Wake me up when the revolution begins

This morning I am giving my English comp class a diagnostic exam to see where exactly their writing skills are, this is standard department procedure. I usually have a question ready for them before hand but it slipped my mind so I had planned on coming to work a bit early and grabbing one out of my desk of ones I have already used. On Good Morning America though I found my question. It seems that a new MTV survey given to 13-24 year olds found that they are happier in most cases than I and my generation of Xer’s were at their age. So, I asked them this question (poorly stated as I was rushing): “In a recent MTV pool 13-24 year olds are mostly happy with their lives; write an essay explaining why you are or are not happy with your current life.” They are now pressing pen to paper and I am watching them and hoping that they are not too nervous about their first essay. They of course are.

This whole topic of happiness has gotten me to think about my own happiness. I would have to say that between the ages of 13-24 I wasn’t happy in a lot of ways. Not only with my own life, which was a disaster in most ways( but a beautiful and adventurous one that was full of laughter and hi jinx that I look but on fondly now since I know it is where I came form and has made me who I am) but I also was not really happy with the state of the world around me. I am happy now in many ways with my own self but I am not happy with the state of the world I live in. I know that I don’t really do as much as I could to change things but I do try to do little things like write letters to China, fill up my car at night, etc… and in general talk about the issues. I also vote. I have voted in every election since I was 18 when Clinton was first running for office. When I asked my class how many were register only 5 or so raised their hands (I have 17 in this class, two of my students are over 24 and only one of them raised their hand) and when I asked how many had voted in the last election only 3 raised their hands! THREE!!! I know that when people are happy they tend to be less political but give me a break. Are these kids just blind to what is going on around them? We’re in the middle of what I am sure of will be this generations Vietnam, the environment is in ruins, and there are so many other things going wrong in our world and it is just like they do not care at all.

On the other hand they’re have been some studies that have concluded that this generation is more aware of the world and it’s state since September 11^th. I do have quite a few friends who are 19-24 and they, themselves, are very concerned about what is going on in the world and are community organizers in many ways. These are the people I have become close to in the last year not only for myself but also for Sid. I want him to look up to, not the people in the media, Paris Hilton or whoever. So, far I think I have made the right choice as he is trying to start a peace group at his school and is making anti-war shirts.

This brings me to my next gripe, why are there no real youth movements for change the US right now? The last one I can think of is “Rock the Vote” which did do wonders and probably help get Clinton elected in ’92, but I don’t see my own 18-24 year old students doing much of anything. I am hoping I am wrong about this and that the are pockets of underground revolt and I am just not cool enough at my age to be invited into these inner circles of planning and prep but as soon as the revolution begins I will be allowed to walk arm and arm with my brothers and sisters (Ok, I know that sounded a bit cheesy) and hold up my fist and sing “We’re not going to take it” or some such song.

I am in Muskogee, OK spending some time with Nathan before I start classes and teaching again next week. Things were a bit rough when I arrived here on Monday. We were never able to catch one of Nathan’s cats, Jerry, and a plant, that was dear to him and the oldest one he had was stolen out of my yard when I had briefly taken it out of my car to go pick up my mom from Walgreens because her car would not start. I felt horribly guilty about it the whole drive from ICT to here. Nathan was a very distanced and tired on Monday, so I allowed him to be that way. I’m ok with people feeling that way as long as it is not affecting me. If I think someone is really hurting I will reach out and comfort them as best I can.

Yesterday, I read through a blog on myspace that Nathan had written a day before about my belief that we do not “fall” in love but we choose to love. At first I was a bit excited about the fact he was discussing the way I felt about something so openly but as I went on the read it I found myself sitting in front of the screen shaking and crying. He had written in depth about his feeling for his ex calling that relantionship “the most honest, satisfying, and gratifying” of his life thus far and that they were “perfect” and he had thought her as his soul mate (I don’t believe in soul mates in the way that we often think that someone has just one. I think that there are many people who can be one’s soul mate at different times in one’s life) . He then went on to explain how our relantionship was “real” and explanation of the differences between the two made no sense to me. I seem to think that if this relantionship is “real” then it has to be must be honest, satisfying and gratifying in order to qualify as “real.” I have struggled with this for two days now and after many e-mail exchanges with my mother and my friend Mara, and some quality time with just myself today, I have just decided to try and let it go. I am having a hard time with letting it go though and am feeling horribly insecure but in a much better mood than I was in yesterday.

Insecurity is something I am plagued with. I always feel like I’m in second place somehow. Good, but not quite good enough. I can trace this feeling back through years and years of relationships with family, friends, and lovers. In the end, it makes me feel horribly lonely.

Before I read that blog, I had never ever felt that way with Nathan. I had one brief moment of odd fidgetiness, but after I talked to him about how I felt at that moment while sitting in the rain at the Vagabond, it was gone. Now; though, I can’t seem to shake it. He’s tried, hard, to reassure me everything is going to be fine. Has said all the right and sweet things that someone should say and I still feel just sad. I ‘m jealous. I want this to be the most satisfying and gratifying relantionship of both our lives.

For a while, before Nathan and I started dating, I was coming to grips with the fact that I may just be alone for most of the rest of my life with a few short lived affairs to satisfy sexual desire as it arose. I was beginning to be ok and coming to terms that I may never have a life partner and planning a path for myself that would be fulfilling and happy alone. When I started dating Nathan my thoughts started to change a bit. Most of the time when I am sleeping next to someone I can’t really sleep and have been know to sneak out in the middle of the night, but that thought had never crossed my mine till yesterday (I almost left in the middle of the day while he was at work so I would not have to face him when he came home, I was convinced not to by a priest who gave Jack some water while I was taking him for a walk), and now I seem to be questioning and doubting everything I had came to believe as true in my own foggy plans and am having to resort things out in my mind and rethink what I was beginning to trust and believe in. I have never been able to spend a lot of one-on-one time with someone and just be myself, because even though I am a fairly social animal in public, but at home I have a hard time spending too much time with just one person besides Sid, but with Nathan it has always come natural and has seemed altogether enjoyable.


But, I am fearful. I have seen what my own insecurity has done in my past relationships. I have torn down walls and pushed many decent men away in the process and I am scared that I could begin on that path again if I do not pay close and careful attention to what exactly I am doing.

I can’t help, though, to feel sad that he may not feel the same passion for me as I have for him. But, than who am I to judge? I forget sometimes that I am just one person with no real power.

In may ways, I feel that true freedom comes in one of two ways, being totally alone and accepting the aloneness as your fate or by being totally with a lover and accepting that as reality. In either I feel that personal growth can happen but I have found through my own experience that I am the sort of person who is able to grown more when I am with someone than by myself. I think I need that security for some reason. Is this because as a child I felt so alone all the time? I should think about that more.

In the end, I know what he wrote was not really meant to hurt me but to somehow honor me. I knew it when I was reading it. I understand that hurt comes in two ways: the kind of hurt we do intentionally and the kind of hurt that happens when we are really honest with one another. It was the wording that has bruised me. Words are powerful and dangerous things. They are in constant flux and often can be misread even when what we say we mean with a clear heart and good intention. What qualifies as perfect for me may mean something entirely different to him, but when I think of it that way I feel awfully confused and bewildered. It is my own interruption of his words that is causing my insecurity and suffering. But, until yesterday I had thought of this relantionship as just that, perfect. I had bragged to a couple of girl’s when they were complaining about their dating troubles on Final Friday last month that I had absolutely nothing to complain about because I was in a very stable and happy relantionship that was as near perfect as I had ever hoped to have in this life. I continued to tell then it was full of trust and honestly and was probably the healthiest and happiest I have ever been with a man that I loved.

I realize that this is all my problem to solve.

But, I am at an almost complete lost on how to go about doing that.

As cliché as it is—

Old habits are hard to break.

It is not as easy as it seems to just change the whole way you have thought your whole life. If I were not such a coward I would just ask for his help. But, that may be too much of a burden for him to bear.

At times it is too much for me to bear. . .