The Tundra
From what I've observed, when people are exposed to something incredibly sorrowful, their first instinct is to either distance themselves from themselves, or completely meltdown. Whether they hide their dismay, or wear their own despair like an Hermes scarf, if they cover or expose it. They do begin to deconstruct, to break down and fall apart, in some cases mentally, psychologically, and spiritually. They have to reforge themselves to overcome this life-changing event.
For me it's like someone pushed a glacier into my very self. I don't change in any way except that my mind, body, and soul begin to freeze over. It doesnt seem to register, I'm in a state of perpetual shock until the experience is buried under a mountain of ice and amnesia. Then I stop feeling the chill grey death. Life flows into me, but never does it extend beyond the surface. A warm candy coating covering the icy rage, fear, or sorrow. But beneath I am still that hard, glassy, tundra. I am so sharp inside I bleed with emotion, but never feelings about The Event. Emotions about the movie I'm watching, the book I'm reading, other people's experiences, tears shed over my figure or my hair, laughter arising from a joke or a particularly witty GIF.
But never about the ten or so people, friends and family members, who died within the first month of my entering college. Never about my mother's mental breakdown or my father's addictions. Never about my apathetic grandfather who has made it clear he doesn't care what happens to the rest of the family when he dies and leaves us millions to squabble over like chickens on a farm. Never about my oldest friend, a beautiful glory of a girl, with whom I had planned to spend my adult life, the future mother of my daughters and sons, and how she died overdosing on heroine and was left to die in the street, like a stray dog.
Even now, writing these words, I feel nothing. Nothing but a distant objectivity, as if my life were happening to someone else, someone who doesn't matter, a fictional character. I don't separate from myself, or fall apart. I freeze over. Like a perfectly kept machine, my heart continues to pump blood but no longer bleeds or beats. My soul is like a candle flame, barely illuminating, so tender and fragile a sudden flurry of air could snuff it out entirely and reduce me to a morally bankrupt, ethically callous individual.
If anyone reads this and wishes me to continue, please post something and tag me in it.