I thought maybe was a problem but never looked into ended up being ginormous, or some other thing happened that ruined everything, etc. But, I need the air filter because it helps reduce my exposure to allergens, thus reducing the likelihood I get a sinus infection and/or strep; and I don't think it's a coincidence that I had the former last week (still on antibiotics), and so part of me knows it's only a matter of time until I do get strep again and am down for the count for three-plus days. And while yeah, strep doesn't sound like that big of a deal, keep in mind, I'm paid hourly, for when I'm there. If I'm sick, I don't get paid, which means bills don't get paid. So that is why I don't want to get sick. Thus, it's this huge internal conflict every time I get in the gorram car. And even though I'm not really doing anything, that takes up spoons- the seeing the light not on sends my brain spiraling, and it's hard to deal with on a less-good day.

And if I brought this filter thing up with anyone, the vast majority of people would say, "Why don't you just take your car in?"

So let's get back to that litmus test. "Why don't you just__?"

It doesn't have to be phrased exactly that way, of course, but the basic idea that you're not doing the obvious and/or easy thing of your own volition and will assumes 1) you're in a condition to do so and won't, and 2) are in a condition to come up with the plan and execute it, but won't. And like I said before, that second assumption is the one that doesn't get talked about as often. But it happens: When you're in the thick of things, sometimes it's literally impossible to picture a way out. Not because of hopelessness or despair, but because you're drowning and your gorram brain literally can't go there.

You're out of spoons. So you shut down.

And this? This is trauma. Shutting down doesn't happen out of stubbornness, or laziness. It's a neurological reaction to stimuli, conditioned by past experiences, and a manifestation of the brain's response to those experiences. I shouldn't have to tell you that trauma effects your brain- just Google it and read some of the research on it. But suffice to say, shutting down is a survival tactic, initiated by your brain when things get too heavy. I'm not saying being overworked is the same as being in a car accident or getting assaulted. But. I think there's a reason some of the symptoms of the aftermath are similar- similar things happen to the brain in these situations, and the resulting behaviors afterword are related.

When there is enough trauma, the brain starts to go into survival mode by default and, among other things, the fear centers go into overdrive. It's an adaptive behavior, meant to preserve the body, but your brain doesn't understand your emotions and situations the way your actual consciousness does. So when something realistically harmless but existentially frightening comes your way, your brain either panics and you start freaking out, or it just nopes the hell out of there and you shut down.

Shutting down is basically
the "flight" reaction

I think this is especially why people get perceived as "dragging their feet" when it comes to getting mental health help, at least sometimes. Even if they want to improve their mental health, the idea of figuring out how is, in itself, terrifying and overwhelming and would just cost too many spoons to follow through with. So they grit their teeth and force themselves through another day, because at least they know how to budget their spoons on a regular day without taking on such a big task.

The somewhat ironic part is that often times, even just having a plan ends up increasing your net worth in spoons. I've been there before- where the idea of figuring out how to solve a problem was too terrifying, but then once I did- and not even necessarily did the thing I realized I needed to do, just, y'know, realized it- I felt so much stronger, more alive, like I had so many more spoons. 

Now, this doesn't mean I "should just" anything. I didn't attack it directly earlier, but too often there's a sort of moral superiority involved in conversations involving the "just" assertion on the part of someone. A judgment and normative evaluation of the person they're talking to. An implication that if they "just" got off their ass and pulled themselves up by their bootstraps, everything would be fine. Even if not intended, and honestly, even if the person making that "just" statement actually means well and wants to help, they come across as at best, sort of know-it-all-ee, and at worse, a raging asshole. But obviously, the person making this judgment is either (best case) unaware of or (worst case) ignoring the fact that making a plan requires at least one spoon, and well, the other person is out.

And like okay, there's also the "reading the room" factor, too- anybody whose spoon supply is that low already knows it, and being reminded of it by a "just" statement only makes them feel worse- and, hey, probably diminishes their spoon supply right there; go figure!

ISN'T MENTAL ILLNESS FUN!?!?!

My point with all this is twofold. 

1) I want more people to acknowledge this. That it's not just about having the capacity to start doing something about the hardships in our lives when they crop up or accelerate, it's having the mental and emotional resources (spoons) to come up with how to do something about those hardships sometimes that keeps us from doing so. 

2) Asking someone, "Why don't you just..." or making statements equivocal to that is insensitive, at the very, very best. I want to reiterate something I said in one of those older blog posts I linked above in this one: Sometimes people just need to vent. Ask if someone wants advice before giving it. And be very careful about how you do phrase it. Never in any way make it sound like the thing you're suggesting is easy without first acknowledging how hard it will be to get it started- otherwise, by saying it's easy, you're insinuating the person you're talking to is lazy/not trying/etc.

And I think if the first point happens more, the second will follow. How hard spooning is in some contexts will be more understood, so fewer "just"ing will happen to people having a hard time. 

It would be nice if this was the problem:

Instead, it's this:

And once we understand this, like Neo, we'll all be better off.