Happy.

Am I happy?
And if I’m not happy what do I think it would take to be happy?
What does a full happy healthy life look like for me?
I have everything I need to have a full happy healthy life, don’t I… I mean, I have a job, place to live, I have food, transportation, I have a little bit of money just in case I need things, I have a sister and a son that I can call for support and I have hobbies; I write and sing and I’m doing all the work that I need to do therapy wise and also you know I’m trying to get my 10,000 steps in a day at least so I’m moving my body daily and yet, I can’t call myself happy for some reason…
Why is that?
The only thing I feel like I might be missing for me to feel like I’m living my happiest life would be a long-term monogamous relationship. I want that and I don’t really know why but then if that is the obstacle to me living my happiest life then what’s preventing me from having a long-term monogamous relationship with somebody?
Perhaps I haven’t found a person who I feel meets my criteria of being a partner which would include being self-sufficient in all the ways that I am with a little bit of something in your back pocket just in case things don’t shake, no children or grown children, I personally find this person physically attractive and I can tell that they feel similarly about me, there’s no long-distance, they aren’t trying to change me and vice versa and I guess I don’t yet know a person who checks all those boxes so to speak
Seems I run into the pump and dump folk- not sure if that is just the temperature of society as a whole, or if the people who find me remotely attractive can only feel that way on cold evenings when they are bored or alone and not for any length of time
This frustrates me and I don’t want to do anything more than exist to find this partner because it feels like so much work pulling down layers of bullshit people have put up, changing their opinions about the categories I live in that I didn’t choose, and now is it my fault, that I feel like this thing, which I cannot seem to have is the only thing that is preventing me from stamping happy across my forehead?
It feels so vain- for the most part, I have my health, and all other circumstances could change and if they did, and not for the better, I wouldn’t care about a relationship, I would care about creating my autonomy again and being at peace with my work and my surroundings again, I only care about a relationship when I think I have all I need for myself otherwise and he space but will I die without this?

I dunno.

TV says it is what I need to be happy- a mate… songs say it, the poets of old do too, philosophers and religions and psychiatrists claim that you’re supposed to have some sort of person here with me in this struggle we call life to be fulfilled and happy apparently the fact that I have suffered so long and so young without love or meaningful connections that I didn’t bring about on my own that my responses to opportunities in this area are proof of my hurt and that hurts too.
I’m scared of fire because I’ve been burned but my being scared is bad even though staying away from the fire is the right thing to do in most cases so it is confusing as fuck to me- what you did to survive up to this point was a cute way to cope but now that you are coping, don’t do any of that anymore and be, what, vulnerable?
And if you’re vulnerable then you can find that partner, fill that empty space and then be able to mark off the happy box on your life list? It’s these opinions- opinions coming from child molesters and sexual deviants and rapists and pedophiles and serial cheaters who keep yelling at me if I want to be happy, I need love- funny- why do I care about their opinions?
I guess because I want there to be one person on the planet, who genuinely does not think I’m crazy. One person who is willing to wake up next to me, take care of me when I’m sick, and let me love them completely.
Sadly, one person, I can enmesh with.
That isn’t love and it won’t make me happy because well, I am crazy.
I know I’m not supposed to say it but perhaps the fact that I can’t maintain something as simple as a relationship is more proof than anyone could ever need that it is true.
So why do I care whether other people think I’m crazy?
I suppose my proof of self-sufficiency relies on other people thinking I’m at least sane enough to work and be reliable and having a partner with you when you are old, I guess is a thing that deep down all humans are biologically wired for because we are just simply stupid earthbound animals and not some great intergalactic all-knowing beings.
And maybe, I can’t stamp happiness across my forehead because I get a little bored …and BORED is a word that I hate using…I’m not really bored I just want to do all of my favorite things in front of company; the kind of company I can hold and hug afterward without feeling like I’ve been used… Having sex with a person who likes listening to you and looking at you and cooking for you and being with you to me is so much better than having someone tell you that the only reason they know you is because they want to cum inside you- that never has and never will make me happy- I’m not just a sexual object and I’ve been at that stage in my life since my son was born where I don’t want to just be looked at that way- although I really don’t have much sway over it.
I genuinely do not want a pet. I’ll accept a human pet but after a while I’ll be using that word again, bored, because there are only so many things you can make a person do that is turning them on sexually before you want to know what is going on in their heads and that doesn’t seem to be allowed in those sort of dynamics- not truly- not deeply- only in relation to how much it turns them on to obey you- which mind you is thrilling and fulfilling for a time, like a slice of cake is- but it is not food.
I feel like I don’t want this relationship that all opinions say I need as much as they say I need it.
I feel like I have spurts of happiness, here and there, especially when I have written something or crossed something off my bucket list and yeah, I don’t want to be 76 and be alone if I’m forced to live that long simply because I do have an engrained romantic fantasy of some other old person still seeing the me they fell in love with although my entire body is wrinkled and heaving, that same me is there in my eyes and they know her and all her iterations and couldn’t imagine existing without her…
I did think I had this once but he was a terrible liar and you can’t love a liar long…

Am I happy right now?

I dunno, maybe happiness isn’t a destination but a way to control dopamine reuptake as you go through the hills and valleys of existence- a way to call on acceptance and peace in the midst of trials, and perhaps it doesn’t have anything to do with a reflection of someone else accepting me but me accepting me.
I don’t think I fully accept myself yet and maybe that’s why this relationship keeps eluding me, I dunno.
Nobody is better than anyone else, I know but even the most destitute despondent despicable humans can have somebody- maybe they are all just lying- maybe it isn’t something I deserve innately but something you earn if you want it to be ‘real’ as if anything in a world where you will die can be more real than that.
I’ve seen more hurt from love and relationships than I’ve seen longevity and true connection those instances where I have experienced that in my presence have been unusually rare and quite honestly creepy, like how in the fuck are they doing that, what levels of bullshit has this person put up with to keep that smile on their face standing next to someone else?
Happy.

Hmm… am I happy?
I dunno.

And maybe I’ll never know, maybe I’ll never be, maybe there is no such thing as a long-term monogamous relationship for me and maybe I just have to accept myself and let it go, I mean I’ll never be a princess or a ballerina either and those things don’t seem to bother me.
But I’m not sad.
And for now, that’s all that really matters. I’m not sad and that is a dramatic improvement.
And the day isn’t over yet is it?
Maybe the process of learning what happiness is has begun. Crazy is messy but at least it is fun.
Maybe because I’m a gambler by nature I’m holding out for this miraculous “one”.
Maybe I’ll evolve into a happy being before the day that my life is made up of, is finally done…