The Ego Episodes

Friday, Apr. 22, 2005

She is Flawed

There are times when I feel like I don’t deserve to mingle with fellow human beings.

Some days I feel like I've been an annoying brat to everyone. This usually happens during weekends, when I get to go out of my room and interact with my choir mates at church. Maybe it's because I live the life of a hermit the whole week that the chance of getting out of my hole is nothing short of exhilirating -- if by "exhilirating" you mean "that drunken feeling causing me to interrupt people's sentences midway to insert my own totally irrelevant but sometimes corny quips to which they react with genuine laughter because they're really nice people." They really are. If I may apply the theory of relativity here, being in the company of nice people makes you feel like your soul is made of tar.

The thing with me is that this self-realization does not occur in real time, that is, as the event is progressing. I only get this wretched feeling in retrospect, at the end of the day, before I go to sleep, when all's said and done. So I sleep with the thought: I am a terrible person.

Not that I'm not doing anything to combat this almost-compulsive behavior of interrupting people. Writing in this journal, for instance, should exhaust me of some of that stuff nobody wants to hear (nobody except me, of course). Writing in this journal would save the world of having to hear things like, “Food is for you to eat, not to lose weight! If you want to lose weight, exercise, but don’t compromise on your food.” I so believe in this. I especially despise low-fat mayonnaise. It’s mayonnaise stripped of its purpose, it’s akin to a shrunken sumo-wrestler on Atkins.

And with that paragraph, I have now deviated from the point of this entry. I’m trying to be more conscious every time I talk to people. Of course, I’m barely successful, but I’m trying. To sum up: There are times when I feel like I don’t deserve to mingle with fellow human beings.

Until one night you get a message from a friend telling you that she misses you. And your heart melts, shedding the coat of tar enveloping it. Then you think that maybe, you’re not that terrible a person after all.

I admit I’m not the organizer among my friends. I don’t initiate get-togethers or coffee chats. I’m more at ease saying yes to those things. I guess this is one habit that’s hard to undo.

Yessy, my ex-roommate and a good friend, seems to understand this part about me. I never told her how happy she made me that day. The ice cream was just the cherry on a sundae. I enjoyed talking to her because if there’s one person who can outtalk me, it’s definitely her.

Sometimes I feel bad that I can’t go out as often because I don’t have the energy or the resources (see previous entry). I don’t even go online as much because I’d rather meet the person and chat, you know, face-to-face. And chatting through sms? My fingers are not made for those, sorry.

And now we have gone back in full circle. I am a hermit for reasons stated above. But maybe, not a terrible person.

Side note: Totally off-topic but this, I think, is the kind of article that my school paper has for their Opinions page, inappropriately titled, "Frankly, my dear". Do you see any frankness? No. IT'S NOT THERE. Unless, of course, you include the next phrase after that and make it, "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn." If you don't imagine Rhett Butler saying it, isn't it more apt that way? Also, that additional phrase could stand on it's own as a title, in my opinion. You know what? I suggest they just feature an entry from someone's online journal/blog. Save all that pretense.

{ joycie at 10:37 a.m.}