A reflection

Wikipedia defines love as “an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment”. Of this, I am sure. When I was three years old, I forged a bond with a young boy called Billy. I adored the presence and attention of Billy and couldn’t wait until he chose to be around me. I would wait outside on many days, long before my mother woke up, on the chance that Billy would want to see me. We would use sticks to stir about puddles of sludge in gutters but I didn’t care. He was there and that was what mattered to me. Our friendship was brief, but from that moment, I experienced the emotion that would shape my life. It didn’t stop there. After Kindergarten began, it was a fifth grader called Mike. I would adorn my mother’s makeup and wear my Sabbath best when I rang his doorbell. You can see where this is going. From a very young age, I endeared the swooning affect that the opposite sex incited upon me.

As I grew up, things didn’t change, and neither did I. At fourteen, my first real “personal attachment” came in the form of a confused goth-ish boy named Jordan. He was the first person to acknowledge me as a young woman, and as a person. He discredited all my insecurities and held my hand when I thought I couldn’t make it through. Yes, I was in love. His honesty and integrity reflected upon me in a way I didn’t know was possible but alas, all teenage things end abruptly, and I found myself in the true condition of humanity: alone.

I’ve loved many since then, and even after a failed marriage, find myself no different from the three year old I’ve described to you. To me, the world only seems happy when you can share it with others. I think it goes deeper than that. I’m certain that, though love is a very real thing, it is few and far between. You can love with your whole heart and soul, though there is no guarantee that you will be loved in return. In fact, the chances are slim.

I didn’t graduate from high school, and barely attended the several colleges that I half-heartedly enrolled into. I don’t have a home, any children or anything that normal, functional adults strive every day to maintain and I can’t tell you why because I don’t know. There are many things that I don’t know.

To me, the only thing that is real is truth and the truth is from the moment I entered this world I can, without a doubt make the following statement: I don’t know how it feels to be loved. And this is the most disturbing thing of all. I feel as though I’m guiding a ship through a treacherous ocean without any helm. I have no map, and I am alone. And yes, I’m afraid. The storm is always at bay and on most days, I want to jump ship. I’m exhausted from manning a giant ship that never seems to reach land, and never offers any fruitful reward.

Survival is an instinct, of this I am sure. Often times I have been suicidal, though I’ve noticed that I never fail to look both ways when crossing the street. This I cannot explain either. Perhaps it is the fear of a painful death, or just the fear that the God I revere could never forgive me.

I am perplexed as to why I experience guilt when I acknowledge the ongoing notion that perhaps life really isn’t for some people. Evolution says that only the strong shine on. I don’t seriously flatter myself that I fall in that category, but I find my strength in my love for others. I’ve heard that everyone you encounter in your life is not a mistake, but a lesson. In everyone that touches my life, I feel that strong personal attachment that Wikipedia has the audacity to define, from the homeless man asking me for spare change, to the father that abandoned me in the beginning of my life, and even the woman that takes pity on my barren womb and lets me hold her baby. It’s frightening to shine in a world of darkness and I’m not sure I possess the necessary courage when I feel so much hatred and indifference from the world, but it seems to me there is only one option: I have to try. When you love, God’s light shines upon you, but if I’m living by truth, I must admit, I’ve always felt as though I dwell in the dark. I’m angry, and have been for thirty years, and I don’t know how to make it go away, though I would never tell anyone. The walls are too high and anyway, the monster on the other side is no reward.

I don’t like to be too close and I don’t like to be touched. I shudder at affection because I don’t trust it and I can’t recognize or define it. I’m standing in a dark room screaming but it feels as though nothing or no one will understand and my efforts are futile. I belong to no one and no one belongs to me. Solitude is my only reality, and I can’t stop looking for cowardly short cuts to my final breath.

Even though it hurts me, I can’t stop trying. Maybe it’s necessary to put aside the pain and keep going. Be that light. Be that smile. Maybe others are in the dark room with me, but they are too afraid to speak up and can’t see me smiling for them. If I put out my hands maybe I can find them. Maybe I will find you. Maybe we can be in the dark room together and both find a way to shine or at least to crawl out.

Nothing is certain, but the ‘maybe’ has to be good enough…