All These Looking-Glasses Are Weighing Down My Raft

I feel both overwhelmed and insufficient.

I wish I were standing victoriously at the bow of my ship as we make record time around the horn of Africa, but instead I feel far more like the boy paddling furiously in his raft who get's dashed on the rocks when he reaches the mouth of the bay.

I know this isn't a unique sentiment. In fact, I'm sure it's fairly common. But, it still feels like shit.


I think I make a good impression. I'm pretty good at image control. Which is to say that people see me as who I want them to see, more or less. I mean, I make mistakes and let the real me slip out from time to time, but people are usually pretty forgiving of that sort of thing, and they chalk it up to a lapse in judgement (which, I suppose it usually is, in a sense).

But, the real me, the one who I do my damnedest to keep as hidden as possible, the real me is much more despicable, disgusting even. In social psychology, there is a theory called the Looking-Glass Self. Basically, we believe ourselves to be the people that we perceive other people perceiving us to be. Maybe this will help.

I held to this theory for a long time. But, today I began to question it. I don't think anybody sees certain parts of me that I know are there, and they're usually the worst parts. I know people who see me as the devil over there in the corner (besides my ex-girlfriends), but none of them know the things that sometimes make it difficult for me to look into a mirror long enough to shave.

Maybe this is just a self-esteem issue. Maybe I should go see a counselor or something. Maybe I should expect less from myself. Maybe, maybe, maybe. I obviously have no clue what I'm talking about.

Yet Another Manifesto (This one's about hope)

I really should be dong my homework right now, but hope is on my mind.

Those of you who know me know that I have said many times that if there is one thing that I believe in above anything else (including religion or empirical fact) it is hope. Without hope, I see no purpose for... well... anything.

There's a lot of pain in the world. I'm not gonna list any specific examples, because you know them. There is pain on the other side of the globe, in the bedroom down the hall, and in you. There's the obvious pain of violence, and the hidden pain of loss. I recently attended series of monologues where a very specific kind pain (the pain of sexual violence) was put on display for us all to see. The event shook me, and I was left feeling very unsettled. The most unsettling thing about it, however was the apparent offering of appropriate response.

The second to last monologue was, in my interpretation, the offered appropriate response to all the information we'd just consumed, and that response was rage. Now, I don't really like rage. It makes me uncomfortable, and I never know what to do with it. Mourning? That I can handle. Hope? That I could muster. But, rage?

I had a conversation today with someone about this event. She said that maybe the hopelessness was the point of the thing. That the reality of the situation is that many people are left in hopeless situations, and we must acknowledge that. That my sense of being unsettled was exactly the point.

I think I understand what she was trying to say, but, you know, that doesn't really help me. I know about this stuff already. Okay, that sounds arrogant. I do not know the pain of rape, or genocide, and I never will. But, I know that it's happening, and I do not want to ignore it any more than I want to marinate in it. If you tell me your story of pain, I will want to offer you a story of healing, of hope.

I want to make something especially clear here. I am not trying to ignore the problem, and I am not trying to pretend it doesn't exist (at least, I think I'm not). I would like to propose healing, comfort, and mourning over rage and gawking. This requires digging in to the problem even deeper, but with a purpose. It will require getting our metaphorical hands dirty. After all, at the end of the day the combat medic has had far more blood on his hands than any soldier.

This is the value of hope. Hope, not unlike fear, is self-sustaining. By believing in hope above all else, I will never be utterly hopeless. By sharing hope above all else, there is no need to wallow in pain. There is no need to rage at empty skies and full cocktail parties. Speak, now that's a different story, but rage is no longer the appropriate response.

Earlier today I entertained the idea that perhaps hope was sometimes an inappropriate response to a situation. I have decided to reject that theory. I am not going to ignore the pain of the world, in fact I want to confront it head on. I will not ignorantly soar above it, or defeated, burrow into it. I will charge headlong into it and it's gonna hurt. But, it's good.

I have been hopeless before, and I have found myself at times unable to communicate hope to another, but never from lack of trying.

You, reading this, you probably know me pretty well. If you've read this far, I hope you understand where I'm coming from. I hope a lot of things. But, one thing that I hope above most is that this determination against despair would be contagious. I know that I can't be alone in the trenches here, and I think that some of you are already down here with me. I'm not the standard bearer. Hell, I don't even know if we have a flag. But, we have a cause, and I am willing to fight my whole life for the sake of hope.

An Offering to Ishtar, Maybe

(Note: This was the product of multiple dreams that I mashed together, taking some creative liberties. If I can't take creative liberties with my own dreams, when can I?)

"With these hands," He said, "I would cradle your warm face and comb your hair, like our primate ancestors did, brushing and cleaning with soiled, scarred fingers."

She spoke in response, but from the other side of the square he couldn't understand what she said.

"With these arms," He said, "I would hold your world, gently, for fear that I would crush it between my clumsy arms, sending shards of dreams cascading to the floor and covering us both with tiny cuts that bleed hope."

She seemed to smile, but it was hard to tell through the fog.

"With these shoulders," He said, "I would share the weight of your yoke, pulling and tilling the soil of a new future through packed red clay and soft dark dirt."

Her silhouette in the dim morning (or was it evening?) light began to grow as she walked towards him.

"With these feet," He said, "I would dance with you into the long hours of the night, our bodies moving in intricate patters which could not be defined or reproduced, a dance of two souls unbound by music."

She was closer now, he could almost make out her features. She was as beautiful as he'd thought, even more so, emerging from the fog like some mythical monolith to beauty and grace. The clacking of her shoes on the concrete indicating her imminent approach, personal war drums beating out the rhythm of heartbeats. 

He gathered his nerves. This was it, do or die. This is the speech, the one that would decide the outcome of their lives.

"With this heart," He whispered, "I would love you."

"Excuse me," She said, "I'm lost. Do you know where 15th street is?"

He was stunned for a moment, but he put himself together from what pieces he had and managed an answer. "I can't help you," He said. "I'm lost as well."

"Oh. Well," She said, "good luck then." Then, she walked away.

He managed a muted "Thank you." 

He stood in the square and allowed the sound of the victorious war drums fade slowly in the direction of a road he never knew. When they were gone, he looked around the square and spoke again, to the fog that muffled some sound and amplified others, to the fading light that turned insecurities into wolves and people into angels, to the concrete floor that was starting to make his feet ache, to nobody in particular.

"There must be a better way to do this."

I Want to Grow Up... But

I've made a decision recently. I decided to grow up. I realized that I'd be living my life, and making my decisions, based off of what felt good rather than what was good. The resulting decisions and forks in the road led me to a place of self-pity and self-loathing. Or, as I would say were we talking in person, I felt like shit and I felt like a shit. I'm done with that.

I came to a place where I was forced to make some long-term decisions about what kind of person I am going to be. Suffice it to say, I didn't feel confident or comfortable making these decisions when nearly every choice I'd made over the past three months had been so... adolescent. I talked with my Dad about this stuff one afternoon, and he smacked me around a little bit. I needed that. He pointed out just how out-of-sorts I've been, how unsure I'd been about all of my decisions, my life. I decided then that I wanted to grow up.

I've wondered when it is that a boy becomes a man since I was in 5th grade. The past three months, I have been taking no steps toward adulthood save those foisted upon me by the passage of time. I've been a boy. I've been selfish, egocentric and hedonistic, and I've seen the cost. I want to be more than that boy.

Over the past two days, I've been wrestling with this decision, and things have been going pretty well. There remains, however, one gigantic hurdle which I am afraid may throw a wrench into this whole plan.

I don't want to do this alone. I seem to have an unquenchable thirst for affection and companionship, but now is not the time for that. I'm going to leave the country in three months and I won't be back until nearly Christmas. I'm working on school, and planning this trip, and planning my life, and I simply can't get distracted anymore. But... but. There's always a but.

But, I am afraid of being alone. But, I want comfort and to be comforting. But, I want someone to share this burden with, and whose burdens I could share. But, I don't think I can do this without help. But, I get cold. But, I lay awake at night and pretend that somewhere there exists someone who is laying awake pretending that I exist. But, I am a hopeless romantic.

But, that's part of what got me into this whole mess in the first place, innit?