Friday, January 4, 2008

we're only liars, but we're the best.

if the truth comes out, and no one's around to hear it...does it make a sound?

our parents teach us to lie at a very early age. we do something we're not supposed to do (i.e. breaking the lamp). there you are, standing in the midst of the shattered ceramic antique, and mom flips a shit. now, these are all of a child's favorite situations, aren't they? being screamed at, knowing you've disappointed your parent(s), being grounded and/or having favorite things of yours temporarily taken away. so what do we do? everything we can to avoid those confrontations in the future.
we usually get caught in the lie, so we learn to get better at it and the lies grow as we do. our lives become more complicated and, you guessed it, so do our lies. we hide behind them to evade vulnerability. lies are our most common "flight" technique. we even lie to ourselves in a pathetic attempt to steer clear of getting hurt and everyone knows that will backfire 99.9% of the time. fuck it - 100%.

there are so many different categories of fabrication, too. there's the lie told to save our own asses from a verbal spanking, the lie told to save a loved one from pain, the infamously debatable "what s/he doesn't know" lie, and the lie people of my experiences are most well-known for... the "it's fun to have my own secret" lie. then, there's this new category i've recently discovered. the "i was originally telling the truth, but the truth changed shortly after and i haven't corrected myself...yet" lie. that one is as complicated as it is drawn out. it also often overlaps with "what s/he doesn't know," which can cause more confusion.

i left my music dormant on my ride back to westborough this evening, but the ride was anything but silent. my secret, not one of the fun and devious ones to keep, felt like it was reverberating off my skull walls, as if to make sure that i can't forget it's there. i won't fucking forget, i promise. is it a lie? am i being dishonest to not share it? am i keeping myself from something amazing by swallowing this down? will it tire itself out and slowly fade, or am i going to have to listen to it scream at me until it makes it to the ears of the right person? when did this truth replace the one that i was telling before, and how much did the original effect everything that's happened since that day.
i've shared the must current of the two facts with my group...and myself. and while it thrills me to declare that the hardest thing i must fight through right now has nothing to do with the ghost of an eating disorder in my life, it's something i find i'm actually ashamed of. i can even say more of my eating disorder than that.
shame is not a thing i often associate myself with. there are only two other facts of my own life that i can truly call myself ashamed of: my greatest fear, and something i did when i was 15. i don't want to tell anyone else... i'm barely able to admit it in my own mind and it still sounds awkward out loud.

i wish i could get a sign...or God could come to me in a dream or something and tell me whether or not i should just be honest. and if ever, when. and most importantly, how much time do i even have?? life's not that cool, though. and God doesn't like to communicate with us so closely like he did in the Torah. so i'm left here, with my own tools, to decide which hurts worse: sitting with my lies, or having answers no matter how good or bad.

is this the point where i start turning back to my teenage practices of wishing on stars...
c'mon, now. i must be too old for that now.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

15 is a long time ago but sometimes letting go of the lies we tell ourselves, or the things we keep ourselves of accepting is cathartic. I don't think you have to share it with a group of people. And I surely know it doesn't make you the Emmy you are today. I don't know what this lie or action or whatever it is, is. But, I know that if it is eating away at you then you should share it with someone. You can always with me lil one.