untitled.

She told me she got the rejection letter. That’s how it began. As simple as that. 

I told her she just had to be sad a great deal. If she didn’t, she wasn’t the same person I knew. 

In fact, I didn’t know how to console her. I detest failures. I never know how to efficiently cope with them. Every time failure dooms, it feels as though I’d fallen in to bottomless pool of depression. Being a terrible swimmer, I would keep on sinking, breathless, emotionless, lifeless. Being too proud, I would never ask for help. Neither would she. 

But she will recover eventually, floating again in the bubbling realms of ideas. No matter how long it takes, that eventuality is what matters at all. Idleness is detrimental. Continuity is important. You should try to figure out what to do next. You shall see the lights again, even if you are now enclosed in darkness. 

I said I would be waiting. 

“What is there to wait for?” – she asked. 

It made me wonder. Neither about her nor the people on the streets whose faces are marked with crow’s feet yet eyes still brightened with expectations; but about myself. High time I faced the truth. What am I waiting for?

Being struck by chains of failures earlier than her, I started to build up a nest as a hideaway. I licked the wounds, tried to ease off the pains and dragged through the days. I was so disappointed with myself I didn’t even know how to cope with the diurnal events. Each disturbing happenstance sent me deeper down to another level of bitter isolation, away from society, away from human. I became an unconcealed misanthrope in order to conceal my dejection.

Pushed to the corner, survival instincts awakened.  I came up with a plan, not to stay and fight, but to yield and flee - with dignity. I felt the urge to have some other projects going on, just for the sake of having something else going on. Maintaining the existence of another personality with other abilities and prospects means allowing some hope to beam through the closed curtains.

So long as the feel of ignominious failure is kept away, this subconscious survival mechanism works. I am protected, safe, unharmed. I’m not any stronger, though; on the contrary, I’m reduced to being supremely vulnerable. Insecurity is seen through susceptibility to anxiety about imperfections; allergy to succor, which is purposefully misconstrued as pity; obsessive-compulsive behaviors consisting of brain-dumping, gossiping, trash-collecting, attention-seeking, escapism-occupied.

I have never walked out of the nest ever since. I don’t intend to even when I am now well aware of it. What am I waiting for, I have not the faintest clue.