Clouds

I don't want to disappear as much as I wish I could view the world in Universal Omniscient – a narrator in life rather than a character, watching and observing my surroundings without having my own story. I envy the clouds that float across the sky, able to see everything but feel nothing. They explore the world, from the skyscrapers in New York City to the Himalayan mountain tops – free of fear, bound by nothing. They travel wherever the wind takes them. And even on days when they flood the world with their sadness or rip it to shreds with their anger, they can't be touched. They continue toward their next destination, able to view the entire world on their journey.

I, like everyone else, view my surroundings through First Person Limited – thrown into the mess of life while only truly seeing myself. I'm forced to interact with my surroundings. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. There are no breaks. There is no chance to view the world from up high, free of tethers. The strength of the clouds as they release everything they've pent up inside of them is seen as weakness in me. That which makes them needed is that which makes me unwanted. And I wonder if I'll ever even have a next destination – unable to even fathom how I might get to it. I want to disconnect myself from life – removing myself as the main character of my story while still being able to view the beauty and tragedy in the world. I want to be untouched, a silent observer of life and death, able to eventually move on and allow people to experience the sun that shines through when I'm no longer around.

And it kills me that the only reality of escape is to simply disappear.

To observe as myself is to take but not contribute – to become more of a burden. To not exist as myself is to do neither – providing others with sun.

To compromise, I consider becoming a different person. I develop an image in my head of the person I should be – someone with different likes, different positive traits, different flaws, different ways of thinking. Someone so vastly different from who I am now that that person has to be 'good'. Someone who can interact with the world without causing turmoil. I imagine being someone intelligent who is a good friend and a welcomed acquaintance. I imagine being someone who never takes but always gives. I try to be someone who will get somewhere in life and who won't burden others with their presence. I reinforce the idea that I am bad, but my attempts to be good only seem to make me worse.

I wonder if it's possible to hate yourself so much that everything in you simply gives up. Because as I was taken to the ER the other night, controlled by vomiting and panic, it felt as though my mind and body had simply given up. And now, I don't particularly want to get out of bed. I don't think I'm sick as much as I am done with being myself – someone so selfish and unlovable. I think maybe I would feel better if I wasn't me.

But I am me – and I want to close my eyes and disappear.