Status report: Increasingly frequent hives situationhas me reaching for the antihistamine more often than i’d like to admit. Thankfully a few natural remedies shared by a friend are working. Insomnia is also being inconvenient, but hey maybe it’s more excitement to wake up than anything?

Happy bits of the week:

1. Surprises. I an a sucker for a good surprise, and I got a few for my birthday. I was dreading the birthday, I really was. A friend offered to make dinner for the group, but was met with silence and/or no’s. I get it, people have lives, and they have their own stuff to deal with, but people get tired too you know? So when another friend organized a dinner, I got surprise flowers, congee and a cookbook, AND had a really fun day that I wasn’t expecting, it really made me grateful. For people who just show up. Even with their own shit in play. Because as mych as I hate to admit it, I do love birthdays. Maybe it’s the middle child thing. Maybe it’s something else. I don’t want to think about that right now. But suffice to say, the people that showed up, if you’re reading this, thank you. You made an anticipatedly shitty day, much less shitty.

2. Laughing way too much at silly things. When I hang out with friends from kindergarten, I have a tendency to behave a lot more towards that age than my current. The short attention span, the lame jokes, the laughing on the side (oh wait, that’s kind of me 24/7). I love hanging out with these girls i’ve known forever, knowing I don’t need to do anything or be anything outside of the person who they saw grow up from 5 years old to present. And we laugh a lot. Like a lot. And that makes me happy.

3. A zero fs friendship. In a world full of people trying to preserve an image, or be overly polite, or just plain uncomfortable, I am grateful to have a friend that is completely no filter. Any question answered. All curiosities explained. It helps me learn a lot — and I’m naturally curious about everything. Especially when people come from a different perspective. I feel like I learn something new on a regular basis. And that makes me feel a bit more engaged in a very isolated environment. And i’ll forever be grateful for the weirdness.

-J

Songs of the week:

Anti-Hero by Taylor Swift

Snap by Rosa Linn

Love Lockdown by Kanye West

Sad Forever by Lauv

Modern Loneliness by Lauv