Sleepwalking

I'm lost within myself. I've recently tried to figure out the general time frame when I became lost. Because that's what you do with things that are lost...you try to find them. Try. Not everytime is the time when you want to find them. In fact, most things that are lost are things that were never really needed in the first place, when you think about it. They're usually frivolous things, things you can live without. But they're never labeled as being "lost." Only important things are labeled as such. And those things are usually never found. Sometimes they are. But they're never completely found. The sense of loss is never completely satisfied. Especially if you can remember the time when it was lost in the first place. Just because that part is recalled, it doesn't give any hope to the lost. It's just something to recall.

I recalled that I started to lose myself after my life started to lose it's reality. Or rather, that my life started to become real. I woke up from my dream world, which I thought was perfect at the time. It's when my world started to crumble, when I realized that life could crumble.

I used to be so happy. All the time, I was happy. I used to laugh a lot. I used to always smile. I used to love to smile. I never thought about it back then. I talked a lot. That's the main difference between then and now. I would talk about nothing even though it felt like I was talking about something. Now I hate chit chat. It makes me nervous. That moment of stalling, trying to think of something to talk about. I have to work on it now. I never used to have to do that.

I have completely lost myself. Every new year I realize that I lose myself more and more. As each new year arrives, I feel less like myself then ever before. It doesn't make me sad. I don't know what it makes me feel. I feel nothing.

It began when my life started to crumble. I used to be happy because I was oblivious to the world around me. To my life, to my family and their secrets. When I found out how ugly that was. When they revealed themselves to me for the first time. When I looked at them and actually saw them. It hurt me. I didn't know it was hurting me at the time but now it's so clear that it did. And I had no idea. No idea that I was falling apart. That the seams that held me tight, bound myself, were slowly unraveling.

It started when uncle jerry died. He was young. He used to call me "jungle book" like the kid from the movie cause I was really skinny like him. He used to let me pick up change from his bedroom floor and let me keep it. His floor was always covered with change.

He died at the beach. I never found out what happened. All I know is that he could have possibly passed out near the shore...and drowned. I don't think my family told me the truth, but that's all I knew. I never asked.

I remember seeing his death reported on the local news. I've hated the local news ever since. It was so impersonal. I never learned how to swim before then. I don't ever want to learn now. I don't trust life guards at the beach. The news didn't even say his name. He was only referred to as "man." I don't know how that makes me feel.

When we got to the hospital I thought he was still alive. That he was just in surgery, trying to make it. I never prayed so hard in my life. And I was a Catholic school girl. Across the street from the hospital we went to eat at Weinerschnitzel cause we hadn't eaten anything all day. I was praying while we waited for our food. That's when my dad told me that he died. I was praying for nothing. I've never set foot near a Weinerschnitzel again.

It wasn't long after that grandma died. We used to see her everyday. We used to go to her friend's funerals all the time. When I was little, I went to so many funerals. I never personally knew them. I never cried. One time I went to a friend of a friend of the family's funeral. I tried to cry cause everyone else was, but I couldn't. I told my mom that I tried to cry cause I thought it was the appropriate thing to do and she said that it was alright that I couldn't cry. I felt a little bad that I couldn't, that I couldn't make myself.

I went to a lot of funerals when I was little. I saw a lot of coffins. A lot of people dressed in black. Crying. Always with their heads down. I never looked into anyone's faces when they cried there.

At grandma's funeral, I don't think I ever cried so much in my life. I stood in the back of the church the entire time. I listened to the eulogy that my cousin read, which I know my aunt wrote for him. He wasn't close to her like I thought I was. I saw her everyday. He didn't. I cried more when I thought I heard him talk about having to hold her purse. That was what I always used to do for her when we walked together. I would hold her purse and she would hold my arm.

I've forgotten the sound of her voice. I dreamt of her once a long time after the funeral. In the dream I was in the car with my dad while my mom was shopping inside of a store. We were parked right in front. There were a group of old women walking by and I thought one of them was grandma. She looked like her, talked like her, except she wasn't walking with a cane or a walker. In my dream it scared me, to recognize someone that was dead. I was even more scared when it turned out that it wasn't her at all.

I don't remember uncle jerry's funeral. But I do remember crying. So much. I don't like that in funerals you have to get up and go in front of the coffin. I don't like that everyone has to get in line. I didn't look because it was an open casket. I didn't like that at all.

After the deaths of the people I used to see all the time, the drapes of reality started to come down. Grandma's husband sued my mom and my aunt. I gave my first deposition to a judge (or was it just a lawyer?) when I was 14, I think. I didn't know what was going on. I still remember the building and the office. I remember that I was happy, that I was oblivious to what was really happening. But when I think back, I don't like it at all.

My family was split down the middle. I stopped seeing half of my family. Those two halves stopped talking to each other for years. I was oblivious to that back then. Everyone that I trusted to be good people were...well, I saw them for the first time who they really were: themselves. I don't like that at all.

I wish I could have remained oblivious. Then I wouldn't have ever changed. I wouldn't have lost myself.

All the relationships that I thought were true were only obligatory. They were never genuine. I never really knew those people at all. I never will.

For one half of my family (the other other side of my family), I've slowly started to get in touch with them. That mere thought makes me feel a little better. I don't know who they are still, but I like that I have this little bit of contact. It means something in its nothingness.

I miss the days when I was young, when I would go outside and lay down in the grass and feel the warm sun. I remember the subtle breeze that blew. The whistling of the trees. I can still feel it when I close my eyes. I wish those days never ended.

I wish I tried to discover myself more when I was little. Find out my likes and dislikes. My interests. I was into ballet and hawaiian dancing and writing. I loved watching movies. But I wish I could have discovered my true talent. I think it would have made things more easier for me.

I wish I never lost myself. I miss who I was.

I hate that I've had to go through so many tears to figure out truth, reality. I hate that I had to learn the hard way. But I love that that's the only way to find out. It makes it feel worth it. That all the bad that happened had to happen. To help shape me. But maybe all of that contributed to the loss of myself. I don't know what to think.

I used to always be so happy. I was so talkative. I was so carefree. Now I'm carefree only because I know bad is going to happen - let it flow. What else can you do?

Since I lost myself, I haven't lived. There is no life. I've been sleepwalking. Under the surface, just trying to scratch my way through.

I feel less like myself everyday. I don't remember how I used to feel when I was little. I wish I could get that little girl back. So she can be happy again.

I used to talk a lot and express myself. I keep it inside now. No one knows how I feel. But now I truely believe that no one would care if I told. So what does it matter? I don't like when people ask how I'm doing out of politeness. I don't think it's polite. It's ingenuine. It means nothing.

I wish I could lose myself completely and get it over with. Become someone new. But I only feel lost. I don't know who I am and I'm too tired to figure it out. I want to go back to those summer days. I used to ride my bike. I loved that. I used to go out for walks, climb trees. Look at bugs. Especially caterpillars. Chase butterflies. I used to dream. I don't remember my dreams these days. None of them are worth remembering. I don't think I even dream at all now. I can't fall asleep in seven minutes like the average person. I don't want to be normal. I want to be unique. I want to be different. I want to live in the countryside, near a lake or a pond.

I love the ocean, the beach, but I won't set foot in it. Not since after my uncle died. I don't want to ever go to a funeral ever again. I don't want anyone to hold my purse for me when I walk.

I want to spend my days reading under a willow tree in the warm sun, next to a creek or something. With Billie Holiday singing in the background. I want life to be simple again. I want to spend days in librairies, in museums, in cafes. I want to be left alone. I don't want to be needed. I want a quiet life. Taking pictures. Taking myself out of the moment. So that just for a second, I don't exist.

I want every night to be a calm, cool one, where the crickets sing to me, and where the candles gently flicker. With Billie singing in the background. And the water lilies slowly float. Where the water isn't a threat and it makes amicable sounds that I love.

I want to be unattached from everyone I know. I don't want to be relied on. I don't want to be thought about. Because I hate when it seems obligatory. Which is every time.

I want patience. I want joie de vivre. I want small irritant things to fly over my head without a care. I want knowledge, I want passion. I love art and I want to know everything. Miniscule details. Background stories of this and that. Details that hardly anyone knows or cares about. Those are what I love.

I try to keep in touch with people without keeping in touch at all just so there could be some seats filled at my funeral. But now I realize I don't want one. I wouldn't want to put anyone through that. Maybe I'll write a book and have them read it.

I want to be able to laugh at everything. I think I used to be really good at that when I was little.

I wish I was like Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face where someone finds me, takes me to Paris and solves all my problems for me. Or rather, take them all away. But I don't want to fall in love like she did in the movie. I hope I never fall in love. I don't want to rely on anyone and I don't want anyone to rely on me. It's not about the possibility of a broken heart and hurt feelings. It's simply because I don't like the idea of it. How could I love someone if I don't even know who I am? How could I trust someone if I'm afraid of myself because I have no idea of what I'm capable of? Not capable of hurting anyone or anything like that. I mean I have no idea what I'm capable of in life. I'm afraid of what to expect from life since everything that's happened to me so far has been the gradual loss of myself, of the life that I thought I had, that I thought would never change, but ultimately has been changing every day, more so than the days before.