Cracking My Own Whip

The first impression most people have of me is that I'm someone intense and intimidating. I don't know what I did or said to have them conclude this, but more than one person has said this to me.

"I don't know, you just have an air about you. Like you're not there to make friends." 

I guess I'm not. Friends are not high on my list of things (which is probably why I find myself lonely from time to time).

I take myself seriously. I take everyone seriously. I'm not the one to be flaky with. It pisses me off if you waste my time. When I go out of the house, it's usually for a purpose. 

I was raised that way. I had an aunt who happened to be the teacher in the school I was going to. Everyone knew who she was, so everyone knew who I was. The rest of my class gave me a wide berth, as if association with me would get them into trouble because I was a spy or something. 

I got used to being separated from the herd early on. It's my normal.  

But this isolation...well, it left me with no one to compare myself with. I don't know if I'm saying that right. It was both a good and bad thing. 

See,I didn't know I wasn't supposed to be able to do certain things like read. My aunt didn't tell me kids were taught to read.  She literally placed on the kitchen table and told me to read. I mean, I couldn't read but I was told to sound out the words and read. No one sat next to me and pointed to words. I was told to sit and read for hours during one summer. 

And I did. 

I don't know if that's how it's supposed to work. Tell a kid to do something and they do it (I hear it works for surfing). All I know is I spent an entire summer "reading." I probably sounded out words that didn't sound like words. Until one day, I was reading out loud, something clicked, and the words made sense. 

So I took that experience and figured I could apply it to everything. (I'll tell you now that it doesn't always work). But I believed that if I work hard enough and endured through any struggle, then I would get what I wanted. 

I expect more than sweat to come out of me to get what I want. I expect tears, I'm prepared for blood and I don't mind sacrificing comfort to suffer through the entire experience.  

It does make for someone who could seem extreme, I guess. 

I've learned to accept it. And keep it quiet. When I say the things I do to some people who don't know me (and even those who do), they always seem a bit alarmed at the lengths I'm prepared to go through. 

"Wow, that's...wow," someone once said after I told them how I was preparing for the Spelling Bee. Wasn't it normal to write out every word on the dictionary? 

I can't function in the middle. I figured that out. I tried it and it didn't work for me. So I've made pain work for me. Self doubt, fear of failure, crippling worry. Yeah, those keep me company a lot. 

I was at a GRW meeting a few months ago, and a conversation really stuck with me for some reason. Someone asked what kind of songs people listen to to get themselves pumped up to write. 

I was surprised at the tepid responses. The songs they called out seemed...well, happy. They wouldn't work on me. I'm not fueled by sunshine and good vibrations. Is that how people get motivated? 

My own personal playlist goes like this.

Eminem's "Lose Yourself" 

Britney's "Work Bitch"

Jimmy Eat World's "The Middle"

Jordan Sparks' "You Gotta Want It"

Katy Perry's "Roar"

Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive"

Christina's "Fighter"

Daft Punk's "Harder Better Stronger Faster"

Destiny Child's "Survivor"

Kelly Clarkson's "Stronger"

and once more Eminem's "Till I Collapse"

So...yeah, most of those are songs about working hard and struggling to fight for your dreams. I know my buttons. I'm fueled by fear of failure, regretting shit on my deathbed, and that one Langston Hughes poem "A Dream Deferred." I shudder to think of myself as a walking version of a festering dream. There's no other worse fate I can think of. 

It calms me down when I meet more extreme people than me. When I make them look normal. I once met a nice lady who was a mother of five, went to work full time and nursing school full time, married, the church Sunday school teacher, and was valedictorian of her class. 

What. The. Fuck. See, people like that? They make me feel normal. I'm intimidated as hell by them. And that is really comforting. Because it means I don't live alone in the world of the extreme. Also, I'm not even at the furthest areas of extreme. 

I think I'm right where I need to be.