art - paradigm, for mikari_chan, G.
paradigm, 2013. graphite, watercolor, acrylic, gouache, ink, & white gel pen on 7x10” Arches Aquarelle watercolor paper. Sarah belongs to mikari_chan.
When he thinks about it, he realizes over and over that most of his life has been spent opposing the things that were expected of him. He had thought himself more subtle than that, but instead what he has become is a study in the good son, subverted. He was always smart, always had potential; maybe he should have been a scientist, a politician, someone who was important, a support beam at least in the structure of society. Instead he has become a criminal, a liar, a thief, and a consummate one at that.
He had never expected to fall in love, and if he did, he thought it would be oppositional, adversarial, like his approach to himself seems to have been. In some ways, it was a self-fulfilling prophecy, learning to relish the difficulties of his life and to fight constantly to keep what he had, even when he was fighting against the person he most loved - or, more frequently, against himself. Maybe this is why he has no place for the way that he loves her; the way he loves her is in the expected way, the way of wanting to protect her, to enfold her in his arms and keep her so safe, to let her pick up the pieces and glue him back together when he needs it, instead of stubbornly doing it himself as he had always done before.
The way he feels about her makes him recall things that are uncomfortable to think about; the laugh lines at the corner of his mother’s eyes, the way his father sometimes just stopped what he was doing and went to touch her hair. He never thought something like that would be worth aspiring to, or at least nothing that he would want for himself. He thought of it as something lesser, but now the reality is that feeling this way is uncomfortable in how fully it fills him up and makes him buoyant, as if he can barely keep the illusion of gravity he has fought to hard for.
There are no words to tell her this; there is no appropriate vernacular for what it feels like to understand cliché when he looks at her and sees the universe in the depths of her eyes. Maybe it’s not meant to be explained - his intentions have always been to try hard, to expend all possible effort in the pursue of the things he wants. But maybe this isn’t something that’s meant to be explained. Maybe it’s supposed to be easy.