The pain of weightlessness
Not really sure how I feel at the moment. I seem to be falling ever deeper into myself. Shying away from human contact, my lips sealed in silence. I don’t think my work environment helps. I am alone, with my only company being a good few floors away from me. While some aspects of this solitude is advantageous, as I can write and play on the Internet when I get a chance without people peering over my shoulder, I also fear I am losing my ability to interact with other human beings. I feel like I am losing what little confidence I have regained over the past few years, and am forgetting what makes me me.
The hum of my computer and the cars passing outside is my only company, and I find myself reflecting on how I got here, and what I want from life. Yesterday, I bumped into Bob at the Post Office. I used to go to primary school with Bob, and then, later, we knew each other through Blackfriers and theatre. While he’s always been a pleasant sort of chap, and I have nothing bad to say about him at all, I have never really felt like I connected with him, and used to struggle for things to say. I knew he was living in Derby, indeed he has been for years, but neither of us went our way to seek each other out. Guess he must feel the same way about me.
Anyhoo, he is now married, bought a house and Jane is badgering him about kids. He seems happy enough, and after a chat we went our separate ways. But if got me thinking…is that want I want? When am I going to look at children and feel that urge, that longing to have one. When am I going to pass a wedding and wish that I too was a bride? And is there something wrong with me that I don’t want these things?
Because I don’t. Not yet. I feel really nonchalant towards any of the conventional ‘next step’ things that society deems should be happening in my life. §I think this could be in part why I resent going home so much. I really felt that people just wanted to place me in a convenient box and stack me away. Rossy’s mum for example, hints constantly that she needs grandkids to carry on the family line, and that she’ll be old and grey before me and rosy get married. My dad’s the same, only I think I resent him more for it. He doesn’t seem to understand who I am or listen to what I want, and I can feel myself detaching from him.
But then, I also feel that my reaction about going home is more to do with me than anyone else. They are all happy, happy in their lives, in their town, who am I to look down on that? Just because I have finally achieved something does not mean that I should go seeking congratulations in places where I will not find it. Because people just don’t, won’t and can’t understand what I have achieved and how far I have come.
With reflection, all my life I too have pulled away from people who I felt judged me. People who I felt resented me because I didn’t fit into a convenient box. For nearly 10 years I haven’t spoken to my cousins, some aunts and uncles, some schoolmates and associates. I felt the breeze around me and the weightlessness of freedom before me. It’s what made me dream my whole life of leaving home, of moving away, travelling around. I feel very much like Sabina from ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’, at the moment, an artist who travels around, and at the moment when someone tried to tie her down, moves away without a word. Wonderful.
But with weightlessness comes a terrible burden; for people forget about you, and your life becomes meaningless. Will I always push people away? What good can come of this?
I feel that what holds me back from the conventional way of life is my fear of what comes next. I mean….what does come next? Say you have the house, the car, the marriage, the kids, the job, the money….what then? Does gaining these things constitute for being a whole human being? Do we define them, or do they, after a time, define you? Who are you?
Who is Aimee Wilkinson?
The hum of my computer and the cars passing outside is my only company, and I find myself reflecting on how I got here, and what I want from life. Yesterday, I bumped into Bob at the Post Office. I used to go to primary school with Bob, and then, later, we knew each other through Blackfriers and theatre. While he’s always been a pleasant sort of chap, and I have nothing bad to say about him at all, I have never really felt like I connected with him, and used to struggle for things to say. I knew he was living in Derby, indeed he has been for years, but neither of us went our way to seek each other out. Guess he must feel the same way about me.
Anyhoo, he is now married, bought a house and Jane is badgering him about kids. He seems happy enough, and after a chat we went our separate ways. But if got me thinking…is that want I want? When am I going to look at children and feel that urge, that longing to have one. When am I going to pass a wedding and wish that I too was a bride? And is there something wrong with me that I don’t want these things?
Because I don’t. Not yet. I feel really nonchalant towards any of the conventional ‘next step’ things that society deems should be happening in my life. §I think this could be in part why I resent going home so much. I really felt that people just wanted to place me in a convenient box and stack me away. Rossy’s mum for example, hints constantly that she needs grandkids to carry on the family line, and that she’ll be old and grey before me and rosy get married. My dad’s the same, only I think I resent him more for it. He doesn’t seem to understand who I am or listen to what I want, and I can feel myself detaching from him.
But then, I also feel that my reaction about going home is more to do with me than anyone else. They are all happy, happy in their lives, in their town, who am I to look down on that? Just because I have finally achieved something does not mean that I should go seeking congratulations in places where I will not find it. Because people just don’t, won’t and can’t understand what I have achieved and how far I have come.
With reflection, all my life I too have pulled away from people who I felt judged me. People who I felt resented me because I didn’t fit into a convenient box. For nearly 10 years I haven’t spoken to my cousins, some aunts and uncles, some schoolmates and associates. I felt the breeze around me and the weightlessness of freedom before me. It’s what made me dream my whole life of leaving home, of moving away, travelling around. I feel very much like Sabina from ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’, at the moment, an artist who travels around, and at the moment when someone tried to tie her down, moves away without a word. Wonderful.
But with weightlessness comes a terrible burden; for people forget about you, and your life becomes meaningless. Will I always push people away? What good can come of this?
I feel that what holds me back from the conventional way of life is my fear of what comes next. I mean….what does come next? Say you have the house, the car, the marriage, the kids, the job, the money….what then? Does gaining these things constitute for being a whole human being? Do we define them, or do they, after a time, define you? Who are you?
Who is Aimee Wilkinson?