Ain't No Man

A couple of months ago, I switched the background on my computer to pictures of my friends and family and me. I went through my facebook photos and I downloaded and saved group shots from as early as freshman year of college, bringing to mind the people that I left on the other side of the ocean. I put it all on a rotation so I see full-sized pictures of the mellophone section or the seniors from my last year in SAI or work-friends from work-excursions. Don't worry, I also have group photos from this year in the rotation. I made friends and had fun and stuff. I know you were worried.

There's a balance in life that you have to maintain, I think. It's the balance between what you and other people think and what you know to be true. It's a semipermeable membrane. Not everything is going to get in and not everything is able to leave. And I know that I live in my head and so I consider carefully the people who are able to give me ideas in the first place but I'm frequently surprised by what I see as the outsized impact my friends and situations have had on shaping me. It's the typical mix of good and bad that you get with humanity, but weighted, I feel, heavily towards the good. The memories I have on my computer are good, with one or two bittersweet. But I've had enough time to tease out the things I carry with me and where I picked them up from. The good thing about a year abroad in academia is you have a lot of time for your thoughts and a lot of perspective from which to view them.

At the same time, I feel strongly, deeply that there is an incorruptible part of me that no one gets to shape and that part of me is exuberance, joy, and some kind of love. The casing might get dented, but that's not going to break me. I might believe the lies that have been given to me, the ones that I tell myself about who I am and who I can be and what I am worth, but the most they can do is to cover up that core of who I am. Eventually, I'm going to burn through them. I'm only sorry that it's taken me so long.

There's a vanity in me too, that longs to say pretty things and hold intelligent, indispensable opinions and direct people in the spirit of those lovely words and worthy thoughts. It's a privilege of position. But the way we combat this vanity is with others. You realize that the bit of you that you hold to be true is surrounded by a sea of humanity, some of which batters you out of defense of their own cores, some of which holds you and builds you up and maintains you when you could not or in ways that you did not expect.

I guess what I'm saying is that I found myself and I found out that I wasn't alone all at the same time. It's kinda a lot and I'm still dealing. But at least I know I'm not the only one who's felt all this before.

No man is an Iland, intire of it selfe; 
every man is a peece of the Continent, 
a part of the maine; 
if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, 
Europe is the lesse, 
as well as if a Promontorie were, 
as well as if a Mannor of thy friends or of thine owne were; 
any mans death diminishes me, 
because I am involved in Mankinde; 
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; 
It tolls for thee.