wanna f? nice shoes. oh wait.. i think i got that backwards

Dear people of the internets,
I am about to share a universal truth. You may suspect that sooometimes there are cases where this is not true, that there are exceptions. but it needs to be revealed, cuz i'm sick to shit of girls doing this.
okay ready?
There has NEVER ever ever ever been a single instance, when a woman was legitimately bothered by being hit on.
Ever.

sorry girls-i-will-never-be-friends-with. i'm growing impatient with this ridiculous exchange between the sexes.
you pretend to be bothered by how many men want you, guys pretend to empathize...
all i ever hear in these conversations is someone saying "look! look how many people want me! you should want me!" and the response of "wow! it's so impressive how many people want you! let me show you how much i want you!"
i want to live in a world of blatant honesty :)

When you hear a ladyfriend explaining to you that she was genuinely "annoyed" and took "some thinly veiled" action to avoid repeated instances, I urge you to ask yourself-
-Is there really nothing to gain by complaining?
You will find, the answer is ... uh...NEVER. there is ALWAYS something to gain. ALWAYS.

It is not difficult to avoid being hit on.
what is difficult, is admitting that everything we do in life is to attract someone of the opposite sex.
the clothes we wear, the social activities we do, the things we find entertaining.
it's nothing to be ashamed of. we're programmed, rightfully so, to procreate and populate the planet. so... gots to be teh sexiest.

so what's so wrong with being hit on? it's not annoying. it's flattering. and if you don't want attention, there's a lot you do that don't involve such egregious extremes. (omg i always wear this fake engagement ring when i go out to clubs. it's so the creepos don't bother me cuz it's laaaaadies night)

no, i don't have a lot of close girlfriends, you are correct :) cuz most of them are so unbelievably clueless about how obvious and pathetic 90% of their actions are.

this is a way meaner entry than i intended.
Let me self-depricate a little to balance the aggression.
I get hit on. I wouldn't say a lot but I don't typically engage in behavior that makes it easy for most men to do so.
I'm shy. I don't dress very lady-like. I'm almost always with another guy. and i'm not really of that "smokin hot" variety.
and i have complained about getting hit on. on multiple occasions. but i was totally lying. past kari had much to learn. if i'm being really honest with myself, i was absolutely complaining for attention, even the smallest amount.
and another truth- i like getting hit on. is very validating. i like attention. and sometimes i dress up with the very intent of getting said attention.

anyway, at the end of the day, there is absolutely no situation where a girl actually means it when she claims to be bothered by being hit on.
cuz really what they're saying is "i find it displeasing to know that i appear valuable to another human being."
which if that's really the case then i guess you are truly allowed to complain.
but everyone else needs to shut the fuck up.
k thx :)

The Scientist

My therapist had me work through a personality test yesterday. Normally I hate doing them. I have so much trouble answering the questions. "Do you use data to make decisions or go with your gut?" Well, it fucking depends on the situation.
But working through it with her helped a lot and the results were terrifyingly accurate.
it's quite comforting tho. to understand yourself. all the lit she gave me talks about common challenges in work and relationships that this type of personality has. it left me feeling like... more okay with my shortcomings.
A couple of the relationship points that were glaringly accurate:
-Is extremely sensitive to rejection, but no one will know it
-Insist their partner be logical and rational if they are to be convinced of their point of view

we worked though some recurring problems i've had in relationships and was able to find some underlying conflicting personality types.
oddly enough it made me realize how compatible i was with dw. how we complimented each other's contrasting pieces and shared them with the ones that matter.
Apparently the N part of the myers briggs test means i feel connected with people who share my need to make crazy future plans and dreams without worrying about the details. the T part means I think relatively complexly and get excited when someone understands the way i explain things.
That was exactly why I fell in love with him so hard.
therapy makes me wish we were talking. 9 months later and i still haven't found anyone i want to share things with more than him. i wish i could tell him that not everything was either of our fault. that i have some stuff i need to work out with myself but i could be in a place to build something real when i'm done.
le sigh. anyway, the good news is, business analyst was right at the top of the list for recommended careers..
and so was artist :)

let the drummer kick, let the drummer kick that

I should have written down all the things I was thinking about last night. Everything felt really clear. Completely and devestatingly heartbreaking, but clear.
I stayed in the studio for hours after the guys left just thinking, and crying, and listening to music and crying more. I never feel like I can just go home or go to sleep until I find that thing, that one idea or plan or concept that makes me feel like this feeling won't last forever.
but even after 6 beers and 90 minutes of my emo playlist, i couldn't come up with anything.
If i'm being totally 100% honest with myself, I'm a lot more messed up about this *thing* than I a- let myself believe and b- know i need to be.
at the end of the day, i lost my 2 best friends in seattle. and i'm not over it.
convinced myself i was over losing dw because i was so over the relationship. jumped right into one new thing after the next and replaced feeling trapped and bored with butterflies and adolescent honeymoon drama. but when all the boys are busy and i'm alone, i realize how much i miss the connection i had with him. and how no one around me right now comes close. and how it's easy to mistake puppy love for a genuine connection... until it's over. i know it's been almost 9 months, but the distractions are finally fading and i'm finally mourning my break up. and it's gut wrenching.

and i convinced myself that i was fine burning out a 3 year "when's it gonna happen?" fling. rationalizing how incompatible we are. focusing on all the reasons why i don't want what i was told i couldn't have. swallowing all the bitterness i felt for the way it all ended. playing nice so the rest of the things would be affected. and even when that friendship turned to spite and fighting and emotional abuse, i convinced myself it was okay to lose a friend. that friends come and go. that i didn't need him. that maybe he wasn't such a great friend after all.
but it's exhausting keeping up those perspectives. they're broken over and over again every day that i see him. every time i have to email a question and i'm met with cold calculated answers. every time i text with feedback on something and i'm met with monosyllabic bare-minimum responses. every time i see him with someone new.
and every time i try to rationalize with him i'm reminded that i cannot feel ANYTHING. it's absolutely forbidden to just be hurt by any of it because it's completely counterproductive to everything and I should absolutely just get the fuck over everything.
and every time i get mad at the lack of empathy, i mourn the loss of my friend more.
it's hard enough when someone you love stops loving you. it's even harder when their actions seem hateful. it's even harder when they deny they're hurting you.
it's too much to deal with.
and the answer to all of this is remove the source of stress. because i clearly can't fix it and i can't force someone to be nice to me.

so...
i sat on the couch in the studio and thought long and hard about what i needed to do to fix things. cuz i can't convince myself that everything is okay anymore. i feel broken.

but nothing ever came. i don't think i can fix everything myself this time.
desperate aggressive drastic action feels on the horizon...

brain cleanings

I must say I am really enjoying therapy. Probably for 2 big reasons. 1- I love talking about myself. I mean that in an honest way. I find myself genuinely interesting and enjoy sharing parts of me with others. I am very proud of who I am. 2- I see therapy as a problem solving exercise and i really love puzzles. It's like a game. Why do i do this? or feel that? how has my life chiseled these complexes into me? and how do we fix?
it's probably the perfectionist in me to wants to have the most healthy and functional life possible but honestly it's like problem solving crack.
so what has therapy revealed about me so far?
well, I am too guarded in relationships and i have trouble letting myself be vulnerable in someone else's eyes. i don't have a good sense of myself in making decisions about relationships. i seek too much outside counsel and i don't have a filter for what advice i should be giving weight to.
none of this is news.
but it is very interesting to dissect where it comes from.
it would seem a lot of it comes from having an irrational fear of being too needy and high maintenance. I've started lumping all emotional reactions as irrational and I feel like i should be able to talk my way out of feeling anything that hurts.

so the homework this week has been to acknowledge when something hurts my feelings, admit it to myself and feel shitty about it before beginning the rationalizing process instead of skipping straight to it.
i asked my therapist what happens if I let myself get upset and I can't get out of it? She said that's what you bring to therapy and you work through it with help.

kinda wish everyone was required to go to therapy. it's so helpful to do mind cleaning. and god knows the people we usually rely on for advice are helplessly littered with bias and agendas.

anyway, a fun exercise i've been playing with, which honestly I think will do wonders for my song writing, is this:
when you get that hurt feeling, you write down what happened and your instant gut reaction to why it hurts. then you write down what you think is the irrational reason why it hurts. then you try to come up with a logical reason why it should hurt.
so the example i'm working through is like...
What happened- I didn't have a boyfriend on Valentine's Day
Gut reaction- I'm lonely
Irrational reason-  It's my fault that I'm lonely  either because I messed up all my relationships or because I'm not good enough to be loved by anyone. :)
logical- I'm lonely because society tells me there's something wrong with being single and I would rather be alone than with someone i don't truly love so I haven't chosen to settle.

this led me to write a really rad song on the piano last night actually.
combining the puzzle solving with the letting myself wallow by belting out lyrics that express the irrational was a total catharsis.

long story short- head shriking = fun

The Audition

This weekend I auditioned for a TV show called "America's Got Talent." Normally, I would never in a zillion years do something like this. Why? Because those shows are not for good singers. They are for phenomenally gifted singers. So why bother?
But one of the show's casting agents asked me if I would send her a non-band video of me singing. I recorded a few things and didn't think any of them were very good, so I kept putting it off until the casting agent demanded I send her one. She told me she ran it by the producers and they wanted me to come in for a private audition.
Srsly, the video was ridiculous. Emo  Kari playing a Jewel cover in her bathroom. I was almost embarrassed to send it.
So I figured I had to do it if I was being asked and was skirting the open call auditions.
So last Saturday I threw on a flannel shirt, my ripped jeans and chucks and headed to this hotel downtown where they were doing the auditions.
They were running behind so I had a half hour to wander around. I found this gorgeous grand piano and used it to warm up.
Outside the audition room was like a circus. There were break dancing troupes doing backflips and people riding unicycles and playing bagpipes and belly dancers and drum circles.
I was the only singer in the group but I'm curious how one can judge if like I'm a better at singing than that guy over there is at juggling. Apples to oranges.
Anyway,  I get called in to this giant ballroom where there is a 3X3 peice of hardwood flooring in the center of the room. There's a panel of 5 producers and a camera behind them.
The producer tells me that I'll sing first and then they'll ask me some questions.
So I start singing  (Criminal- Fiona Apple) and I was happy with how pretty the room's acoustics were making me sound. Then my voice started shaking a little and after that I was super paranoid about being nervous and they were staring emotionless at me. So I made sure to look at each of them in the eyes and smile and be as flirty as humanly possible while singing.
After it was over they clapped, which I thought was odd. Normally no one claps at an audition.
They asked me about where I was from and what I did for a living. They asked if I was nervous and I said a little because I'm used to loud crazy rock shows and this was certainly different. They asked if I got nervous on stage. I said it is much easier singing for a crowd of people than for a few.
They asked me if I would be available for the show's filming in a few weeks. I said I thought I could manage taking a few days off to film a show.
Then that was it, they said to reach out to the casting agent if I didn't hear from them soon.
The super hot guy who escorted me back to the lobby said I did a really great job and had a great voice.
And then I put my Aviators on and walked home.
bizarre day.
Not expecting to get a call back but kinda hoping I do. Would be a very welcome boost of vocal confidence in a time when I need it most.
I swear, I'm having the weirdest month...