Me

There is a strange thing about becoming your own person. And I’m only starting to appreciate this now. I mean forever before I lived for others. I lived for my parents filling a role that they felt I should. I did the whole perfect daughter... bit. I did my best. Being adopted made that harder not easier. My life was comparable to walking on eggs for the first half of my existence.
The second part of my life was a battle at school to form an independent identity different to others, yet not to different that I became strange and weird. I mean as the only person “of colour” in a school of white hillbillies I already stood out like a sore thumb. I mean different has its own appeal, and a sense of quirkiness and freedom of care drew people to me and I found that I had many friends. Yet one person has the ability to tear your whole world apart with a single word, a phrase has the ability to crumble your very existence to nothing more than a pile of rumble on the classroom floor. To keep myself grounded I maintained a slightly coarse persona, and this trust me defied everything I was on the inside. You see someone who couldn’t give a, but inside I was silently begging you to stop, praying that your fat trap could just stop. Let’s take this moment to digress a little: I mean why were you mean? Was there something that compelled you to constantly hurt people? I hope for your sake that there is some tragedy hidden within your family history. I hope this because otherwise, your soul is in jeopardy of some strange darkness that I feel will devour you. Let’s go back to the matter at hand. Teen years are so ill fitting to all, like a pair of huge shoes you have to fill, that are ugly, uncomfortable, and full of strange little surprises some good and mostly bad. We find ourselves unable to control our emotions, a violent roller coaster of anger, sadness and happiness. Of course this makes it impossible for us to be anyone, when in fact we don’t even know who we are.
This brings me to today. I mean how different am I then I was a year ago at 19. That’s a good question. I wish that I could say that I’m wiser, and more caring. I mean I wish I could say that I now know who I am and that Africa has taken me on a journey of self-discovery and forgiveness of the past. Ha. Listen here, this might sound a bit radical, but hear me out…. When I talk to myself in my head, and no I’m not crazy, inner monologue this is completely healthy and in fact normal, every one of us does it. Okay, when I talk to myself in my head I still feel five, and scared of being alone in the dark bad things live here. I still feel eight, and happy, carefree and in love with life and the simple things like laying in the sun with my little brother talking about the sky and why it’s blue. I feel thirteen and in love with the love of my life, or so I thought. I feel sixteen and ashamed of my skin colour, such a simple thing that will forever define my life. I feel nineteen and scared of the choices I have to make and worried about the ones that I have made. And today…well today I feel good about the future and all the possibilities it contains.
In conclusion, we are all the little things. We are a mosaic each tile a snap shot of our soul, a little piece of our essence. We are who we are and that’s made of all things good and bad intertwined together. So am I who I will be when I take my last breath. The mosaic of my life gains its last tile when I lay down to sleep for the last time. I am my past, my present and my future, whatever it holds. I am me.

Reviews

[M.A.Rathore]

Nicest feelings you have pictured in your story with some emotional and racial comments that made be purplexed yet the whole story is a moving account of your formation as a young and energetic poet and writer...thanks sharing it...

[amrit]

an honest piece , though i felt in the mid u went subjective cz of the series of events , hence a bit judgmental . i enjoyed a thorough vibe , felt that acceptance , that hunger , that seeking vision . well done ! god be with you .

[Kat Leila]

Thanks again for the review!

[MoriartyMesa]

I only have one thing to say https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31rrtc8GHlc

[Kat Leila]

...and now this song has become my obsession.....

[Not Your Typical New Yo..]

A lot of painful truth here. I suffer with depression, and I understand where you're coming from. The truth is your skin color shouldn't matter. I have black friends, and I once had a black girlfriend who was one of the nicest girls I've ever met. I don't know what it feels like being adopted, but I can imagine you often think about your real parents. You've written a lot of heartache in this piece, but it's nonetheless well crafted, straight to gut wrenching pain. I thank you for sharing this with us, dear.

[redzone]

interesting introspection... a life lived and yet still living, on a journey and yet noticing how we consciously interact with all the things, people, places, events etc around us. Not to mention the world as it spirals from epoch to epoch... You are certainly YOU, as no one can be anyone else but themselves (believe me I have tried when I was trying to figure out if I was real or not). Even when we do things for the sake of others, it is still our decision that has been made, not theirs. Of course such decisions always have consequences (good or bad) and these too shape us.

It would be interesting to read your thoughts on "you" when you reach, oh say, 35. How you and your life has changed. What you have done to make the world better; how your life has affected others, what you think about love, the future???

Your dialogues with yourself are revealing of a young woman raring to live out loud and brilliantly...
A question: they have hillbillies in Swaziland??? Funny, thought that was a purely American term... ;0)

~~redzone

[Kat Leila]

I'm a Canadian living in Swaziland working for an NGO and desperately seeking my roots.

[JC]

so powerful and real, so much truth and bared soul! Could be the start of a novel, gripping...draws you in right away and fills my head up with so many emotions and images like a fragmented, shattered crystal of visions and thought...really dug this for all its honesty and insight.

[Kat Leila]

Im glad you enjoyed this! Happy to share emotion. ..