Crazy

It seems like a while since I've come here. Why? Because these days, I spend the majority of my time grinning like a fool and listening to music that I can't relate to.

Example: last night, I was driving across town with the last of the Arizona sun warming my face, smiling the smile of the hopelessly happy and listening to old R&B on the AM radio. I'm basically a one-woman cliche.

I haven't really wanted to write about it because I'm afraid of jinxing it. I haven't felt good about myself or my life in a while and I don't want to scare away the good fortune. The beginning of the year was rocky for a variety of reasons. My demons came back for me and for the first time in a long time I didn't see a way out. I thought it over plenty of times and was just beginning to accept the fact that I was meant to be unhinged when something happened. I can't quite pinpoint what changed or how I got out of it, but I noticed one day that my head was a little clearer. Yes, the static and depression and overwhelming urge to obsess and control were still there, but the ideas that scared me so badly were now just speaking to me instead of shouting.

A while later, I realized that I wasn't so concerned about how I was going to make it through the day. Before, I had to have a firm plan of what I was going to do during the day, down the hour, because having free time to be alone with my thoughts was too risky. Suddenly, I had the free time that I dreaded so much and, very surprisingly, I wasn't afraid of it. I started to embrace it and it felt familiar. I realized I missed having time to myself.

These days, I can't quite remember what it the first four months of the year felt like. I remember what I was doing and saying and how damaging both tended to be to me, but I can't identify with the feelings anymore. It's like my brain re-arranged itself one night and I woke up feeling new. I went to work and my eyes weren't glazed over. I started caring about myself and things I deemed important. Funny thing is, after I started to realize that I wasn't crazy, things just started to fall into place. I'm two years away from being a college graduate, my relationships with my friends and family have proven to be stronger than I ever expected, I met The Boy and, while I'm still some way from my weight-loss goal, I am absolutely confident that I will make it to where I want to be.

Like I said, I don't know what changed. I still have moments where I don't know if I'm allowed to be this happy. It doesn't feel real a lot of the time, but instead of spending a lot of time questioning or analyzing it, I'm just accepting it. Every single thought that kept me crippled during the beginning of the year is still there; I don't think those will ever go away. But they're quieter now and don't interfere as much. For the first time in a long time, I feel like I've beaten it. I don't need a label, especially that label, to define who I am and what I think about.

This isn't at all what I intended to write about, but I guess it just needed to come out. Funny how that works.

It's getting better all the time.

I don't know what it is, but I've been in a really good mood lately. Case in point: today, for no reason at all, I just started giggling. I'm not talking about a little tee-hee-ing, I'm talking full on giggle fit. Japanese school girls came out of nowhere and were like, "Hey, KV, chill with the giggling. You're embarrassing yourself."

I don't even know what to do with myself. Mind you, I'm not complaining. It's just that my situation hasn't really changed at all, so I'm kind of caught off guard. I'm still clueless as far as life goes, I have no idea how I'm going to pay for the transition to a state university, my summer is jam packed with work, school and social obligations and my car/phone/computer/life breaks down every third day of the week. I'm still in the exact same situation as I was a few months ago when I was sobbing myself to sleep and doing my share to help with the failing ice cream industry by eating enough Dryers to put the half-ton man to shame. I was basically a walking Lifetime movie.


I need to work on my seduction eyes.

So why the change now? Why am I falling into giggle fits and taking detours down Shit-Eating Grin Lane?

I don't know. I don't know and, honestly, I don't really care. I'm happy with whatever happened in my brain that triggered this good mood. So, I'm going to try something that I rarely ever do.

I'm going to enjoy it.