good-bye, memphis

every now and then, I've been getting these little jabs of guilt. it has taken me this long to realize I am going to miss this shit city. memphis is not a receptacle where i can abandon all of my hurt, my bad memories. it's all going to come with me. it is not this city's fault.

or the south for that matter.

i'm going to miss how clear the air is here. big open spaces where you can yell and no one will here you for miles. part of me will always want to be thirteen again, walking around in the middle of woods and laying on pavement with allison. there's some big part of my childhood that will always stay with that girl. and i have this nibbling fear that there will be no country where i'm going. if i ever find a best friend like that, where will we walk to? whose driveway will we lay in?

i don't want to forget how naive i was as a kid. i want to remember how bad it can fucking get when I read myself into a hole or play so much warcraft, i no longer have any friends i can hear without using a headset. i still can't believe how much i idolized lisa when i was younger. she was so perfect and beautiful in my mind. i think it keeps me up at night now, the thought of having a single thing in common with her. i think she really wanted us to be the same. i think she tried her hardest to make it that way. maybe we are similar. but now I get to pick the ways how. i think people are really all grey areas.

if i was less of a coward, I would call up every guy who ever thought he was in love with me and apologize to him. apologize for being so insensitive, for playing with your feelings and taking them for granted. i'm still trying to see all the things you saw in me in myself. until very recently, I don't think I had an inkling of an idea of what i problem i have with these things. i know i've laughed at the situations, but i also know now that I have permanently damaged people in this way. I am so sorry. a lot of people hurt me before i hurt you. in some ways, i am trying to get back at life for fucking me over so young. it wasn't your fault, though. I hope you have moved on. I hope you don't think about me anymore. I know saying this here doesn't make a difference because none of you will ever read it (and you'd all hate me for lumping you together like this) but I need to collect my thoughts. I regret how I tried so hard to be the perfect girl for you, and then I got bored of it and tore it all down. I am flawed. I never expect any of you to forgive me. no one deserves to be disrespected the way I did you.

as far as forgiveness goes, I am not far away enough to forgive the people that have wronged me. I can only hope that day will come.

for any person that has stayed up late talking to me-- whether we were reclining in a car, loitering in some restaurant, falling asleep on the floor or on the phone-- thank you. thank you for letting me get in your head. you will never know how much your words have shaped me.

allison. bailey. linda. liz. rose. not all women are dumb.

i can't believe all the different parts of the world i've found in this city. fuck, i can almost speak a different language now. I've made friends with people from places I barely knew existed. I make bad jokes about memphis being a cultural wasteland, but I've found everything to disprove that. I'm so behind :) i should have learned more languages.

i am really going to miss my surrogate parents. they have cared for me in ways that i never got (and probably never will get) from my biological parents. there are good people that actually care about others in this world, for sure.

i will not miss memphis drug culture. the people who do it here are beautiful and sad and pathetic and I always wanted to help all of them, but the truth of it was if I ever let myself do these sorts of things, I am among the worst. I have no more self-control than they do. I hope they all find something wonderful to hold onto that they don't have to buy or smoke away.

i can't finish this right now.