The Right to be Ridiculous

I’ve gotten over the shock of going to college and being away from my parents. I’ve accepted that the people I live with are beezeys (well, some), but right now I question every little thing that goes through my mind. I’ve started questioning who I am to a large degree. I’ve decided (for now) that I’m going to be an anthropologist, and possibly an archaeologist, so that’s out of the way, but other things, primarily my social life has come into question. I feel dumb. In high school, I thought myself in the top ten percent of smarts. At least, I felt I was smarter than a lot of people who had higher grades than I. I just chose to not care about grades so I didn’t do homework and my grades consequently suffered. But I still thought of myself as “smart.” I’m questioning that now. Seriously questioning that. I’m at a school with a LOT of smart people. And quite honestly, I feel dumb. People never used to question things I said, and now I get challenged on facts I believe to be true on a daily basis in casual conversation. I question almost everything that I think about saying now. I’ve become a lot more awkward than I used to be around people. I’m intimidated now, so I keep my mouth shut or just pretend to be dumb on purpose so people will think I’m being silly and ignore me. I’m having a lot of difficulty finding a place where I feel comfortable. I haven’t felt “at home” yet here in Davis. I prefer here more than San Mateo, but it’s not “home” the way Aragon was for me most of the time. My wit that I valued so much in high school has evaporated. Maybe that’s because the people I hold company with didn’t understand my brand of wit so I stopped, or maybe I was never all that witty in the first place and I just sucked the wit from my high school friends. That’s concerning me. I’ve always had a tendency to over think things and make situations more difficult for myself than they need to be, and that hasn’t changed  at all. I always look from the other person’s perspective in every situation. I know that’s a good thing a lot of the time, but I usually find a way to blame myself (or at least not blame the other party) for every issue I come across. I suffer from chronic empathy. And that makes it a lot harder for me to go “well fuck off then” to people who don’t like me. I want everyone to like me. I know how ridiculous that is, and very impossible, but I still want that. I feel unhappy if someone doesn’t like me. And because of that, few people do truly like me because I try so hard to please everyone. I’m very happy with the people I can call my close friends now, but I always want more. I’m never really satisfied. I KNOW how dumb I can be. Trust me, there’s no need for you to point it out to me, I know. I KNOW how ridiculous I can be, I just can’t deal with changing it. I don’t know how. I am so confused right now I don’t know what to do. My mind is always going at a million miles per hour and I can’t stop it, coffee or no coffee.

I thought I knew who I was, and now I have to reevaluate everything. I’ve decided to cut my coffee addiction because I thought that would be good for me. After day four, I stopped craving it. I think I’m okay, but I am so easily distracted now. I’m not all present. I was riding my bike and I don’t know what happened, I stopped paying attention and I came within five inches of running over this girl who was walking her bike. I just… zone out. I don’t think about anything in particular, at least nothing I can remember (I’m probably thinking, just not paying attention. Like a dream you don’t remember the next morning), I just look down at my wheel turning or something and keep going forward. This isn’t good. I’m questioning other aspects of my life, some that I don’t want to spell out for the rest of the world to read, but that’s leaving me rather dazed and confused. I don’t know who I am, and I don’t know how long it’s going to take me to figure out. I always think to myself “things will be better once I move out of the dorms.” But will they? Really? I like to think so because I like the people I’m moving in with, but I don’t know if that will answer my confusion. I’m just going to keep going day by day and wait for things to get better. That’s the best I can do.