[Nemo39122]

I don’t understand people. People in conversations switching topics so effortlessly, how do they know what to say? How do they know what is ok to say and what would be thought of as just random and inappropriate? They can keep talking for several minutes, even hours without that silence and awkward eye contact that seems forced. But how, how do they do it? Oh I get it. They’re normal. They’re in their world, with all the other normal people. And I’m in my world, with a population of one. It’s as if there’s a wall separating me from the rest of the world. It traps all of the darkness behind it and keeps it close to me. It’s always there, keeping me from being part of that other world. I pretend to be like them, I really do. But it just keeps me somewhere between their world and mine. But I try, I really do, but it is worth it?

I never feel close to people. I don’t know why, I just never have. I never have and I never will. So what’s the point of friendship, or any other relationships? If I let people close to me they would see behind the mask. They would see everything. All the lies. Everything I’ve tried to be, everything I’ve pretended to be for nearly half of my life would be destroyed. Then would they even want to be around me at all? Sometimes I wonder if I would even care. If I can’t be honest around people, really be myself, really have friends, then why be around people? I don’t want to be alone. Although in a way I already am. But do I even care?

There’s another problem. I just don’t care. People tell me I’m too desensitized, and I am. Because I have to be. I force myself to be numb to as much as I possibly can, because in reality I actually feel too much. Nothing in the outside world bothers me anymore, with very few exceptions. Its only the things inside my mind that can slowly destroy me. I am my own worst enemy. I’m constantly arguing with myself, as if I’m split in two. Happy or sad. Mask or no mask. Life or death. It’s not that I don’t want to care, I can’t. I can’t let myself try to deal with that much at once. Why? Because I don’t get how normal people deal with things. Once again I have a different world. I just don’t get how they can do it. How can they deal with things without some external “crutch”? How can they let things out without literally letting out blood? How can they settle their minds without some illegal substance, or an overdose of things thought to be safe? Did they learn something helpful I didn’t? Or did I learn something harmful they didn’t?

I don’t recall being taught anything like this. It’s just always been there. That need for something, some habit to fill up an empty hole, a part that’s missing. Then when that emptiness is filled, everything feels right. I feel whole. There’s finally something I can control, something that’s steadily there, that’s predictable and controllable unlike my mood. It is, in its own way, stability. Ironic in a way, but that is my world. Pain helps pain. Spinning out of control ends in the feeling of finding stability. Having friends ends in the feeling of isolation. But that’s just me. It always has been, it always will be. Can I change that? I don’t know. I’ll try. I’ll just keep trying. All I can do is try.