Like A Dream...

"Why was I your last choice?"

Stupid question. Yes I knew it was a stupid question but I asked it anyway. Why was I the last person my boyfriend landed on, on his quest to find a girlfriend? I liked him from the start why didn't he return the favor? You'd think I was past all this bullshit. Four years and some change into a relationship should mean I am happy, self-satisfied, and even a little smug, deservedly so, as what other 24-year-old girl has the boyfriend I have? And truly, he's wonderful. He was my best friend before my boyfriend and that's the dream right? Well I got it. And still these idiotic niggling thoughts pop into my head and show me once again what a pathetic excuse I am for a human being.

Why is always at night? Why is it when the world is sleeping that us seemingly content and happy girls toss and turn and analyze and come to the conclusion that we're crazy and stupid and hate our lives when in fact, we should be thanking God or whatever higher being we believe in that we have it so lucky. For the record, I do believe there is a higher being; someone who knows what they're doing. Because if I didn't believe everything happened for a reason, well I'd just have kill myself. Except I wouldn't because I don't believe in suicide. Anyway, I am one of those content, happy, and overall lucky girls that's convinced she's barking mad as she spends night after night, awake and sad. I come from a pretty well-off family that's half Turkish and half Iranian. The bonds that tie us puts the fairy tale that was, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," to shame. We breathe, eat, sleep, and live each other. Which sounds gross but really, we're the most tight-knit, protective, loving group of people that could ever share common blood. On top of this, I'm highly educated, fairly intelligent, have awesome hair when it cooperates, and an excellent taste in music. Yes I am a self-proclaimed heavy metal chick but guess what. I am. So fuck you. Iron Maiden forever. And then there's my boyfriend who any sensible female would take an appreciative glance at and who I find very attractive and who sincerely calls me a hot ass babe. Screw your feminism, in my head where I reign as the smart but weird friend to the hot girl (RIP John Hughes but nothing Molly Ringwald as ever been in compares to my life), I crave to be judged by my looks sometimes.

And yet here I am, pulling an Elizabeth Gilbert as I sit up in my apartment, my amazing, gorgeous apartment located in the heart of Boston on Newbury Street I might add, lamenting how deeply, deeply unhappy I am. Maybe it's something all of us privileged white girls go through but depression is a bitch. Especially when there is no goddamn reason for it. I had my oh-so-delightful first nervous breakdown (yes first, as in, more to come) a few years ago during the summer between junior and senior year of college. Then again after I graduated and started my MFA. Then again the next summer. And now. What the fuck, man. Why me? I went to art school where I had a blast for four years as well as getting degree in Media Arts, I got a masters in screenwriting, and now I have every opportunity to make something of myself in the creative world. Except this is the very reason why I bawled my eyes out, quit an internship program that may have lead me to what I've wanted in Los Angeles, and came crawling back home.

Why am I the last choice? Why was I never asked out in high school? How come all my friends are hotter than me? How come I'm such a failure in my eyes? Can I write? Why do people tell me I can when I don't even know anymore? Why am I so far away from my cat, the only thing that has brought me joy in the past year?

I need to get the fuck over myself. So here we are. I want to be a writer. I want to be heard. Hell, maybe I even want to be a screenwriter but I sure as hell ain't gonna succeed if I don't write so here we go. Time to analyze and take a few steps forward.

Madonna is amazing. I've loved her since I was a kid. Yes I am pulling a non-sequitur much? but it will make sense. See, the stories that I love to read are the stories about people, people like me, women, who have come to a block in their lives, in their, to all outward appearances, perfect lives. They crave more. Eat, Pray, Love and Julie & Julia were the two books from last year that sucked me in and made me cry out (inwardly of course, as I'm a robot who can't express emotion unless I'm having one of the aforementioned breakdowns and leaking tears from every face hole), "This is ME! This is what I feel." This past week in L.A. it all came to a head. I didn't want to be there even though I had worked so hard to get there. I got my driver's license, I applied to my school's post-grad program that helps place students in internships within the industry, I left my kitty with my parents in Turkey, and hauled my ass to California. But that awful feeling happened. Depression affects everyone differently but the way my dark passenger, to quote Dexter, rears her bitch head is by forming a giant lump in my chest and throat, killing my appetite, and thoroughly convincing me that I'm dying and I'm going crazy and I'm the only freak that feels this and the world is ending all at the same time. After teary phone calls with my parents and long, long, often heart-breaking conversations with my boyfriend that I won't rehash here, I up and left L.A. and came back to Boston. After three days. And it all boils down to being afraid and not knowing how I was going to get by alone in a strange city that required driving. Yeah, I'm that hysterical woman from 1930s mystery novels that needs a proper slap to come to her senses.

Enough is enough. Time to fix me. I wasn't happy in grad school because I thought I was wasting my life and now it's 8 months past graduation and I still haven't done anything and I'm 24 and time is running out and I've gained weight, and I'm ugly, and I'm just a worthless person. Well, no happy person I've ever met thinks so harshly of themselves so here is my first step. Learn to love myself. Oh barf, I can't believe I just wrote that. Before I go hug a tree and make a dress out of hemp let me get to my point. I was lying in bed tonight, not sleeping, and got to thinking about Madonna. I've listened to her my entire life and I spent today walking around playing my favorite song, "Like A Prayer," over and over. There's comfort in familiarity and Madonna is my childhood and the bond that connects me to every important female in my life from my mom to my cousins to my sister to my best friends. Lo and behold, "in the midnight hour, [I felt her] power." There was a book I once read by India Knight called My Life On A Plate. In it is a description of the main character, "playing Madonna." Basically, whenever a situation arose that she couldn't handle, that she balked at, that made her uncertain and fearful, she pretended she was Madonna and rode it out with confidence and style. I get that. You see, to us Madonna is the ultimate queen. She's been around forever, she always looks fantastic, she's her own muse, she's got talent and creativity and she has that attitude that you just can't mess with.

I want to do that too.

I mean, I don't literally wanna become Madonna, I have no patience for children and certainly won't adopt any, neither will I dye my hair blonde because being a brunette is the one thing I know I take a glowing pride in. Though my hair right now is very blonde streaked. I was having a Kat Von D, trashy dark with blonde highlights moment. Hey, I pull it off. But I digress. No, I don't want to be Madonna but I would like to play her. I want to face problems head on instead of cowering and taking the easy way out. I want to be successful. I want to look fabulous and know it. So here is my Julie & Julia-esque journey of self-discovery; I will make a concise list of every momentous look and fad Madonna went through and pay homage to it in my daily life. Maybe looking ridiculous will help me get over my self-esteem issues. Maybe it will make them worse. But it's something. I can tackle things that I normally don't like writing daily or on a semi-regular basis, do stuff I never would do otherwise, say off the top of my head, riding horses with self-assured aplomb. Watch out Lulu (my dad's horse), English-version Madonna Leyla is coming. Of course I will document it all here which is the next step in getting me writing. I want to do 100 days of Madonna. Maybe they won't be back to back, but I will have 100 days where I tackle the day as Madonna would do and never look back. I've always wanted to be a muse to someone but that is just a girlish fantasy that will never come true. So Madonna will be my guide to make me the muse I want to be for myself. Sounds egotistical right? Good, I think I need that now.

I warn you though, I tend to ramble when I get going. So I will write a lot. Hopefully. I hope so. Writers should write. I can't say now if it'll be good but by the end I hope I can sincerely say it and mean it, have faith in myself. Now I go crawl back into bed with my gorgeous, wonderful boyfriend who will read this in the morning and either pat me on the back or agree, finally, that I am crazy.

"Like a dream, no end and no beginning."