Vampires and Mermaids

Steph's going to write a story about mermaids, she said some time ago. Do you know why?

I do.

It's because they are the same in her universe, and ... in mine, too.

You see, Vampires are basically sad (except Alice and Esme and Carlisle ... well, okay, so most vampires are okay, except Edward ... and Rosalie), and Mermaids are basically happy, but you know what's exactly the same between the two of them?

Neither of them cry.

They can't cry. They are physically incapable of crying, which means for Vampires, after a year or so, they don't miss it, they don't even think it or feel it. When they are are sad, they channel through stillness or anger or rage or detactment or a blink of the eyes or laughter, but they don't cry. 'Cry,' as a concept, simply doesn't exist for them. Mermaids (and I suppose Mer'men' exist) from their conception don't have 'cry' in their lexicon, in their emotional repertoire. I mean, a mermaid is basically happy anyway: they are playing or singing or swimming or dancing. They are just so happy, all the time. Air is what we breathe, but mermaids don't breathe water, they breathe happiness.

Except.

Except with they, or perhaps just one, just one little mermaid, one kära lilla sjöjungfru, becomes aware of ... something.

Something that isn't for her, that could be. She falls in love with that human above water, and the normal mermen just don't do it for her, I mean, she could be nice to them, and they, nice to her, but ...

But, something's missing from her existence, and that is her handsome human prince (because it'd be way too much for me to ask for a sweet human princess to fall in love with me ... I mean her, human princesses don't give a fig for mermaids, we're nothing but rivals for her affection to her handsome prince). And when she realizes this, she becomes sad, and this is new for her, and so confusing. She is sad: she doesn't want to sing and play.

But she doesn't cry. She doesn't know how. She doesn't even know that 'crying' exists as a possibility for her, because it doesn't. The sea is the only salt water she'll ever feel on her cheeks.

And I so want to be a mermaid ... and, okay, I admit it, even though I am so going to get a serious tongue lashing from Rosalie (and not the good kind, girls), I so want to be a vampire.

Because.

Because when it's hard to draw the next breath, because the tears are obscuring your vision and you have to type this goddam entry from the memory of where the keys are under your fingers because you can't see the screen, because you know the next breath you'll draw is a gasp and will come out as a sob ...

It's tiring, girls. It's tiring drawing that next breath, because you know the sob will make the tears spill over, and here I am, crying like a baby, and Larry (my coworker, my 'partner' at sbux) has to drive me home from work and how much leave can I take from work? 'Cry-leave'? Is there any such thing? For me, yes, too much of it, in fact.

I don't know why Larry, well, anybody puts up with me. I can't stand me: so I don't see how anybody else can.

And if I were a mermaid, or a vampire, I wouldn't cry. I'd just deal with the emotion so dispassionately: 'I am sad. I have no reason to be sad. I am now moving beyond my sadness.' But no, here I am, a weak, sad little human, who, okay, girls, who hates herself, and hates the very next breath she's drawing because the tears are falling and can I hide this from anybody? No. And isn't it about time they fired me?

Vampires don't cry. Mermaids don't cry. And I so want that. I so want to be happy because that's my natural state. I so want to be unable to cry.

Another thing common to vampires and mermaids: they don't exist.

Humans don't cry when they don't exist anymore, did you ever notice that? The only people crying at a funeral, if there are any tears shed, are the people still living.

The dead don't cry at their funerals. They don't care. They are in eternal repose.

yeah. I'm fine.