#My Portal fixation didn't last all that long this time around but it was very enjoyable to draw everyone again :)

[sysig]

Your Weekly TV Guide

On Monday you can expect:

2:30 PM: The Stanley Parable/Portal

And Tuesday:

2:30 PM: The Stanley Parable

Wednesday:

2:30 PM: Portal

Thursday:

2:30 PM: Adventure Time

Friday:

2:30 PM: AT

Saturday:

2:30 PM: Fellplates

Sunday:

2:30 PM: Fellplates

Thanks for tuning in! (Patreon)

[irradon]

i think i'm finally getting over it, guys!

the story of me making a "sad" spotify playlist is so streamlined, you could almost boil it down to a recipe. be it due to another boy betraying my expectations or the suburban quiet turning to a deafening roar, it all starts with me legitimizing the nagging feeling that tugs at me like a child. it pulls on my shirt, asking for my attention when all i want is to ignore it, pretend that i am beyond messy tantrums and even messier rooms.

i ran away from the disappointment of this last fling for so long that i accepted that the heartbreak would linger its way into a home. i made room for it in my heart like one does for a stranger in a bus. the sadness, the feeling of unworthiness that followed in his absence, which came as quickly as his presence, it became my companion as i attempted to lead my life as if it was unchanged. it was only one date, amrita. you should be over it by now. he ended it with you already.

i am famously incapable of moving on from people who express any care or interest in me out of their own volition. more than anything, i am stubborn to a fault, and was so shaken by the whirlwind of march 2023 that i didn't even know how to begin to move on. from that one night he took every expectation i had for romance and shattered them. i had never tasted anything like it, and just like that, it was taken away from me. i couldn't understand the sheer insanity of what had happened. all i knew was that i didn't want to be over. and so despite the wishes of everyone around me who wanted me to move on, i let myself hold onto a shred of hope that it wasn't over.

it was that same persistence that numbed me through a month long escapade in greece, where i fooled around with not one, but two different people in my study abroad program. i let their interest in me dictate how these would go, not stopping to think or care about the consequences or how i was being objectified as a result. they weren't him, after all, so why would i care? they simply provided some much (so i thought) needed validation, and my ego craved nothing more.

when i came home, i found myself more miserable than ever as my attempts to get over him failed. as if things had never ended, i found myself learning more about him, finally having an interest in king krule's space heavy and listening to his song "cellular" (from a different album) on repeat. when i could handle it, i would replay the conversations we had in my mind, trying to figure out what went wrong along the way but wishing, more than anything, that the intimacy we had would return again. i let his music create a sort of makeshift intimacy for me, the sounds through my headphones becoming a portal to my dreamland where my heart wasn't broken and we were friends with no awkwardness. music tears down the ego like nothing else. chords, rhythm, melodies, and lyrics can bare your heart open for anyone to see, if you let it.

and so the nagging child of my own hurt continued to be ignored. my feelings swam around me like koi fish in a vast ocean, muddied by selfish motifs of betrayal and "deserving better" and the godforsaken phrase "if he wanted to, he would" plaguing my social media algorithm. where i was once considered "emotionally aware," charting my own feelings for him with any honesty with myself was like sailing this ocean blindfolded. i would meditate and pretend not to hear my own sadness. instead i'd pick up on "still in love" and assume that was the end of it.

the date itself was a very divine and ethereal moment in time. my body seemed to buzz from how right everything felt at that time. it was so surreal i felt drunk. because of how desperately i wanted these feelings to last, i fixated on them and neglected the anxiety which followed immediately after. i couldn't believe it even happened. my skin felt like it was on edge. my body knew it was over before my mind could even understand it. but these were feelings i knew too often and too well. i wanted him to be different, because he was so different. when i think about the divinity i saw in him, how loving him felt like a religion, how blissful it is to be in love with someone, the allure of unconditional devotion, it felt like a healing balm. i didn't want to walk away, and so i rooted down and stayed to no answer.

it was like that for eight months. the moments of divinity found their ways back to me in ways i never expected. another hours long conversation that ended at 2 in the morning, tying my keffiyeh before a protest, making eye contact that once again felt like years condensed into a second. when i got into that car accident, he only waited for me to say yes before driving over, staying with me for an hour, and driving me home. in these ways, when i think about it, there is still love. it's just confused.

but too much in my life is uncertain and in flux. my routines after the accident have disrupted the facets of my life that kept me grounded. so much has changed in a few months, and i graduate after this next semester. new house, no car, no job. new friends, new pain, your doctor said no exercise for at least a month. no relationships in sight. the ocean of feelings swimming around me has only grown deeper. the nagging feeling of heartbreak is still tugging at my shirt, silently begging for me to pay attention to her.

the nagging feeling finally had a chance to grow louder once my finals ended, and i couldn't numb myself by partying, organizing, working, or studying. i was home, left to my own devices for days on end. and so i numbed myself with my last resort of doomscrolling, and that's where the nagging turned into a scream.

i'd heard the harmonies of "can't catch me now" by olivia rodrigo and they captivated me almost instantly. but instagram reel audios don't always tell you the song name. all i knew was that those were undoubtedly her vocals, and that she'd released an album pretty recently. i searched through her discography, incessantly looking for the song i only knew the melody for, and was left disappointed. still, it tugged at me. it was too pretty - i had to find it, i knew that. but maybe i had gotten the artist wrong, and without knowing the lyrics i was lost on a google search. and so i once again let go of the nagging child's hand.

it only took until the next day for me to find another reel with a sped up version of that song. and, like a beacon of light, someone in the comment section will always ask, "song?" and an angel will bless them with an answer. it was the one song i'd chosen to ignore in olivia's discography, naturally. when i finally pressed play, let the verse bleed into the chorus, a gentle lilt of harmonies and the lyrics "but i'm in the trees, i'm in the breeze / my footsteps on the ground" with nothing but soft strings and finger pickings on an acoustic guitar for an instrumental, i was captivated. i dissolved into the music almost instantly, and the muddied ocean in my body began to clear. i could hear it so vividly, "i'm here, i'm there, i'm everywhere / but you can't catch me now" and felt those words graze my skin with the sunlight streaming through my window. i was ready to let go. my body and mind, my emotions, they were tired. i had neglected myself, that nagging child, for so long.

i've listened to that song on repeat for close to two days now. i parked myself on my couch and let my soul find answers. what about this song spoke to me so loudly? what feelings did it elicit? were there other songs like it? and from those answers, a new playlist was born. olivia's femininity, the sheer power that radiated from soft lyrics and quiet harmonies in the chorus. this was what it has always felt like to walk away. it is to realize that whatever divinity you felt was yours always. the experience came from you and was felt within you. the other person was simply a trigger. i could finally feel a sense of control over myself again. i could embrace something to be "mine," and mine alone. other songs quickly followed suit: by woom, by adrianne lenker, billie marten, laufey. it needed to be explicitly feminine. it needed to be rooted in nature, and soft. and it needed to be beautiful.

the title of this playlist is "555." the caption is "change. everything is shifting." and i'd had it empty for a few months. i knew that when i was ready, the right songs would find their own way into that playlist. it's like any other creative act, or any act in general. when we are ready, we will receive. it took me this time to be ready to move on, to really try everything and feel fleeting moments of connection before fully letting go. do i have answers to most of my uncertainty? no. but the fog finally feels like it's lifting. the ocean is clearing. i finally feel like i'm getting over it.