Thahabu

I don’t like writing about myself. I’m tired. I have empathy for everyone but me. Too many people died this year. Including a childhood friend who passed at the end of last month. I pray for her family. I pray she’s at peace.

I’m allowing myself to feel my sadness and anger. It’s supposed to heal you, I’ve never been in so much pain. My brain feels like it’s failing me. It doesn’t work. I wish people didn’t die. My mind is full of “I wish”s and “what if”s. That’s probably why I’m so anxious.

The past ten months have been rough. Of course I’m depressed. It’s OK to be sad. But I can’t let go of the guilt I’ve attached to it. My life is going really well despite everything that’s happened. My depression is selfish. At least that’s what my brain is telling me. That’s what makes me so upset.

Writing this is not as cathartic as I want it to be. After not being able to write for months, you’d think I’d have something interesting to say. I can’t hear or see any of my accomplishments. Everything is really flat at the moment. I’m not miserable, but I don’t feel like I’m here in the world. And as a black woman, is the world even for me? As a black woman who has what some disability activists call a naturally modified figure, do I really belong in the world? I ask this question every hour because I progressively feel less safe as each day passes.

It doesn’t take me 30 minutes to get out of bed anymore, but it takes me an extra 15 to get dressed. I can’t simply put clothes on without considering who will shout, point, and follow me home, or to the deli. Wherever I go, someone, usually a man or white woman has to stare and objectify me. Those random people on the street have a bigger influence over my fashion sense than I do. I hate all my clothes. I’ll probably go shopping this weekend.

A 35 year old white guy threw a 10 dollar bill at me and jumped in my face at school. We were working on a film project for class, and he refused to update me when he made changes to call times, production design, and locations. This cost me a lot of time and money, so naturally I became more and more irritated as the months went on. He acted like I was nagging him every time I asked him to be transparent about these changes.

On the last day of our shoot I asked him why he thought it was ok to withhold information from me until the very last minute on a project we were working on together, as class partners. He raised his voice, I did the same, then brought up my frustration with the amount of money I spent on transportation and props that day because he didn’t tell me about a change he made until an hour before we were supposed to be on set. He then jumped in my face as if he were about to hit me. I wanted to respond in a similar way, but quickly remembered I’m not a child and it wasn’t worth it. Instead I cocked my head back and laughed, then screamed for security as I ran downstairs to diffuse the situation. In short, I filed an incident report and he never came near me again.

Our professor told us to edit the film separately. Everyone wanted me to get revenge. Friends said I could come back stronger by editing it better, and telling a different story with the footage we got for his script. I was so sick and tired. I did not have the energy to come back with a vengeance. I’m tired of being the bigger person. When someone is nasty towards me or I experience a tragedy I always bounce back and pretend like it never happened. It’s so draining. I retreated into my depression and turned in a project I wasn’t proud of. The only person I hurt was me, but I wasn’t mad about it. I needed to let everything get away from me. Is it self-sabotage if you genuinely didn’t have the energy to try? I feel better about tackling other projects after that situation. My GPA is still in good standing. I succumbed to my depression, and I’m not ashamed of it.

When the semester ended, all I wanted to do was go to my favorite park and sit in the sun. That’s when I feel closest to my loved ones who have passed. I’ll be OK. ♦