fears

I am not afraid of the dark. I'm not afraid of heights or spiders or snakes or any of those fears that could be labeled as ordinary. Ordinary fears. That's a strange phrase, isn't it? Things that so many people are afraid of that they're often written off as being, I dunno, less serious. Childish. You say you're afraid of the dark and I promise one of the first things anyone will think is 'childish'. And it shouldn't be that way. Why can't we accept each other for our fears?

But I digress. I am not afraid of the dark, but I am afraid. Afraid of more things than I'd care to admit. For example, I am afraid of arriving at an event under or overdressed for fear of standing out. I am afraid of doing poorly in school and I am afraid of getting fat and I am afraid of failure.

I am afraid of loneliness. Of growing old having never shrugged off the isolation that clings to me like a shadow. The loneliness that seeps into my conversations when the other person would rather be elsewhere. The kind that holds me close when people laugh and I haven't the energy to. The isolation I feel when watching friends interact, when watching people connect. I have never understood the formation of friendships, have never managed to capture the moment where people become friends and replicate it in my own life. I am loud when I need to be, sarcastic when I am uncomfortable, and quiet every time else. I have never had a best friend, and at the rate I am going I sometimes doubt I ever will. I have never dated anyone, never held someone's hand or kissed anyone. I know I'm not missing out on much, but part of me aches thinking about it. The center of my chest gets all tight and my lungs shrivel up mid-breath because sometimes that is all I want.

I want to be loved.

That is a human desire. An ordinary wish, if you will. Oh, a teenage girl wants to date someone!!?! Now that's something that's never happened before!! But I don't want to date someone, not really. I don't want to pretend I'm adult enough to invest my emotions in another person and trust them to do the same with me. I want love, but I don't want to be in love. I just want that spark I see between people. That connection between friends when they look at each other and understand what they see in the other person. I want to feel safe in social interactions instead of constantly overthinking, worrying, feeling like I'm receiving different frequency signals than everyone else in the room. Getting messages just different enough to hinder my ability to understand situations and react accordingly.

I don't know how to face this fear. I don't know how to look society in the eye and force it to love me. And maybe that's the way it should be. Maybe everyone's like me, thinking that everyone else is connecting in ways they aren't. Maybe they're not. Who's to say?

Maybe living life alone isn't the worst fate. We'll see.