At my friend’s birthday event last night, I met a guy who I would definitely label a creeper. I realize that sounds really judgmental, but I couldn’t help it. As soon as he introduced himself and made eye contact with me, I felt uncomfortable. He stood too close to me, got his face too close to my face, and tried to bond over the fact that we both have roots in Vietnam. To make sure he knew that I wasn’t available or interested, I started talking with another of my friend’s friends about my fiance and our upcoming trip to Japan, where this friend is originally from. This creeper suddenly became super belligerent and started interrupting our conversation to talk about completely irrelevant topics just for the sake of inserting himself rudely into our conversation. It eventually became so unbearable that I looked at my time and decided it was late enough to leave and not look like I was ditching my friend. So I left.

On my short walk home, I started thinking about how people get labeled “creepy” or “shady,” and I realize that I couldn’t really pinpoint an exact quality or trait. They tend to seem like ordinary guys at first glance, but there’s a certain unsettling vibe that these guys always tend to send to those around them. I kind of feel bad for them, but at the same time, I wonder if they even realize they are being creepy.

My friend and I went bridal gown shopping yesterday afternoon, and I found one dress I really liked that is now on my short list. The hesitation I have with this dress is that the sample I tried on is about six sizes too big for me, so obviously because of the size difference, it’s hard to tell exactly how the dress would fit my bust and arms if it were exactly in my size. By far, it’s the favorite dress I’ve tried on since beginning my bridal gown shopping, so I’ve thought about it a lot since then.

The assistant who was helping me gave me the brand, model number, and the price, and when she wrote the price down, she said that she’d give me 10% off the original price. This morning, I looked up the brand and model number, and I find out that the retail price for this dress is actually the price the assistant gave me after the discount.

You’ve got to love the fake mark-ups for the fake mark-downs. Everyone is out to screw you in the wedding industry. Everyone.

Tonight, I went to my third in-person mentoring session at my program’s high school in the west 50s. When I arrived, my mentee was sitting and eating pizza with her friend, who is part of the program, but her mentor was absent. I decided to include her in our discussions so that she’d feel like she had a reason to be there that night.

The more I interacted with her, the more I realized that her English was even poorer than my own mentee’s. She could barely understand me when I asked her what grade she was in, so in the end, my mentee ended up being our translator, even though my mentee’s English isn’t so good. I found out that this mentee has only met her mentor once, and that every other mentoring session that has happened, the mentor has never RSVPed or showed up. She’s never given her any advance notification that she couldn’t make it.

That made me so mad when I heard this. The face I made immediately made both the girls burst into laughter. While they found it comical that I was so annoyed, I just couldn’t believe that someone would sign up for this program and be so flaky. Why even participate in the program if you can’t show up at all, and if you don’t, at least give your mentee some notice? It’s as though this mentee shows up once a month, waiting to be disappointed each and every time, except that one lone time her mentor decided to actually show up. These kids join this program, hoping to have someone to look up to, and instead, this kid gets absolutely nothing and instead just keeps getting let down. She’s already complained and told the program coordinator, but unfortunately, he said that they had no more available mentors left to fill in the spot. She just keeps showing up, waiting to one day not be disappointed.

That almost sounds like me.

When I was my friend’s maid of honor back in 2012, planning her bridal shower and bachelorette weekend in Vegas wasn’t that difficult. In the end, I really just had to rely on myself (and I rarely fail myself when it comes to getting stuff done). I had a co-maid of honor who was just a maid of honor in name because the bride was too scared of hurting anyone’s feelings, and three other bridesmaids that in the end, proved to be pretty useless with offering any help. In the end, I made the plan, did all the bookings by myself, and just told each bridesmaid what share she had to cough up for the event. We had little interaction regarding event planning, and maybe in some ways, that was probably the best. I might have liked if someone actually offered to do something tangible, but I guess that’s just wistful thinking now.

I have three bridesmaids now, and there’s clearly some trouble brewing. One is freaking out over little harmless comments I am making about my mom (who has no expectations regarding anything), and another is getting flustered by this bridesmaid and not understanding why she is stressing out so much. And my third bridesmaid is trying to not get involved by not saying or doing anything to help the situation.

Planning events tends to be stressful for those of us who don’t do it on an everyday basis. There’s always going to be stress involved. But what would ultimately make the planning less stressful is if each of us just exercised a bit of level-headedness and tried to work with each other to make the process fun. That doesn’t seem to be happening here.

Chris came back from his latest work trip yesterday, so I thought that maybe the bad dreams would stop since he was back. Well, this ended up not being the case because I had a stressful dream last night again.

In the dream, he and I are arguing over something completely senseless, and then out of nowhere, he starts tearing up all these pieces of paper and envelopes and starts throwing them at me. They don’t really fly the way you think they would, though, and instead, they fly all around us in slow motion, and each piece seems to have a life of its own.

My sleep has been the worst this week. The last time my sleep was this poor was the week that Ed passed away.

I woke up this morning feeling really disturbed. I tried to think back to what I dreamt about before I woke up, and I remembered I was sitting in a public area with my mom that had huge, elegant, almost Victorian looking chairs with big cushions. She’s pacing back and forth, anticipating bad news from an unknown source. In the dream, Ed has been drafted to serve in the Vietnam War (this makes no sense, but what ever seems to make sense in my dreams?), and my mom is worrying every day that something bad has happened. We’ve heard through the grapevine that my brother got shot in combat, but we had no verified news of this happening or of his current condition. Suddenly, a man in miltary dress comes out of nowhere and hands me an official looking envelope.

“Open it,” my mom says. “I think this is it.” She’s implying that this is the news of his death, confirmed in writing.

I open it, and the words just bleed in my vision. The letter notifies us as his family that he has been shot and killed in combat, and that they will be shipping his body back to San Francisco.

I started screaming and sobbing, and my mother is already sobbing. The entire room continues on as though we aren’t there screaming and crying, and we just continue crying and mourning my Ed.

It’s weird to think about Ed dying in other ways. Shortly after he died in 2013, I constantly had dreams of him dying and committing suicide in different ways. Now, it’s like he’s still getting killed, but it’s not by his own means. Other things are out to kill him now.

This week is so dreary. The weather is a mix of cold, rain, and snow. Chris isn’t here. I feel anti-social and don’t really want to talk to anyone. I feel unmotivated to do anything. That’s also probably why I’ve skipped the gym.

The gym doesn’t seem like an exciting place, nor does work. Walking around outside for fresh air doesn’t help since it is cold. Being at home isn’t even that great because it’s just me, and then I have all these things staring at me that need to get done — wedding tasks, scrapbooking, my reading list, career stuff, mentoring… the list seems unending. And today, everything just seems like an obligation rather than a want. It’s one of those type of dreary days.

I’ve been having unpleasant dreams since I came back from San Francisco. In one dream, Chris and I were arguing about something, and he said he wanted to end our marriage (it’s great when someone asks to end your marriage and you haven’t even gotten married yet). In another dream, I’m fighting with my mom about the most ridiculous subject (which is usually the case in real life), and she starts sticking her finger in my face. There’s really nothing worse than someone yelling at you and sticking their pointer finger in your face. I yell at her to get her finger out of my face and to just stop being so difficult. That’s what I’m saying when I wake up, and Chris is trying to calm me down. In the next dream, Chris lets me know he made out with someone else, but he glosses over it as though it’s no big deal.

Then this morning, I woke up and remembered I was out to dinner with my friend, her boyfriend, another friend, and Chris, and when we got to the restaurant, Chris and the friend got their own table, my friend and her boyfriend got a table, and no one wanted to sit with me. We all went to dinner but apparently were not planning on eating together at the same restaurant, which made absolutely no sense. I woke up feeling disturbed and unloved.

Visits to San Francisco always seem to mess up my subconscious for a while once I’ve returned to New York. This will probably be a constant re-occurrence until… forever.

A friend and I were chatting today about my visit home. I said it was okay… until it wasn’t at the end. He figured it wasn’t a big deal, that it was just some little tiff that happened that got me into a sour mood. I copied and pasted my blog entry regarding the sign on the gate at the house, and he was really shocked. He said he didn’t think it was a good idea and agreed it was hostile, but he also said, “Try to be good to your parents. They only know what they know.” He then shared that he hasn’t spoken to one of his two brothers who currently lives in Australia in over six years now, and as much as he’s tried to reach out to him, he won’t respond. He’s also estranged the rest of the family, as well. “We can’t control our family,” he said. “All families are dysfunctional in some way.”

It’s true. People only know what they know. They will only do what they want and what they see in their own restricted minds. It’s such a dismal thing to think, though. Are we even capable of changing ourselves and our own perceptions? How much power does it take for us to change, to prevent ourselves from becoming the qualities that we detest the most?

I don’t know what it is about going back to San Francisco and the house I grew up in, but ever since Ed passed away, for at least a few days after I come back to New York, I tend to get flashbacks of the past when Ed was still here that make me angry. Most of the flashbacks are about terrible family situations we’ve had where Ed was getting yelled at, accused of something he never did, or intense screaming arguments that have happened in that house. The latest one that happened today while I was at work was the time when I was of a middle school age, and my parents accused Ed of stealing money from their bedroom. It was a massive shouting match that ensued for what seemed like hours, and I got involved by screaming at our parents, telling them that Ed would never steal from anyone, and how dare they even attempt to accuse him of something so awful. That really didn’t help anything because that just got me yelled at, but at that moment, I rather would have had myself get yelled at then Ed. He was just so weak and defenseless. It didn’t matter what he said. He was on the verge of tears, and it always pained me when he was either crying or on the brink of it. He didn’t deserve that type of treatment. In the end, when our parents found the money that they had misplaced about a month later, no apology was ever said to Ed. Parents never need to apologize, right? That’s what our parents think. Parents are never wrong… Even when they are.

Being there just reminds me of all the injustices he faced that he never deserved. He just wanted a little bit of peace, but he rarely got it. I get so angry thinking about it sometimes that everything around me blurs, and I stop hearing what is being told to me or seeing what is in front of me. I think of how powerless I was to help him, even when I tried. I could never have been enough. And it really hurts to know that.

I hate that house. That house destroyed my brother.