living in a bell jar

sometimes I worry about all the social media I use, because once it’s out on the intertubes, it’s out, and it can’t be taken back.

with a click of a button, my inner thoughts, feelings, emotions and funny pictures of cats are up for grabs, and I wonder what that will mean for me in ten, twenty, however many years.

my thoughts don’t feel private.

as soon as I think a thought, I consider whether or not it’s Facebook-status worthy.

it’s usually not, but I do it anyway.

it’s catharsis I’m looking for, and since I’m not finding it in drugs, alcohol, therapy or repressed childhood memories, I keep writing, keep blogging, keep tumbling.

it helps, I think, because I get to say things that I don’t always feel brave enough to say in person.

moo.

Last Kiss

It was brought to my attention recently how differently I perceive things. I could go on and on about how reality is relative, but for the purposes of maintaining my sanity and also your attention, I'll just limit myself to this particular instance of misperception, or non-neurotypical perception, as is the case.

Okay, I am the worst at brevity.

So there's this song called "Last Kiss," originally released by Wayne Cochran in 1961, but the version that I'm most familiar with is Pearl Jam's cover. Long story short, boy takes ladyfriend for a date in his father's car, loses control, and ladyfriend dies. Then he's all:

Oh where, oh where, can my baby be?
The Lord took her away from me
She's gone to heaven, so I've got to be good
So I can see my baby when I leave this world

And then I was all,

*IMITATE SCREECHING BREAKS WHICH IS FAIRLY INSENSITIVE GIVEN THE CONTEXT OF THE SONG*

I was probably fourteen or fifteen at the time, so I really didn't know much about driving and how accidents happen and whatnot. So when I heard,

We were out on a date in my daddy's car
We hadn't driven very far
There in the road, straight ahead
A car was stalled, the engine was dead
I couldn't stop, so I swerved to the right

All I could think was, WTF were you doing in that car that made you not pay attention to the road, dumbass?!

#empathy

I thought to myself, if I were borrowing my parental unit's car, I would be EXTRA SUPER DUPER CAREFUL to not crash it because I CLEARLY would not be able to afford a replacement vehicle. And of the object in the road, straight ahead? If he's driving on a relatively straight road, as he denotes with the 'straight ahead,' he should have had PLENTY of time to stop if he were driving with the proper precautions. And I don't know that I thought about it at the time, but I'm curious to know whether or not the stalled vehicle had put on their hazard lights.

Aspie-me thought (thinks, even) that this tragedy could have all been avoided if he would have checked his hormones for like fifteen minutes to pay. attention. to. the. road.

What really ground (grinded?) my gears, though, was the fact that the singer believed that the Lord had taken his ladyfriend away, when clearly, by all logical standpoints, he was the one at fault.

The song legitimately made me sick for that reason. I thought he was just a stupid dudebro who wasn't paying any attention to the road, and while he may not have deserved what he got (mostly 'cause it was kinda the ladyfriend that got the shitty end of the deal), he had no place looking for any kind of sympathy because of the error of his ways.

It makes me kind of sad that I used to feel this way.

I happened to bring this up to my 53-year-old friend (heretofore to be known as "Beaner," and no, it's not a racial slur [well, it is, but not in this context], it's her actual nickname), and she shook her head and laughed at my interpretation. Then she did that thing where she looks at me for a period of time, and I get this look a lot, and from all kinds of different people, but I've yet to decipher its meaning, and she asks me, "Do you always think of things like that?"

And, in true Aspie fashion, I was all, "Like what?"

It really never occurs to me that other people don't always see the world as I do. Well. Sometimes I guess it does, but it's always a constant surprise when it's brought to my attention so starkly. She explained that the song came out when she was about four, and that it makes her cry every time (and also that it's the only song she knows by heart on the guitar; as she was in a band for most of her twenties, this is significant). Where she seen the whole picture, even at age four, how tragic something like this can be--is, I only seen pieces of the puzzle, seen only the elements that I could strip down and analyze and process. (Seriously, I think I'm a robot.)

Maybe because I drive now, or because I'm older and slightly more worldly, or even because I've had my heart broken, but I get it now. And not just in an intellectual sense. This song, when I'm really listening to it, when I'm really absorbed in it, will bring me to tears. And I rarely cry unless it's that damn Sarah McLaughlin commercial about abused animals or the end of The Little Mermaid.

It's funny how radically a song's meaning changed for me over the course of seven years. I guess that means I'm growing, which is good, but it kind of makes me wonder how I'm doing in other aspects of my life. I still really, really hurt over Stupid Boy, but then I wonder if I'm just hurting because I'm constantly misperceiving things. I want to trust my instincts and my perceptions because I honestly believe this AS is a gift, but on the other hand, I know it can make me somewhat narrow-minded (if that's even the right term for what I feel).

Even if I am misperceiving, it still doesn't change the day-to-day reality of my emotional turmoil (yeah, it sounds kinda melodramatic, but it's fo real). And even that sidebar just now! Why do I feel like I'm being melodramatic? Aren't my emotions valid? Shouldn't I describe them however I want or feel?

I feel, again, like there is a neurotypical girl trapped in the AS. And I think once I figure out how to properly harness my mutant Asperger's superpowers, I will be unstoppable.

Right now, though, I just feel stagnant.

This Doesn't Really Have a Point but Bear With Me

I'm unsure of how to proceed here
Lot's happened since last I wrote
But also, a lot of nothing happened
As is generally the case in my life

I still get most of my social interaction from work
And I still have noooo idea WTF to do with my life
But I've kinda decided that by January, I will start looking for real life employment
At least, something that is moderately in my field
AND ALSO
I want to apply to school again
Because I'm pretty certain that working with teens with Asperger's is a thing I'd be good at
Mostly cause I am like
PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OUT THE WAZOO
But like
I am so unsure of how to proceed in that area also
Because how do you Google search "degrees in Asperger's?"
Believe you me, the results that come up are the opposite of helpful
they're all
ONLINE DEGREES, YES?
And I'm all
BITCH PLEASE
As much as being in a room full of strangers and trying to fit in with them is difficult
That is EXACTLY the shit I need to be doing
NOT being on the computer
Too much of my time is wasted interacting on the internets

And like
Don't get me wrong
Facebook and all the social media have been awesome tools for helping me keep in contact with friends from college who've moved far, far away from the deep recesses of Northwestern Pennsylvania
And I'm all
GO FRIENDS, IT'S YOUR BIRTHDAY
Because I love them and I'm so happy to see them go out and pursue their dreams

But again
I feel like I'm suffocating because I'm not also doing those things
And granted, I am learning a hell of a lot where I work now socially
I love the people I work with, mostly
And the thought of leaving genuinely bums me the fuck out
But I'M LIKE A BIRD and I WANNA FLY AWAY
because I know neither WHERE MY SOUL IS nor THE GEOGRAPHIC LOCATION OF MY DOMICILE
Apologies for the brief Nelly Furtado interlude
I have issues

So basically I've given myself four months to continue life as I've been living it
Which is to say, not really living to my fullest potential
And then it's application time
Though probably I should look into grad schools before that

I was also considering reconnecting with some of my high school personnel that helped me out when I was a perpetual train wreck
Like Sitz, my English teacher who steered me toward Allegheny and also kinda took me under her wing
And V, who put up with all my random angsty bullshit and who I think is secretly a saint
I'm just, ONCE AGAIN, unsure how to proceed
Because I'm learning that so much of life is about who you know
Granted, that's not the all of it
But it IS important
More important than I have ever realized
Even relevant to my own experience, because of the three jobs I've ever held, two I've acquired because of familial or friend connections
Of course, I've KEPT the jobs because I am a good worker
But I was given the chance because of those connections
And if I do connect to said people, I'm kinda hoping they might hook it up with THEIR connections
But then I wonder, am I really doing myself any favors by always leaning on other people to do the social grunt work for me? Even if that's how a lot of neurotypicals do it?

I look back on my life
And mostly I think
HUH
ASPERGER'S
GOOD GOD, Y'ALL
What is it good for?

Is it absolutely nothing or absolutely everything?
How much of it is me and how much of it is the disorder?
Is there even a line between the two?
How do I reach people?
How do I exist, how do I embrace, how do I resist?

Bound By Wild Desire

Here's the thing.
This whole "setting things on fire" thing that's been getting so popular nowadays?
Been sayin' that shit since 2010.
Before Adele.
Before that "We Are Young" song.
Before Katniss.
Before my graduation speaker.

Now, it doesn't really bother me that setting things on fire has become a thing, cause I'm like YES PYROMANIA IN ALL THE THINGS but it really grinds my gears that people think it's just a fad I'm following. Like, okay, it originated with Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire," which is (one of) the songs my dad used to play for me as a child. So when I say that I'm touched by fire, or bound by wild desire, I'm not just going along with some catchy pop culture shit.

It's in my blood, bro.
In my neurological wiring.

Fire is absolutely fucking fascinating because it is both life-sustaining and lethal. It is equally beautiful as it is horrifying. Less literally, it is the thing that keeps you going when shit's got you down, but at the same time, it is the thing that will consume you and burn you out if you can't learn to check yoself.

Back when I was diagnosed as bipolar, I was all, "woot, touched by fire like all these historical badasses and also Kay Redfield Jameson!" But now that I know I'm AS, I'm like...how the fuck is it possible to be touched by fire and have the emotional variation of ice cubes? And not in a "I'm-super-cold-and-distant-and-have-no-emotional-ties-to-anyone-ever" way, but in the sense that I sometimes lack the ability to be touched by others in certain ways because of a neurological wall of ice that prevents me from understanding what the fuck is going on most of the time.

I do feel, and I am capable of reciprocating love and other emotional feelings, but some, even most of the time, it doesn't always come naturally. Or instinctively, rather. I think the reason I have passed under the AS radar for so long is that I am a good observer; I can see how other people act and react, and I trial and error the hell out of that shit until I think I've got it mostly right.

Like hugging, for instance. Never been big on it. It's not that I don't like hugs, or that it causes me physical pain like some people on the spectrum, it's just not something that comes naturally. And I've hurt people's feelings because of it, and never really understood why. Now that I'm older, it's gotten better--if I can assess based on someone else's emotional needs that they require physical contact when greeting, departing, or sadness or happiness is involved, I can usually reciprocate without having being told to do so. Usually, though, I still have to ask if it's okay, particularly with things that involve crying or sadness.

And honestly, I think my methodology should be everyone's goddamn methodology, but that could be because I might actually be an alien robot.

Anyway.

I wrote this post because I'm always so goddamn torn between fire and ice. Almost as if there is a neurotypical Girl on Fire stuck somewhere inside, dying to make contact and to feel and to envelop others in my warmth and light, but that girl is trapped by the AS Ice Queen, who comes off as cold and immovable and who would sink the FUCK out of the Titanic.

I don't even know how I exist sometimes, but I know I am worthwhile. I just wish I was able to harness my mutant AS powers for good instead of laying around and staring in abject silence all day.

You Don't Meet a Girl Like Me Every Dynasty

For being only twenty-two, I feel like I've lived a lot of life. Or, rather, have had a lot of life experiences, largely negative, happen within a time frame that is atypical from the average white, middle-class lady experience. At the same time, though, it feels like I haven't lived at all--most of the cultural markers of adulthood have not happened to me yet. And I guess to some extent, that list is subjective; it's true that I did go to college, did purchase my own first car (or got a loan for it, at lease, lolpun), went abroad, have road tripped independently, et cetera.

The life experiences I'm referencing the lack thereof, however, are more in regards to relationships. Now that I've got my AS diagnosis, this really makes sense, because even if someone were all, "ohey, sexual," it would probably go right over my head. Conceptually, I understand flirting and its function in male-to-female relations (lolheterosexism, but in this case, it's applicable), but as I can neither understand nor reciprocate these subtle and confusing cues, I feel #foreveralone.

Rudy Simone touches upon this subject (re:sexypantsness & dating) in Aspergirls, and the entire chapter is marked to hell with OMGWTFBBQs and exclamation points because finally, finally, FINALLY someone GETS it and explains it in a way that makes it seem like I'm not a pouty, whiny thirteen-year-old who thinks it's the end of the world because a boy did not ask her to the middle school dance. It runs deeper than that. WAY deep, like in the way that my brain is wired. Here is the thing she said (one of them, anyway) that makes SO MUCH SENSE to me: "Informed thought-out choices are the best ones as opposed to 'love at first sight' for an Aspergirl, simply because we don't read others' intentions all that well at first, and we may take longer to get to know someone. Ideally we must try and take our time."

The extent to which this profoundly touched me cannot adequately be put into words. As I've said before, a lot of my friends are procreating, living together, getting engaged, married, real life employment, and I feel like I'm absolutely drowning in all the not adult things I'm doing with my life. Simone helped me to understand that not only is this a typical thing for a lass with AS, but it is actually a GOOD thing--I mean, statistics about marriages being more successful when entered upon later in life aside, I realize that at this point in my life, I don't actually want these things. What I'm feeling is partly cultural pressure, but mostly (and more acutely) the fact that I will always be behind developmentally, and it's statistically likely that everything my friends do, I'll be doing five to ten years later.

And that's okay. Good, even.

I am where I am because I need to be. What's meant to be will always find a way. Other various cultural cliches.

Also, since my brain mostly processes things on the level of Disney, these quotes from Mulan are super applicable:

Fa Zhou: My, what beautiful blossoms we have this year. But look, this one's late. But I'll bet that when it blooms, it will be the most beautiful of all.

The Emperor of China: The flower that blooms in adversity is the most rare and beautiful of all.
Shang: Sir?
The Emperor of China: You don't meet a girl like that every dynasty.

Boom.

Ass Burger

holy christ the layout has changed on this thing DAAAAAAAAAAYUMMMM

so anyway, last week I met with the local superstar of Asperger's
and she was all
um
yep
you just spent the better part of the hour alternately staring at me without blinking slash looking at the ceiling
you, sir, are an ass burger

and so I'm kinda like
(well, more like REALLY like)
pissed off that no one was like
OHEY
you CLEARLY exhibit signs of this disorder
buuuuuuuuuuut
howbout we diagnose it as seven different other things
and drug the fuck out of you
MRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRFFFFFFFFFFFF

so I was chatting up the superstar
tellin her bout all the childhood traumas and whatnot
and then tellin her bout all the social failures
middle school
and about boy-who-I-thought-was-my-friend and all the advantage he took
because here's the thing
I'm jaded as all living fuck
but like
I'm also really naive
and I don't know how that works
well actually mostly it doesn't
but it is what it is
I am who I am
and I like me, mostly, I just want to be able to reach out to people more

cause therapist and I (not the superstar) were like
oh right
insight
YOU HAS IT
but also
YOU HAVE NO COMMON SENSE
like it literally dawned on me just two weeks ago that people view me as a sexual being

...

I have taken ALL THE WOMEN'S STUDIES CLASSES
been subject to ALL THE STREET HARASSMENT
had ALL THE PERIODS
but I guess it just never occurred to me that people view me in that way

THAT INSIGHT WOULD HAVE BEEN MUCH MORE HELPFUL A YEAR AGO
but it's not even really insight
it's just a thing
other people seem to understand it
perceive things like that
and I'm just in my own little la la land
which is fine most of the time
but like
I'd really like to not be taken advantage of
and I'd like to know if Boy at Work is really flirting with me or not
because he says yoink and shazam
and apparently that is the key to my heart

but real talk, I have NO IDEA how to fucking navigate human social relations
especially sexypants ones
I can't tell if he is equally as oblivious of social cues as I am
or if he's like...#giggity but we work together so is sneakypants about it
pretty much until someone is like
look
I want to stick my penis inside of you
I am like
LUUUUUUUUUURRRRRDERPA NOT UNDERSTAND

I feel really helpless about this
and logic-me knows I have agency
and that this is something I can work on
and that in all honesty, I am probably much more endearing and funny because of it
but I just don't want to be all heartbroken again
cause that shit is the WORST

and sometimes I feel like everything is a giant lie
because so much of communication isn't even words, it's body language
and if reading facial minutia was a class
I would do the opposite of pass it
like
WHY CAN'T PEOPLE JUST FUCKING SAY WHAT THEY MEAN
within reason

but you know
one thing Superstar said about people with Asperger's really stuck with me
and I wish I could remember what she said exactly
but it was something to the effect of
she knows a woman with it
who lives so honest a life
so earnestly
that Superstar is almost jello that she doesn't get to experience the world the way that Woman with Asperger's does

so I'm like
cool
I'm special
CA$HMONEY

and I think I'm ramblin on meow but really I guess I'm just super thankful for all the people that I love
who love me for me
Ass burger and all

Shit's Real Whack

I haven't updated in forever
Mostly because nothing ever happens to me
Scratch that
Aggressively bad things keep happening
But like
They're #firstworldproblems bad things
And sometimes I'm just like
Self
Shut up.
Just shut THE FUCK UP
Because okay, yeah, it sucks that YET ANOTHER DENTIST has fucked up THE SAME GODDAMN TOOTH
And YES YOU WILL HAVE TO PAY A FUCKTON TO REPAIR IT BECAUSE EVERY DENTIST IS AN INCOMPETENT SADIST AND INSURANCE COMPANIES LIKE TO DO THE OPPOSITE OF INSURE YOU
But like
There are fucking people
IN THE UNITED STATES
Living in GODDAMN SHANTY TOWNS.
TOWNS COMPRISED OF TIN
WHERE THEY WORK IN MINES
WHICH IS PROBABLY SIGNIFICANTLY WORSE THAN WHERE I WORK NOW

The other day I calculated my total debt, finally
And I was like...$75,000? that doesn't even seem like a real number
I actually have more private loans than I do federal
A DERPA DERR
Because I had zero conceptualization of money as a senior in high school
Because those dumb fucks who ran the school were all
"Oh, college prep, you should probably take Trig 3 and calc, because those are certainly real things that you will encounter in your everyday life"
as opposed to
"ORIGHT, you're seventeen and you know shit about shit, how bout we setcha up with a nice consumer math?"
Well that would be RIDICULOUS
Because everyone know that consumer math is for POOR PEOPLE who can't afford to hire accounts or whatever the fuck people who deal with money are called

RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE

So then I just get in this super unhealthy spiral
Of feeling SUPER GUILTY that I'm privileged enough to have even GOTTEN loans to go to a place like Allegheny
But then also realizing that I graduated with a bunch of fucks who are all
WHY YES WE SUMMER IN THE CAYMAN ISLANDS. BECAUSE THAT SOUNDS LIKE A DEFINITELY NOT MADE UP PLACE AND WE LIKE TO USE SEASONS AS VERBS AND WEAR FUCKING NORTHFACE AND GO ON SO MANY ADVENTURES.

The point of me staying at home was to get mentally well enough to move. And really, it's not happening. One, because these fucks NEVER CALL ME BACK. Like. Maybe if you deal with psychically damaged people, you maybe inform them if you're just going to up and leave for weeks at a time, so they don't irrationally convince themselves that you hate them and then they stop seeking psychological services altogether and then get WAY WORSE than they were before?

I just
UGH
I really want out of Erie
It's just a bad situation all around
But I BARELY make even working 40+ hours a week at my current job
And all my savings were wiped out the one year I didn't take out a private loan

I get so stuck
And I feel so helpless
And really, I'm not even depressed
At least on a neurochemical level
I just need new people, new experiences
Non-northwestern Pennsylvania type things

I wanna fall in love
I wanna set the world on fire
I wanna vigilante the shit out of some shady-ass dentists

But I feel like that's gonna keep not happening because A) I am terrified of losing the safety net I have when I'm at home, minimal as it is; B) I am brokeasfuuuuuuuuck; C) I have zero ability in relating to other human beings.

There's a quote from Dollhouse, something to the effect of "sometimes the people who most need to reach out are the least capable of it."

True. As. Shit. I am too afraid to reach out to people because of a shit ton of conditioned rejection and pride and fear.

Excuses, excuses, right?

I just wish I knew how to make it stop.