Friends

I felt unique in my passion for martial arts, my affinity for Call of Duty, my go-with-the-flow attitude toward boyish adventures. I wanted to be “one of the guys,” while still retaining the distinction of my sexuality. I longed to be the quintessential cool girl — desirable yet approachable. But in retrospect, all that really amounted to internalized misogyny.

There’s a big difference between talking and communicating. One exists to relay messages, ideas, and feelings: the building blocks of being a person. The other exists to fill time. I’m by no means here to tell people how to approach their relationships — I just don’t want people to feel pressured to fill silences with noise out of the fear their partners won’t think they care.

One person’s successful venture or exalting victory — regardless of what it is — does not take away the possibility of anyway else’s. This world is vast, and there is plenty of room for everyone’s love and success stories (if they so desire them).

I've noticed an evolution within myself over the past year: I’ve been avoiding leaving my house at all costs.

I used to be the kind of person whose every thought was fodder for Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. No matter how mundane, morbid, ridiculous, or inconsequential, I shared it. You might even say that sharing it was part and parcel of experiencing it.

Mom friends were the ones to whom you were supposed to spill all those dark parenting thoughts. I wanted that mom-magic. I knew it was out there somewhere.

First of all, befriending someone and becoming their confidant while secretly yearning to get in their pants isn’t just fucking creepy, it’s manipulative. The girls I “befriended” opened up to and trusted me because I was patient, sensitive, and seemed to have their best interests in mind.

On her adventurous lease on life: