I admit it. I have before. I am constantly diluting myself for men so I don’t scare them off. And the constant manipulation of my own brain has given me a headache. It has turned me into this lesser, Manhattan-fashioned imitation of myself.
There was someone, once. Just once. He is far away now. And although we don’t speak anymore, I must admit he was the only one who could manage to keep up. Well he certainly tried. But then, you know, it gets tiring. It gets exhausting. I have been told that by men: I am exhausting to keep up with. So then they bolt. Or I get bored.
Is it any wonder all of my exboyfriends live in different time zones? That the closest one is, last I heard, in northern California, another is in Hawaii, and one more in England?
Listen: I know I am exhausting. I exhaust myself. I thought I had mono for the past month before I realized I just needed to have a martini and turn my brain off. Perhaps it’s why I drink. Perhaps it’s why my writing is simultaneously self-involved and detachedly esoteric, full of little buried blips of puns and planned-out internal cadence.
Here is a secret: Every therapist I saw growing up eventually told me the same thing. They told me I think too much.
I wonder about the line I crossed that separates just enough from too much. And I wonder if I could, or would ever want to, stop myself from crossing it.
