good advice!

but I'm trying to be clingy (healthy) and not clingy (unhealthy)

and even if i don't quite remember how to take my problems out of my chest to show them to my friends, we can still go out for dinner. eat good food. badmouth the people who've given us grief

when bruno mars was on his "you can count on me like 123" shit back in the 2010s(?), i clearly didn't internalise it enough. because gang, it's been kind of rough lately, but ive grown terrified of making my wellbeing a burden for my friends on top of what they're already going through. but dawg.... "I can count on you like 432 and you'll be there"...... because that's what friends are supposed to do...... oh yeah......

so much for knowing that i can lean on my friends ?

this is a reminder to pace yourself for the year ahead

mildly meta but yknow I used to obsess over whether the vague, shady posts people in my circle posted on social media were about me.... outgrew it (mostly) because short of asking directly, you're never gonna know for sure if something's about you!! and as someone advised me more recently, if someone has a personal grievance with you but doesn't communicate it in an unambiguous way, then it's none of your concern after all

sometimes i'm just figuring it out, and you're neither God nor my father

pondering the significance of the statement "you look tired" today... from friends it's completely innocuous, and even from some strangers it can be nice, but hearing it from people who have a paternalistic interest in my life...... i don't want to deal with you! i have bad days. i don't want to receive a lecture from you every time i have a bad day. not when even in regular circumstances we haven't been able to engage in a way that doesn't make me uncomfortable

you're partners, you're supposed to be equals. treat her with dignity. don't make her feel small :(