Leave an extrovert alone for two minutes and he will reach for his cell phone. In contrast, after an hour or two of being socially “on,” we introverts need to turn off and recharge. My own formula is roughly two hours alone for every hour of socializing. This isn’t antisocial. It isn’t a sign of depression. It does not call for medication. For introverts, to be alone with our thoughts is as restorative as sleeping, as nourishing as eating. Our motto: “I’m okay, you’re okay—in small doses.
Love isn’t her calming you down when you yell. It’s her yelling, just as loud, just as hard, right back at you, right in your face to wake you up and to keep you grounded. It isn’t her or him bringing you roses everyday or cute things that make your relationship appear more presentable. It’s after a long fight, that drains the life and bones right out of you both, and yet her showing up at your door the next morning anyway. It’s not her saying all the right things or knowing exactly how to handle you. So no, it’s not her caressing your hair and telling you everything is going to be alright. It’s her standing there, admitting she’s just as scared as you are.
It’s time to train yourself
to sleep alone again
and it’s so fucking hard.
to sleep alone again
and it’s so fucking hard.
For fear you will be alone
you do so many things
that aren’t you at all
you do so many things
that aren’t you at all
She wasn’t doing a thing that I could see, except standing there leaning on the balcony railing, holding the universe together.
Sorry about the bony elbows, sorry we lived here, sorry about the scene at the bottom of the stairwell and how I ruined everything by saying it out loud. Especially that, but I should have known. You see, I take the parts that I remember and stitch them back together to make a creature that will do what I say or love me back. I’m not really sure why I do it, but in this version you are not feeding yourself to a bad man against a black sky prickled with small lights. I take it back. The wooden halls likes caskets. These terms from the lower depths. I take them back.
I felt like crying but nothing came out. it was just a sort of sad sickness, sick sad, when you can’t feel any worse. I think you know it. I think everybody knows it now and then. but I think I have known it pretty often, too often.
