moving forward

i just bought the domain severelymediocre.com.

now i have a financial responsibility to keep this updated.

hoping for the best!

cause and effect.

the other day, a group of my friends and i went to el cid, the taco place on the corner of my block.

we were seated at a table where my chair was so awkwardly close to the guy sitting (by himself) at the table behind me i could feel him. in an effort to get out of his aura (or whatever), i scooted my chair in. as i grabbed my chair to pull it in, i put my hand in a mass of hardened, chewed gum, which was undeniably stuck there by some real pile of garbage idiot.

i didn't react quickly.

i didn't visibly or audibly react at all.

my immediate thoughts were: "this is disgusting, but i know there is a reason i deserve this".



fast forward to today; i was waiting for the #11 lincoln/sedgwick bus.
it arrived surprisingly quickly.
i got on and headed towards the back of the bus and sat across from a hyper normal looking girl. i pulled out my cell phone and started blindly texting to pass the time.

slowly, a strange feeling fell upon me. i felt like i was being watched. i ignored it for a second, and then succumbed to the awkwardness. i looked up to find out who was watching...

the normal girl was staring at me and her face was filled with disgust and horror and anger...

i was confused, briefly... what could she possibly be looking at? i'm the only other one back here, and its not like i'm your stereotypical bus rider.


and then it hit me: i realized that while blindly passing the time... i had managed to pick my nose and wipe the results on the bottom of my seat.


i thought about the chair at el cid and smiled at the girl, completely content with my life at that exact moment.

those who do not learn from the past...

This is what a friend request from the man who molested you when you were 14 looks like.

Really? You think its appropriate to add me as a friend? Wild.

so over it, i'm back into it.

i had the same boyfriend (on and off) for 3-4 turbulent years.

the last time we tried to make it work, i had an uneasy feeling the whole time... i ended up following my instincts and ending it.
that's not to say that i didn't have a hard time with him moving on. i was flirting with this "maturity" thing and kept my attempts to stay "friends" and being in the same place as him randomly to a minimum. i didn't see him or really speak to him for an entire year. i heard he had a new girlfriend, i had a new boyfriend(s), and everything was falling into their very separate places.

a few weeks after i moved into my current apartment, and in an attempt to rekindle my dying social life (fuck you hair school), i went to some shitty punk bar. as i walked in, i had terrible memories of the last and only other time i was there... my formerly cheating boyfriend had a past relationship with the bartender during one of our many breaks. i remember watching her pick up her sidekick, texting away. i remember him checking his matching phone seconds later. i remember becoming completely consumed by rage and jealousy and sadness. i remember the fear of losing control and walking outside to clench my fists and lose my breath and shake uncontrollably. i relived it as i walked into this fucking bar. how did i end up here? what the hell am i even here for? i was past it, though. and i bravely (or so it seemed) took a seat at the bar, ordered a pbr and spitefully pressed on with my will to hang out. i closed my eyes deeply several times in an effort to clear my head of its wildly associative imagination, and was generally working it out. i feel accomplished and adult. i was letting go.

and just as i felt like i was finally making it, who walks in but the bane of my existence, my wretched ex.

i knew the feeling. my heart came loose and it fell onto my stomach. my stomach, shocked from the impact writhed and turned as it tried to gather itself. we made eye contact, our eyes widened, i turned away and inhaled so deeply that my lungs should have burst. i looked down at my lap. i closed my eyes deliberately and slowly. my roommates saw all this, and suggested we go outside to smoke.

once outside, i sat in silence. i smoked, hard. and fast. everyone around me tried to keep the conversation light, and 3rd party acquaintances played along with the menial small talk. i nodded in agreeance to words i couldn't understand. i half heartedly laughed when i could force myself to pick up social cues. i felt myself growing dizzier and dizzier. i was falling apart.

he came outside. he smoked now too, apparently. i thought he was such a piece of shit for it. hypocritically, i judged his filthy habit and saw it as a sign of weakness. i scoured his skinny, dirty body for every flaw. every deliberately careless article of clothing made my heart race faster and faster, his substandard posture, the way he laughed harder than anyone else at jokes... i hated him. i hated him because i remember loving him and allowing myself to be dragged along for years, waiting for him to come around. i hated him cause i hated myself when i was with him, and now, in the face of our first encounter in over a year, i realized the absolute worst fact: i was not over it. he finished his cigarette (fucking bitch) and went back inside, and one by one my friends followed urging me to come along. i refused, i needed to sit outside for a few moments more... i needed to sort this out, quickly, and put it behind me.

i sat there. my shorts were just short enough where the cement i was sitting on was cold and abrasive to the backs of my thighs which, when i left my house seemed fine, but now as i looked down at them i felt pasty and fat. i stared blankly down north avenue in either direction. i wanted to get up and run. i wanted to die. i wanted to fight. i wanted to figure out how exactly i felt. and then it hit me, i wanted to puke.


so i did.



i ran into the alley, and i threw up. form nerves. for the first time. i was so worked up, i made myself sick.

i was crying and puking and i was embarrassed. when i finally got it together (sort of), i started back toward the bar to collect my things, unlock my bike and get the hell out of there. as i staggered through the parking lot, i heard his voice. i dove head first, literally, into the bushes behind the fence he would walk by in a few seconds. immediately, i slapped myself in the forehead. what a fucking idiot i must look like, throwing up in alleys and jumping into bushes. i shook my head at the ridiculousness of the situation and i watched him walk, awkwardly as he always has, around the corner to his car. when i was sure he was gone and i was mostly sure i hadn't been seen, i emerged from my awful hiding place, brushed the gravel off my hands and knees and tried to carry on to my bike.

and then i saw his stupid car creep around and corner and i jumped right back into the fucking bushes. god dammit! i watched through the bars in the fence, like a sidelined chubby kid, longing to be where he was but at the same time resenting him and cursing his existence. he slowed as he passed the door of the bar, and rolled down his window...

"i miss you bria!"


at least, that's what i think i heard. the more time that passes, the less certain i am of what he actually yelled.

but at the time, i know what i heard and what i heard made me puke again. he drove off. i cried.

i won't go into the extreme measures i took at this point because i'd like to think that i'm past it and it hurts my ego to think of it. what i will say is that my efforts were futile, i never made contact. i didn't see him. i didn't find him. if that gives you any indication of what i did. whatever the case may be, i came up empty handed. i went back to my home. sat on my bed. my head in my hands in utter defeat and regret. god.

that was a year ago.


i've seen him from afar since then once or twice.

tonight, i went to an event he was putting on. half out of curiosity to see what these dudes do, half to actually hang out, but mostly to test myself.

i feel over it, but am i really?

i rode up late, and winced when i realized i was riding the bike he gave me one of the last times he was trying to win me back. i pulled my collar (figuratively, of course) when i saw several people i slept with out of spite when we were broken up. i shook it off, joined my friends and had a nice time. i didn't puke. i didn't get irrational. we didn't address each other. it was the most neutral situation i had ever encountered.

i did it. i got over it. i never thought i would, but i did.

i've finally overcome a feeling i thought would consume me forever. the sharp, active pain that would consume me at the very sight of him has now become a dull, debilitated awareness of his existence.

i can't say i hate him. i live the life i do now because of following him in my wild teenage years. i appreciate the time we spent together. i like the person i've grown into in those crucial socially formative years. and i hope he is happy and well doing whatever it is he does, because i know i finally am.

thanks, hardcore.

'best friends become strangers'


i tried to sing this song in my head in the shower... i couldn't quite place it. but the words wouldn't get out of my head. i got out of the shower, dried off (sort of), and googled it...


i think its really funny that it was a terror song.

best

she asked me if i wanted to smoke in the backyard, and i obliged. i showed her the "full bodied" american spirits i've been smoking and explained how i had obtained them for free from a co-worker who gave up the habit. we laughed about it as we started down the back stairs. as we reached the bottom, we were faced with the most amazingly disappointing excuse for weather on july 1st; dark, gray, no more than 60 degrees. we sat, begrudgingly, upset that here we were, half way through summer, and forced to wear full legged pants and sweatshirts.

"this paper is killing me" she said, throwing her entire body back into her chair.

she was in enrolled in city college. as someone who has taken two semesters at the very same college, i knew the immense lack of challenge it presents, and thusly, was wildly unimpressed with the hardships and challenges she seemed to incur almost daily. despite my nearly irate notions, i looked at her thoughtfully, allowing her to continue.

she carried on, "i just don't know what to write about, my next paper has to be an argumentative essay".

i, trying to help, asked, "well what do you usually argue about?"

and as i asked this question, a million things popped in my head inciting the rage i had managed to tame earlier... mostly regarding her lackluster, meathead boyfriend. i pictured their countless quarrels about where to go eat, or he'd be out with his friends much too late. or more so he would berate her for spending time with either me or our other roommate, he thought both of us to be whores and bitches and a terrible influence on our common friend.
in the few seconds it took me to think of the things she obviously wasted so much of her life arguing about, i realized not a single one was worth writing a school paper on. i was sure she thought the same, because after thinking about it briefly, she answered,

"i only argue about stupid stuff".

i already knew that. and having already known that, i smiled a half humored, mostly satisfied smile.

her cell phone made a chirping noise time three or four times in a row, as though she was getting a flurry of instant messages. i asked if she was signed onto AIM on her phone, and she embarrassingly explained that her phone was broken and that she often got three or four duplicates of text messages, one right after the other. i couldn't help but wonder if she was lying, and true as it may be, her phone was janky as fuck, if she was actually having one of her meaningless arguments at this very moment via text message.

i put my thoughts for conversation material on hold, as i assumed she would look at her phone. but she refrained, and so i, having nothing relevant to speak of, began telling of the book i had just finished reading. at once i felt stupid for talking about it with her, she was my best friend. surely i could have come up with something better to talk about. something pertaining to the both of us. i realized i was talking to her like i would talk to one of my clients at work and it broke my heart. have i lost my best friend?

it is entirely possible, that yes, i have lost her. we live together, its true, but i work 6 days a week, and she has her school and work as well. but that is not the reason for our lack of communication. the fact is that she is in a relationship with this monster again, and i, forgive me for being presumptuous, can only assume she is embarrassed of this fact and instead of allowing me to see that she is ashamed, she would rather just go on not facing me at all.

and so it goes, every conversation we have, is diluted and shallow and vague. and even when i feel like i'm having a ground breaking realization i want to share with her, i've lost contact with her so much that she wouldn't even appreciate it if i told her all the thoughts i was sorting out in my head.

such is the case with how the conversation carried on, because despite my work appropriate approach to this particular segment of our talk, i managed to gain my wits about me and divulge the amazing self realization and fear the book i had just read incited in me. and as i told her of my disappointment in the ending of the story and how it was a solid parallel to my life, i looked up and realized she had pulled out her phone and was furiously typing to that fucking monster. and so it was. my real life conversation had taken a distant second place to a text message fight, which would surely prove to be not worth writing about in class, and therefore not worth even having, in my opinion.

so i sat there, watching her type; cigarette hanging out of her mouth, oversized glasses dominating her face, and both hands on her phone... just as i remember her in the days when we would ride mopeds and drink sparks. just as so many pictures represented her on the internet. but this time, she wasn't responding to a party invitation or finding someone to snack with, she was having a menial argument with a man i didn't respect or deem worthy of her time.

i watched for a few seconds, took a drag of my cigarette and looked away from her at the backyard. our backyard was pretty impressive for an urban setting. you see, my best friend, in the face of her last big break up, took to gardening as her way to escape the pain of her loss. and so it was, we had a dozen tomato plants, beans, lettuce, all sorts of herbs. we even had a rose bush, a magnolia tree, and a hibiscus bush. these plants were all surviving quite well on their own with all the rain we've been having, but the flower bed, the flower bed was severely lacking. now, it could be entirely possible that the flower bed was weak because it had been planted in the shade. but to me, to me the flower beds downfall was a direct representation of my best friend rekindling her romance with her bottom of the barrel, scum of the earth boyfriend. as soon as she began speaking with him again, she completely and whole heartedly lost interest in the garden. and so, the flowers were withered, small, and on the verge of wilting and dying any day. and i personally blamed that monster for singlehandedly killing them. i looked at them intently for a few seconds and half decided to let go of my hatred and compliment the garden.

by this point, the cloud cover that plagued my well being a few minutes earlier was now completely welcome, as it made the green of the grass and trees pop. and the colors of the flowers my best friend had planted were holding on and standing out despite their negligent mother.
i commented on this out loud, not to be conquered by the awkward silence her concentration on her phone was creating, "the clouds are really making the colors pop back here." i

was met with no reply. i looked back at her and she was still feverishly hacking away at the tiny keys on her phone. succumbing to the silence, i scrambled for something to do in the meantime. i picked up the pack of american spirits, and read the side as i often do to packaging when feeling weird.

i read silently,
"made with 100% additive-free, whole leaf natural tobacco. no reconstituted sheet tobacco, no processed stems. up to 25 percent more tobacco than other king size cigarettes."

finally, i said out loud, "25% more tobacco than any other king size cigarette, what the fuck is a king size cigarette?"

by now i was just mumbling bullshit that i didn't even care about. the garden, i know, she used to care about it. and i know she lost interest in it when she started seeing him again. i picked talk of the garden to fill awkward silence because i thought it would strike a chord with her. in some way, i thought she would see what i saw, a representation of her lack of commitment on account of a lying, immature sociopath, and that she would break ties with him and come back to be my best friend. but she didn't even look up when i spoke. she just continued tinkering with her phone.

what caught me off guard though, is that as soon as i let the silly gibberish about the cigarettes spew out of my mouth, she immediately snapped her coll phone shut, hastily shoved it in the pocket of her oversized jacket and replied.

"i think a king size cigarette is just a little longer than a regular one."

with this, she put out her cigarette, and i, taking a cue from her even though i was not done, put out mine. and together we silently walked up the stairs, into the house that we shared, and continued on to the bedrooms we most certainly did not share and shut the door behind us.