Fat City!

giving myself a little context here/a day at a time, etc.

Written in the form of a personal note, but displayed publicly.

I can’t imagine that “nostalgic,” is a descriptor many would use to describe what I’m like. I’m usually flabbergasted by remembrances of the past that aren’t matter-of-fact. Barring pets and pop-culture, there’s very few memories I’m inclined to dredge up or elaborate upon with any hint of emotion. I have never been the one to suggest a photo to remember a get-together or event by.

But someone always does want a photo, and I try not to begrudge that. And with Facebook and Twitter and timelines and chat histories and such, it’s a lot easier to skim through highlights of the past few years of your life.

I’m out of college now and an unmoored, self-reflective attitude is predictable and acceptable for a time, if not downright clichéd. It’s pretty easy for me to treat myself to a slideshow of moments from late-period High School to the present, searching for the moment where I fucked up, where everything went wrong.

With distance comes a little bit of perspective, though, and I can begin to understand how trivial things seem now that were monumental to me at the time. Likewise, I am now aware that the clean-shaven, scrawnier version of myself I’m looking at was also wondering just when he screwed everything up. And so were previous versions of myself, down to even 4-year-old Ethan who was scolded for allowing a stranger to help locate his missing dog.

That was the first time a mistake felt insurmountable, a learning experience instead of a self-created problem that could be solved. It was a degradation, the first visible impurity in my character.

This is all, big-picture-wise, incredibly silly. It’s not the source of anything, it’s just my earliest memories of guilt, of self-blame, because everything before that is a little too hazy for me to remember clearly.

But here’s what I’m trying to tell myself: the point isn’t that you fucked up as a kid, the point is that you’ve always felt like shit, and you’re keeping fond memories out of reach because you want to explain it all away.

I can’t necessarily control my emotional core, and moods are often dictated by circumstance, but this small revelation of self-awareness is another tool to use to overcome daily hopelessness. Once it is accepted that I will survive myself, every other challenge or crisis becomes a problem that has a solution, and is therefore conquerable. It allows contentment, even joy, instead of a lingering itch trying to tell me there was only one correct course to take and I am by now helplessly lost.

I want to be thankful for the goodness in my life, and not treat it as a consolation prize for ruining everything ten years ago, and I think I’m getting there.

Also, I just inadvertently wrote a holiday-appropriate blog post. So, happy Thanksgiving I guess.