sometimes i like being left alone. i don't want to talk to you, don't want to answer your nosy questions or try to salvage a dead conversation. i don't want to spill my secrets, don't want to open up & trust you - or anyone, for that matter. sometimes i want to stay at home all day & night, surrounded only by the voices leaking out of my itunes & characters on movie screens. sometimes i like walking alone, leaving myself to wander in my own thoughts. & sometimes, yes sometimes, i can't stand being around you for more than a few hours. i need me, just me, no one else - not you.
but then there are those days i wake up from a blast of chilliness breezing through the window. i curl up inside my blanket but it's not enough. my eyes squint at the time & it's too late, already afternoon, the day half gone. i unwillingly crawl out of bed & throw myself a mix of foods salvaged from the refrigerator & shove it down. i check my phone, my email, facebook, & there's nothing new. the world around me seems to be chattering away, talking & interacting with each other, leaving me behind to observe. i crack & break, sutures slowly unwinding as i feel this facade of embracing loneliness is becoming a lie, a lie.
i am someone who tries to embrace (& does succeed at) being alone. i wouldn't bitch & whine about being alone the entire weekend, finding company in books & movies & my own thoughts. i could learn to eat alone & cook alone, experimenting all kinds of dishes & being the sole tester. & i know how to love alone, not a flighty crush but loving myself, embracing every one of my flaws that i have dug up & found. i am not scared of myself. i don't fear knowing about what hidden subconscious nightmares i have inside, knowing i have perused & trashed every single one of them. i take personality quizzes with a half heart, knowing what i'll get since i know myself best.
so it's when i crawl out of my cave & see society's expectations of finding company in everything. maybe it's just america or the world at large, but we all try to be extroverts in every way possible. chattering on is not necessarily good but at least better than not talking & shying away in the background. meals must be had with friends or family, never alone. you see that old man at the restaurant saying table for one? everyone looks at him in pity, as if he has no one else, no company whatsoever who will eat with him. to society, to everyone, being alone is a bad, bad thing. & so we embrace love, finding company in a special someone, & we endorse marriage, being tied to someone else for the rest of your life. being alone, walking alone, watching movies alone, doing anything alone (except maybe going to the bathroom) is frowned upon.
& i hate that. don't you think we should embrace a little more of ourselves before running off to anyone else? i'm not talking about narcissism or vanity, but just the experience of being comfortable with ourselves & only ourselves. to spend several days doing everything on your own, knowing independence at its greatest - no depending whatsoever on any other human, but finding your own food, entertainment, & warmth...all alone. discovering what happiness is like on your own - not through loving someone else, not through great friendships - but anything that you can uncover yourself, through yourself.
i say this time & time again but we could all learn to embrace introspection a little more. knowing yourself before than & more than anyone else is one of the most powerful things we as humans can do. because just like you might be laughing at us introverts for loving to be alone, i laugh at you for not knowing about the one thing you've been stuck with the longest - all your life, even. because the only thing you can be sure of, the only thing life can promise is that you'll be with you for as long as you live. like the never-ending clingy bitch you are, you will never let go of you. you are never going to lose you, no matter how hard you may try. you will always be stuck with you.
so do you want to live & die in the arms of a stranger, or in the arms of your best friend?
playing | "sleep alone" - bat for lashes
photo | zuru1024 ; flickr
