Whoever said we start at the beginning has never lived a day past 12. And that's the thing, there are no beginning or ends. You spend your whole childhood clinging onto ground and solid objects, people and memories, ideas and beliefs until you pick up a few digits and learn the hard way that growing up is an act of letting go. It's all a balancing act, you're bouncing on soap bubbles through space, bursting that one to get to the next, and if you're a second early or late you'll lose momentum and be stranded. In a weird way, grownups' power comes from how they acknowledge their helplessness, and children's helplessness comes from their sense of invincibility. It's all a balancing act, and not all of us can move as fast. I know I've always been a klutz.
I'm looking forward to these things, as much as I'm looking forward to a graphic tablet that I saved up for and will be getting in a couple of months. I'm not great at sketching, but it makes me happy. It's work that can frustrate me into untroubled sleep, one that I can spend hours learning without retracing on the clock. Isn't that what life is all about? Well who knows anyway, and who gives a rat's ass. I've never felt more at home than when I feel when I'm learning something that has to do with graphic design, running my ankle joints to shreds, playing piano or writing up a good heartfelt piece.
I guess that's why people feel lost when their things are not within themselves, or that are other people's, or are other people even. You can't find what was never yours, how are you supposed to recognize an ever-changing blob? I felt lost this year because of this, I've lost a lot of people I cared about, they got swooped into their own soap bubble trajectories and I stumbled face first trying to follow until I eventually lost momentum. It's funny how grownups eagerly lose connection, I guess when you get so good at something, auto-pilot takes over and all of a sudden you're ugly Adam Sandler senior lying butt naked on the asphalt groping at your children's backs 30 years too late, the child part of me resents that.
Sophomore year is by far the most hectic I've had, although it has nothing to do with the work load, it's been trivial. Now that I'm on sick leave and have had to miss even more than what I already missed when I didn't feel like going because I thought I had better things to do, it's turned into a countdown to the apocalypse. We dine in hell, baby doll. Somehow, knowing all of that, I know I can handle it still. Although I recognize this time that other people pay when one makes mistakes, and it's usually the people one cares about the most, who also happen to be the ones who care about one the most. You just realize that a little too late, and it shits on your parade. You don't care that you can handle it anymore, you just start wondering why you ever made them go through that kind of shit and call yourself a dumbass while you're at it. It's no celebrating matter, there aren't any Barney Stinsons fixing their ties and theatrically dubbing it a challenge accepted as you swoosh in and spitball your rubble into a minty fresh work of art. You do it anyway, but there's no flare to it. Do people ever get the courtesy of taking risks out of their own time and buck? Are there always people tied to the bungee line, poking out at all kinds of awkward angles? I'd give you the world if I can, but I can't. Stop making me feel bad about it. There are so many things to feel bad about in this world, why do the people you love the most insist to be the magnetic core?
This hasn't been a good year for me, in more ways than one. A lot of constants were shattered for me to learn that lesson, and I really can't learn it often and hard enough. But it has also been a good year for me, because there's truth in that, crippling hard truth that I can see and feel and work with, and possibly fail at, but it's there nonetheless. You can't fear what you know, even if you're just starting to know it. I came here to pour my heart out about all the good things that I'm looking forward to, because I haven't allowed myself to hope for things for a very long time, nor have I allowed myself to pour my heart out fearing the many times I started only to have someone eagerly take a pinata bat at it in full swing. I think I'm okay with that now.
I found out that I'm very sick today, and I'm not ready to talk about it yet. I don't think I will be, and I don't think that matters.
Today, however, was an excellent day. I spent it typing my fingers away at a job that I love, that
drives me absolutely crazy. I write up story lines for games. Starting up small still, but it makes me feel alive, like the sky's the limit, although it's really not. I don't have as much creative freedom as I'd like, it doesn't pay nearly enough to cover a decent bill, and it's a freelance project that will soon expire, one that I know I shouldn't get attached to, but I am, and I always put my all into it and it leaves me absolutely exhausted and empty, in a way that leaks my presence into my work only to have it slowly recharge as I sit back and call it a day's work, squishing the enter button real nice. I'm also looking at an internship in UN Women's rights branch over the summer, which I know will be as fulfilling as it will be time consuming and challenging. It intimidates me, and that's exhilarating. Don't get me wrong, I'm free of UN illusions, I even wrote my freshman paper - back in them glorious rebel days - on the neocolonialist vice that is the UN's true body of work, but it still makes a small change, even if that change is mere placebo effect, and more on the giving side than the receiving. I can't wait to start, all the things you learn when you're given all the gritty work, it's like reconstructing a machine's blueprints from its dismantled wreck. What do people do with themselves when they run out of things to run at?
It has always been these four things. Life is simple, all you have to do is find your things, then keep finding them in other things as they get taken away.
I guess that's why people feel lost when their things are not within themselves, or that are other people's, or are other people even. You can't find what was never yours, how are you supposed to recognize an ever-changing blob? I felt lost this year because of this, I've lost a lot of people I cared about, they got swooped into their own soap bubble trajectories and I stumbled face first trying to follow until I eventually lost momentum. It's funny how grownups eagerly lose connection, I guess when you get so good at something, auto-pilot takes over and all of a sudden you're ugly Adam Sandler senior lying butt naked on the asphalt groping at your children's backs 30 years too late, the child part of me resents that.
Sophomore year is by far the most hectic I've had, although it has nothing to do with the work load, it's been trivial. Now that I'm on sick leave and have had to miss even more than what I already missed when I didn't feel like going because I thought I had better things to do, it's turned into a countdown to the apocalypse. We dine in hell, baby doll. Somehow, knowing all of that, I know I can handle it still. Although I recognize this time that other people pay when one makes mistakes, and it's usually the people one cares about the most, who also happen to be the ones who care about one the most. You just realize that a little too late, and it shits on your parade. You don't care that you can handle it anymore, you just start wondering why you ever made them go through that kind of shit and call yourself a dumbass while you're at it. It's no celebrating matter, there aren't any Barney Stinsons fixing their ties and theatrically dubbing it a challenge accepted as you swoosh in and spitball your rubble into a minty fresh work of art. You do it anyway, but there's no flare to it. Do people ever get the courtesy of taking risks out of their own time and buck? Are there always people tied to the bungee line, poking out at all kinds of awkward angles? I'd give you the world if I can, but I can't. Stop making me feel bad about it. There are so many things to feel bad about in this world, why do the people you love the most insist to be the magnetic core?
I guess the one thing I can't get over with all the change going on right now are the lack of handlebars. We all like to know they're there, even if we won't use them. Those handlebars are the people who want to hear about the good days and care about the bad days. They don't run away from misplaced verbs or serious talks. They're real and down to earth. They also don't exist. I'm not sure they ever did.
I drove myself into a corner again, might as well wrap up before I end up at a worse place, this one's bad enough. A part of me misses a simpler time, and a bigger part of me doubts it was ever real or just a huge figment of my childishly distorted, pink-hued imagination. Cheers, adults. I have no idea how you don't get seasick.
No comments:
Post a Comment