kerouac says

for someone who thinks neediness is possibly one of the least attractive states ever, i am way needy. it's a hard thing to handle publicly; if you share these need-feelings, the people on the other side maybe feel obligated to try to give it to you--or maybe they don't, which is maybe worse. and i guess that's why you'd air something like that. because there's an empty place, and it wants to have something in it. and while asking is hard, asking and not getting is the sort of thing that makes me crawl under the bed.

and maybe it's harder, too, when what you want is more of someone, or of people in general. i remember when we got engaged, the monkey started his preamble with a statement--a wonderful one, a loving one--about how i was his best friend. i think that this is true, and also reciprocated. there isn't anyone i'd rather do stuff with, just generally. no one hears more of the stuff that lives in my guts, and no one is makes me laugh harder. but apart from that one lovely moment, when i think about being besties with your spouse, it . . . you know, it sounds a little sad. not because it's an inappropriate relationship to have with your Relationship, but because i was always lead to believe i would find myself with access to both. you get a spousefriend and you get somebody, even somebodies, who's a really close friend you don't make out with. women people, even. or people who knew you from before. or people you can vent to about your husband never deals with the mail.

(it's fine. this is not about the mail. he and i are way good.)

i don't know when friends start becoming friends-in-theory, at what point distance becomes something semi-permanent rather than something you try to compensate for, or if there's anything to be done about that. distance and change and full lives make for this kind of stuff, i guess. maybe this is an empty place that's solved not by filling, but by agreeing to let it be empty for a while. but shouldn't we work to keep the good people close to us? maintaining relationships is good, important work. is letting go really the answer when what you're letting go of--something like friendship, or intimacy, or love--is so valuable and so necessary, and so hard to recover when it gets far away? and when the empty place really is very achy without it?

i really do spend most of the time thinking that something is wrong with me. which, i know: melodrama! but that's not so strange; i think most people probably do that. i don't know what i'm saying, except that no matter what you want, there are going to be people out there who seem to have it in spades, and mourning over your lack is probably going to pickle you from the guts outward.

and if you ask someone to spend more time with you, or to be interested in your stuff, and then they don't or aren't, i think you just have to grow something (thicker skin/wings/imaginary friends/a set of brass ones) and start playing solitaire. for a while, maybe, until the wind changes. god. who knew trying to have friends would be so much like dating?









(p.s.: wind, i am ready for a change.)