sparkle mode

How to be lonely (from a master of the craft)

Start young (you cannot afford to lose time). Think about little boys who won’t talk to you but write your friend’s name on the inside of the toberaum tunnels. Then move on to Ewan McGregor in Beginners (2010). Write fanfiction about the boys in your class with your best friend, use your sleepovers to chat with strangers on the internet and enjoy the grooming. Revel in the notion of secret admiration. Indulge in devotion.

Congratulate your friends on their domestic bliss and mean it. Tell nagging bystanders you’re “putting yourself out there”. Try not to imagine the weight of a warm body. Of someone to come home to. Of an uncorked bottle and an open ear. Of setting down a casserole dish to eyes reflecting candlelight.

Pray to lost lashes and shooting stars in lieu of the divine. Make your own valentine’s cards and openly parade your sensitive, poetically inclined heart. Feel disgusted with how predictable your desires are. Try feminism. Try submission. Try misandry. Try on a fantasy and wear it well.

Joke about it when they ask. Quote Charlotte Lucas from Pride & Prejudice but dream of a man walking through the misty morning for you. Deny it. Say you’re glad you were given the chance to get to know yourself before ever getting entangling. Know that a woman who knows herself is harder to manipulate, to gaslight. Perhaps, to love.

Do not mention that you don’t know yourself at all, that you feel like you will only discover the most precious part of yourself when you have found someone to pour your love into. Ignore how many people your age claim to feel like this (they cannot understand it the way you do). Ignore it or get all in your little feelings about. Take chic pictures of your swollen red eyes and perfectly flush nose. Feel pretty. Feel utterly repulsive. Aestheticize it. Make it an essential part of your identity and sink your dirty claws into it. Never ever let go of it; know that letting go of it means letting go of yourself.