I always loved who I was. But I’m falling in love with who I am all over again. All the undeniable bits that are foretold by science. My DNA, my skin, my heritage. Except this time, I am falling through the rose bushes of my existence.
The thorns that surround my cultural beauty catch me as I fall. I can no longer behold that budding flower without experiencing the sweet, gentle brutality of my reality.
I say ‘sweet’ because I’m one of the lucky ones. I never experienced war. That was my mother’s generation. They say we were born free but really we are the benefactors of whatever can be gained in the midst of artificial peace. I never slept hungry except every night that I’ve been dying to taste the value of my life. I am educated. I have travelled. I grew up middle class. No, I myself am not middle class. One can only try, these days.
There are better victims out there. A life of privilege is not allowed to cry out this much. There is a river of pain I’ve buried 60 feet beneath the surface of my being. I refuse to excavate whatever it is that has become a thorn in my side. I’m lucky. Let me be gratefully lucky, blissfully ignorant of my pain. It’s senseless, indulgent, forbidden. Expired. Such weakness is not what my ancestors were made of. (My denial is quite dramatic, at times.) People are what they try to be. Even when they don’t try once their trying is actually needed. People care for each other these days. Even when we won’t talk about all kinds of elephants in our rooms. Are we all just giving each other the bare minimum and calling it progress?
I was lucky enough to be raised on dreams. I inherited the ability to dream. Like many, I live to survive. But my background means I juggle the disease of wanting more. Because it is our job, people like me, to strive for more. Ultimate black excellence. Except when we grow up we realise ‘sweet’ is actually bittersweet.
Some of us spit it out while others lap it up like it is the liquid key to the kingdom of Heaven. Others drift in search of themselves. Infections seep into our thoughts. They are called feminism, patriarchy, globalisation, imperialism, deconstruction. Of one’s religion. Of the cult of family. Of late stage capitalism. The West is loud. You can hear the melody of their convictions even from the depths of tradition. As well as all the beautiful things they make, say, sing, share.
Twenty-first century buzzwords are powerful. They make sense once you give them a chance to explain that we don’t actually hate each other. We are harmony interrupted.
The thing is we already know of these things from the past which was judged dirty, backward. We realise there are alternatives to what we’ve grown accustomed to: the ancestors of all of us global citizens have been at that alternative existence before in some shape or form. That’s why everyone itches when they hear these things. They sound familiar, like home. But what are we supposed to do now?
Everything is like that these days. A toxin disguised as healing. Awareness disguised as loneliness. A slow poison versus the antidote our collective repressed soul has been searching for. I love that, in this day and age, I get to witness everyone’s corner of the world. Regardless of history perpetuating itself endlessly. Despite the paradoxes of my torn identity. Despite vicious undercurrents dividing us daily.
Our elders have become irrelevant. The men think we hate them. Our brothers think we don’t need them. Our sisters are detaching to protect themselves. But no one actually hates anyone. We all got disturbed in the middle of being. We learned dominance over love. Isolation over being dominated. We were thrown to extremes that made us disgusted with each other. One versus the other. People versus people. And now we want to know in our marrow that something can still be made of our lives despite all the discord. If not together, we’ll die trying to make it on our own. A fool’s errand, but we’ll try nonetheless.
Why should one still care about the ever-present past? Well, because just when we’ve committed ourselves to oblivious allegiance to the future, fresh truth comes to slap us across the face and put us back in our place. Remember who you are. That can mean anything, depending on who you’re talking to. Or for. We just want to move on. But the healthier you are the more you can identify aggression. There’s another buzz word to roll our eyes at. Microaggressions. Self-awareness isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. That’s why we’re not all in our healing era. What for? So that we can sense the toxicity all around us? It’s easier to think toxins are bitter medicine. Heal so that you can see just how crooked the picture hanging on the wall is? We’d rather believe it’s another day in paradise.
No one ever tells you what to do once you’re looking at the truth. Once it won’t let you go. Once all the paradoxes of fact echo through your brain.
Things have changed yet they remain the same. Where does self-awareness come in? Where do positive vibes and healing go when everyone is fighting for peace? Inside is tranquil but outside people are dying, Kim? We believe our healing will transcend our reality. Perhaps it will.
It comes out in the end, all we avoid during the course of our lives. A funeral may do it. May reveal how we live like we have nothing to do with anyone else -or with history- when it’s the abject opposite. A birth. Whatever it is that brings it on, a moment occurs when clarity prevails. And we see that we didn’t do justice to the seconds. We didn’t say it. We didn’t mean it. We didn’t go far enough. We didn’t want to know. We didn’t want the responsibility of being the one to actually search for what needed to be done and do it. Clarity prevails and then we get to see the horror of our willful ignorance. I didn’t want to know what that feels like. And yet…do I?
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