WARNING: This post rambles. I'm verbose today. Sorry.
It sucks. It really does.
Someone (who quite clearly thinks the sun shines out of my armpit) said when I told him I was grumpy as I was too hot "This is you grumpy? Man, I'd love to see you happy. Well, we do most weeks and we do enjoy you happy or grumpy."
My outward face is bubbly, perhaps too bubbly. It's draining. It's false.
*breathes deep breath before launching into this next section*
More is being made of me not driving. Just comments from various people - a snide "well, clearly you shouldn't always depend on other people to drive you" from a woman at orchestra, an inquisitive "are you ever going to learn to drive?" from my brother after driving me to a gig venue 20 minutes away (I paid for his petrol, and gave him cake as a thank you). I couldn't entertain the thought of driving the moment I turned 17, it was too scary. Living was too scary actually, let alone driving. Now, people are starting to question it more - as I had my Mum drive me to my concert venues and back over the weekend (5 hours worth of driving) and people think my Mum "shouldn't" do that. They think I've got a selfish mental block about it.
I'm petrified, in a way, of failing. Of being completely incompetent at driving. My concentration can be a bit lacking, what if I'm seen as a complete dunce? If I simply can't manage it, and this air of being highly intelligent gives way to the air of "unable to drive a car"?
I'm petrified, in a way, of being successful. On the darkest nights, knowing I could start a car and drive away probably isn't a particularly safe thing. Knowing that if I needed I could get myself to A&E on my own (the lack of good public transport to local A&Es has been a deciding factor in not hurting myself in the last few months) could lead to things. Knowing if I went completely unhinged and ended up stealing a car (I haven't in past periods of being unhinged, but logic is the first thing to give at such times...) I could drive it into a wall/tree/off a bridge/whatever even if I didn't own a car myself is definitely a bad thing.
Then there's the time issue - my self-assured confident eager-to-drive sister turns 17 in 8 months time, I couldn't face being "overtaken" in the learning to drive process by her. And with all the crap I've got going on with driving and the fact life is hectic as it is, am I really likely to pass within 8 months? Doubt it. Yes, it would (if I kept myself safe/didn't drive off to remotest western Scotland without telling anyone etc) change my independence levels hugely. I'd not be reliant on others for the things I am reliant on them for now. But, given that actually my life is a fine balance which sometimes feels a bit precarious anyway, adding in driving seems counter-intuitive. I'd love to snap my fingers, and be able to drive safely and keep myself safe and be independent. I'm just not yet convinced I can. It feels defeatist to be nearly 21 and still not have even ever sat in the driver's seat of the car, let alone tried to drive, and thus am unable to drive - practically everyone learns at 17 around here. I don't know. I feel like I'm fighting against people just because they think I should have (in a way, from how they react) been forced to learn several years ago.
*takes a few deep breathes*
I'm tired. That tiredness where yawns appear from dawn 'til dusk. It is draining being "public figure Hannah". Yesterday, I retreated to bed for the afternoon - got no uni work done at all. Today is too busy for uni work. Tomorrow I've got to do uni work, teach, choir and deal with the plumber (who cut the wrong pipe in my office today and had water flowing out into the room whilst he realised he didn't know where the mains pipe into the house was...). It just feels tiring. Tiring to keep up this appearance which means that everyone thinks the sun shines out of my armpit. I didn't plan this armpit/sun situation. It wasn't what being "recovered" *shudders at the word* was meant to be.
It is easy to say yes though. To allow the person who asked for the favour to feel relieved that what they needed doing will get done. That smile which spreads across faces when I say "I'll sort it" to people is worth the hassle of then actually doing it.
That face, if I have to say no, that "Oh, OK..." comment is horrible.
I like helping out. I'm aware that I can't always say yes, usually as a result of saying yes to something else before that which clashes.
I like people being happy or relieved or whatever I can do to help. I have a knack of stepping in and sorting things, I'm good in a crisis apparently - I swing into action and get things under control. If I can make other's lives easier somehow, why shouldn't I? So many times, as I sit surrounded in papers head in hands regularly, people say "you need to learn that two letter word starting with an N and ending in an O". Pleasing people helps me somehow reconcile myself with those teenage destructive years that everyone around me put up with.
I want to say "love me, somebody, anybody, love me for who I am". I'm at a point where actually loneliness is it a bit rife (more than a bit, actually. Turns out I don't want a solitary life.). Problem is, I've created this "superwoman-esque" pedestal. I used to say "it's lonely at the top" when I felt hugely more academic/bright compared my peers and like they couldn't comprehend me - I was this frighteningly smart kid so no-one wanted to be around me, now I've decided actually it is just lonely full stop. I'm not at the top anymore, the world is bigger than the 1000 strong group of students at a secondary school, but it is lonely nonetheless.
Frequenting groups where I'm the only woman, or the only person under 65, or both, or am in positions of responsibility which others feel uncomfortable with, means I have to prove myself. Prove myself to be worthy of being the accepted unusual one. The young woman amongst the set-in-stone (usually male) older community. Proving myself has made me, in a way, TOO efficient. Too brilliant.
Just would like, just occasionally if that's all that could be managed, people to see me, flaws and all. Would stop them admiring me. See past the superwoman façade, realise I'm just human. And not anything more spectacular then they are.
Blah. It sucks. It really does. And this conflict goes on and on and on. Loneliness. A hug would be good and not one from my clingy 16 year old sister who likes me being the shape I am now as I "feel nice" to hug (I was "too fat to hug" before, of course she wasn't fully grown then, but that's besides the point).
Blah. Now I have to leave my room and do 2 hours of 'cello playing. 'Cello playing means 'cello hugging. Hugging my 'cello is one thing but it isn't quite what I'm looking for at the moment.
*puts on my smiley bubbly head and goes out*
