Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Sunrise, Sunset

When I was in primary school and being shuffled off to piano lessons every week, there was a girl who had her lesson before me who was always smiling. She was several years older than I, but I was always struck by that radiant smile that always graced her face. While concentrating and playing the piano, a frown would always cross my face, but never hers. If she was waiting for someone and began reading a book, a hint of the smile would still be there. Her smile was not fake or forced but it was radiant and she exuded brightness and happiness whenever I saw her. 
I wished I could have been like her, but I felt as if I had little to smile about. Sometimes I did have moments of fun, but otherwise I lived in a melancholy world with few friends and, I felt, nobody who understood me. Even while my age was only single figures I wished, although I didn't understand the concept of suicide, that my life would end each night. In high school, the prayers became regular.
"Let me wake up as a girl", I would plead. "And if not, then don't let me wake up at all."
I guess God doesn't bow to earthly demands and many times I discovered that I lacked the nerve to actually take my own life. It has been the basis of many a comedians routine, but there is actually nothing more devastating to be curled up in tears at the planned site of your own demise, forlorn at the knowledge that not only are you a failure at life but you have failed at something else yet again.
By the time I left university, I decided to try the advice I was constantly given. 
"Cheer up and smile."
"Wake up and smile and everything will be ok."
"Smile and it will make you feel happier."
I suppressed all those unhappy feelings and began to smile. It sort of worked for a while, but years on I found myself out of work and was diagnosed with clinical depression. I guess you can't just ignore your feelings and hope everything will go away. At one of the support groups I cringed every time I heard the phrase "Fake it till you make it". The therapist must have felt my cringing since she didn't much like me either.


Another couple of years later and here I still am. My smile is still here, mostly, but now it is real and it is because I am really happy with myself. I am trying to live my life with integrity and even when I found myself in hospital recently, I had a strange sense of calm. It was as if there was nothing to worry about because I had lived my life the way I needed to. Perhaps it was inappropriate because I discovered that lying in bed smiling during (supposedly) traumatic events may annoy people around you. Barring social convention, I was at peace. 


Sometimes, events in life seem to conspire against you. When hopes, dreams and feelings are crushed it is difficult to smile, especially when tears are streaming down your face. It is difficult to believe in yourself when you question your integrity and the decisions you have made. So the smile fades from my face but I cling desperately to what I have, to what will keep me afloat; hoping that one day, I will find peace again.

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