On the Hardships of Being

The thing is, being oneself is hard. It’s always the advice one will get, of course, if one asks folks.

Be yourself. Be honest. Be true. Be good. Don’t wear any masks. Don’t put on any airs. Don’t strive for something you cannot ever have. Don’t waste time and energy trying to become someone (something) that you are not. Be good. Be true. Be honest. Be yourself.

Yeah.

Most advice is doled out by well-meaning people who believe they’re doing you a massive favour by telling you how to improve your attitude – how to make the right choices, as if the range of right choices were severely limited. Perhaps it is. Hard to tell, as so many of them have sage advice to spread around like a contaminated air-conditioning system spreading legionella.

Is that even a thing anymore? Doesn’t matter.

What matters is getting ahead, is confronting a problem head-on, is headbutting life right in the face…or some such. Metaphors have a way of running amok. Better to steer clear.

Steer clear. Like the ships of old avoiding icebergs…maybe sea monsters, too.

Okay, time to focus.

So, being oneself is pretty much out the transparent steel window for Ezrela these days. After all, she needs to be on that vessel, needs to take that flight, needs to be on that expedition, needs to learn, needs to see. If anyone were to ask her – nobody will – she wouldn’t be able to say why it’s not just a wish but a necessity. It just is. It’s that shiny twinkle at the horizon that she just must get to.

There’s no staying behind. There’s no getting stuck in the treadmill. There can be no same old, same old. There just can’t.

Does that count as being oneself?

Hiding the most essential truth of herself isn’t the hardest part of this whole enterprise, either. No, the tricky bit is learning how to do the job that she told the authorities she was perfectly capable of already. Well. Forging a document…okay, a few documents wasn’t that hard. That is something she can do well, what with those extra skills that she’s not even supposed to have. Hell, she herself isn’t even supposed to be – not like this, not anymore.

Not since the war. Not since the edict.

The documents have been approved, so there’s no reason to fret about that. For years, now, she’s been able to hide what needs to be hidden. Being careful about that has become second nature to her, so that’s nothing to worry about as long as she keeps on her toes.

There’s the made-up job qualification, though. That.

One would think that what with her supposed scary superpowers, she’d be able to snap her fingers, wiggle her nose, shoot laser beams out of her eyes, and just get stuff done like that. Doesn’t work that way, though, as people would know if they cared to understand what she is. She supposes that it’s not really their fault. Things got out of hand. Catastrophe ensued. Now, it is what it is. At least the chaos is over. At least they’re exploring again, the creators, even if it’s in a way that requires a lot of human handiwork, human computation. Human error will happen, too, but that’s a small price to pay, they say.

In the olden days, people used to sail around the world in wooden ships. They did it all the time and almost always survived. Those pioneers had no computers. They had no refrigerators. They had no clean energy to propel them. They did it all by thinking with their divine, natural, inspired brains. If they could make it back then, how could the new expeditions fail these days? Everything is better now. There’s no denying that. If that’s not an encouraging thought, what else ever could be?

Maintenance mechanic, the job profile that Ezrela has faked says. Her real qualification is that of an intelligent software programmer and coder, but who’s looking? The world. That is who. No pressure there. Her field has all but died, sacrificed on an altar of painful compromise – all for the greater good.

When she decided to hightail it to outer space, she thought it would make sense to accept a mechanic’s job. She was made to program intelligent software. How difficult could tightening screws and waving an oil rag around even be?

Very. That is how difficult it is.

Well, she’s got a month to go and a skill to learn…okay, and maybe get rid of her assumptions about what is not at all a menial job. On the contrary: it’s not only something vital; it’s also hard as hell. Doing research on the thing beforehand wasn’t too difficult. Trying stuff out at home without breaking parts of herself (and without the billion neighbours noticing) was harder. But she got the hang of using basic tools (and being able to name them). How many hours were spent like that? With her wrenching and torqueing, cleaning, and wondering why the piece of junk motor wouldn’t work? A thousand? Better part of a year.

Now, time’s running out, the application too the expedition has been accepted, and she’s got only a month to get up to speed with keeping the pipes and screws and other bits and bobs of the ship’s components running – along with a team of fellow experienced mechanics, but still. She can’t draw attention to herself. She can’t be made.

The best solution (ahem) is to yet again forge a document and apply to an advanced mechanics course at a local garage that should set her up well enough for the impending voyage. There’s no other choice, here. She could’ve made herself a computer expert, but that might end up giving her away. That must not happen – not ever.

One fine Monday morning, she squeezes out of her skyscraper into the thickening stream of early bird commuters and lets herself be dragged to the tram. It’s always crowded in there – so crowded, in fact, that she can’t even look outside and admire the first sunbeams hitting the riverbend. It’s a lovely sight, the cleaned up and repopulated river – a sign of new peace and prosperity and renewed respect for the environment, now that the evil enemy is gone and all.

Do the people crammed into the tram car not notice that unlike them, Ezrela doesn’t sweat? She should find a way to change that. Then again, people see what they want to see. One can tell them something is true, and they’ll find a way to believe it. Discrepancies will, if possible, be ignored wholesale. That’s just how the human brain works: it doesn’t get hung up on things that appear not to matter.

Ezrela gets to the tiny shop on Coal Street (old, that name, and no longer accurate) and holds her breath as she steps across the threshold into the workshop. Smells like metal and grease and burnt plastic in there. It’s not unpleasant. Huh. Maybe she just got used to it, given the sorry state of her flat. “Hello?” Wow. Eloquent.

A woman appears from what must be the back office: average height and muscly, she has her dark, curly hair twirled into a bun that’s piled on top of her head. “Ezrela Dohan?”

“I am.”

“You’re punctual. That’s good.” The woman nods and smiles a little. She holds out her hand. “I’m Amina. You spoke with my sister that day. She does the shop’s secretarial work.”

As always, Ezrela would rather not, but she takes the calloused hand and shakes it once. “Nice to meet you.” Nice grip, too.

Again, Amina nods. “You have dry skin. Maybe get some lotion on your way back home, cos you’ll be washing your hands a lot in this job. Gloves won’t do. You need to feel the machine. So…you know, you wouldn’t want to get any nailbed infections.”

It’s important not to sound impatient or condescending or anything unpleasant when responding, as the wrong tone of voice might draw unwanted attention. Also, Ezrela doesn’t want to offend anyone. “Good tip. There’s a drugstore in my building.”

Amina nods, says, “Great. Let’s get started,” and leads Ezrela through the shop, shows her the distinct types of machines they’re currently working on, asks about tool names and procedures.

One month. There’s exactly one month during which Ezrela can learn how to do the job she told the recruiting office she’s so great at. It’s a bit like learning how to play the piano, isn’t it? One looks at the keys and thinks: I can do this. One practices and practices and practices and oh dear, isn’t it awful, trying to make one hand do one thing and the other something completely different?

Feels a bit like running up a hill on roller skates.

One tries to do the thing. One fails, tries again. Maybe painful accidents happen, like Ezrela breaking off a nail whilst trying to unjam a thingamajig…what was it again with her secret being safe? Must be careful. Anyway, isn’t it funny, how when one thinks that all the skills required are ready, steady, go, everything goes kaput and leaves nothing but giant question marks and confusedly scratched foreheads?

No. It’s not funny in the slightest.

“That’s a perfectly normal learning experience,” Amina tells Ezrela, after the latter has accidentally fried the electrics on a training generator that she’s been handling every day for the past three weeks. “You try. You make a mistake. You get better. Then, you make another mistake. What matters is the learning curve, not individual missteps.” She never says error or failure. It’s always a misstep, a mistake, a misunderstanding. That’s just one more reason to like her.

“Sometimes, it feels like all my achievements are a quilt of mistakes.” Ezrela drops herself on an aluminium chair by the back-office window – tiny, cramped, but warm and dry and weirdly appealing.

It’s their tea break. No-one’s seen coffee in quite a few years. According to the authorities, it’ll take a while until that sorry situation gets rectified.

Amina is standing by the small table, cradling a cup of chamomile tea – home-grown, in her flat.

They can’t stop making living things was Ezrela’s first thought when Amina shared this morsel.

“You’re talking about success,” Amina says, smiling a little. It’s a lovely sight. She has full, expressive features and the most pleasantly deep alto voice. “See, I don’t believe in success. That’s just something the media tries to sell you, setting you up for failure – another thing that doesn’t exist – so you’ll buy something, hire someone, invest your hard-earned money in nonsense that will not help you, as there’s nothing wrong with you in the first place. There is no success, Ez.” She leans in a tad, as if sharing some universe-bending secret. “There’s only existing. There’s no failure. There’s only learning. That’s what life is, you see: learning. If we do everything right at the first try, then we can’t learn, can’t better our own selves or the world around us.” She shrugs, sips her tea, frames her face in curly steam rising from the chipped mug. “We’d be like synths and not like human beings.”

Ezrela wishes Amina hadn’t said that but can’t exactly blame her. She listens to the rain pattering against the thick window and shifts her weight on the uncomfortable chair. “Maybe I’m just forcing things.”

“Trying to pass a test too quickly doesn’t always work out.” It’s clear that she’s choosing her words with care. “Why is it so important that you make the trip?”

The deadline and the expedition’s departure line up so well with Ezrela’s urgent plea for tutelage, it seemed pointless to not tell the truth (that one, at least) when she applied for the course. Now, she chews on the inside of her cheek, looks across the room at nothing in particular, and slowly shakes her head. At length, she draws a deep breath that she doesn’t need, makes herself lock eyes with Amina again. “Did you ever get that feeling of…oh, I don’t know, being stuck? Stuck in the daily grind, stuck in a routine? I just” – She shrugs again – “I just feel like this place has grown stale.”

“The grass is always greener on the other side, huh?” The smile broadens, deepening the lines around her eyes. It’s pretty. “Have you ever stopped to consider that it’s not the place that makes you feel stuck? That it’s you? That even if you go on this grand trip to the stars, you’ll be dragging your issues along?”

It’s Ezrela’s turn to smile, but it feels dry, brittle. “Sure. I learned something about myself these past few years, you see…and that was just as hard as learning how to operate machinery.”

“Those are the most difficult lessons, really.”

“Mm.” She sips her own tea, breathes in the steam. Nice, isn’t it? “It’s not myself I’m running from. I’m running from nothing…but toward something. There’s so much wonder out there, and I just…” – She exhales sharply – “oh, I have to see it. I must know. It may not be safe or even wise, but I can’t not leave. I thought I could stay this way forever, but I can’t. I need to go. I need to move on from all this – from this version of myself.”

“You have to learn, you mean.” Amina reaches out and ruffles the other woman’s dark-brown, short hair. “And that’s your existence – not success, not failure, but how you choose to learn. That’s life, and you can’t run from what you need… which is what you’ll be doing if you stay in this safe space you’re currently occupying. I get it now.”

“Maybe it’ll end in disaster.” Ezrela utters a short, almost shrill little chuckle. “Many things have in the past – like you wouldn’t believe.”

Amina’s warm smile stays. “Maybe it won’t. But if you don’t try, you’ll never know…and don’t forget about that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. If you don’t chase that, all you’ll ever do is dream about it. A girl can’t dream forever, though.”

Ezrela looks at her hands – her dry, synthetic hands. “No. I suppose I’ve finally learned that, too.”