Title stolen shamelessly from "Swimming Pool" by The Front Bottoms
Hey… I haven't been around here in a while. Which is, of course, how my last post started too.
Last time we spoke, I was struggling. I was putting on a brave face and trying to spin things in a more positive light, but reading it back now it's plain to see: I was hurting. It's strange to look at that post – to think ouch. I want to take the person that wrote that post and give them a hug.
The other thing I noticed about that post is that I'm trying to be someone else. I'm trying to sound like a blogger who was their whole life figured out, someone who's done things I haven't. I'm parroting people I admire and look up to. I'm not being me.
I feel like these days, in the "internet age", it's expect of all young people to know exactly who they are and what they want to be immediately. You have people like Tavi Gevinson or Arabelle Sicardi – who I both admire fiercely and have enormous respect for – who have been blogging since they were in middle school/high school about more or less, the same or similar things they're talking about now. They've built careers off their teenage blogs and that's awesome. But more often than not I find myself comparing and beating myself up because I haven't got a clue about what I want.
I've been chasing popularity on the internet since I was 15 – doing certain things, posting with the right tone and content on the right social media sites. I have been mirroring and copy-catting other people for five years. I feel like I am a mode-podge, cobbled-together half-human. I am composed of other people's wants and desires. I don't know who I am.
I don't know what I'm doing here – on Earth or this blog. I know that I like fabric, dying it, embroidering it, sewing it together. I know I like bicycles. I like comic books and YA novels. I like camping and being outside as much as possible. I like the band PUP and seeing live music. I want to do something meaningful and to be remembered.
About a month or so back, I was still really struggling with being abused by a friend. I felt so betrayed by them and by the "community" we existed in. It really, really hurt me that it felt like no one was listening, that no one cared. And I realized that I don't actually have to engage with that community. I unfollowed a lot of people on Twitter/Instagram/Tumblr, retreated back from the internet. I felt better. Way better.
But then I started to slowly creep back online. And while maybe those feelings of hurt and betrayal are gone, the feelings of inadequacy and the struggle to be noticed, to be liked remains. When I log onto my Twitter, I'm faced with the reality of people I really, really admire following me and I feel like I have an obligation to post the kind of content they followed me for.
I've debated deleting my twitter and starting over. A fresh start where I can talk about whatever I want and be me – the bike-riding, sewing, book nerd, PUP fan. It seems like a good idea, but I still find my throat closing with the panic of losing certain followers. It feels ridiculous. But it's true.
I want to find a way to exist and honest and true and do things with meaning. I don't want to stop being online. It's not practical and I like the friends I've made. But I also don't know how to do ~*this*~ without finding myself in the same rat race of "gotta be popular/gotta be like _____". I want to be real and true – I want to be myself. I want to figure out who that person is.
I don't really know what to do with any of this. If you're reading, maybe you have some thoughts? If you do, leave them at the bottom under the picture and lyrics.
- AR
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| Cy Twombly, "Fifty Days at Illiam", like a fire that consumes all before it. |
I wanna contribute to the chaos.
I don’t wanna watch and then complain,
'Cause I am through finding blame
That is the decision that I have made.
- The Front Bottoms, "Twin Sized Mattress"
