Unconfined Thoughts 37 – Weapons at Disposal

Growing up, I’ve been more so of a tomboy than I am now. I still have the spunk, but I’ve catered my personality between a nice balance of “femininity” and “tomboyish” behaviors, but I have to admit, it’s still an unnecessary battle. When I was little, I would rather see how fast I could run rather than see which shade of lipstick matched my complexion. That was fine by me and it was fine by my friends, but there were constant whispers from my parents or from other girls that managed to squeeze its way inside of me until I managed to convince myself that I wasn’t pretty enough and that something was still missing

Ever since I was little but old enough to start building my self-confidence, the gentle guiding voice encouraging me that it’s okay to explore wasn’t there. Instead, I was met with a stricter and conformed voice that told me that I had to do what I was told, no questions asked. And that’s how I believed that I wasn’t smart enough, pretty enough, or good enough. I was meant to follow directions, but at the same time, somehow be outstanding. I was already good at being the sheep in the herd, but suddenly, I had to be a leader with no tools that were sharp enough to puncture the impending enemy. It didn’t feel fair, but I continued to my best efforts to shape myself into someone who was bolder than who I felt like inside. But that was when I realized that despite all the poking and prodding that me and others had done, I had managed to build a fortress within myself. I was still who I am, but the voice of myself was still quiet. There were times where I thought I was shouting at the top of my lungs only to find myself silently staring at my sorrowful reflection.

But my voice was strong, and it was there. It just needed coaxing and discipline. I learned that I couldn’t just blurt out anything because everyone would just take offense to my sharp knives I had learned to throw. I had to learn how to cut precisely so that it would maim, but not kill. With my weapons at disposal, you will soon learn to fear me because after decades of teaching myself to be small, I realized you cannot contain a force that refuses with all its soul to be contained.

Heartbeat of NYC – Unconfined Thoughts 36

Hidden in the depths of New York City, you can find a moment of silence. No, it isn’t when the conversation falls dead and you’re left staring at each other waiting for an interesting topic to pass by again. It’s found in odd places. Places you expect to be bustling with sound, but somehow, you find a solid resonance that strikes a chord in your chest. Whether it be at 2am walking along the same streets as your morning commute or feeling the sigh of the bus beneath your feet, the rude, dirty, and stinky city still has a soft spot. It’s unexplainable, this odd sense of solitude. You’re not alone because down the street, you can hear someone’s phone ringing. You’re not afraid because out of the corner of your eye, someone else is also caught in the magic. You’re not drunk because you know where you are. This quietness falls so softly almost like it’s being so careful to not intrude the noise. Keep walking and the magic will maybe pass, but hold these moments close to your heart especially during rush hour when you forget what silence sounds like – your heartbeat in rhythm with everyone else.

Written: 12/11/18 10:31pm

Unconfined Thoughts 35- Microfiber Towel

Don’t get me wrong, I love a little dose of nostalgia, but I feel like I get swept along a long road of introspection that I didn’t ask for. You wrote in my yearbook admiring my quiet composure and sparks of jokes. I can see that you are willingly taking the road of introspection except we haven’t exchanged any glimpses or words ever since your pen touched my yearbook. And yet, you’ve announced your pain, your successes, and growth while all I’ve pretty much done is dry my hair with a microfiber towel and wondered why so much hair was still falling out.

Who are you now? How are you?

Who am I? What have I become? Am I still the same?

 

Written: 11/3/18 12:37am

Unconfined Thoughts 34 – Jazz

Jazz used to be confusing. Ever since I was 7, I was trained with a precise ear to make sure every melody, rhythm, and note had its purpose. When I first encountered jazz somewhere in a café, I knew it had an air of sophistication. Only people who were just rolling with life listened to this type of music and I most certainly did not fit in. The lazy drum beats and steady bass with the swelling trumpets made no sense to me. How could something feel so loose, but steady at the same time? I made sure to avoid it at all costs and drifted towards the electronic music instead where my heart beat confidently with the throbbing bass line and my passions rose when the rhythm dropped.

In times of chaos and confusion, I find that jazz comforts me even more. The loose melodies and sing-song tones is exactly what I needed when I felt like I had no direction. Electronic music, pop music, and the indie vocals still had their prominent spots in my life, but I could feel jazz slowly making its way in. It reassured me of my indefinable emotions and told me that sometimes things just are the way they are and you just need to go with it, just like a flickering flame. Some days, I’m the gentle piano chord giving direction or some days, I’m the drifting trumpet going wherever the breeze takes it. Oftentimes, I find myself as the answering tone, the one that makes the sing-song tones stand out even more. My soul is evolving with the colors of jazz.

Written: 7/25/18 10:50pm while listening to jazz

Unconfined Thoughts 33 – Homeward Nomad

I have a collection of songs titled, home, in my stash. Some sing about being lost and then being found again. Some sing about never finding a place they can call home again. The funny thing is that those songs always elicit a feeling of being home within me. I can’t really pinpoint it, but even if I’m sitting next to strangers in a café a couple miles away from home, I feel safe. Almost like I could kick up my feet, throw on a blanket, and put on a movie and not be afraid of being stared at. I won’t even care! It’s my home and you can’t take me away. I could practically hear my mother from the next room over, cooking up a meal as I count down the minutes before the scent hits my tongue and my belly is full and satisfied.

There most certainly have been moments within my actual home where I felt completely foreign. At those points, home just becomes an area where I have all my possessions, not somewhere of comfort. The fits of yelling and rage are just ugly decorations on top of the desk I bought to help my room feel like home. The lies and deception add an unknown ugly scent that seeps throughout the house. You can spray air freshener all you want, but it just masks the real problem until it gets bigger.

I’m not lost or looking for home. I can just take a couple trains and in three hours, I’ll be home and expecting a meal. Home is just around the corner for me, but being able to detach myself from something so concrete is key to making home more portable and accessible especially when home sometimes feels like I need a passport to get through.

Written: 7/24/18 4:10pm

Unconfined Thoughts 32 – Let’s Talk About This

It’s a funny thing, depression. One moment, I’m curled under my fort I’ve created for myself and the next, I’m staring blankly at my notes as my professor inquires about ethics. I’ll show you ethics all right. We always make these neon “mental illness week” posters and plaster them all over the school and offering free ice cream just for people to show up when I still don’t feel comfortable mentioning the grand word, depression. There’s no end to this. Either you’re just a typical attention seeking whore who seriously knows nothing about mental illness or you are sincerely, definitely and truly sad and in need of your pity. What if, it’s more on the spectrum of, I feel highly pressed by all aspects of life and sometimes nothing and it hurts, it aches and sometimes, I want to die and it can happen to anyone – even the best of us. Yet, I celebrate every step I take out of bed, when I brush my teeth and whenever I smile because that’s another day I’m alive.

I cannot wait anymore. I’m not going to wait for a single week where I can feel like I “belong somewhere” or have the adequate awareness. I’m going to talk more about it. I will mention how gloomy I feel and having no idea why. I will talk about how watching my favorite movies, eating my favorite foods and even talking to my favorite people feel like a sinking stone in my stomach. I could cry, but all that does is make my pillow wet and my nights too long. I will talk about wanting to be blind, lose a limb or shattered into a million pieces just so my Mom can stop saying that “it’s something I have to deal with.” or hear people say that “I’m just an emotional person.” I sleep all the time or I can’t sleep at all. I want to order pizzas, tacos and noodles, but I just ended up feeling full after the first three bites, yet my stomach is grumbling. I will talk about the intense need for pure desire because I feel starved of it, but also carrying the malicious intent to destroy all I loved because as someone who is this broken, no one will ever be cherished. It sucks so much and I hate putting people I love in pain as they see me suffer. I’m depressed. Let’s talk about this.

Unconfined Thoughts 31 – The High School Days

I remember you sitting across from me during lunch and complaining to everyone else about the uncalled for English homework. How does the teacher expect us to write a 2 page paper about Hamlet when we have that math quiz to study for? I silently watched everyone pick through their lukewarm lunches and pass around math packets. We would chat about Instagram follower to following ratios and whether or not that deemed our peers to be popular or not. We never used the word “popular” but we just talked about different people on rotation.

I remember how you bragged about being the oldest one in the class, propping your feet up on the desk and whining about how much you wanted to be done with school and especially this class. I wish I could tell you that we all wanted to be done. Sitting in a class about politics in the final months of being a senior in high school was never a good combination. I couldn’t help but flashback to when we ran against each other in middle school for president and I hated you because you took the time and effort to make stickers while I prepped myself for failure.

I remember hearing your voice in French class and thinking that it was a terrible accent, but mine was probably worse. I looked around that class and feeling a strange sense of belonging and annoyance since we’ve stuck together in that class since the middle school days, allowing the burden of school to slowly whittle off the undedicated and leave this group behind. Although, I didn’t go to France with you, so I couldn’t laugh at all the inside jokes.

I remember training with you during track season and watching you round off the 200 meter curve while I was still coming up on the straight 100 meter. Eventually you would learn of my hidden strength, the strength to never stop until I crossed the line even if it meant that I came in last. I heard your strong voice push through my heaving breaths and I put another foot forward.

Most of all, I remember listening and watching to everyone to the point where I felt like I had embodied most of them. I could feel the mood of the school, but I was always seen on the outside. I watched relationships grossly and beautifully unfold, but I also played witness to the groups of friends shielding the couple from each other after a nasty breakup. I listened to the sharp whispers once the teacher left the room for information of what happened over the weekend. I watched the soccer guys stroll down the hall with the soccer girls as they pass me and I grab my books and walk behind them. They were in my class anyways and I always knew who was going to take whomever to prom. But every once in a while, a gap in the dragging conversations would appear and I would drop my classic “one-liners” and shock my classmates to no end. I gained an odd reputation, not enough to have casual check-up conversations but enough to have a good time in that second.

Unconfined Thoughts 30 — Autumn

It’s quite peculiar that when the seasons change, everyone raves about pumpkin spice everything when all I can think about is why my loved ones suddenly turned into ones who irritate me to no end. All of their flaws, which I’ve conditioned myself to accept as a part of them, suddenly became louder and prickles my skin like millions of unwanted mosquito bites. Those who I’ve simply tolerate breeze by me, causing me to grit my teeth and hurt my gums. I stare at my reflection confused and afraid hoping to see words written across my face indicating me if I’m the jerk or if the world is a jerk to me. Then again, you can’t be arrested for being a jerk. You would just be known as someone with harsh words, but no backbone. You’d be known as someone who utilizes their fears to raise yourself higher or you’d be known as someone who appears to have never felt the kind light before. Behind those tired eyes, you can’t help but wonder what the idling thoughts construct the person who’s walking around right in front of you. You hope that they match up with your own thoughts. That your griping of the world matches theirs instead of validating the fact that the world is true as you see it just without the rose colored glasses.

When the seasons change, I can’t help but wish for all of those who give me warmth from the inside out rather than being forced to huddle helplessly underneath my blankets.

Written: 9/28/17 1:32pm (in class)

Unconfined Thoughts 29 — Just a Nice Person

Excuse me for a moment and let me tell you a story before I forget how it went. This is something I hold very close to my heart, so bear with me as I cast away my responsibilities as a student and as a friend. My heart throbs so much that all I can do is dream about the past and hope the future will arrive soon. And my mind feels as clouded as my darker days when in reality; I am tired of all the bullshit that surrounds me (as if I am an exception).

Hold on a second and step into my shoes. Feel the shape of my foot within the worn out pair that has taken me everywhere. These converses have walked through the pouring rain and blinding sun while patiently waiting for my turn to speak. These slip-ons have crossed the city and sat in nervous anticipation, waiting for a single hello. And feel the exact moment when my toes curl in fear or sadness, but I maintain a cheerful smile. They ask me if I’m able and I nod and spin around in carelessness when all I want to do is book a one-way ticket and never look back. They ask me if I would do it instead and I nod when in reality, all I want to do is drink obscene amounts of beer and wine until reality tastes bitter in my mouth.

Once someone told me that I shouldn’t do something a certain way and the way they said it made me realize how insignificant I was and how nothing I said regardless if I was holding a gun up to my temples or if I was “just being a nice person” really mattered. They got real close and I could smell their foul breath. “That’s just not something you do.” And I wanted to get up close and hiss, “Fuck you.” But I’m just a nice person after all.

You would think in 2017, people would retain the basic knowledge they learn in kindergarten to always be respectful. I don’t think they realize that taking advantage of someone’s kindness is the same as punching them in the face. I don’t think people realize that the simple act of forgetting to say “thank you” can lower someone’s self-esteem one moment at a time until that someone spends hours wondering how they fit into the confusing world and if it’s worth it. I don’t think people realize that there’s an obvious difference between manipulation and kindness. It’s obvious right now, but there have been strong bullshit accusations. I just shrug and say, “I guess I’ll just watch you as you fall down.”

You complain that there’s not enough good in the world when you shoot down all the good that’s directly in front of you. It’s not that hard to be kind, is it? Because you’re just being a nice person.

Written: 9/26/17 5:15pm

Unconfined Thoughts 28 – Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

My hair is thinning and it coats my bedroom floor. Every time I get up from my bed or from my chair, the hair drifts around my feet and I’m reminded of my stress. Like a considerate person, you ask, “What are you stressed about?” I pull a face, shrug and I’m already dissociating when I say, “I don’t know!”

Every morning, I pull back the curtains and a stream of light streams in. I expect to be knocked off my feet as a realization that things aren’t as bad as I make them to be. Half-way through the day, I open the window to air out the stale air and hope that the cool breeze can help me stop losing hair.

On an odd Tuesday morning, I pick up the broom and sweep away all the stray hairs. Enough has cumulated that it’s enough if you gathered it into your hands, it would look like a hamster from the distance when in reality, it’s all the hair that’s taken the jump. I sigh loudly so that it echoes my mind, but not loud enough so that I can do anything about it. It lingers before it drifts away just like each day as the sun comes and goes, allowing time for night to fall.