When the Sky Ends
The smoke is still stinging my throat slightly, dancing with the familiar taste of tobacco in my mouth. Perhaps I’ve developed a mild nicotine addiction… Lately I’ve felt as though I’ve had to have at least one every night. “It’s okay though, I can quit whenever I want.” Nights where I cannot find the time to smoke don’t seem like a burden to me, and often times are followed by a couple nights where I simply forget to greet this habit.
Poor me.
Got into a huge fight with my mother today… It all started when she asked my brother to start his car for her. My brother, jokingly, said that she should ask me to do it instead. He was finishing up his lunch or something… I was busy with Twilight Princess, a great game that I haven’t had the time to get into since its release. So, she asked me if I could do it for her. So I told her that it’s his car and that she asked him first, so naturally he should do it. These innocent words devolved into “Hey! I told YOU to do it, so go do it!” I resisted, and then she began making comments about how lazy I was and how it was just shameful that I was never willing to do any work around the house. She kept going about how ungrateful of a child I was, one bullshit remark after the next.
I wasn’t having any of that today. So, I lashed back out at her. This argument went all over, touching on subjects ranging from how I wasn’t able to find a job this semester, to her and my dad’s inability to find jobs this season either, to my brother’s greatly belated high school graduation (coming this December… he’s 20 now), to the sensitive (for her) issue of me having to take her car to college this semester instead of my own which had expensive transmission problems, to my parents playing favorites when we were children, to statements such as “Why don’t you just move out already? We should start charging you rent,” to “I’m the only one in this room who’s actually planning on doing something that matters with my life… you’re the one who’s a failure.”
It was fierce, abbreviated only when she realized she was running late for some errands she had to attend.
I’ve come to a realization today. When I was younger, when I needed friends and company and relationships the most, they were the ones who were never there for me. Due to some masterful work by my then-manipulative, brown-nosing brother, he had managed to convince my parents that I was the source of scorn in our family. I was labeled as the misfit, the mischievous, selfish child who twisted the opinions of my friends against my own family members.
It all began when they first held on to the notion that I was abusing my brother, trying to turning friends and family against him. In a heroic attempt to foil my evil plot, I became the evil one. They were the heroes who had stepped in just in time to save my brother from certain peril, sentenced to a life of depression and loneliness ushered in by me, who sought the approval of my peers more than the bonds of family. I was the problem child from then on, the one they had to unite against to undermine.
They needed someone to fill this role in their lives. I happened to be in the right place in the right time. Thus the evil one’s schemes would be forever put to rest, the villain locked up and bound. No more would these plans come to fruition, no longer would this terrible concoction of blood, tissue and bone which had gone awry continue to herd corruption between their precious family bonds.
What’s it like to have your family stand up for you, to protect you when people aim their fragile fingers your way undeservingly? What’s it like to be encouraged by a loving father when you’ve been paralyzed by the fears of a reality which seeks to destroy you? What’s it like to hold a deep, genuine conversation with a mother who’s interested in your thoughts and feelings, interested in the relationships you’ve managed to build in the mere 10-20 years of life you’ve been granted thus far?
Tell me… somebody please, tell me…
These days hurt so much. Each day I walked through this desert, chapped lips seeking water. It wasn’t long after stepping onto this baked earth that the wolves first spotted me… wasn’t long before I could hear them pacing around me as I slept, each night drawing closer, biding their time to strike. My father once told me I was the worst sibling he had ever known. “I would never want to be your brother,” he said to me. Even as my brother defended me, he held fast to this idea.
I wanted to die… I wanted to die…
When have I ever been the wanted one within this circle? I’ve always envied this love, the bond of which I apparently am undeserving of. Even now as they talk to him… my brother, the victim… Each time they laugh, each time they share something of themselves… Hell, each time they so much as genuinely listen to the words he speaks, I wonder if it ever could have been me.
…But sometimes I wonder if I truly wished it could’ve been.
I thought that these cuts would be for my friends, those who’ve fallen where I’d managed to stay strong. But now I believe that these cuts will be for me.
I wish I may, I wish I might
On crimson-coated steel tonight…
Oh God… I need to get out of here…
Around the Fireplace
Well, I’m back. Too bad my home doesn’t have power. We’ve got a generator though, so it’s not so bad. At least I can shower… And, obviously, I have internet access.
My ex removed me as a facebook friend recently… I’m not sure exactly when, but I was reading their updates just a few weeks ago… so, it can’t have been that long since then.
I’m… not sure how I feel about it. One one hand, I can understand… We barely talk since we’ve broken up and I’m sure my ex is tired of receiving updates about me and my current interest. It’s interesting that several other friends have removed me as well. Call these dynamics silly politics if you will, but there hasn’t been a day that’s gone by where I don’t recall the pain I’ve caused this person. Though I still don’t regret my actions, I do still care about this person tremendously. As for the other friends who have removed me, I have other, much better friends than them. I’m growing tired of the drama around here anyway.
On top of this, I heard that there may be someone else involved now. Honestly, I sincerely hope so… I hope my ex finds that perfect someone, and soon… I think they could use it.
I don’t know. I suppose I am disappointed that a friendship couldn’t work out between us. Though, I cannot say that I’m surprised.
One of my other friends broke up with her boyfriend, recently. Now they are both dating other people… I’ve heard that the guy she’s dating isn’t such a great person, and it’s wearing on her.
It’s funny, the directions in which people change sometimes.
Myself included, I suppose.
I haven’t cut yet. I think I may be afraid to. In a sense I feel as though I have to be there emotionally for my family right now, as money is short and we haven’t had power for over a week now. Family bonds are funny, too. I’ve never (and still don’t) consider myself to be close to my family, yet I feel a sense of responsibility about them.
*sigh* I hope we get power soon. I need a true vacation right now.
On a good note, I managed to get all A’s this semester, despite one of my teachers being a bitch! Yay!
The Color Theft
I need to cut again. I need… need…
Perhaps I have seasonal affective disorder… This seems to be a new recurring trend for me in the wintertime.
It’s the same as last year. These cuts will be for my friends who are falling… who feel they are not good enough. For those who feel as if there is no escape for themselves, who let the blackness within them grow.
I think I care too much. That’s my problem… that’s it…
…I’m holding out until I leave for home.
Suspended in a Sunbeam
Sometimes I find myself lost in these moments, thinking about my life. Not about anything in particular, just… my life.
So often we view our lives as fragile and meaningless. We see ourselves as temporal… impermanent, finite beings with little purpose outside of sustaining ourselves and those our minds have connected us to. “Why are we here? What good are we,” we ask ourselves, “that we should be gifted — or perhaps cursed — with the burden of life?”
It is moments such as these that I find myself on the outside, looking in. I feel as though I can see the stage of the earth as it twists upon its axis and dances within its orbit. The actors which populate this theater are us members of the human race. God sits in place of the sun, watching the dramatic improvisation unfold.
I see the strings of each man and woman, connected not the hands of some demented puppeteer, but to each other. For a moment I can see every action and every reaction caused by the pushing and pulling — the tightening and loosing — of each of these strings. I watch downwards to see these billions of actors sitting upon this crowded stage as they bump and struggle to stay on, to reach the center, to climb to the top, knocking and bumping fellow men and women off this stage as each presses inward. I look within and I see myself, fighting this same fight, still holding my own. Still hanging on, sometimes by several threads. Sometimes by just one.
I reach down and scream a voiceless cry to myself, beckoning that my body should join my mind here in the audience. We could watch together, in peace.
I weep for my own blood. I feel as though it is trapped within me. I must release it from its tomb, lest it wither away and speak to me no more.
I want to cut. But, I can’t. I still find occasions to wear clothes with short sleeves.
I am too controlled by the opinions of my peers… far too controlled. Perhaps contained is a more appropriate word…
…I’m not sick anymore. Except for this cough and the grossness in my throat. Ick.
I can’t believe I cheated on the one I love…
