It's Not Irony, It's Just What Happened

(August 25, 2002)

(Addendum, October 14, 2002: Hey kids, I'm tacking on this addendum nearly two months after writing the below entry, out of a sense of fairness to Joe. See, we had this big huge enormous twister of a fight, but it blew through. It decimated the barn but didn't touch the house. A wise person once said, "I can erase what I have written, but I cannot unwrite it." True words, those. Though I can't delete this 8/25/02 entry where I opened this vein (I was just so, so hurt I couldn't even see straight), I'd like to point out that Joe Kowalski is a good boy, not an asshole. Loyal like Lassie and sharp like that knife that cuts a tin can. I appreciate him and and am happy to count him among my friends. If in another two months there's another addendum taking back any of this, you can just look me in the eye and kick me in the stomach for being too stupid to live. But I don't think that'll happen. Thank you. Good bye.)

_________________

August 25, 2002

You're all freaked out that yesterday's entry consisted of nothing more than an Alanis Morissette song about everything blowing up in your face. I can feel you all out there, cringing and weeping and wringing your hands. Well. She's just so pissed off. Sometimes you just need to look to someone more pissed off than you are, and thus, find yourself at peace again.

Joe Kowalski hurt my feelings. A swift, brutal kick to the ego, you do not expect from a close friend. And, twin facts sit goofily side by side mocking me like Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-fucking-dumber: 1) He didn't mean to burn me and 2) That it's even having an effect on me at all reveals that I'm a lot more shallow than I thought I was.

Shallow. Not a good color on me.

All it is, when you strip away all the bows and bells and bangles and baubles and beads, is: if Joe had to make a list of his friends in order of their attractiveness, I'd be somewhere between, I'm guessing, Mindy Cohn and probably, like, Walter Matthau. Yeah I know Walter Matthau is dead. And not that Joe knows Mindy Cohn nor Walter Matthau. Just say.

The conversation during which this became clear isn't important. Actually, the whole damn thing isn't important. I never, once, in my whole entire life, felt like "the pretty one." The funny one, yeah. The smart one. The nice one--- or, the bitchy one-- and often, all on the same day. Sometimes, "different."

Different is nice, but it sure isn't pretty
Pretty is what it's about
I never met anyone who was different who couldn't figure that out
So beautiful, I'd never live to see.

That's from A Chorus Line. I fucking love that show.

I'm not Angelina Jolie. This is not news to me. But still. It's one thing to know inside that you're not anyone's idea of perfect. It's quite another to get it right in the teeth. You know the sinking feeling of, when you're little, in the playground, and some adult is forcing the kids into teams for kickball or softball or fuckball or whatever, and you hear the words "okay, choose sides." Now, somehow, and I don't know how this can be, given the science of averages and all, but everybody knows the embarrassment, the bright pain and misery of being chosen last. This is like that. The whole rest of the school day, you can't even look up from your Buster Browns lest someone, dear god, see that you're doing all you can to not let the brimming tears actually fall.

Gym teachers should all be taken out and shot.

So. Though it doesn't matter (there's zero reason that it's important that my friends think I'm cute), it kind of knocked the wind out of me. It also knocked the mojo out of me. I'd lost my groove. I'd misplaced my whole head. And I'd had NO idea my ego was this fragile. And here's what's fucked up: The person I felt most like talking about it with... is the one that hefted the scimitar in the first place. And it's not like there's anything he can do about it. It's like when someone tries to convince me that I should like beets. I do not like beets. Don't try to tell me I just don't know how great the beets are. Beets are gross. Beets made me hurl a whole dinner when I was eleven. And believe me, they're even worse coming up than they are going down.

So let's review: A) what's the difference one way or another? None. And B) See A.

But still. This is one of those times when my natural pragmatism (Taurus, you know) takes a break to go curl up in the corner and cry. I have this thing where, when I'm most vulnerable, I return to the rageful, irrational expressions of my childhood. To wit...NO FAIR!

So. Fabulousness Meter resting at zero. Flame doused. Engine, stone cold. Not good. I'm Lexi. Where is my fabulousness. How could this have happened? So I called for reinforcements. Friday night, it was me and the best woman in my life, the one and only Laura, one excellent joint, three bottles of wine, two packs of cigarettes, one small onion pizza, and enough girl talk and wound-licking for a John Hughes film festival.

Saturday, I slept all day. Saturday night, I looked up from my Buster Browns and found reasons to be, once again, fabulous, darling. A little, anyway. I'm comin' back...

(Footnote: I'm not mad at Joe. As I said, my fractured ego is really a stupid thing to ramble on about. I plan to resume our friendship as soon as I can stand to look at him again without wanting to disappear.)