CRIPPLED

A couple months preceding my 40^th it was all I talked about; almost as though turning 40 will be a defining moment for me. I was talking to my sis (Que) and she said “Oh, you won’t feel any different, I’ve been there” and I had laughed. But it is slowly dawning on me that she is right. Change doesn’t happen from one day to the next. I like the fact that I am 40 though, and I seem to throw it about carelessly of late, almost as though it gives me the right to belong to a prestigious group. Silly.

However, it has been a source of some nagging thoughts about personalities and what forms ours. When do we break away from the silently assigned roles of gender, or culture, or race? When do we see that the defining difference between one being and the next has very little to do with any of that?

When do we begin to take note of our individuality? When, how and why do we built the courage to embrace who we want to be and become that person? Then at what point does it become habitual to the point we become resistant to change?

I have always thought I was an evolving person, and in that sense, I mean I am ready and willing to embrace change; to see from a point of view that isn’t mine, to dare to think outside my box. I am slowly beginning to despair at my lack of breakthrough, lately especially. For some reason I can’t seem to break away from a crippling cycle; I am in a communication warp and it feels like a prison. I don’t seem to communicate effectively to the people that matter, and I don’t seem to process information in the way it is intended.

I have wondered if I have become so locked up in myself that I have become incapable of change. Is there even any such state?

When I was a child, I developed an attraction to dictionaries; I had to. Scrabble happens to be a favourite family game and to stay on top, it helped to know words and meanings……but it was also through playing with words that I had discovered back then how very little I knew of language, which in turn made me aware of how ineffective proper communication was without it.

Today, I have a wider vocabulary but feel like I am less successful with communicating even the simplest ideas, which simply makes me want to lock myself in…..and I find that I am doing just that. It is exhausting trying so hard at something and feeling like a failure for it.

Is my resignation a result of sheer laziness or have I really reached that age where change (evolving) is difficult? I thought life began at 40?

Sigh.

IT'S ONLY HAIR.

What is it about dreadlocks that seem to offend people? Yesterday in a conversation about caring for my daughter’s hair, I mentioned looking forward to when she will worry about it herself, and I got a rather odd retort of it then becoming ‘rasta’ like it would be a bad thing, I had to quickly point out that it’s what I have on my head, so it won’t be a totally bad thing.

It’s amusing. This is the 4th retort being made about ‘rasta’ from people close to me, like it’s a bad thing to have. One was a direct attack on my own locs and the three others were just disapprovals on the general idea of dreadlocks with a quick justification as though it was ok, if it was on my head but not as an acceptable hairstyle (?)

I am not apologetic for having locs and as a matter of fact not even my own father’s disapproval of my hair would make me feel any different about it (and I care what he would think….). But I am beginning to wonder though, in all honesty what you guys really feel about my hair. Can I say I would rather have the disapproval voiced out there and we can all move on? It’s odd suddenly having to wonder who else is putting up with my hairstyle simply to keep the peace. Come on guys!

This is an open invitation for you all to take that long awaited swing at how ‘disgusting’ (or your choice of words) you find locs. Don’t worry, I won’t take offense. If I had asked permission before locking my hair then it could matter what anyone thinks, so let’s have it out, it’s only hair and it is quite OK not to like it, so don’t try to like mine simply because it’s on my head. I am not my hair.

FLAWS

One of my flaws is the ease with which I can withdraw from people and remain ‘hidden’ even when I am there. It takes a lot to make me withdraw but once I am at that point, the withdrawal is quick. And by that I mean, I hate conflict so much that I would rather remove myself from a situation that creates a reason for conflict rather than assert my ‘rights’.

It can come across as cowardice. It isn’t. I don’t just begin withdrawing at the first sight of discomfort. But I don’t have an aggressive manner of voicing my discomfort either. And I suppose the light manner in which I say it makes it come across as something not worth taken seriously, which I think is sad, that we take each other too much for granted and are quick to decide what is important to the next person based on our experiences and ideas rather than really listening to what they say to us and ‘see’ it through their eyes.

Years ago, I wrote a poem titled “Into myself again”. It was written in response to someone suggesting I was shutting myself in for no reason. I had a reason. We talked about it, turned out that I had voiced my discomfort and it was not heeded because I was not ‘aggressive’ or ‘seemed quite bothered’. I didn’t know how to respond to that.

I am not sure what it is about humanity that makes us think it is alright to take people lightly. I don’t mean we should go around as though on egg shells, but isn’t the mere fact that someone voices a concern, reason enough to mind it? Do we really need to get in a ‘mood’ to be taken seriously?

Into myself again was just an echo of what we have become. We are like snails. Little packs of mysteries, carrying our inner demons within our shells and the only glimpse anyone really gets to see of what is inside the shell will either have to be defined by the essence of our operculum or we will have to be crushed and separated from that protection…..or if they heed what we reveal in our delicate ways.

I want to voice my concerns and be heard. It isn’t so for the most part, but I do wonder if it is because I also do not HEAR when concerns are being voiced to me. What goes around comes around after all.