That’s just tough love!
The morning after Donald Trump was elected president again, I had to sit through a school shooting training starting promptly at 8 a.m. This was a reminder that there are forces in the world that are much more vast, and much more pertinent, than my boy problems and girly woes and sorrows.
As a school counseling grad student, I read about Columbine and teaching tolerance in the wake of such tragedies. I learned what is common sense: that gun control works. Mass shootings are endemic in America, and we could stop them at any time if over half of our country wasn’t so repulsed by common sense.
I got my November paycheck on Halloween this year. The next day, I walked into a Berkeley tattoo studio at 8:30 p.m. with my brother and his best friend. I asked them to please tattoo the words “that’s just tough love” on my right arm. This is a lyric from “Tough Love” by Gracie Abrams. I chose a font, and the tattooing itself took maybe five minutes of pain I maintain is excruciating even though many of my best friends claim that the pain of being tattooed is not so terrible. It is very terrible to me.
But I love words more than I love anything in the world. I want them on my body, all over, even if I can barely tolerate the pain.
My first tattoo was from “Waiting Room” by Phoebe Bridgers, the end refrain, in all caps: “KNOW IT’S FOR THE BETTER.” I thought about getting this tattoo for four years before I finally got it. When I told my ex-boyfriend that I wanted to get a tattoo, he told me he would break up with me if I did.
I wanted to cry, but I didn’t. We had this conversation while driving home from the house my mom was renting at the time, where she and I had just signed the papers to buy another house, a house we now co-own — a major accomplishment for both of us, even if the house is in the middle of nowhere and I don’t live there. It was such a monumental day, and he ruined it like always by being so inconsiderate.
Three days after Donald Trump was elected president again, a man on Hinge asked if he could get me drunk. I am sober and my profile says this, and I receive so many senseless comments from dating app men — this was simply the last straw. He was the unfortunate and convenient target of my ire. I called him pathetic, told him he doesn’t know how to read, and said he made me want to die. The next day, I was permanently banned from Hinge because he reported me. If I make a new account, it will “promptly” be removed.
I guess this is probably for the best, though I do think his ego was very weak if my comments drove him to report me. These days, I am in therapy, but I don’t know if therapy can cure misandry. I have been a misandrist for so long. I became a misandrist when I had to testify in court so that my mom would be granted a restraining order against my ex-stepfather, a rabid Trump supporter that emotionally tormented us for years. Why was a man in his late forties beefing so hard with a fifteen-year-old girl? We used to get into arguments about politics all the time until I learned to be quiet in his house.
But I don’t want to be quiet anymore.
Yesterday I rewatched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The first time I saw this film, I was 19 and in a psychiatric ward for severe depression. I thought it was a beautiful movie. I rewatched it again with my college roommate after we watched I Love You, Phillip Morris and developed a night-long fascination with Jim Carrey that also resulted in us watching The Truman Show.
Both of the times that I watched Eternal Sunshine, I was in denial about my attraction to men. Now, I’ve exclusively been dating men for two years. It’s complicated but also not really. The roots of my baggage when it comes to men are really very straightforward. Even the best men in my life have done awful things.
Is it a red flag to relate to Clementine from Eternal Sunshine? I understand her. I wish I could forget about all the men I’ve been involved with. I wish I could forget about all the men that have let me down. She just wanted to be seen and loved for who she really is.
But Joel couldn’t see her, and Clementine couldn’t fix Joel. I couldn’t fix the emotionally unavailable men who have broken my heart, so I would rather just forget about them altogether. Even the happiest memories that I have are tainted by the knowledge of all the sourness that came later.
I am currently writing my third novel. It is an adult horror novel and I am having so much fun writing it even though society feels apocalyptic right now. I am about halfway through writing it, and I think I can finish by the end of the year. Both of my previously complete novels, including the one that I am querying right now, were young adult horror/thriller novels. I loved writing about sad teenage girls, but right now, it feels freeing to finally be writing about a sad adult woman. For the first time in my novel-writing journey, I get to write explicit scenes. Yay!
I have documented some of my woes and sorrows on this blog. The nature of having a cyclical disease and severe mood swings means that I always swing up eventually. October ended and I finally let myself breathe. I stopped spending so much time alone in my apartment rotting on my couch and watching Catfish. I remembered that I actually have a lot of friends. I’ve been regularly attending a writing group.
Both of my tattoos, in my view, are reminders to live life with radical acceptance. Whatever happens to me is for the better, and I have to accept even the toughest of love. It’s like Gracie said — “That’s just tough love, and you’re lucky to receive it.”
Now, these reminders are with me forever.
