Indulging the fear
The popular girls didn’t wear primary colors, but they were bright, the Esprit t-shirts and the jeans in shades that never occurred in nature. That was how we measured value, in the clothes, the labels, the human search for approval and status in the most base of ways. You needed money, you needed to be an extrovert, you needed connection and cotillion tickets and a house with a yard. Your family needed a new car, or at the very least a car, and maybe even two parents, two parents who were supportive and together, with an entire ensemble of family behind them, too. You needed a group to support you, to ride along until you were able to swim by yourself, to be on your own.
I don’t want to come across as bitter – no, I’m not bitter – but I am close to the edge this morning, thinking about how we measure our value and the value of other people. It’s a strange way to think about humanity, to think in terms of how much a person is worth, not in dollars, but in the right to take up space, to demand attention and love. Aren’t we all worth the same -- that is, aren't we inherently valuable? We may be, but that’s not how it works practically speaking.
My fear is that I will die alone. We all die alone, of course, unless perhaps we take someone down with us, or go out in a jetliner crash or a conflagration at a packed hotel or train car or apartment complex, but I mean alone. The family that buffeted me when I was small has died and dispersed. The people I trust are few, and my own little family may not be enough. I can be brave, I can, I try, but sometimes it just hits me, the fear, the paralyzing feeling in the pit of my stomach. I may not be capable of creating the connections I need and crave, my self-protective shield is already in place, and I am not of enough value for people to reach out for me.
Yes, I am getting better, I am healing and I am brave and strong and capable, but this feeling of not mattering, of being existentially alone, is overwhelming right now. Maybe it was the continuation of our home reorganization, the weekend spent emptying a closet that has been packed with boxes since we moved here, the dismantling of the antique armoire we bought a decade ago to make room for a new configuration in the back room, this rifling through a recent past, through days of connection that feel very far away. Maybe it’s the process of making the room into something else, a physical acknowledgment of change. At any rate, I’m drowning, the whirlpool is pulling me underwater, my lungs are filling up, and I don’t know who to reach for. I feel like an item on discount at the dollar store, unwanted and cheap. Disposable. I am on my own.
Dying alone, living alone. It can be a self-fulfilling prophecy, but I don’t see how I can get out of it at the moment. Surely I’ll feel better tomorrow or the next day or next week. For now I’m just going to indulge this feeling, tinged with fear and self-pity, for a few more minutes before I put it away, box it up until I am ready to feel it again.
From the prompt "Very popular."
I'm posting every messy Round Robin prompt, a prompt a day until the RR ends. This one took a bit of editing for clarity.
Image by Sebastian Fritzon.