inDifference

I marvel at our capacity to feel so much for so long and then in a heartbeat, it’s gone. Nothing left but the cold, black numbness of indifference. If it’s meant to be a layer of protectiveness, a thing that kicks in for self-preservation, then I will embrace it. My skin is not so tough and I don’t know how to ‘just get over it’. I feel the burning questions beneath this thin veneer. The what ifs, the what now, the where do I go from here?

I’m liking the emotionless indifference offers.
I have been hurt enough.
I have blamed myself enough.
I have doubted my goodness once too often.
I have questioned my worth and never will again.
I need resolve.
I need distance.
I need clarity.
I need myself back.

I saw women last night in the village. Young and old, beautiful and tired, hopeful and disillusioned, searching and resigned. I saw these women looking at me and I wondered which one of those women they saw staring back.

When I looked into their questioning eyes, past their silent smiles, I saw the searching. They were all searching for something.

Acceptance.
To be wanted and desired.
Love.

It’s what we all want. Yet it is as elusive as it ever was.

I wondered at the need that brought them all together and the boundaries that kept them all apart. I watched one woman look at another and then so clearly dismiss her. Why? Was it because she wasn’t wearing the right clothes, didn’t have the right look, too old, too young, too pretty, not pretty enough? What causes us to judge each other so righteously without ever having witnessed the soul? What made her so sure that the woman she dismissed had nothing to offer her? She may have been her new best friend, a tender lover, or a partner for life. Yet she snubbed her before she had even spoken, discarded her like trash, and deemed her unworthy of a second glance.

It pained me to see careless rejection extinguish that beautiful light of possibility as she dropped her gaze, bowed her head and moved herself out of the way. Her rejector was not unaware of her action but was indifferent to the hurt she had caused. I wanted to yell at her, “When did you get so fucking mean?”

I used to believe that people were inherently good. A part of me still does I’m not so sure anymore. Where I used to see only They are selfish, self-serving, manipulative and cruel. I used to think that people didn’t hurt others indiscriminately, but they do and oftentimes with great pleasure. I never thought it would happen to me, and I am not proud to admit it, but I too am becoming indifferent. I am losing my faith in people.

And that in itself is a tragedy like no other.
I was one of the few true believers.