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I'm just tired
Sunday, 14 August 2005 03:29 pm—And I Was What I Most Didn't Want To Ever Be, Humiliated, So I Left Him There, Forcing Myself Not To Run Out the Door, Gone . . .*
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A couple of facts:
The zebra's first line of defense against predators is their stripes. When the zebra are all together in a herd, the predator watching can't tell just how many of them there are, can't pick out a single zebra. They look like one big zebra. Nobody wants to attack one big zebra.
That applies to healthy, adult zebra. Young zebra disrupt the pattern because they move differently, and so do sick or wounded zebra. The herd will fight to protect the young ones. The wounded ones aren't so lucky.
People can do this, too. My mother was telling me the other day about some talk show she was watching (Jane Pauley's?) where a pedophile was saying he could walk into a room of children and pick out the vulnerable one, the one who would be susceptible to his attention, the one who wouldn't tell. The damaged one. The one who most needed to be told they were special, and would most feel they deserved to be hurt.
I don't have any verification, but I know that bullies can do it, too. It's been happening to me my whole life.
When I was in high school, I spent as much time as I could trying to go unnoticed because I'd already been through eight years of being the object of ridicule, the last two because I was a known lesbian in a small Catholic school. So I did my best to hide.
Let me tell you something: I'm not good at hiding. I'm not good at staying invisible. The more I hear, the more I wonder if any manic-depressives are. When I'm up, I feel like—not like nobody could hurt me (my moods don't go that far up) but like nobody would want to hurt me. I fall in love with the world and can't imagine that it doesn't love me, too.
And when I slide down, all the memories of all the laughter come back and I can't imagine that anybody could love me, and much as I want to be invisible so nobody can see me to laugh at me, the uncontrollable crying is usually kind of noticeable.
Anyway, high school. In terms of harassment, high school was nothing compared to grade school; there was only one creepy guy who, whenever we were in the same place at the same time, would attack me. And we both took German, which, in a small school, meant for two years, our schedules were the same. I think gym class was the only one we didn't have together. I could hide during lunch, and there was one study hall I was safe because I was playing cards with one of the teachers. But the rest of the time, it was open season. And nobody did anything. There was one guy, and there were a number of people that, I at least imagined, seemed disgusted by his behavior, and no one said anything. I had a few friends, who said nothing. The teachers said nothing.
I didn't fight back. I'd tried that in grade school (when it was the whole pack) and it always ended up worse; when it came to defending myself, I learned to shut down, to keep my head down.
But I couldn't keep my mouth shut about other things. There are times I want to, but—
My mother says virtually my first words were, "It's not fair!" The feeling of complacent injustice weighs on me and whether I say anything or not, I feel like crap about it. I hate making myself a target; I hate hiding. I hate breathing.
When I found fandom, I felt like I'd found the people I'd been looking for my whole life, the people I could be my real self with. But fandom isn't any different than any other group, except that for the most part, fans won't make fun of you for being obsessive about a TV show, or seeing a movie over and over again.
I've become convinced that there's no place I belong, no place I can just be myself. I've always known I was born to be discontented, and I can handle the discontent in myself; what I can't handle is being afraid all the time. When I ask questions, they're always the wrong ones, and no one believes I'm looking for a serious answer.
I don't know what to do.
*William Goldman
-:- -:- -:-
A couple of facts:
The zebra's first line of defense against predators is their stripes. When the zebra are all together in a herd, the predator watching can't tell just how many of them there are, can't pick out a single zebra. They look like one big zebra. Nobody wants to attack one big zebra.
That applies to healthy, adult zebra. Young zebra disrupt the pattern because they move differently, and so do sick or wounded zebra. The herd will fight to protect the young ones. The wounded ones aren't so lucky.
People can do this, too. My mother was telling me the other day about some talk show she was watching (Jane Pauley's?) where a pedophile was saying he could walk into a room of children and pick out the vulnerable one, the one who would be susceptible to his attention, the one who wouldn't tell. The damaged one. The one who most needed to be told they were special, and would most feel they deserved to be hurt.
I don't have any verification, but I know that bullies can do it, too. It's been happening to me my whole life.
When I was in high school, I spent as much time as I could trying to go unnoticed because I'd already been through eight years of being the object of ridicule, the last two because I was a known lesbian in a small Catholic school. So I did my best to hide.
Let me tell you something: I'm not good at hiding. I'm not good at staying invisible. The more I hear, the more I wonder if any manic-depressives are. When I'm up, I feel like—not like nobody could hurt me (my moods don't go that far up) but like nobody would want to hurt me. I fall in love with the world and can't imagine that it doesn't love me, too.
And when I slide down, all the memories of all the laughter come back and I can't imagine that anybody could love me, and much as I want to be invisible so nobody can see me to laugh at me, the uncontrollable crying is usually kind of noticeable.
Anyway, high school. In terms of harassment, high school was nothing compared to grade school; there was only one creepy guy who, whenever we were in the same place at the same time, would attack me. And we both took German, which, in a small school, meant for two years, our schedules were the same. I think gym class was the only one we didn't have together. I could hide during lunch, and there was one study hall I was safe because I was playing cards with one of the teachers. But the rest of the time, it was open season. And nobody did anything. There was one guy, and there were a number of people that, I at least imagined, seemed disgusted by his behavior, and no one said anything. I had a few friends, who said nothing. The teachers said nothing.
I didn't fight back. I'd tried that in grade school (when it was the whole pack) and it always ended up worse; when it came to defending myself, I learned to shut down, to keep my head down.
But I couldn't keep my mouth shut about other things. There are times I want to, but—
My mother says virtually my first words were, "It's not fair!" The feeling of complacent injustice weighs on me and whether I say anything or not, I feel like crap about it. I hate making myself a target; I hate hiding. I hate breathing.
When I found fandom, I felt like I'd found the people I'd been looking for my whole life, the people I could be my real self with. But fandom isn't any different than any other group, except that for the most part, fans won't make fun of you for being obsessive about a TV show, or seeing a movie over and over again.
I've become convinced that there's no place I belong, no place I can just be myself. I've always known I was born to be discontented, and I can handle the discontent in myself; what I can't handle is being afraid all the time. When I ask questions, they're always the wrong ones, and no one believes I'm looking for a serious answer.
I don't know what to do.
*William Goldman