Ah, that staring
and dynamiting oppressive West Coast social norms
Yesterday, something extraordinary happened: just as I finished giving my order to the sweet barista at Peet’s, someone got up from my favorite table, freeing said table, which happens to be everyone’s favorite table, which means I have not sat at my favorite table all year, until, a celestial chorus guiding my walk, there I was, sliding my backpack off, fitting my crutches into a snug natural corner, and enjoying that two-person space nestled near the window, for what nearly felt like the first time because I was out of my mind with joy.
Then I noticed an elderly gentlemen staring. REALLY staring. At me. Now a thing I enjoy doing is talking to strangers because I am a New Orleanian and I grew up in a 1980’s/90’s coffeehouse and also I believe that human beings are made for connection above all else, specifically connection’s outside one’s own family be they biological or chosen, but West Coasters disagree with me on this issue because well no need to finish that, because if I do, I will get mean. You, kind readers, don’t need me to project my anger at People Who Are Not You onto you! So, back to our starer.
“Any particular reason you’re looking at me?” I asked him.
“Sorry,” he said.
“Do you have something you’d like to ask me?”
“No,” he said.
“I would prefer that you did, rather than just staring, because staring is very rude.”
He says nothing.
Of course at this point, all the good patrons of Peet’s, none of whom, as it happens, are visibly marginalized, are glaring at me, because I’m a BIIIIIIIIIITCH (here I point to my polite phrasings!) and I have disturbed their peace. But wait! My peace, as a visibly marginalized individual, has been disturbed by this dude! Does that matter? of course it doesn’t. When white progressive San Franciscans said they were all about diverse voices, did I think that meant they wanted us to actually speak?
Of course I didn’t, I’ve lived here for 3 years. But I do it anyway. Because going home in January alchemized me and I officially don’t give a fuck about forcing grown adults to feel a bit of tension rather than swallowing my marginalized misery and getting clinically depressed. Wild, isn’t it, that I choose fortifying my own spirit over the comfort of inhibited strangers? I’m not supposed to. Neither are you. And people wonder why the Bay Area is constantly exploding with anxiety, with road rage, with dogs that lose their minds carrying their owners’ unexpressed anger and grief.
As my time in San Francisco comes to a close, with our next location yet to be determined in large part by the discerning people of two specific MFA programs that are tantalizing me with spots on their waitlist, I’m coming to understand how much this city has forced me to grow, how it’s been, to borrow a phrase from Francesca Lia Block, my “loving antagonist.” I spent a couple of severely depressed years thinking everything about me was simply wrong because none of these people liked me. Then I went home, to New Orleans, where, funnily enough, I did not feel at home as a bookish drug-free virgin teenager, and suddenly, the world split open, back to the heart I was raised with: human beings are made to express emotion and connect with people who haven’t been vetted by their stupid friends. (This is no offense to your friends, dear readers, there is an oppressive friend-culture here, a conversation for another time.)
Suddenly I made some fucking sense. And I did not come this far, go to this much therapy, cut as many painful ties as I had to with people who formed my very roots, just to make sure I made no impact on anyone and let oppressive or “polite” behavior be. I’ve been suicidal at multiple points in my life (no longer, and I’m on Welbutrin, so while we’re at it I have no time for anyone who treats ‘depressed without drugs’ as heroic), and one of the reasons I was suicidal is because I didn’t believe I was worth a whole lot outside of others’ approval.
Which. is. Madness. But I was so scared. I never let on how scared I was in those years because I didn’t want to face it myself. I didn’t want to face where that fear came from or the ways it had fucked up my brain. My first boyfriend really did a number on my self-image when he told me, at sixteen, that I would be prettier without crutches, so my brain, my “intelligence,” was all I fucking had, and if it were to be my problem then I had nothing.
That, of course, is stupid too. Wow the many ways I held myself back because of stupid beliefs. It’s why I have almost no tolerance for the stupid beliefs/assumptions of others. Because those unquestioned conclusions are so often at the core of the unnessary suffering that too many people insist is “just life.” It’s not! Life is actually supposed to be a thing we’re generally excited about having. And I am now. Which doesn’t mean I walk around without heartbreak, far from it, but this unshakable faith in my own worth has made me some degree of invincible, and all I had to do was not care if a stranger felt a little tense as I spoke my mind.
Well, this one got real vulnerable really fast! I don’t know whether to apologize or high five you.
There’s end to this. I am smack in the middle of life, at a transition point that seems it will always and only lead to more transitions because “conclusion,” like time, is a lie. Here’s a photo of me with half my head needing shaving and the other half really dry, but who cares, we don’t hide anything in this space. Also? The way the weather is right now, I’m not sure we’ll get that actual sun again any time soon, so have a sunfire flame-lock in the meantime.
