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Thoughts of the day
Oct. 23rd, 2005 12:45 amMirrors fascinate me. I always watch myself in them; I can't even walk by a particularly shiny window without glancing at myself. It's not that I'm vain. I just can't get over the idea of what it means to "look like" something. I can't see what I look like to other people, I can never see what they see. I can only see what I look like to myself. I look in a mirror, and I see the scar that I got when I was ten on my right cheekbone, the glasses I bent when I slept on them in an airport in California, the shirt that I bought because it reminded me of Hisoka. All my own memories and associations and feelings, and there's no way to see through those to what other people see. Do I look young? Cute? Smart? Annoying? I can't know. I wish I could, just once. I want to know what other people see. I want to know what people I meet on the street assume about me. I want to know what my friends are reminded of whenever they look at me. But even if I could find someone who would tell me the truth instead of being polite, it wouldn't help, because they'd still only be seeing their own memories and associations and feelings, and every single person I'll ever meet has their own individual set. Everyone sees something different.
And if I obsess over this question, imagine how much more interesting it is to think about what kind of person I am.
A couple of years ago, a meme went around where you described everyone on your friend's list (or as many as them that you knew well enough, anyway) with the fictional characters that you identified with them. Someone who I considered to be one of the only true "best" friends I'd ever had described me as Tsuzuki. I don't remember the exact wording, but the idea was because I was nice enough to hurt and tended to keep people at a distance. And I was amazed. I must have read that little paragraph a hundred times, because I'd never heard anyone come so close to how I thought about myself.
I don't know if that's true anymore, though. I've noticed that I've picked up a habit recently of describing myself as a misanthrope. I've called someone a bitch to his face, and meant it, and would do it again in the same situation- actually, if I had to do it again, I'd probably call him a bitch two weeks sooner and do it more than once. Am I still a nice person? I think so, though perhaps you can't ever see yourself with any accuracy. But I'm not the kind of nice that hurts. Some people are, you know. Some people are so worried about doing the wrong thing, about hurting others, about making a mistake or being inconsiderate or looking mean that niceness becomes a compulsion.
My niceness, now, is a conscious choice, and one driven by cynicism more than anything else. People are rude and thoughtless so easily, and for such stupid reasons. Because they're tired, because they've had a bad day, because they're busy, as if that gives them the right to treat other human beings like trash. It's so petty that I can't stand it. So, yeah, I'm going to be nice, if my other choice is to feel like an idiot who can't even notice the people around her.
But what type of person does that make me? I have no idea. And have I changed so much in a year or two, or was I always like this, and I was just too busy hating myself for being incapable of making friends to notice that, for most of humanity, I don't really want to bother with anything beyond politeness. I don't know who I am. I don't know if it's possible to know who I am. I don't know if it even means anything to say "a type of person", or if the only things that matter in the long run are the consequences of the choices we make, and not what we think or feel.
I want to stay up all night with a bunch of people I love and have deep philosophical debates while we hang out at a Shi-Shah Lounge, but no one I know does that anymore.
And if I obsess over this question, imagine how much more interesting it is to think about what kind of person I am.
A couple of years ago, a meme went around where you described everyone on your friend's list (or as many as them that you knew well enough, anyway) with the fictional characters that you identified with them. Someone who I considered to be one of the only true "best" friends I'd ever had described me as Tsuzuki. I don't remember the exact wording, but the idea was because I was nice enough to hurt and tended to keep people at a distance. And I was amazed. I must have read that little paragraph a hundred times, because I'd never heard anyone come so close to how I thought about myself.
I don't know if that's true anymore, though. I've noticed that I've picked up a habit recently of describing myself as a misanthrope. I've called someone a bitch to his face, and meant it, and would do it again in the same situation- actually, if I had to do it again, I'd probably call him a bitch two weeks sooner and do it more than once. Am I still a nice person? I think so, though perhaps you can't ever see yourself with any accuracy. But I'm not the kind of nice that hurts. Some people are, you know. Some people are so worried about doing the wrong thing, about hurting others, about making a mistake or being inconsiderate or looking mean that niceness becomes a compulsion.
My niceness, now, is a conscious choice, and one driven by cynicism more than anything else. People are rude and thoughtless so easily, and for such stupid reasons. Because they're tired, because they've had a bad day, because they're busy, as if that gives them the right to treat other human beings like trash. It's so petty that I can't stand it. So, yeah, I'm going to be nice, if my other choice is to feel like an idiot who can't even notice the people around her.
But what type of person does that make me? I have no idea. And have I changed so much in a year or two, or was I always like this, and I was just too busy hating myself for being incapable of making friends to notice that, for most of humanity, I don't really want to bother with anything beyond politeness. I don't know who I am. I don't know if it's possible to know who I am. I don't know if it even means anything to say "a type of person", or if the only things that matter in the long run are the consequences of the choices we make, and not what we think or feel.
I want to stay up all night with a bunch of people I love and have deep philosophical debates while we hang out at a Shi-Shah Lounge, but no one I know does that anymore.
