I do not know if I am still here or where ‘here’ is for that matter. Lately I find myself extremely conscious of two things, the first being that I shall turn 25 this year and have almost nothing to show for it and the second that I may just hate the fact that I am a woman.
Both these observations met me a week ago. They told me that they had travelled through a month of absolute hellishness as I slithered in my blasé lethargy. Work has been non-existent of late, even for those of us with steady employment and I have spent my hours at the office reading a new book almost daily. Presently I find myself immersed in the travel diaries of hobos with excerpts from Kerouac, Guthrie and Faulkner. At home I find myself painting absolutely nothing just because I happen to enjoy the acrid aroma of turpentine and watching a string of films. My skin is ashen, my morale is at an all time low despite the fact that I am over the moon about my break-out moment approaching in September and my mother tells me my teeth are slightly crooked again!
But I am writing. For real it seems, with characters and some semblance of storyline. Unfortunately it appears my writing and my characters will lead to nothing short of a ‘father-daughter’ cliché. Perhaps I need to get this dynamic out of my system, my hope chest and my imagination once and for all. I do not really know if I am writing or performing an exorcism which is indicative of the vehemence with which I am taking to it.
Still, where is the sense in arguing with the dark confines of a hyper-conscious and endlessly spiteful Muse?
Observations Alpha and Omega met me while I was re-watching all of the Batman films for the umpteenth time. I am going over trilogies again, I began with Star Wars, then the Lord of the Rings, Superman, the X-men and now Batman. I saw myself dressed in a Batman (not bat girl, I can’t abide that woman) costume lying on a shrinks couch admitting that I had ‘Daddy issues’ and needed some help. I also heard Bat-self mention that I was almost 25 and I couldn’t believe that I still revered cartoon heroes more than real ones. I also confessed to a dirty dream I had about Christian Bale. The fact that I would turn 25 this year meant that it had been 18 years to the day I first decided to make an escape from myself. I was sitting in my tiny pink room planning on how to go about writing my first true confessional to my father and then running for my life. It also struck me that 25 is just five years away from 30 and that 30 meant a strike-off point for being an independent woman with a career, a husband and a baby on the way and that I was no where near any of those things. Somehow my mind jumped straight from Single, Fabulous and Thirty to ‘I am going to die ALL alone’ and this prophetic hyperbole was my cue to hyperventilate.
Observations Alpha and Omega met me while I was re-watching all of the Batman films for the umpteenth time. I am going over trilogies again, I began with Star Wars, then the Lord of the Rings, Superman, the X-men and now Batman. I saw myself dressed in a Batman (not bat girl, I can’t abide that woman) costume lying on a shrinks couch admitting that I had ‘Daddy issues’ and needed some help. I also heard Bat-self mention that I was almost 25 and I couldn’t believe that I still revered cartoon heroes more than real ones. I also confessed to a dirty dream I had about Christian Bale. The fact that I would turn 25 this year meant that it had been 18 years to the day I first decided to make an escape from myself. I was sitting in my tiny pink room planning on how to go about writing my first true confessional to my father and then running for my life. It also struck me that 25 is just five years away from 30 and that 30 meant a strike-off point for being an independent woman with a career, a husband and a baby on the way and that I was no where near any of those things. Somehow my mind jumped straight from Single, Fabulous and Thirty to ‘I am going to die ALL alone’ and this prophetic hyperbole was my cue to hyperventilate.
I didn’t hyperventilate.
And the lack of reaction is more disturbing.
Observation Omega met me while I was driving in Defence. I parked in front of the Mc Donald’s jogging park in Y-block and yearned for the familiarity of being flippant about important things. I do this often, stalk people from my car, while listening to some folk strains and sipping my coke. It hit me that I didn’t not like being a woman because of all the man issues, or the marriage issues or the appearance issues…I didn’t like being so damn ‘aware’ of everything: my emotions, my insecurities and my persistent longing. For the first time in my life I curse my imminent need to find ‘meaning’ in every damn thing I read, see, touch, watch or hear. I hate the fact that I can’t dismiss anything in my head and that I cant be ‘meaningless’ about things that – by every definition- ought to just be left meandering without definition. I always marvel at how people can spill around double entendres of ‘meaningless encounters’ and ‘meaningless conversations’, because I wouldn’t even know how to go about initiating either. Sure I talk gibberish more fluently than I talk sense, but there is always an emotional solvent to douse out the ‘meaningless-ness” of it all.
I don’t know if this curse is about me being a woman or about being just me, but I long to rid myself of it. It has been fourteen minutes spent staring at my computer screen mocking me. At times like this a flashing cursor and a blank sheet of paper are the most formidable of foes one can encounter....in any realm. That thing that people always say about how all girls are the same because they all think they are different, I wish I could truly believe it.
Observation Omega met me while I was driving in Defence. I parked in front of the Mc Donald’s jogging park in Y-block and yearned for the familiarity of being flippant about important things. I do this often, stalk people from my car, while listening to some folk strains and sipping my coke. It hit me that I didn’t not like being a woman because of all the man issues, or the marriage issues or the appearance issues…I didn’t like being so damn ‘aware’ of everything: my emotions, my insecurities and my persistent longing. For the first time in my life I curse my imminent need to find ‘meaning’ in every damn thing I read, see, touch, watch or hear. I hate the fact that I can’t dismiss anything in my head and that I cant be ‘meaningless’ about things that – by every definition- ought to just be left meandering without definition. I always marvel at how people can spill around double entendres of ‘meaningless encounters’ and ‘meaningless conversations’, because I wouldn’t even know how to go about initiating either. Sure I talk gibberish more fluently than I talk sense, but there is always an emotional solvent to douse out the ‘meaningless-ness” of it all.
I don’t know if this curse is about me being a woman or about being just me, but I long to rid myself of it. It has been fourteen minutes spent staring at my computer screen mocking me. At times like this a flashing cursor and a blank sheet of paper are the most formidable of foes one can encounter....in any realm. That thing that people always say about how all girls are the same because they all think they are different, I wish I could truly believe it.
Its been fourteen minutes.
I am resolved to believe it.
