Y'know those times where you hate yourself? I have those a lot but I'm not exactly sure why. I know I can't be perfect nor do I want to be (because what's the fun in that), but I have this habit of pointing out my own flaws to myself. Probably too often. Then I recognize that one of my flaws is that I think about my flaws too much. Kinda ironic.
It started about two years ago. My best friend had left me for her boyfriend and I had one friend at school (don't get me wrong, she's a great friend), but anyways I was trying to methodologically find out why it seemed like nobody liked me. Naturally I focused on everything I thought was wrong with me. Pouring out all my emotions and frustration onto paper because I had nobody to talk to, I started to make a list of things popular people have in common. There was nothing to put on the list. There are no lists of qualities and requirements you have to have to be ‘popular’.
I realized that it's our flaws that make us who we are. An entire group of people can't be categorized into a specific list. Just like not every home in one community is the same: even if they have the same architecture, every single one has something personal to it. Everyone has something that makes them different from a group. People have different definitions of "perfect" and a lot of times these include those flaws that we think are bad but others may think are okay. I also know now that I don’t really want to be popular. It bothers me that I haven’t talked to half of the people in my grade and it makes me sad that not many people know who I am; but even so I enjoy having my close group of friends, it’s like we’re a family (a dysfunctional one but that’s why I love it). With too many friends to try and keep track of, it’s hard to get close to people. And here’s where I completely contradict myself. I’ve always wanted to be able to be close to people and have someone I can tell everything to, but at the same time I have these trust issues and don’t like to confide. I want to be able to be close to someone, but I also don’t want to get too close just to lose them. I tell my friends all the time I'm there for them to talk to if they ever need it because it's important to talk things out, and they tell me the same is true the other way around, but even when something is bothering me I have trouble talking about it.
I’ve lost too many (two is too many for me) “best friends forever” to even think that the whole concept is even possible anymore. (I'm not even really sure about what exactly a best friend is. Is it your confidante? Your partner in crime? I guess it's just whoever you feel closest to. Can you say "Oh such and such is my best friend" if they don't say the same about you? Does that even make it a whole best friend thing? Does the feeling have to be mutual? Is it awkward if someone says "You're my best friend" and they're not yours?) I know part of that is growing up and moving on, but at the same time it seems like I’m always the one that wants to keep up the friendship and the other person no longer cares. They’ve already moved on to being best friends with someone else. Even when I do occasionally talk to them, it seems like we have nothing to talk about and it just gets awkward. Things keep happening to make me think that the middle school experience I thought was fun and genuine at the time was not really that way. Experiences at the time were important to me, and I thought to my friends too, but maybe that was my own ignorance. Maybe I just didn't realize until now that my middle school experience (or what I remember of it) could have just been full of me lying to myself and not facing reality. It’s not right of me to make assumptions, but judging by the fact that I only was able to keep semi-contact with about two people from middle school, they don’t care anymore. Now when I look back at notes I have from then, I wonder if the words on the paper were even true or even if the words those people spoke to me were true. Could I have constructed my own idea of middle school? It's possible, but thinking about it won't solve anything, all I can do is move on and enjoy the company I'm with now; because if I regret the past too much, I won't see what I already have.
You're right, flaws do make up who we are. The people who look like they're perfect are just really good at acting. I'm also usually the one who wants to stay friends with people long after they've forgotten me. I kept up with all my friends from middle school longer than any of them kept up with each other. It's awkward now when I talk to the best friend I had for 9 years. She just stopped talking to me in high school, and whenever I see her every so often, we're like strangers. One time this year we managed to break the small talk and talk about real things, and for an hour it was like nothing changed, even though everything's changed. I turned to another "BFF" after she left me and all she did was make me doubt myself and make me feel like a loser. She was popular and she would just run down my life and everything that mattered to me until I couldn't even tell her anything for fear she would ruin something I cared about, and through all that, she never knew. She thought she was giving me helpful advice. I think in middle school, we're all just kids. It's not that experiences don't matter as much to other people, just that the things you do when you're a kid don't define you. It took me a while to accept that.
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