Persona

Source: http://www.fountainhillsartistsgallery.com

I heard of a young man (within two degrees of separation), handsome and smart who committed suicide by shooting himself with his father’s gun. He had been troubled, sad, frustrated and felt he had no one to talk to. He cloaked his inner turmoil in humour, cleverness and life-of-the-party-ness. When he couldn’t handle it any more, he stopped.

For a while I’ve felt overwhelmed. I feel the weight of having to be responsible. Friendly. Sensible. Lacking the African shoulder chip. Feeling worthy of something when I know I didn’t put in enough work. Having to be capable. Smart. Funny. Fun. Caring. Confident. Knowledgeable when I feel like a fraud.

And I’m tired. I don’t want to see another therapist. Sometimes I feel I learned much more of psychologists than they ever did of me. How they attempt to shape your treatment based on what they think is right for you and not what is actually right – if ‘right’ actually exists. How they live vicariously through your own experiences. But I’m so tired of having to wear masks everyday. I want to run away to a place that I don’t have to be polite. Responsible. Sane. Reasonable. Friendly. I want to ride the wave of the anger, joy, happiness, irrationality, redness, light, darkness, weakness, power, nothingness that I feel rising higher and higher inside me and see where it takes me. I want to retreat so far into myself that the world ceases to exist. I don’t want to wear a mask today.

But I fear that if I give in, I will never find my way back. I cannot afford that. And so as I put on another mask and leave home, I believe everything will be okay.

I will be okay.

Somehow.

 

Wordle: A New Apperception Test Perhaps?

I came across Wordle via The Dad Poet (thank you!) and it’s a web-based application reminiscent of the Tag Cloud that creates an image of the words from a webpage or feed with the most common words appearing in a larger font. It’s very simple and straightforward to use. You can then pick a format that best fits your personality or mood or whatever – apparently this is the most annoying word of 2012 and I totally agree! It generated an image in two seconds but it took 43 minutes before I finally selected an image out of a roll of randomly-generated font and color combinations – was unusually finicky today (I’m suffering from a very primal deficiency). Though I used the three most recent posts, I’m quite surprised (in a good way mind you) at the words that appear the most. I’m trying to feed my entire blog into Wordle but haven’t quite figured out how to do that yet. Try and it see what comes out.

 

Better Late Than Never!

Finally back on line after a month of waiting for a new internet connection then having my router short-circuit from a power surge. It was a lesson in patience, one that I hope never to experience again.

I was tagged in this Q&A game awhile ago by Rainey which involves answering a group of questions and formulating yours. This has come at a great time since I needed something to cheer me up today.

The rules are as follows:

1.  You must post the rules.

2.  Answer the questions the tagger set for you in their post.

3.  Create eleven new questions to ask the people you’ve tagged.

4.  Tag eleven people with a link to your post.

5.  Let them know they’ve been tagged.

The questions and my answers:

 

Funny But True: Black Gay Stereotypes

I read this awhile ago but forgot where I saw it. Just happened to come across the site again today and it’s still as funny as the first time I read it! We all know stereotypes are usually a little more than caricatures of the types of people they portray but  I read this article and it’s like the writer is talking about some of my buddies.