(This is very off-prompt. But it is about being alone. It's just too weird not to blog about.)
As
you might have noticed by now, I am an affectionate and emotionally
needy person. I would also consider myself an extrovert. I need good
conversation and distraction. Yet I still appreciate being alone. A
little less so now, because my life and schedule is such that I am alone
all day. Often I don't have a conversation with an adult till I get
home. (This is why I tweet like it's going out of style- I need to share
my thoughts somehow.) Even now though, with all this alone time, after a
party or an event I relish the quiet subway ride home to digest my day.
Even now I'll sit in a restaurant alone, reading a book. Sometimes I
just sit there and think.
***
But
let's backtrack. You all need more stories of my traumatic childhood. I
liked being alone as a child because I have (had) an overactive
imagination. Real life and real people could harsh that buzz. Growing up
one of four, then one of three, then one of four again, I didn't have a
lot of time alone. I used to lock myself in the bathroom to just be by
myself. I entertained myself as a child with something I called
"headgaming." My imagination was so strong that I would pick a character
(fictional or historical) to be, and just live in their body all day.
It made the boring part of life much more interesting. Instead of doing
school, I would imagine I was in a one-room school house in 1860's
Wisconson. While washing dishes or cleaning, I would imagine myself to
be a servant in a Downton Abbey style house. I usually had four or five
scenarios at any given time, and would pick one depending on what was
going on at that time. Naturally, too much outside interference would
ruin the whole thing. Which is why I'd lock myself in the bathroom and
sit on the floor and have incredibly detailed conversations with people
who didn't exist. Because of this, sometimes I wonder if I would be a
good actor, given the opportunity to try. I can cry on demand and scream
bloody murder to nothing very well.
Headgaming
persisted into middle school. I would seek out alone time to cultivate
these games, and then, while entering back into reality, would let them
sort of simmer in the back of my mind while also engaging in whatever
was at hand. Of course, if I was really having fun, I forgot all about
the games. They existed mainly for when I was home, bored, and alone.
It wasn't until I was 14 that I learned the art of being alone while out.
It was a whole new type of freedom. It was summer and I was taking
classes at FIT for what I then thought would be my future career in
graphic design. I had a decent lunch budget from my dad. Despite the
fact I could have found girls in class to have lunch with, I decided to
eat alone for the most part. I chose a diner, Greek Corner (ironically,
the same diner currently around the corner from my church). I sat at a
little table alone, at 14, and ate a burger at a Greek diner. It was
quiet. I had my imagination.
Suddenly I had a whole new
option. I could adjust my physical reality to fit with the game. I'd
spent the last ten years of my life railing against my age. I wanted to
be 35. I wanted to be married. Move on. Run an immaculate household and hold business lunches and buy babyfood on the way home from the office, while toting my briefcase.
I've wanted to be a harried working mother since I was a kid. So,
instead of being at home, pretending I was out living an interesting
life, I could actually be out! It was an incredible realization.
Especially considering by 14 my imagination was dying down.
***
I
wonder now how much of this was natural weird-ass kid behavior and how
much was some sort of extreme escapism. During the most intense years of
headgaming, life was a little messy. My best friends had moved to
Florida, Pennsylvania, New Mexico and up near Orange County NY. My
sister Kate and I spent a lot of time slapping each other and sitting on
each other. My brother had died.
But I don't want
whoever is reading this to think I was a depressed child. I was very
happy, though perhaps happy for the wrong reasons. But that is beside
the point, I guess.
***
So then I'm a
teenager. I'm working at Moretti Bakery and having lunch at Oasis Diner,
four days a week. These hours of solitude kept the headgaming alive. If
you're working at a bakery, essentially by yourself apart from your
bosses, from 6-9am, you need to keep yourself entertained. So of course,
whoever I pretended to be worked at a bakery, but it wasn't me.
It was just... someone else. And then I sat in Oasis and stared at my
Fancy Man (owner of diner, early thirties at the time, love of my life)
and pretended I was someone else.
During these years I
had lots of friends. These friends tore me away from my imaginings. The
games didn't follow my around anymore- they sat in little pockets. If I
was playing Monopoly with six people on my bedroom floor, I didn't have
to pretend I was not me playing Monopoly. I just was. This state
of "just being" was rather pleasant. But back to the whole case of me
railing against my age. When I was with my friends, I was very
definitely 16. And though I liked my friends, I hated being 16. And
sometimes I just wanted to forget I was 16 and pretend to be "adult"
again. So I'd go and hang out and be alone. I wouldn't have to engage in
some sort of crazy imaginings- just being by myself without anything
bothering me or defining me was enough.
***
If
you're tracking with this, you might see that eventually this whole
game was going to catch up with itself and implode. It did a long time
ago. Now, if I'm sitting in Veselka with a cup of borcht, reading on my
Kindle, waiting to meet someone... I'm me. I am now that adult person my
little eight year old self longed to be. (Minus the children, the
high-pressure job. But I think you understand.) I don't really have
anything left to pretend.
I still eat at diners
because that's how my life is structured and because I really like two
fried eggs with toast and homefries and coffee for $6. But it has also
become slightly depressing sometimes. Sometimes I get lonely now, and
wish someone I knew would randomly walk in. (This, though sounding
ridiculous, has happened before. So I keep hoping.) Real people are
better than imaginary people, and my life is finally full. I don't need
all those games, and obviously, I am no longer capable of playing them. I
don't have access to that imagination anymore, it died a long time ago.
I still need down-time. Most people do. But I have lost the whole
reason I liked being alone as a child. It's a good thing because my
reasons for wanting to be alone were a little strange. I always knew I
would outlive the desire to "headgame."
I still hold on
to a bit of that imagination. As someone who has artistic tendencies
(despite lacking an actual outlet) I think my imagination is still
better than the average person's. I write angry/passionate letters to
people that will never be seen. I imagine scenes before they happen, and
occasionally, have been dissapointed at how they played out in
comparison to reality. (I know other people do this because of that
scene in 500 Days of Summer.)
Memory is
important to me. It's why I kept/keep a diary. It's why I instagram. I
want to document my life. In a way, headgaming brought my childhood into
technicolor, and has given so much more to remember. I was never just
me, I remember all the people I pretended I was too. I believe very
strongly into holding on to memories. So I do.
No comments:
Post a Comment