AS IT SEEMS…

I should be taking some alchie as I write this, no?

I mean c’mon, I am already listening to The Riddle by Five For Fighting. I am filled to the brim with music and words. I am finding myself in that dark (and not in that icky general way that mud-bloods define it) yet comfortable zone that I unwittingly have to be in to write as though there were nothing else left in me but the words. And see, I am all about the words.

You should see me as I pound away at the keyboard. My face with that frown. Head tilted at an imbecilic angle. I can see no one, hear nothing else, but bass guitars and drums and my own pounding heart. Of course, the customary goosebumps are not absent.

There was a time in my life when I cared about absolutely nothing. From the time of high school up until when I graduated from the university. I was alive, but I was not living in me. It was as though I gave my body up for rent and went to live in a shoe. I think that the only people who even saw a bit of the real me in all that time was Tumi my high school rock buddy, Yeside my sister from another mother, Chex from living together in that cute apartment, Nkem from being my roomie in my second year of university and also from living together in that cute apartment with Chex.

No one else.

Not my class mates.

Not even my non-existent family.

I always just felt that I should not be where I was. I needed to escape, but I did not know how. I stopped reading for my exams in middle high school. Feck it, I did not care. I did not fail any exams, but I wasn’t exactly top five (5) like I used to be. And to be fair, even when I was top five (5), the decline had already started. I was not giving all of me. I just did not want to alert anyone. I would sit in my chair and look at the apparent geniuses with an inner smile of knowing. Because see, if I wanted it, I could’ve got it. I knew it. Ursula knew it. It used to take such a huge physical toll on me just holding myself back from all that. And no one knew. I was just Sonia, the girl who apparently did not like to study. I cannot say why I did not care about high school stuff at the time, I just knew that my heart wanted to be somewhere else. I wanted to escape it all. My family. The girls around me who judged me harshly without understanding what it was like to be me. I was a time bomb seeking explosion. I was not sad. I was not depressed. It was only that my soul was way older than my body. Tough fix at that age. I felt misplaced. Like an alien on earth.

In the university, I’ll bet you my course mates thought I was bonkers most of the time. And I probably was. Let me now tell you, that all the exams I wrote in the university, I studied for none. None. Not even the famous Anatomy. Of course I would hold the books like everyone else. Do the motions. But I knew that whatever I went into the exam hall to write was purely residual knowledge from some of the interesting lectures I attended, and a mix of what I somehow just knew on the inside of me. All I had to do was know the basics, I could spin on from there. So then what if I had studied? Would the world have been able to contain my genius, then? Because genius is what everyone blindly calls it, no? And exactly one of the reasons why I shied away from it. To be put in that box only because of my academic aces. When so much else mattered to me. And I do not know why it did, but it did. I found peace only when I ran in the mornings. Peace from conversations with strangers and the reading of poems. After that, zilch. To be fair, I was going through a lot of crap that no girl my age should have had to go through. I don’t even know how I even lived through it all. And all that, it just added to my feeling of not being where I was supposed to be. It always just seemed like there was something more for me. My soul kept seeking fulfillment. Clothes, boys, cars, make up… they mattered none. I cannot even remember how many times I cut away all my long hair. I was constantly seeking, reaching, and finding nothing. I wanted to know the meaning of life. I wanted to understand the universe. I really wanted to exist in that ultimate plane where people existed less, and their essences existed more. It is hard to explain. And you can only understand it if you are me.

 

Today. I am here. And now, they call me genius. Why, because they’ve experienced only a fraction of me?

Bleh.

My certificates and accomplishments are in tow, still meaning absolutely nothing to me. I probably will go get a few more in the near future, just for the heck of it and well, because I love to study, to read, to discover, to know for the sake of me and not for prizes or accolades or parents. I am a functional (define functional, will you?) member of society. I still reach and seek, but guess what? I always find something. Maybe my body has not truly caught up with my old soul yet ( I doubt it ever will), but at least they communicate effectively now.

I like all of humanity, the good and bad and ugly. I think that they are all part of the dynamics that make life interesting. I am happy, deep down, I am. I am a sucker for reactions. I will poke an ape in the ass just so it can make noise and stomp around and beat its chest in that very sexy ape-ish way. I love wine and coffee and cranberry juice. I love music, I do nothing without it nearby. I love my perception and experience of God. I cry when I watch emotional scenes in movies. I love to give and receive hugs. I love children, and let’s face it, they love me too. I am the only adult that’ll do all the Disney renditions for and with them over and over and over again. When I want to pee, I walk around in circles, stamp my feet for good measure, just to buy time so that when I finally run to pee, the way that it oozes out… such bliss. I eat food for the heck of it. I would kill for the ones that have my loyalty. I love like a vampire, with intensity, till the very end, and even beyond. I do not tolerate disrespect (not of age, but of person), and because of this, I fear no one. Maybe the only person I fear, is myself. Sometimes I stand before the mirror naked and look at myself. I see all of me. My straight legs, my thighs that never meet, my muscles that refuse to take on fat. I see my neck, my small ears, my slits as eyes. And shit, I am real. Inevitable. I am here. With my heart, my soul, I am here. And I swear, it counts for something.

So then people, no more judging. No more assumptions. Whatever it is. Can we all just see with our hearts and not our eyes? Can we? Because I tell you, it is not always as it seems.

Nay.