Half Moon Bray

“Are you coming tonight?”

Why do we always have to be going someplace. Not that I don’t enjoy going out, but sometimes I think we do things, like go out, just to have an excuse to avoid one another. Being physically alone is a one way of keeping others out, but the same can be true of being with others. Getting lost in the interaction. It taking the necessity of sharing from one level and places it on another, a more nebulous, unassuming one.

We do this intentionally at times to provide a form of escape from things we don’t wish to be involved with, people too. We use the herd mentality exercise that allows for safety in numbers. Not that numbers will protect you; it is just that the odds of there being someone more alluring than you exaggerates your lesser importance. We can keep our anonymity sequestered in the midst of everything that is going on, by the distractions involved with everything that is going on. It is a conundrum within a conundrum.

I don’t really feel like going anywhere, but I don’t want to be alone. I also know if I say anything about wanting to be alone, that there must be something wrong. There always has to be something wrong if anyone wants to be alone. It is as if when left alone we will undergo some terrible transformation, and come out of it a different person. Someone no one will any longer be able to discern, which is the real you, and which the imposter. 

I feel at times the necessity of becoming an imposter. Someone no one knows, no one believes they can regulate, interpret, or control for their own ends. 

If I sound cynical, I don’t mean to. It is just that we are all guilty of doing what I confess I feel, is being done to me. Analyzed to the point of extinction. Becoming a fossil encased in a past that belonged to a version of someone else.

Parties, get togethers, are all good excuses to be who we are supposed to be. No one likes to make a scene, be disruptive or incorrigible, but at the same time many of us feel the need to be just that. And yet we don’t for the sake of our status, and that of our friends and acquaintances. We do not break the piggy bank that doesn’t belong to us just to find out what has been horded away.

We would no doubt like to do that very thing, but propriety keeps us for the most part in check. It is easier to lock yourself in the bathroom and scream into the mirror, than it is to confront the thing that causes us to become so emotionally tied to that person, whom we presently dislike.

Caring about what other’s think of us has a way of encroaching on who we are. It keeps us in line so to speak. Keeps us from climbing on the ledge and looking down at the street knowing you don’t have the courage to jump, but hoping others don’t know that. 

We are to attend another one of those functions where we are supposed, even expected to have a good time whether we do or not. We will have to shake the usual hands, hug the usual people, be introduced to some for the second and third time, appreciate the hostesses newly acquired assortment of jeweled accessories, and leave thanking everyone for such a wonderfully wasted evening.

We could have of course stayed home, but then, having to fend off the insinuation of rejection is worse than enduring the party itself. You simply can’t win. There is no acceptable excuse any longer for just wanting to be by yourself. You become immediately a suspect of people’s imaginations. What are you planning, what did you do wrong, what did they do wrong? It is no longer natural to want to be alone. We are social animals; we are designed by nature and providence to be with others of like minds and social etiquette.

We are suspect if we do, or if we don’t. And why do we care? I believe it is also a part of us that we have inherited from our history with humanity, whether we care to accept it or not. To survive, we need each other. Other’s provide for our needs and wants, and we in return provide an equal and hopefully accommodating measure of compliance with their needs.

We however have forgotten the benefits of being alone. I have read about people who when deprived of companionship whither like a dying plant, while others flourish, as if capable of making their own rain and sunshine. So where do the two diverge, and which side do we find ourselves on…and if we don’t like where we find ourselves, can we change pots, gardens?

I have an obligation to participate in these communal activities, as they do provide a means of expressing appreciation for being considered worthy, I suppose. But I also reserve the right to privacy, my own alone. A place where I can lock out the world, take off my clothes, and dance around the banana tree in the rain.

Perhaps that does not make sense to some, but for others it hopefully is my way of appreciating the fact that sometimes, most times, but not often enough, you do what is best for you. What in all practical terms is best for everyone. 

When you are not where you want to be, there is a good chance not only you, but those around you will see, know, that you do not belong. Not because they don’t wish you to, but because you don’t want to be. I’ve seen more than one ghost standing against the wall holding a martini glass and wishing they were really dead. I’ve always been tempted to intervene, but then I remember. 

I believe we need learn to know, when to say no, not this time, not ever again. It is a freeing moment spiritually, when you realize you owe yourself more than you give yourself credit for.

“You going to be ready soon. Supposed to be there at eight.”

See what I mean about expectations. They often aren’t your own you have to watch out for, it is becoming increasingly more likely the encroachment on your time and person is from an outside impersonator of expectations.

“You go ahead. I’m feeling a little under myself tonight; wouldn’t be much fun to be around. You go ahead, I’ll just leave me to myself.”