I lie on the couch. The lights are out in the hall, but the orange glow from the lamp from the bedroom manages to find its way to it, almost how a child tiptoes to a door and halts right before entering. For the first in the last two or three days, I find my heart and mind at rest, which feels foreign and undeserved. Perhaps it is the nap I took in the afternoon. Maybe it is the rebellion—not the nap in itself but what it represents, but I have beaten that metaphor to death in older pieces, so the specifics are not my concern.
In this state of statelessness, I watch reruns of a show I last watched a decade ago, and some part of it reminds me of who I was ten years ago, and it also points out the many ways I have become who I have become. And what have I become? I do not know. Flawed, I wonder. At least, that is one of the first words that often comes to mind when someone asks me about myself. Now, I realise it is not a good look on anyone to claim a negative adjective for their own self lest people tell them to think of themselves in a more positive light, and often, if they are altruistic enough, they hand you the adjectives on a platter. To avoid this unsolicited help, I often skip and hop over until I get to hope, to optimism, to the faux boldness with which I seemingly carry myself.
On most days, however, it is a character I play. And we all play a character; only I am willing to admit it. And mind you, it is a performance so believable on most days, even I get convinced of all the hope I present outwardly to the world, to friends and family and acquaintances and strangers alike. But often, I lose it, too, you see, and I retreat to a desk in some dingy corner of my mind. And though the desk has windows beside it, the curtains are all tattered, and though there is light, all it does is illuminate the dust floating about it. And the dust gathers, and I find no motivation to wipe it off. But I can write there, and I can write for days, months even, and I have before. It has happened before; I have written myself out of the proverbial room.
Until last week, I did not imagine I would find myself there again. But I did, and I have, and now, I sit here, writing. I do not know for how long.