Reflections

Floral pants

            Polka dot bra

                        A helmet without scratches

                                    But in the end only ashes 

A mind

            Constantly running

            From

                        Soul

                        Shattering

                        Sadness                     

It can’t keep up

“Como estas?”

“No se.

Vacía.

Quizas numb.

Casi como no puedo sentir nada.

Como nada es real.

Como no soy real.

Como ahora todo es una produccion de teatro.” 

Desolation.  Noun.

-       A state of complete emptiness or destruction

-       Anguished misery or lonelines 

When you look through the lens of a camera, you can see everything clearly; everything is in focus.  But only if you want it to be.  When you take a picture, you are recreating that reality, supposedly freezing it in time, just is it is just in that moment and maybe no longer after.  However, when you look through that lens, at that reality, you can choose to change the way it appears. The way you see it. How that moment in time is processed.  You can choose to look at the entire picture- the scope of everything, the depth- and to capture everything clearly.  Or you can make adjustments; you can distort it.  By changing the shutter speed, you can slow it down, and everything will be blurry.  By changing the aperture, you can choose to focus on only a very small portion of what’s in the picture, while blurring out the rest of the image.  This is what I do.  By keeping part of the picture in focus, you are tricking the viewer, or yourself, into thinking that it is a proper representation of reality.  But the reality is that the rest of the information is inaccurate, or missing altogether.  I choose to focus only on what’s right in front of me; on the one tiny portion of what’s in front of me and nothing else. I pretend that the rest of it does not exist.  Because I don’t want it to.  I don’t want it to be part of my picture.  It should not be part of my reality.  It cannot be. 

I do not dare to change the focus to anywhere else, because then it will become a completely different story.  A story of desolation.  A story I do not want to be part of.

A story I cannot bear to live.

So for now… I distort the picture and look at this version of reality. Not a lie.  But hiding the truth.  Not hiding, but disguising.  Blurring it.  Making it impossible to recognize even if you try.  I’m not sure I ever will.  I’m not sure I ever want to.

In my picture it is incomprehensible. 
And in my reality that’s how it will stay.
Impossible. 

Hundreds of people around you.
But one person is missing.
Forever. 
The tears stream down your face, faster that the rain across the airplane window you gaze out endlessly.
A sky of desolation.
A soul of desolation.
Four hours.
Infinity.
Hundreds of people around you. 
Beside you.
But not one word is said.
While you shed
An attempt at silent tears. 

I had thought moving back to Los Angeles would fix everything.  I knew it wouldn’t But I had hope for something; just a tiny part of it. But the world around me cannot be fixed, because what is inside of me cannot be fixed.  The problems I feel trying to face the world- even simples tasks feel overwhelmingly impossible for me to accomplish- are because of the damage inside of me. 

I am broken and I want to be fixed.

I don’t know how. I don’t know if.

When you rip a hole in a pair of jeans, you cannot fix it, in the sense that you cannot make it go away. “Fixing” something implies that the problem is no llonger there. The hole is still there. The hole inside of me will never be gone.  You can try and mend a hole- sew it up, patch it- it might even work very well.  If you do a good job, you might not even be able to see it anymore; an undetectable hole hiding beneath a meticulously crafter shell.  But it will never be as strong as it was before.  It has been mended but it has not been fixed.  It is weaker, it is more susceptible to further damage.  It may rip again.  It may just pull at the seams; every time you move; to remind you it is still there.  Maybe you will grow accustomed to the patch; you still wear the jeans and you are able to because of the patch.  Maybe the jeans still bring you joy, but they are not the same pair of jeans anymore.

This is not the same life of mine anymore.

The pain stays within me but sometimes I can’t feel it. Sometimes I am numb to the pain but worse I am numb to happiness.  To everyone around me.  To experiences. To myself.

Mostly I feel nothing, especially when I want to feel something. 

Every once in a while I almost forget why I am numb; about the tear in my jeans, about the hole inside of me. 

And then, without warning, it rips open again. 

“How are you?”
           --  I’m ok right now

“”How are you?”  
                 --   Fucking shitty

“How are you?”
          --  How the fuck do you think

It’s funny that after dreading that question for so long, I now wish people would ask me.  People probably don’t ask because they don’t think it’s relevant. And unless you go out of your way to blatantly tell them otherwise, they assume you’re good.  Or the very least, that you’re doing better.  They don’t want you to feel bad because it makes them feel bad.  They want you to feel good because it makes them feel good.  Not in a selfish way, but because they don’t know how to fix it, to fix you, to make you feel better.  I don’t either.   And that’s the worst part.  When you don’t know how to feel better, you can’t tell yourself when you will, or if you will. 

And the truthful answer is that I feel worse.  I don’t know if I actually feel worse relatively, or if I feel worse because thought I would- or should- feel better.  But I don’t.   I feel like a less fun, less happy, hopeless version of myself.

No, not even a version of myself, I feel like a different person altogether.   Someone I don’t like, someone I don’t want to be around, but someone I can’t escape.  It feels as though someone has hijacked my body and trapped me inside.  I don’t want to be around people anymore, which used to be my best escape.  Or maybe it’s the thought that if I don’t even want to be around myself, then why would other people want to be around me.  I tried to describe the feeling to my aunt and she told me not to worry, because other people can’t tell that I’m feeling any of this; that they just see me, and they still want to be around me.  “You can’t tell at all.” 

But is that supposed to make it better?  Or does it make it worse? 

Not only do I have to feel this way but other people don’t know that someone else has replaced me and they think that this is who I actually am. 

My identity is being stolen. 

Maybe they won’t know the real side of me; maybe the portion of it that is hiding will dissipate, while the inside of me screams out in pain.  Silently.  Disengaged.  Empty.  But not quite enough so that anyone will take notice.

“Are you ok?
          --   No.
Maybe one day I will be.
Maybe even for more than one day.
I will be.
Good. 

I thought I would feel something, anything. 

Happiness.

Numbness.

Other people’s happiness.

Anxiety.

My own happiness.

Missing.

Pressure.

Dissonance. 

My room secretly reflects the inside of me.

I have been sleeping pillowcases for one month.