The apathy is settling in. That sentence feels plagiarized, like I’m trying to claim a ubiquitous human experience as a unique and personal one. (Interesting to me, I just use a not an in form of 2 words that start with the vowel u – spoken word wins where feelings lead, doesn’t it?)
But anyway, I’m finding it hard to care about things in this world. I’m stuck in a world beyond this one. I’ve been seeing the hawk a lot lately, thinking about my Ojichan. He could name every species around Georgia, and tell me if a specimen was male or female. All the males were named George, all the females Agnes. The carpenter bees buzzing nearby make me think of him too. And the squirrels. The flowers make me think of Obachan. She was the only femininity in that family. I’m sure it was hard, and I wish so badly I had more time with her. I wish I had more time with Ojichan before the Alzheimer’s took him.
Why does sorrow feel competitive sometimes? I don’t know why. Maybe it’s me.
But anyway, it makes me sick of caring openly. I want to be normal so bad. But then I realize, I’m just not fucking normal, and that SHOULD BE OKAY. I hate myself for fitting molds, I miss the little girl who didn’t care. Going to the looney bin in 7th grade, and the whole school finding out…it broke my give a fuck. I miss that feeling.
And ya know, I feel like we live in an era where we assume everyone is worse than what they seem…everyone’s a little more racist, a little more selfish, a little more shitty than what they claim. And the more people I meet, the harder it gets to not believe that assumption. But knowing myself, I’m obsessed with contrast and breaking stereotypes and molds. Obsessed with the rebellion of it. So I keep making efforts to be better than what I seem, and I keep trying to believe that about others. Humans are complex, and even the worst ones HAVE to have some sort of tenderness in there somewhere, right?
So I try to seem worse than what I really am. My words are harsher than my thoughts, because I don’t like feeling like there are boundaries on my expression. Maybe this is why I feel so dramatic all the time.
Maybe it’s hard to tell, but I do love all people. Pros and cons here, but I especially love the ones who like me the least. So I end up feeling trapped on the outside looking in. I wish I could either be let in or find my people out here, but I also hate spending energy on figuring out where I belong. It’s generally suggested that we should be ourselves, and we will find our people. But I feel like I’m wandering out over a cliff on an island…and I belong here, but there’s nobody out here. I’m stranded at The Cay (Theodore Taylor), and I’ve gone blind. Who’s here with me? Will you join me to make a great team, or will you let your implicit bias ice me out and turn this cay into Hispaniola?
Because that would be colonialism built on supremist bureaucracy…and don’t get me started on that, that’s a tale for another day.
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