GHOSTS OF THE PAST
Sometimes I remember the better days, sunny blue skied days, filled with laughter and green grass; cool blowing wind passing through my hair. Then I remember, I remember the truth. The haunting, lingering ghosts of my forgotten memories; the unwanted thoughts- forsaken to the dark corners of my mind. The screaming, high-pitched and filled with pain; it lingers through my ears, constantly present, the begging for help, the un-ending blood curdling screams that filled the air; filled my childhood home with an unexpected but not an abnormal experience; the norm.
There was nothing but pain, never ending and constant, the unrelenting stream of pain. It’s hard for me to ‘square away’ my childhood and the pain associated with it. I couldn’t understand how there could be so much pain and so much ‘love’; it would make me doubt what love was or what it is, leading me to believe that no such thing actually existed. I grew up with a grey, bleak, unhappy childhood; but it was not loveless- there was sometimes love sprinkled in-between the monotony of my painful existence.
I often justified the misery I experienced because there would sometimes be this ‘love’, this feeling of momentary bliss that somehow I was good enough, I somehow would survive this life and maybe- someday- I would be ‘happy’ but that happiness was always a distant memory and never a tangible thing I was capable of grasping. Often these happy memories are small; fluttering experiences, camping- fishing- vacations- brief but full of love, full of happiness and joy. These however; were far and few between, more often than not my day to day life would consist of a barrage of shame, guilt, fear and pain, the unending pain. I thought if I could escape, runaway, distant myself from my ‘family’ I could truly escape this misery- how wrong I was, there never was an option of escape.
The pain follows me, lurking in the shadows, stalking me down empty streets, waiting for its chance to pounce on me and rip me apart. I desperately ran away from everything, from my memories; I had forsaken them and blocked them out; ridding myself of these unneeded burdens- but, they lingered. Just behind the façade was a rotting, deteriorating structure, hollow and empty.
I was broken, I am broken, I have always been broken, and I was born broken. This is what I was leaded to believe; that I was this disgusting mistake, I was a burden, an unwanted child; guilty for my existence, shameful I wasn’t able to bring it all to an end despite my best efforts. ‘love’ for there was ‘love’ in my household, I was ‘loved’ and ‘cherished’ but only when witnesses were present; behind closed doors I was the issue, I was the root of the problem, all other problems were merely symptoms of me. This is no way to live, to way to grow up.
writing exercise 06/02/2022
Edited by Anonymous (06/02/22 12:31 PM)
|