#EyeTwitch

I do my best to be a positive person.

Lately, it's been hard. The stress of being away from F has been greater than I could have ever imagined and the lack of sleep is starting to make me a little crazy. After spending most of the last year alone, I've overcompensated by filling my days with people and I haven't taken a quarter of the alone time that I really need.

Enter the eyetwitch.

It takes a lot to really grate my nerves, and yet for the past two weeks everything has been abrasive and irritating. Little comments and actions seem huge, bad drivers seem to have multiplied and all of the stupid people in the world seem to be out in full-force when I'm in a rush to get somewhere or get something done.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Negativity spreads like wildfire. Little irritations snowball into massive pet peeves, bad days spiral into bad weeks and the next thing you know you've become that douchebag you can't stand. You're irritated just listening to yourself be irritated, you're pissed off by your own bad mood and yet you feel powerless to stop it.

Once it begins, it's almost impossible to stop it. I'm exhausted by my own exhaustion, and annoyed by my own annoyance. It's tiring and it's unfulfilling. It sucks the joy out of everything, and I've decided to put my foot down.

I can't change the past two months. I can't undo all the crap that happened, and I certainly can't go back and adjust my attitude but I can look forward. I can make sure it doesn't happen again. My patience my wear thin from time to time, but I don't have to let it get the better of me. In fact, I won't.

I've decided to implement a 10-minute rule.

I can bitch and complain for 10-minutes every day, and then put it all away. Whether it's a person at work, the ass who cut me off in rush hour traffic or the neighbours who play their music too loud, I can complain for 10 minutes. I can be angry, sad, annoyed, frustrated, WHATEVER for 10 minutes and then I have to let it fly.

I can't take on the frustrations of others. I'm too empathetic. I will tune out the "Debbie Downers" and I'll ignore the gloomy moods that I run into in class or the office. I'll be the irritating, cheerful person that all the cranky people can't stand.

And they can bitch about me all they want.

#EyeTwitch

#EndRant

Ignore-A-Text

I suck at dating.

I hate hurting people's feelings or letting someone down. I'm genuinely flattered by someone's interest, but I also get sick of people way too quickly. I consider it nothing shy of a miracle that I've been in 4 long-term relationships, although I'm just realizing now that all of them (including my marriage) were long-distance for the most part. It's now less surprising that I put up with those people for so long, but I digress.

People.

Upon moving into the city, I had decided that I was going to meet lots of new people whether at school, at the park or through friends new and old. I planned on having an open mind, going on dates and just having fun, so I did. I met new people. I went on dates and I had fun just being out, but I'm stuck with what you might call some "clingers" now.

Avoiding future "dates" by being "super busy" didn't solve the problem, so I decided to gently lay it all out on the table with the age-old "I'm don't feel like I can get involved" line. That didn't seem to work either. So now I'm just straight-up ignoring the texts. Lucky for me, the phone hasn't started ringing. If it does, I might have a meltdown.

These were genuinely nice guys: they were kind, funny,  attractive and they had jobs (bonus!). For about a week, I thought I was really into one of them but that faded after his 476th text. Another I only met once for coffee, but he's asked me out about two dozen times since then. I haven't responded to the last text asking me to go out this week. I've run out of excuses and "Sorry, but I'm obviously less interested than you are" just seems a little too harsh.

Maybe I'll just be super busy for another little while until they run out of energy. Or interest.

Whichever comes first.