I’ve heard the question, “who are you?” land on my ears, many times and all I have chosen to do is look at the ground, shuffle my feet, and smile because the second most difficult situation to face (people singing happy birthday to you remains the first) is this, because, I in the nineteen years of my existence, am still unsure as to who I am. Yes, I might be the daughter of an officer and a practicing doctor, the sister to two of the most annoying children in the history of time, a friend to, well absolutely no one...but none of that speaks about who I chose to become or everything I could have been.
Am I my insecurities? The way I put my hand over my mouth every time I smile because I’m not proud of the way I smile or my teeth (I used to be known as the bugs bunny of the class back in junior years), or how I hate the scar on my right arm that I got from falling off a tree, or the tremors that I get that I can’t properly hide most of the times, more than that even the way I get too passionate about things and then shut myself out too quickly. Am I all that?
I refuse to restrict myself to that.
I choose to be more than that and so, what I am is
Lost
I would be lying if I said it didn’t hurt sometimes, but do I not lie? And this one tiny lie makes no difference or so I like to tell myself...
So it doesn’t, it doesn’t hurt at all
And that establishes me to be a liar as well.
In addition to this, what I can tell you with great certainty is that I’m a mess; collateral damage like every other creature with a heart on this earth. But I try oh so hard to pull myself together on some days, while other days I’m just as careless and tired that I choose to convince myself I simply forgot to brush my teeth and didn't avoid the morning chose on purpose.
But tired of what, you ask?
Tired of being human, of carrying a heart that feels more than it pumps blood, a wild creature in the cage of ribs. Such a very strong creature that when late at night my head starts to spin and everything feels too loud, when I have nothing to hold on to, chaos is all that is around me, I can still hear my heart beating inside my chest. It is like a clock ticking, reminding me of the beats I have left to pass in this world before the vicious, wildest creature I’ve ever known falls silent and takes into its hollowness, everything in proximity.
And so that brands me to be chronically exhausted
But ... what else?
"I’m broken" is something we have all heard, either from the knots of our own tongue whispered to our ears as tears failed to stay locked inside the windows of our eyes, and other times from someone we love ever so dearly, either way, it hurts. It hurts so terribly that for a second
Just for a second
We think the world will end right here upon our shoulders, but it never does. And I cannot decide whether that is good news or just another bad one.
Am I broken then? No I am not and I’m sorry for the heavy statement my fingers are about to bleed right now.
I’m sorry for I can’t understand the hurt that you’ve been through but still, I say that no matter what has happened, how brutally life has made you what you are today, none of us are broken, we are all just bent. Despite all of that, there exists a spark; the only thing we’re missing out on that will make us feel more complete.
I promise you there is something out there like that and it’s waiting with open arms to envelop you.
So once more it is decided that I’m not broken, just slightly bent from the hurt thrown my why.
But what else does that rant about not being broken make me? A pretend-to-be healer? Selfish? Someone who thinks they know everything? (Absolutely not though, I don’t even know half the things I say)
But I think what it makes me is a lover of words and poetry somehow trying to put together threads across a dartboard trying to figure out where the end leads me to, well knowing at the back of my head that it’s all a mesh leading absolutely nowhere. Nonetheless, I like to pretend I know what I’m talking about, it helps me stay on the ground, helps me believe that my head is not filled with thoughts that will eventually kill me.
More to this, what does the information in the last bracket I used tell you about me?
Probably that I constantly require the need to get the approval of people around me, to make sure no one thinks bad about me (it’s a terrible terrible habit that almost pushed me down to the brink of suicide). This one’s not metaphoric or poetic at all, some things you just cannot beautify no matter how hard you try and this is one of those.
The “ I don’t care “ what people think about me attitude simply is not for me and I wouldn’t lie, I like to pretend just as much that I truly do not care, but my own thoughts, my own mind is what I cannot lie to and that’s what will always continue to haunt me until I don’t have any right over my breaths anymore.
That’s all I can manage to put to words about who I am in my confusing way with words, but that’s the closest I’ve ever gotten to truthfully answer this question.
I dearly hope this gave you a dive into some shallow parts of my soul, the ones I’ve discovered yet.