This. This is the fourth time I am typing this out in my head. I had wanted to stick to the first opening lines to this piece I had come up with but couldn't because I lost that train of thought ten minutes and five sentences in. The second one I don't remember now either. By the time I got around to the third I was almost ready to pull my hair out if my laptop would have opened up any slower. Honestly, then I thought maybe I should stick to the basics and begin with LIFE IS HARD but that shit is cliched as fuck and you've come across it a million times already before you found your way to this today, right? Heard something along those lines on the radio? Maybe watched some heartbreaking news on the television? Listen to a podcast? Watch a movie about it? Or maybe played a song? Read a book or an article or a post some distant acquaintance put up on his/her social media account? God! I know. How infuriating.
So, that is why I decided to not roll with it. My friend texted me earlier in the day and told me he wasn't happy with his life right now because it was relaxed. I almost laughed out loud when I read those words on my screen. I wondered if his words also implied that his mind and body were relaxed, and not just the superficial details of his life. Because when I think of relaxed, I think of nothingness. I told him that. And that Milan Kundera got it right in his book when he spoke about the unbearable lightness of being. I would take a screaming head over a silent and quiet one any day. The former you can deal with, one way or another. Alcohol. Cigarettes. Drugs, if you into that kind of stuff. Or maybe even sex. But the latter? I do not think there is a fix for it, easy or difficult. You want to then simply blow your brains out. You ever feel like that? A deadly desire to put an end to a deafening silence? I guess what would put an end to it isn't just death but also that loud pop of the gun. Man! That sounds wonderful to me on some days.
But, my head isn't empty right now. It is full. More than full. It is spilling, and that is why you see these words on your screen right now. LIFE IS HARD, I know, I so get it. But I am dead set on placing the blame elsewhere. This life is not on me because I did not ask for it, didn't sign up for it. I guess choosing to end life is like clicking on the unsubscribe button. You can do it if you want to, if you feel like it. It is like taking yourself off an inevitable kill list that will one day find its way to you either way. Better to end it then on your own terms, right?
LIFE IS HARD. There is just so much to give a shit about these days. Do you care? Are you aware? Did you fight? Are you a survivor? Did you tweet today? Did you support a stranger? Did you dislike that hate comment? Did you like and share that inspiring story? Are you up-to-date? Do you care? Do you give a shit? Are you part of the revolution? Are you fighting the system? Do you know right from wrong? Do you know who is on your side? Do you know whose side are you on? Like I said, LIFE IS HARD.
You must know everything today if you want to make a difference, if you want to change the world. Apparently, you are no good to this world dead so you must keep on living. But has anyone ever dared and stopped to wonder if this world maybe is not good enough for them? You are all so selfish and greedy and self-absorbed and broken that my death, if it ever came to it, would also have to serve your purpose. My pain would have to add to your pain and make it greater. My disappointment would have to add to your disappointment and make it more important. My suffering would have to make yours more soulful and heart wrenching. My silent cries would have to add volume to your shrieks and make them more powerful. OH MY GOD, does this ever stop?
LIFE IS HARD, and sometimes I think love makes it the most difficult. Not hate, not indifference, but love. Because people will throw logic, sanity, value for self, basically all of those good things out the bloody fucking window when they find themselves in love. Yes, I am angry. Can you see me scream my lungs out and my eyes get redder as you read along? Am I making you uncomfortable? Are you scared? Worried maybe? How well do you know me? Are you even considering granting me some artistic freedom here or are you ready to play savior and send me some bullshit text message about self-love and self-esteem? Do you think I could do it? End my life? Take away that one damn thing which I have and which I did not ask for? Are you wondering if there were signs? Do you hate yourself now? Or are you happy because you knew I'd end up this way eventually? Are you crying? Do you think I should stop? Do you think I have crossed the line? Well, you know what they say, LIFE IS HARD. So, go deal with it!
I am sorry. It wasn't supposed to turn out this way. I swear. Hah! But you know that is not true. I would not swear. I am an atheist, amongst other things. But don't get me started on that, please! But alas, here we are. Labels. Tags. How utterly exhausting and completely disappointing this task is. But we do it. We all indulge in it, shamelessly, over and over again. Or maybe you let it happen to you. A victim, of one amongst many vices? I don't get it. Why do we always have to be something? Wrong or right? Rich or poor? Uncultured or sophisticated? Educated or illiterate? Leftist or Rightist? Fat or thin? Ugly or pretty? Tall or short? Straight? Gay? One gender, many gender, no gender? Feminist or misogynist? Environmentalists or not? OH MY GOD. I don't know if we more often fail miserably at this task because there is just so many definitions to choose from or not enough. For someone who thinks about being forced to live this life and draw some larger purpose or meaning out of it as a pass time, passively, day in and day out, I think it is nothing short of blasphemy, all these roles I am supposed to play and these aims I am supposed to have and this life I am supposed to want.
Do you know how excruciatingly strenuous it is to just be plain fucking sad old human? No, you don't. Because you haven't given it any thought. You are cozy and comfortable in your closets, all smug and full of yourselves. These labels and tags, and these assumptions and expectations, which I am so tired of and despise, you live off of those. Because these protect you and keep you away from life's only true harm-- of being human.
If only you could ever look inside my head one day. A gazillion tabs open, at all times. I am thinking about my myself, my past, my present, my future and the past, present and future of all the people I know, and of this world, which I don't know much of but enough that it gives me a headache each time. I put on a mask, lock my brain in a cage and zip my tongue. I say what you want me to, I do what you want me to, and I hear what you want me to. I am the perfect con artist. I do what I can to fill in holes, gaps and broken bridges. I play your beacon of light, guiding you in your darkest hours, whilst I continue to drown, slowly and steadily, in the customized hell I build for myself with each passing day.
YOU DON'T KNOW ME. And you really don't, so please don't bother. It isn't something I say because it sounds cool or mysterious, it's simply become the truth now. That bitter, honest-to-God, raw kind of truth. You didn't know me when you thought you did, and you certainly don't know me now. Don't worry. It isn't all on you. We just got caught in a vicious cycle. I showed, you didn't see and then because you didn't see, I didn't show. Love, pain, disappointment, anger, grief, sorrow, joy, desire, lust, madness, serenity--all of it. So I packed it all up, put it in a box and pushed it away so hard and fast that its disappeared inside of me somewhere now. And so that cycle continued, until we got to the point where you knew nothing about me and I had you convinced otherwise so that we could go on and live our lives as usual. Funny, right? Or only dark and morbid?
Are you alarmed yet? Will you care now? Change? Listen? Look, but also see? Do you know what to do with this? Bury it or dig out old skeletons from your stinky closets? Tell me, what will you do now?
I know, I get. I so get it. DAMN, THIS LIFE IS SO FUCKING HARD.