Helena's a local celebrity...
Helena walked into the gas station today and the clerk said, "it's YOU in the paper, isn't it!?"
A long article in the local paper, the Press and Sun Bulletin, was devoted to my online journal today. Plus photos and a list of my favorite links. How honored am I?!
Of course, I'm basking in the glow of the spotlight. How could I not? After nearly two years of having this thing up, I've relaied solely on word-of-mouth to keep people coming to see this little creation! And now, suddenly, I've got upwards of fifty hits in a single day, of people just stopping by to take a look at ME? It's like somebody advertising that I throw awesome parties and having a ton of people show up at my door to have some fun!
It's also a little freaky. Never once have I intentionally used my real name in this journal, partly out of fear of stalkers, partly because pseudonyms are fun. Now the whole world knows that Helena Thomas is really, *gulp* the girl they know from the gas station, the post office, the bank, high school, work, the coffeeshop... My picture is right there on the cover of the features section. I'm almost afraid to go out, because I know someone will say, "Ahhh! I saw you in the paper!" Never have I been "famous" for anything. I'm the chorus-girl, the third one from the left, not the star. It's an entirely new experience for me.
I was slightly disappointed about one thing, though. The reporter who did the story -- who is a charming little thing who looks like an odd combination between a cheerleader and a quietish tea-drinker with a book -- focussed a LOT on some of my past entries: the suicidal ones, the depression ones, the codependent whiny ones. I will admit freely that the suicide entries, the whiny entries, the "I'm-fucked-up" entries are the ones people are more likely to read. People are addicted to torture and unhappiness, and the sad stuff is what gets responses, what pulls people in. They want to make sure you're alive the next day, they want to make sure you didn't jump like you inferred you might. They want to tell you it will all get better, but once things are better they sort of lose interest. I know this, and I've basked in that, too.
I will not delete the old entries. But I can't say I'm very proud of them. I'm not proud to have been a little fucked-up. I'm not proud that I spent my time catering to my love for a toxic friend. I'm not proud of it at all, and I prefer to freaking move on.
Since January of last year, I've moved, I've become closer to my mother and brothers, I've gotten Peter basically out of my life, I've maintained a steady and happy relationship, I've discovered new music and new places and new restaurants and new friends. I've fallen in love; I've let love fade away; I've gotten two new jobs where nobody yells at me; I've cleaned myself up, and cleaned my apartment, and gotten a kitty, and read a lot of new books and been inspired in ways I cannot even describe.
I haven't thought seriously -- or even non-seriously -- about suicide in eight or nine months. Seems like a waste of time, you know?
I would much rather spend my time making mix tapes and saving money to go to Seattle in the summer; figuring out a way to put up my Christmas lights; working and playing games; making love and socializing; arguing and cutting my losses; writing letters I never send.
I haven't cried since I watched "JFK." That didn't count, because I was running a fever and would have cried anyway. I haven't cried out of unhappiness in a LONG, long time. Months. Seems like years. What is there to be unhappy about? I've got friends, and even if I don't, I know how to make some. I've got enough money to see movies and pay my rent. I don't have anybody on my case about every little detail of my work, my behavior, my words... I've cut a DAMN lot of negativity out of my life. Nothing to cry over. Nothing to really worry about, at least not seriously. Yeah, I have my troubles, and I have my flaws, and I have my fears, but I've learned not to take things so seriously. For gahd's sake, how can you take your life seriously when you're an avid follower of Tom Robbins and you're dating a philosopher-musician who calls you his Special Little Pumpkin Seed?! How can one live one's life unhappily when one knows how to make lattés and can watch the sun set in a coffeeshop every night? How can I be depressed when I'm smiling at a roomful of leftover Christmas stuff and know that with one or two phone calls, I could reach somebody who would want to go out and play with me?
I feel beautiful, dammit. And WORTHY. This is NOT a bad way to be, and not vanity.
I have everything I need. I have just about everything I want. Oh, there are things that could happen that would make my life better... David could call and tell me he's okay, for one. (*HINT*) I could have the recipe for the Irish Cream Cheesecake I had today. I could have a futon in my living room and a VCR that worked. I could have better hair. I could find where the hell I lost my dryer sheets. But there is no sense in crying over lost dryer sheets.
I gave up waiting. I gave up the idea that good things might come to me, but probably wouldn't. I don't believe that anymore. You get a good break or two, and you work with that and it's up to you.
A year ago, I couldn't pay my rent and my lover wouldn't admit he had anything to do with me. A year ago, I was told I was crazy and I believed it. A year ago, I was so frustrated with everything I WAS going crazy. But once you convince yourself you're nuts, it's DAMN hard to crawl back. I did it, though, and I'm happy and fairly well-adjusted.
...And I'm not really bitter anymore... Maybe a little, about some stuff, but nothing incapacitating.
Somebody told me when I was seventeen: "I don't understand it [suicide]. I've had some hard times; I think everyone does, but it's nothing I'd ever consider as an escape. Or Whatever." Of course it's not an escape. A greyhound bus is an escape, but a bridge is not. What's there to escape from, anyway? Poverty and assoles? No escaping that sort of thing; you just have to work through it or die. And I'm not ready to die. I have too much to do. Moreover, I've got time to waste and films to see and a junk-drawer to organize and mail to send.
"I'm better," she quotes me as saying. No, that's not quite right. It didn't come out right. I'm not "better," I'm not a normal kid who's been through bad times and reborn. I'm a screwy person who had a lot of bad things happen, and I got over them. There was no tunnel of light, no instant decisions to be happy, just a lot of good people and some good breaks and good books and good coffee.
(...and a very good friend who went through a lot of similar verybad things, and who hugged me and smiled and presented quite a nice model of surviving verybad things with a smile and a lot of good coffee...)
I'm not upset that the reporter focussed a little excessively on depression and darkness. It's maybe a little more intriguing than coffee and buttercups or whatever, and I expected nothing less. But I do need the world to know I'm okay now. Not normal, exactly, but okay. And warm and comfortable and not fucken going anywhere that involves lots of pills or a freefall into icy water, unless I happen to slip on my way across the bridge to see a good movie at the Art Theater.
Anyway, I love you all, and thank you for sticking with me, through all my ups and downs. Hopefully, there will be a LOT more ups than downs from now on. I expect nothing else. Thank you.
Love,
~Helena*
"[At least they didn't say anything] about burnt corn..." --my little brother, attempting to be cool, and failing miserably, for which I may have to stick his head in a toilet and flush...