97th Reaping [District Six]

carmen cantelou.

Have you ever loved something so much and then found every reason to hate it?

It's not as simple as 'going through a phase', it's not like how my Mom says. Because for a while, everything associated with said thing feels like it could keep me content for the rest of time. There's no need for pretty flowers and incense burning when I kick the door open on my way back from work, there's no need for me to create the illusion of a warm embrace with the things I think will make me feel better. Some things just have that innate peacefulness within them that make them so fulfilling that it feels like nothing could ever claw you away from it. 

It can be anything. A hobby, like writing or exploring, or maybe it's a place; somewhere that wraps up all your loose ends and ties you into the neatest, most perfect bow. For me, though, it's neither. It's a person. Actually, arguably, it's worse than that because it's a boy. 

I don't think I'm obsessive in an unhealthy way but for a while, he was all I could think about. I'd wake up and wonder when I'd see him. I'd wonder what he'd say and whether or not I'd deem it good enough. In the moments where I'd have no company, I'd think of the things we could do together, the roads we'd go down just for the sake of it, and the carefree carelessness we'd do it with. Lost in those knowing eyes that blink my worries away, I could write stories about the people we could be in the crinkles of his nose when he'd laugh. And when he'd smile, that fuzzy feeling that people only ever speak about so rarely, but so preciously - I'd feel that.

For a while, nothing compares to that magic. It's so enchantingly perfect that it doesn't feel real. It's a religion you fall into and the practice only reinforces it. 

I don't love him anymore. Quite frankly, that's a good thing because he's not even half as attractive as I remember, and all those perfect memories we made are sliced apart and frankenstein-ed together with each time he gave me a reason to hate him. I'm not a hater, though, I look back and think that it was worth it; everything is a lesson if you allow it to be, and I'm not the type of person to hold history against myself and go to sleep with a bundle of worries and regret. There's not enough time in the world for that, let alone enough love to heal it.

But the same thing happened with my work, too - my passion for helping others was unrivaled. It made me high and I used to wake up and look forward to clocking in and wondering what I'd do, who I'd help. That feeling got tarnished, too. It got knocked around a little too much and it just doesn't have the same charm. You can put the pieces back together but you'll always know where the cracks are. That once perfect feeling of passion and fulfillment and 'I can't believe I do something I love' meets with a sledgehammer and it breaks apart. The stars fall out of alignment. The passion slowly becomes a hobby, said hobby becomes a job and then the job becomes a chore.

Sometimes I wonder if it's just a problem with me. Am I closing my heart off to the things I used to love? Is it a form of self-sabotage or self-destruction that I'm subjecting myself to for some reason I haven't discovered yet? I look around and see so many people who smile without weight and live without worrying about the consequences and I think: why can't I be like that? Why does everything have to be tainted by this here brain of mine?

I'm probably not well, but that's okay because I have other things going for me: I hate my work but it's stable, I feel powerful and I like that I can get away with playing God. I thrive under my own control because I'm so introspective that my self-assurance is king. And on a more vain note, I do think I'm cute and I'm smart enough to use that to my favor. There's a number of reasons that help to balance out the things that annoy me about myself, but I'm not sure I love them in the same way that I know I can love other people.

I've considered all these things for a long time and with everything going on at work, I told my Mom that I'd be having a 'neon year'. It's a year to rediscover who I am and what I really enjoy. To make mistakes and not feel bad about it, and to always say yes even when my body is frozen because it so desperately needs me to say no. Sometimes the key to happiness is to let go and forget about it completely, and I haven't tried that yet, so here goes. My goal by the end of the year is to feel like I can love in a deeper and more meaningful way, and that I'm not constantly cutting something beautiful with sharp edges just so that I can give it a reason to hurt me. I want to know myself inside and out so that I can learn to love that, too.

To be 'neon' is to glow, and I can glow and be un-apologetically bright, I think, I just need a chance.

Life doesn't work like that though. It never has. And I know all too well that death definitely doesn't, so why have my manifestations of good fortune and happiness led to this?

I'm standing here with knees threatening to buckle beneath me and a pasty look on my face that screams 'oh, she fears everything'. My idea of having a 'neon year' feels so backward now, even though I loved it so much, and maybe that's where I went wrong - because who am I to want something good for myself? In this world, that's absurd. That's selfish. It's the kind of wishful thinking that gets you punished at the reaping. 

Still, I'm too much of a teenager to die.

I don't even know myself, so who am I going to show them?

[ carmen accepts her position. ]