Metal on metal...

More and more, I'm straining towards another division of blogs.

Though it becomes increasingly unlikely as my schedule takes another shift. School is starting tonight. A fifty mile commute to my classes, lovely. My "underling" is starting school as well, going down to part-time, meaning that I am going to have to pick up the slack. That means less writing time.

Already, I have problems maintaining two blogs, the other one neglected as this one went up, me basking in anonymity, knowing I can say what I want about who I want without the desperate emails from men telling me that we needed to go out, that I was the one for them, that only I would understand them, or the growing section of fangirls, girls that I don't know how to handle.

And this blog is still anonymous. Those who have asked for its location have been denied, no matter how close we are, because I'm withdrawn, because I know that even with the closest friendships, things happen and people change, and people are self-serving beyond good, beyond bad, just seeking for themselves.

Someone commented just a little bit ago that I was slumming by making out with a man in a relationship, that I needed to raise my standards. It made me feel as though they hadn't read the post at all, simply skimmed it, not bothering to understand the content, just getting the barest of details and slapping a face on it, a face they understood.

I forgot what that was like.

I'm so used to having my face up, so used to having a backstory, so used to having groups of people reading my stuff and interpreting it that things like that so rarely happen.

But it's something I need to get over.

It does let me see the difference, though.

Things move along though. Inching towards my Master's degree, couch-surfing, socializing much too much, the random social encounters... I've met so many people in so many places and I wonder how many more I will meet before I give up entirely in the barely-there-as-is belief that I might meet someone for me.

I run through southern California, from San Diego to the Valley, digging.

Digging for experience, digging for knowledge, digging for identity, to compare myself to others and say "this is who I am not" because it is so rare for me to say "this is who I am".

I'm 26 in a month and a half and I feel like I'm starring in some crappy indie flick about a girl trying to find herself.

Usually, though, these girls are these delicate creatures who have never fallen in love, never experienced a man, wear wacky scenster clothes, and stumble across their awkward romance while working at a drug store.

Whereas I'm sitting here, wild, damaged, too experienced, always mellow, withdrawn, overanalytical in my simplistic clothing style, glasses, and layered black hair, nose in a book, wondering if I should just start dating only intelligent ex-cons because it seems I get along with those the best.

When I was out with Sad Eyes on Friday night, wandering Downtown Disney, he said he was looking for his Belle, interfering that he was such a damaged beast, saying that he needed the tolerance and understanding of such a woman.

And I find it funny. If you've seen the Disney version of Beauty and the Beast, it starts off with Belle being incredibly devoted to her father, nose always in a book, innocent and determined. And then she rescues the Beast from the darkness within him through her faith and understanding, through her determination. She keeps, for the most part, her innocence, only losing it somewhat when the villagers in the town she lived in lost their heads and Gaston went all possessive/avenging his honor batshit.

We were by the west end of the area when he said this, walking back from the Disneyland Hotel. I could not help but chuckle because the last time that tale was raised around me, one of my blogging friends rewrote it in the start of a project where he was redoing fairytales to feature the girls he knew. It was about me, a combination of Sleeping Beauty and Beauty and the Beast, where an innocent girl pricks her finger on a spinning wheel and becomes, inside, a beast. In the end, she saves the beast, prevents him from turning back into a human, so they could be beasts together.

I enjoyed it.

So often these damaged men I dig up are looking for redemption through innocence. Looking to be saved like in some Hollywood ideal. Embarassed and distant about their past actions and feelings, they go through women, looking so hard for that one that will see past their behaviors, that will somehow, solely through love, make them whole again.

Every time they hurt another one, one that cannot handle who and what they are, they become angry, frustrated, and more withdrawn. Badges from battle, they wear these girls like shields, keeping people out, yet drawing them in.

I suppose I'm no better.

Looking for a beast of a man, someone I can respect and run with. Someone who pushes like I do, someone who wants to be more, someone who will be more and understand the isolation that comes from this all, comes from being different and wading through crowds, up to your neck in people that you do not want to understand, hoping that someone will grab your hand and yank you out, or at least walk with you until you both find shore.

But that's all fantasy.

And, right now, I've got to be in reality. I have thirty minutes to wrap up work so I can start my lovely commute to class.

Good morning to me.