how to put on a façade in four easy steps!1. smile, nod, laugh!
2. spew a random expression from your prepared collection, where applicable!
3. provide vague responses to direct questions!
4. use lots of !!!!!!!!!
it's so easy to put on a front.
life is fantastic! your face seems to say, your laugh only supplementing your clever cover. no one could ever guess how rotten everything really is.
what's not so easy is to look inside yourself, pull the pieces out through your throat and string them up like christmas lights.
"what's that you're doing?" whispers the wind, pausing"what's that you're doing?" question my teachers, my professors, my friends.
in a heap just outside the window.
"what's that you're doing?" shout my parents, my aunts, my uncles.
"what's that you're doing?" quiver my past ambitions, my forgotten dreams.
i want to do everything but nothing, all at the same time. i feel like i'm living life with my eyes half-glazed over under the tired, heavy, oppresive light of mid-afternoon, too frightened to look into the black abyss that is my future and too ashamed to look at the apparent failure that is my past.
now that i'm free to be myself, who am i?now that i'm free to be myself, who am i?
can't fly, can't run, and see how slowly i walk.
now that i'm free from my pre-med chains, my medical school imprisonment, what am i to become?
all those ignored passions, where are they now? all of that suppressed life, everything that i wanted to be but couldn't dream about, where did it go?
i can do anything. i can determine the blueprint for the entirety of my existence, right here, right now. isn't that supposed to be empowering? aren't i supposed to be happy?
it doesn't happen all of a sudden, you know.but it must. i haven't got the time. the clock keeps ticking, rushing madly and unforgivingly forward. my mother must give me those eyes, that disappointed and coldly unforgiving stare, telling me to put away my ridiculous paintings and get back into the real world.
"listen!" she shrieks. "you're throwing your life away! don't be so stupid!"
if i had an answer, if i had any confidence in my future at all it wouldn't matter what she said. but i don't.
i feel so lost, so confused. a shriveled-up shadow of my former self. a girl that almost wishes she could go back to living that comfortable, confident lie just to avoid facing the brutal honesty of reality.
2 comments:
Isn't it so fun to wear a mask all day? Your words evoke all the feelings I think we all feel at times, especially at this point in our lives. Again, just remember that you are wonderful, that you are loved, and that no matter how it turns out you will be okay, and I know that whatever you do your life will not be a waste--you are too much of a talented, insightful, and gifted person for that to happen.
Amen to what Le Mec said. I love the fact that you're real. Sometimes I walk around campus glaring. That might not be the best thing to do, but it's real. I see your pain and your achievements and I'm glad that you share them with me. Whatever happens with your life it will be good if you don't deny yourself the things that make you truly happy. And making someone else happy isn't always one of them...
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