are you happy?

This is it. This is what I've been waiting three years to do. This is my final blog post.

You can actually see if you go back, not that you should, but you can see me start to think about ending the blog as early as 2015. But I didn't and I think it was good because I still had a lot to say. But now, I think I'm done.

It's not so much that I have nothing left to say. I have plenty still to say, but this is no longer the platform for it. And I've got to stop doing these to myself.

I think for a while I got so caught up in writing this and being a person as filtered through this blog that I forgot how to be a person. And since the whole point of this blog was to become a better person, a more me person, the fact that it's getting in the way of that, shows it's time to stop.

I think there was a period of time where I only cared about being me and being better for me for the sake of a new blog post. All I thought about were new blog posts. I would cut myself open and rip myself a part for the fucking sake of a new blog post. And I'm so proud of what I've done, and what I've created, but it's time to stop.

The theme of the blog has been "I Bailey S. Fox want to be a better person," and now it's time to do that, beyond what I can write.

But before I go, I want to give you some updates.

I've been working out. For the first time in my life I am approaching something that might be an actual appreciation for my body. I don't always hate being undressed. It's not an end result, I still have a lot of work to accomplish, but it's progress. And I'm very happy to have been making it.

I've been making better choices for myself. I've been eating healthier and I've been trying to take care of myself emotionally. I've started seeing a therapist, I've started working on my communication skills, I've started a record of things that make my happy every day. I'm slowly no longer becoming a self destructive person trapped in his own constant cycle. Maybe I can break out of this.

And also, I'm currently working to try and discover myself outside the context of a relationship. Because spoiler, I'm not in one. So now, and I'm really going to try my damnedest, I want to discover who I am without the context of another. I want to give my life meaning and purpose outside of another person. I want to do this for me. I'm ending this blog, for me, I'm working out, for me. I'm making better choices, for me. I'm going to therapy, for me.

I want to be a better me, for me.

I've watched artists I admire step away from work in such graceful ways. Bo Burnham with "Are you Happy?" at the end of "Make Happy" or the Epilogue at the end of "The Tempest." And while I'm nowhere near as important or relevant as those artists, I step away from this blog now. There is more for me. It's time to stop analyzing what I'm doing and just do the damn thing.

Thank you all for reading the last three years. The nearly 20,000 views, for reading each and every last one of the 84 blog posts I've made. Thank you for the love and support you have given me. I can never thank you all enough for this, all of this. It's meant the world to me.

I will be happy, it's time to move forward. It's time to find myself, and the world outside of me.

For the last time,

thanks for reading.

Love,

Bailey Olmstead
<3

Hero Complexities

In two days, it will be the three year anniversary of a very arrogant 15 year old trying to explain his thoughts on things like humanity and also The Planet of the Apes remake that helped foster his deep hatred of Mark Wahlberg

And I've changed a lot since then. Something that hasn't changed (as much as it probably should have) is my hero complex. I've been confronted by everyone who has ever known me with the fact that I have one. And right now, (AKA the last six months,) in an attempt to rid myself of it, I've kind of become the worst.

Or I haven't.

I can't tell.

I can tell you a lot of shitty things I've done in the last six months, christ, everyone who knows my name could as well, but I've probably always done shitty things in the same frequency, so why am I suddenly so burdened by it now?

I've been thinking a lot about it, and I think it's because what has always made my past transgressions more acceptable has been the clear visibility of my intentions behind it, but the choices I have made in the last six months have been ones of a more selfish nature. I wasn't doing things to better myself that might have had consequences, I've been making a lot of selfish and cowardly choices, and then trying to write the narrative around those to comfort myself, but I stand here in the muck of the narrative, and I can either let it pull me down, or I can pick up my feet. and free myself of my own lies and self-deception.

Despite your grand attempts the chips are set to fall

And all the stories you might weave cannot negotiate them all

And I'm making it all sound worse that it probably is. It's not like I've killed anyone. But I've become selfish, I've become more closed off, I've become less tender, less soft, I've let myself grow hard and blame the world around me and the people around me instead of accepting and owning up to the fact that I've grown scared. I have, the worst thing that could happen to me is me losing the people in my life, but all I do is I keep them at arms length with a brusque sense of humor, strong silences, and snappy moments. I said it before, but I've let myself grow hard. I've let myself write excuses for why I am how I am instead of just taking control and writing my own story. I've lost the plot. I'm tired of making excuses. I want to be good enough, not for other people, but for myself.

I'm tired of being such a way that I constantly question my actions. The careless remarks I make in front of the wrong people, the jokes that are too close to crossing the line for comfort, I'm tired ob being afraid and hiding.

I can't tell you exactly when it started. I can't pinpoint the day and say that's when I became the victim. Because any guess I made you could probably find and earlier example of it.

I need to come to terms to what I've done and how I've been, and then I need to let it go.

No one wants to hear constantly about how I've been shitty. They want to hear about me growing. Not me slowly learning that I've been regressing. And regressing is a misnomer. I've made a lot of growth as a person in some areas. I've taken good care of myself and I've started doing a lot of good for me. But I've let that progress hide the shitty things I've been doing from myself. Because it's too easy to write selfish behavior off as just growing up when every damn movie about selfish adults has the moral that they need to grow soft again, and that becoming a dick isn't a part of growing up inherently. For fuck's sake, the moral of the movie I wrote is that you shouldn't grow up to be a selfish dick.

I think I've let myself run for too long. It's time, not to stand still, but to stand tall. It's time to grow up and take responsibility for who I've been, and to be a better me. I know that if 15 year old me were to look at me now, he'd be proud overall. He'd be awed. But 15 year old me had low standards. (Higher than Marky Mark and his shitty Planet of the Apes movie, but not that high.) 15 year old me thought very lowly of himself, and by extension 18 year old Bailey is better in every way. But it's not all that hard to be better than yourself at 15. The goals I should be setting should be better than that. Maybe the hero complex got me into trouble, but I'd rather be in trouble for trying to help than being in trouble for being shitty.

Maybe the next person I have to try and save, is myself.

Thank you for reading, for the last three years. Holy shit that's crazy people have been reading this for three years. Also, like 1,400 people read my last post and that's absolutely bonkers. You guys indulge me and love and support me and for that I'm so thankful. I wouldn't be able to be better without you guys. Thank you.

Love,
Bailey S. Fox