On life changing and being a big ball of stress

Hello there silent readers! Due to my life being a bit of a shit storm at the moment I haven't really gotten around to posting like I said I would. I've been crazy stressed over just about everything, mostly because I finally got it. I got the Certificate of Eligibility, which is pretty much the final hurdle in the whole going-to-Japan thing, apart from the actual sending-it-to-the-Japanese-embassy thing. It's pretty safe to say that by this time next month I will be teaching at a language school at Ikebukuro, Tokyo. I made it, you guys. I made it, and it feels... good. Bad. Weird. Stressful. All adjectives related to that and more. About half of me is going 'YAY!' and the other half of me is going 'Oh my god, I'm going to die. Seriously die.', which I've been told is pretty normal, although far from fun.

Obviously this is a really emotional and stressful time, and I'm not really handling it graciously, or at least not as graciously as I would have hoped I would. Hell, I've cried more times since the New Years than I think I ever have in my 25 years on the planet, including toddler time. Becoming less of a hard-ass with less of a shell makes things more difficult, even if it in and of itself is a good thing. Mushiness just never really came to me naturally, and as such it's hard to deal with the consequences. I mean, my family isn't really a family that talks about feelings and things, since it's hard and it's not something that comes naturally to either me or my parents. When I tried talking about feelings the other day when they treated me to lunch, mom went straight into trying to figure out ways to solve anything but the abstract. No wonder I've had such a hard time trying to get the whole emotional part of my vocabulary going. They care though, and they show it through actions rather than words. Actions like them coming with me to Japan to help me get my shit together. Actions like not telling me to stop being an idiot when I was contemplating not going. Actions like my dad pretending that I in fact wasn't crying over the phone when I tried very hard to sound like I wasn't, and offering to lend me a rather large sum of money in the casual tone of someone lending money to someone who doesn't feel freakishly desperate. It's hard to ask for help. I want to be able to take care of myself. I just can't really, not yet. Mom was telling me the other day that I could probably have done this all on my own anyway, that I didn't really need to feel so freaked out, but the truth is I'd probably be completely lost and even more petrified than I am now. I don't think I could've done it at all.

It feels so much better to kick ass together.

Another person who's been completely invaluable is the Philosopher. Apart from having put up with a completely insane version of me that cries at the drop of a hat and is prone to some crazy stress-related mood swings, he's let me stay at his place whenever I haven't felt like going home (which has been a lot recently. Just seeing my stuff makes me freak out about having to pack, which leads me to freak about having to move, which leads me to freak out about the future in general). He helps me with everyday things, and getting everything in order for the trip, structuring up my plans in regards to what I have to do before I go and what I have to do when I've actually arrived. I wonder about this, about how it feels for him. I mean, I find all of this pretty unbearable, the thought of going away and leaving one of the best things to ever happen to me, and the fear of the unknown and all that leaves me in a state of near-paralysis and misery. It's hard to force myself to do anything through the apathy that follows being totally stressed out. I wonder how things are for him though, not only having me move away but actually actively helping me do things that will lead me to be further and further away. I've been feeling so out of sorts, with burts of crying and feeling like the world is ending coming at an ever more frequent pace, so I guess he's just trying to make the transition flow more smoothly for me so that I don't end up freaking out completely, but I'm sure it's not fun, and I kinda feel bad for putting him through that. That being said, I know that he supports me despite the circumstances being pretty far from desirable, and that in and of itself is pretty amazing to me.

The Philosopher is pretty amazing in general. If we hadn't decided that we'd stay together despite the whole distance thing, I would've been even more torn up about moving. I don't even know if I actually even would've moved. It came to the point where Pony was contemplating going over to his place without my knowledge to 'talk some sense into him', which when she told me about it, we were both rather relieved that she didn't have to do. Still, I really appreciate the sentiment. He's even told me that he's thought about coming over to stay more long-term, as it's possible to stay up to 90 days in Japan on just the regular tourist visa, sub-letting his apartment, and that's something I couldn't have hoped for even in my wildest imagination. Obviously it isn't set in stone or anything, mostly because he has things he actually needs to do in Stockholm as well, and the fact that he would be in a foreign country he didn't really know anything about, not speaking the language and only knowing me. I understand that it would seem kinda daunting to just get up and go in the face of all that. But just having told me that it was on his mind really set me at ease as to going. Well, as much at ease as I could possibly be, considering that I'm one big unstable ball of stress.

Seeing as the whole moving thing is happening soon, I thought I'd make an effort to post things at regular intervals again. It's nice to get some thoughts down on... well, not paper, but the internet? The cyber void? I don't know. Cosmic journal writing maybe.