#wildly personal

[rentalboos]

When you filter for Thirteen/Dhawan fics and sort by kudos, my fic shows up second, and that's insane actually, that's nuts, I don't think my brain comprehends that

[nessysweet]

The meat of things, written in prose, on a Saturday in bed. Fuck it.

I lately haven’t been feeling like myself, or rather, I haven’t felt myself. I feel numb all over my body, in my head, and in my heart. 

I constantly feel like I’m living a huge lie, knowing I carry all of my life’s secrets in my bosom, hoping they don’t explode out of me in some embarrassing way.

I wake up and put on clothes I don’t like anymore, I brush my teeth to the same bands I listened to when I was 12, and nothing resonates with me. I go to finish off my face with red lipstick, my daily choice, and I realize I hate the look. 

All of these things, superficial changes to my appearance, can easily be fixed and altered, but which direction do I go? I have a world of options, a long a brillIant spectrum of bold to subtle, but I don’t know where my look fits. I don’t know where I fit. Or maybe I do know, but the alternative I imagine myself pursuing...is too scary. It’s too wild, too fabulous, too majestic, way too cute.

I remember how much of my childhood was spent being an outcast. I remember the constant bullying and mocking. That one kid who actually pulled a chair out from under me in school...where is he now I wonder? Fuck him. Being true to myself meant subjecting myself to a world of pain, and I couldn’t handle it anymore. 

“No Vanessa, you can’t wear your favorite collection of Homer Simpson tees. No, get rid of that Naruto shirt you saved up money for. Stop talking about anime, no one cares about your cherished collection of stories. No, the scene kids don’t want to discuss the ‘philosophy’ of punk and diy culture with you, why do you mistake them for comrades?”

So I stopped. I “grew out” of anime and manga, and the fantasy worlds that came from the depths of my rich imagination. I “grew out” of all my obsessions, everything that gave me purpose and joy and meaning. I “grew out” of the feeling that brazen, unabashed punk rock could change the world, and I opted to listen to my favorite bands out of irony because I was becoming so “mature” and “well-adjusted”. Soon enough, I wasn’t the daily target of bullies, because I became so bland and boring and unassuming. I blended into hallways, and fit into small corners, giving no one a reason to bother or look at me.

But I’m a wild one at heart, and I yearned for a little // color //. I knew a girl in high school who wore brilliant eyeshadow everyday. It was beautiful and bright, and I loved it. I begged her to give me the same look, and she place big, bold, shimmering layers of pink, gold, and green on my eyes. Probably a tacky look, but for a second, I felt like I had peeled myself off the wall and stepped into my personhood again. But it took 5 minutes before I had “hoar” whispered into my ear, and my ass grabbed by multiple boys, and panic set in. I ran to the bathroom, wiped it off (along with my tears), and looked sadly at the girl who tried to help me feel again.

So I did grow up into a relatively responsible, reasonable adult. An artist, but not obsessive over her work. Not full of fire, just simmering. Ambitious, but still reserved. I applaud vivacity in other people, but I continue to display a sense of control and stability, nothing too out of the box. Nothing that would make people notice me.

And it’s eating me. Invisibility is a superpower I never wanted. I want to shoot lasers out of my eyes, and for my voice to split mountains, but it feels like I’m stuck as this invisible mutant, and I want to crawl out of my skin into a new one. I want to wear my favorite honey blond wig outside my bedroom. I want to be the unadjusted rape survivor who doesn’t have to evade the question “so why are you in therapy?” I want to make art about Gundams, and cosplay every damn day. I want to yell into a microphone about pizza, and demand people pay me $$$ for it. I want to live in my queer body and begin to understand what that means for me. I want to laugh obnoxiously loud and chew with my mouth open because I’m having such a good time, and no one can stop me.

In my youth, I laid on my bed and dreamt about how adulthood would be so much better, so much freer. And now I sit here bemoaning my position as a dull, uninspired, anxious grown up, desperately searching for that boldness I had as a kid. I’m looking for my heart again. I dropped it somewhere along the way, and now I have to go back and find it. I can only hope it finds me first, because I don’t know where in the hell to start. 

I’m going to start my search... at the thrift store today.

[filmsinthedarkofdawn]