Trying to Find My Goddamned Bliss

I’m a pretty uptight person. Does that come across? I’m always stressed out. There is not a whole lot in this world that brings be joy. If I had to pick one thing that always makes me feel better, I’d pick my husband but only because he might read this someday. The real answer is water. I love water.

I’m a Pisces. I leave it to you to decide if the two facts are connected. All I know is that no matter how sad or mad or stressed out I am, I can usually make myself feel better just being around water.

The ocean is, of course, my preferred form of water. I’m about as landlocked as a person can be in the United States so it’s not something I get to see very often. I really don’t see the point of going anywhere on vacation if there isn’t an ocean involved. Everything else is just Targets and Taco Bell’s. When we get near the ocean, it’s pretty much all I care about. When we’ve gone to LA, for example, I Don’t actually care about going on a studio tour or a being in the audience of a television show or shopping at The Grove. I’ve never even been to Beverly Hills. If I had my druthers, I would just sit on the beach all fucking day, or play in the water, or sit in the hotel room we can’t really afford but in which we always stay so that I can lay in bed and watch the ocean.

My husband and I compromise, we spend half of our trip by the beach, just ordering postmates and cooking in our room and the rest of the trip we can do whatever he wants to do. I’m sure that Venice beach and Santa Monica aren’t even very good beaches compared to Malibu or The Bahamas or wherever else there are beaches but it’s good enough for me. I’m content to just sit and stare at the water completely unaware of all the homeless people and body builders. I look at the ocean and always, at least once, I feel compelled to cry.

I’m sure those of you that live closer to the ocean think I’m a huge dork right now. Unless you specifically moved close to the ocean because, like me, you just can’t get enough of it. I don’t care. Come say it to my face or better yet, just tell me where you live. I’ll come to you, kick your ass for calling me names and then later that day we can hit up the ocean and cry together.

I plan to move close to the ocean someday. Those plans may never come to pass and even if they do it might take a while. So for now, if I want to be happy, I have to go to the fucking pool. I mean, i could go to a lake or something but I usually don’t. You can’t swim in lakes anymore because you might ingest a brain eating amoeba somehow and then die. I just can’t take that chance.

Sometimes I’ll go look at a lake. Mostly I go to the gym. I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned the gym before. I’m there quite a bit. You might not be able to tell that by looking at me because…tacos.

So my gym had three pools, one indoor lap pool, one outdoor half lap pool/ half children’s play area and a third, smaller pool at the back of the gym that up until a week or two ago, I didn’t realize was heated. Ever since that discovery, it has become my happy place. There’s just one little problem, other people. God, I hate them so much.

The outdoor pools won’t be open much longer because winter is coming. My version of white walkers are old men who walk back and forth in the water and seemingly never have to go home. There are older women too but we more or less give each other the space that we both want.

I try to get to the gym as often as I can so that I can get that pool time in before it closes. I go at night because it’s fun but also so that, hopefully, it won’t be busy.Sometimes I get lucky, most of the time I don’t.

Yesterday was a particularly stressful day for reasons I don’t even recall and I was really looking forward to crawling into what I’ve come to think of as my private outdoor bathtub and just floating on my back and staring up at the night sky isolation tank style. I try to go as completely brain dead as I can, which, if you were wondering, is pretty fucking brain dead. It’s a joy. Pennywise the clown could probably get me go go with him voluntarily on just the promise of floating if it wasn’t for all the children down there.

So I go to the gym late at night and I work out for a bit and I try to keep busy as long as I can to increase my chances of having what is aptly titled, “The Miracle Pool” all to myself.

You can’t really see if anyone else is in it until your already there so it’s risky business. I don’t want to go back there, see someone in there, have them see me and then just walk away. (I really do try not to be so obvious about what a bitch I am.)

I also think people probably appreciate it. I would, especially if they are in there alone. They probably don’t want my company any more than I want theirs, which is not at all.

Sometimes they will greet me with a friendly hello and I just have to bite the bullet and get in anyway. Then there is the awkward, trying to avoid eye contact but also trying to make it not look like I’m not purposefully avoiding eye contact. I just happen to always be looking elsewhere. I don’t really want them to know how much I wish that they would get the hell away from me and let me go to my happy place: pure oblivion.

The pool is a decent size for a backyard pool but compared to the lap pools it’s very small, intimate. It’s deeper than the other pools, too, so you can’t always touch the bottom. I like that. You could easily have a party and fit a lot of your friends in the pool but when it’s you and one or two other people that you don’t know, it’s odd. Or at least it feels odd to me but I’m socially awkward.

So anyway, yesterday I go outside and miracle of miracle pools, there is no one there. I’m so happy. I get right in and let the water hold me and gently sway me back and forth. My problems are gone or at least they don’t matter. I have found the present moment and it is sweet ass sweet.

This motherfucker was in the outdoor lap pool as I walked past. Within five minutes time he walks his dumb ass over to get in the pool with me.

I think this is rude. Most people probably think that I’m rude and I am but when I go out to the pool and I see a person alone and at peace, I let them be. They got there first, fair and square. It’s there turn. Unless they wave me over, I go to a different, less intimate pool and let them have their space.

Now if a half hour or so goes by and they are still bogarting the “miracle”, I may go out there and join them until they, hopefully leave but I do give them their space and their time to fully relax.

This motherfucker followed me into that pool like he was a baby duck and I was his momma. Maybe he was headed there anyway but the book he had, wrapped in a plastic baggy, leads me to believe he was planning to get in a hot tub and read. Who knows?

So okay, he’s here. He’s ruining my life but I still think I had dibs. He was the interloper and as such, he could just fucking deal with my rudeness. So I ignore him. I go to the far corner away from him. I float on my back and I stare at the sky. I convince myself I’m alone and I began to try and find my chill.

“You playing dead?” He shouts to me, harshing my mellow and pretty much any chance I have to enjoy myself.

“I’m just pretending ” I respond and I try to go back to my happy place but it’s no good. His presence is felt. I sit up again to see that he is treading water back and forth across the pool and just staring me down the whole time. I am not hot. This man is just a turd. I can’t relax.

Now I am stuck in the uncomfortable position of wanting to leave but casually. I don’t want him to know that it’s all his fault that I’m leaving but I also want to leave right away. After a few minutes I finally get out and go inside.

I go into the locker room and I get in the hot tub. There are a bizarre amount of women in the locker room talking. I can’t relax there either. I take a shower. I get dressed. I leave the gym and as I’m doing so I walk past the miracle pool again. The fucking night king is still in there. He’s been all by himself for at least a half and hour. I hate him but I wouldn’t be able to recognize him if I see him again because I’m bad at faces good at avoiding looking at people.

I turn my car on. I see my lights reflected in the gym’s window. One of my headlights has gone out. I blame him. Look sir, I literally told you that I was pretending to be dead. If that’s not a “don’t fuck with me” sentiment, I don’t know what is.

I know I complain about not having friends and I know a big part of that is me avoiding other people but goddamn it! I’m trying to find my fucking bliss. I honestly don’t know which one of us was being rude. I do know who was minding her own business and who was being s creeper.

I guess I’ll try again tomorrow. Maybe I’ll toss a Baby Ruth in the pool and tell anyone that comes along that I had an accident, Caddy Shack style. Maybe I’ll just stare at them until they feel uncomfortable and leave. Most likely I will just concede and go inside.

I just wish people would take a fucking hint sometimes. When you tried to talk to me, did I pick up the conversation or did I tell you I was pretending to be dead? Selfish. Turd. Interloper. This is why I’m such a lonely person but I swear I can’t help it. I wish I were a friendly person. Im an introvert, we recharge when we’re by ourselves. A few more minutes alone in that pool and the miracle could have been, “oh, I don’t hate humanity anymore.” That’s on you, sir. Good day. I said good day.