jd yates

mood: awake
music: The District Sleeps Alone Tonight-The Postal Service-Give Up

It never ceases to amaze me how this simplest of activities manages to get lost in the shuffle. For as often as I think about journaling there’s absolutely no excuse for not finding the time. I still regard this ridiculously placebo-esque attempt at self-therapy as a healthy and helpful habit, but simply can’t seem to make one of it.

So, here comes the update. I’ll try to cliff notes most of this since I’m sure most of the people who will read this fondly remember the novels I have a tendency to write.

For those of you (including myself) who believed it would never happen, I have a shocking revelation: I have a boyfriend. Not one of those “18 year old I approached on the dance floor at s4, kidnapped, and duct taped to my couch” kind of boyfriends,(cuz I wouldn’t know anything about that) but a real, live, non-kidnapped one. With that in mind, this will likely be my first journal entry in over 3 years that isn’t mostly, if not entirely, greg-centric. Though on a side not, just to clarify, he is irrevocably no longer part of my life as of going on 6 months ago. I have moved on, *pause for applause*

Back on the boyfriend, and I’ll be brief. We’ve been together for about 4 months and he’s wonderful. I’d forgotten what it was like to be with someone who was honestly invested in my happiness and emotional well-being. He’s loving, he’s affectionate, he’s both articulate and intelligent, mature, responsible, and about five-foot-nothin’. Perfect right? I think so too. Though my commitment and affection issues have both resurfaced with a vengeance I’m doing my best to keep them at bay without revisiting the whole therapy thing. We’re constantly leaving town for one reason or another, which I’ve always wanted to be able to do, and I haven’t worked in damn near 3 months. This is the life.

Not only do I get to spend all this free time traveling and going out with my friends, I’ve also been charged with decorating his new house, a challenge I’ve only barely had the guts to rise to, and only at his peril. Furthermore, as soon as I’m finished with that I’ll have a fabulous job waiting for me that allows me to travel, work from home, and make good money doing it.

It’s certainly an exciting time, and yet I experience this reluctance to reflect on it. It doesn’t seem real, it doesn’t feel like progress. This feeling must be due to the fact that I still feel like something is missing without what I was certain at one time was the love of my life. What an awful experience for Skinner (the boyfriend) to feel like he has something to live up to. I’ve done my best to alleviate that fear, but there’s no denying that there is and likely always will be a void. I suppose ideally we hope not to have to cut that first love out of our lives completely, but in this case (as I’m sure most of you will agree) I had no choice.

This journal entry has taken a depressing and novel-ish turn, so I think I’ll conclude by saying that I’m inarguably in the best place I’ve been in in more than recent memory. I cherish every minute of it and simply need to find a way to fill that void with this newfound happiness despite a very give-and-take inequity. I know it can grow to fulfill me in ways that it’s predecessor never could and that I will grow both emotionally and intellectually for it. To expect any more of it at this early stage is simply wishful thinking.