If You Don't Have A Date, Celebrate

At age 23 (fine, I’m 2 weeks shy of 23.  Sue me), I can, on most days, say that I am pretty confident with who I am, both physically and mentally.  I go through each day without being too preoccupied with what others think, because I’m only a little preoccupied with what others think, because I’m 23.  I woke up this morning freaking the geek out about my “future”, and getting a job and whatever, but then I had a coffee, laughed at myself and continued with my day.

Anyway, after years of looking at other seemingly more attractive/funny/girly girls with a “why aren’t I like them” attitude, wondering why they are in relationships while I’m at home watching TLC’s What Not To Wear with my friend on the phone so we can play by play it, I’m pretty satisfied with the woman I have become, and continue to become.

So why is there a little piece of myself that feels inadequate in some way because there isn’t a guy who wants to spend time with me for no reason other than to spend time with me?  Why isn’t loving myself enough for me? 

I know a handful of people who have trouble reconciling these two… things:  being satisfied with oneself yet still feeling lonely and in need of feeling loved/cared for/thought about by someone else. 

And I have no fucking clue how to do it.  And the more I think about it the more I don’t know.  I guess its just on two different planes, the love you give to yourself and the love you get from others.  One is basically completely dependent on yourself and your self-reflection, but the other is just completely out of your control.  If someone loves you then they love you.  You’ll never really know how or why, because they see you in a way you can never see you. 

And as much as it hurts and as much as it sucks when its not reciprocated, I guess you just have to keep trying to love people?  But, like, don’t get me wrong, I am SO not there.  Most people are still the worst for me.  Sorry.  Because I’m 23 and I over-think everything on every possible level, which is definitely a problem (sometimes).  But really, when it comes right down to it, some people love you and some don’t.

So maybe that’s it.  Sometimes things happen and sometimes they don’t.  And I guess we just have to deal.  But most of the time, I think most of us are better than fine.

The Howl of the Feminist Werewolf

Oh hi there,

 

It seems like we kind of dove into things a bit quickly, and while we're not all about making the first move, we at feministwerewolf are all about love and respect and manners… and burgers.  Especially burgers.  

So let's get to know each other.  Grab a seat - your burger, with a side of hopeful angst, is on its way.

Here’s the deal: This blog may be called feministwerewolf, and while it's mostly about the trials and tribulations of being a 20-year-old female, its kind of about all of us.  

I was sitting with my two other, uh, werewolves, tonight and what started as a debate over what to order for dinner, suddenly turned into an in-depth share session.  Six hours later, we were still hungry, but learned that in our three different upbringings, we shared not only similar memories, but similar emotions associated with these memories.

Which is a pretty cool thing if you think about it, that we can all have these pseudo-shared experiences that transcend most cultural, gender, and religious boundaries.  Some of us may have been happy (or whatever), some of us not so much.  Some of us are hungry right now, some of us aren’t (haha, just kidding, we’re all always hungry.  Where’s the cheeseplate?)  But even if my experience of love or happiness or hunger differs from yours, we all know what it’s like to feel something. 

Lauren spoke about the conflict between ones emotions and reason, and I believe wholeheartedly that we, especially as women who are constantly pegged as being "too sensitive" or "overly emotional", need to give our feelings and experiences more credit.  The things that we say and feel and do matter, and discrediting them just seems unfair. 

I mean, our own understanding of the world is all we have, so shouldn’t we pay attention to our emotions and perceptions? It’s one of the saddest things when I encounter people who feel bad about feeling bad.  This is all you have!  Your feelings are yours!  You need them.  They let you know what’s up.  Otherwise they’ll just build up before manifesting themselves as some kind of peptic ulcer.  And I don’t know about you, but I’d rather just let my sadness run its course than cough up blood… but that’s just me.

Sruti said it once and I’ll say it again, we all need to stop for a minute and realize that we are, fundamentally, all the same.  We also need to understand that this is important.  We need to stop being so scared of this insanely huge community of weirdos that we’re all a part of, and we need to help each other out. 

I affect others, and you affect me, things leave marks, and our decisions have value.  Our lives are basically one giant high-risk pick-your-own-ending Goosebumps novel.  Except you know yourself better than R.L. Stine.  And your life has fewer vampires/haunted houses/monsters under your stairs (probably, maybe).

So, this blog was created for two reasons (probably more, but we’ll spare you):

1)             We want people to know that we’re all pretty much in the same boat.  So let’s all be friends!  Also, send us your stuff.  Also, I'm sure there are probably only 4 people reading this so... send us your stuff.

2)             We have a lot of time/ideas on our hands and we like whining on the Internet.

 

That’s not to say that this blog won’t have its fair share of videos of cats fighting fax machines, Sex and the City clips, and yes, the occasional male-oriented rant (c'mon, we're still 22 year old women, okay).  Anyway, we like to try to keep a nice balance here. 

Be open.  Be weird.  Get mad.  Try to find what makes you happy, and then maybe get mad again.  

Welcome to feministwerewolf.  We hope to see you back here real soon.  We love you.  So does this dog.