published in 2014 on my tumblr
I have a rather scary inability to compromise. I have had relationships going to waste because I cannot accept some shades of grey. I have had unpleasant discussions at work because I can’t do half-arsed things for the sake of doing them. And most of the times, I find the complete scale of values of the world around me to be pretty fucked up. Because, like every self-righteous prick out there, I too uphold the things I consider right to be right in the absolute way. Not all of them, but there are enough of those core immutable ideas to cause unwanted friction.
I used to battle a lot of windmills and spend a lot of energy trying to fix things (from my point of view) that are seemingly unfixable. Well, probably not entirely, but when the difference I make is barely noticeable… I will keep on doing it until at some point my engines run dry. And when they do, I always back off and/or show people the door out of my life. And these decisions are always final. As my dad once put it, I don’t go to lick where I spit.
A well-meaning person once conveyed the opinion of a third to me – that my It’s my way or the highway attitude is intimidating and keeping people at a distance. Others were less gentle in their phrasing, giving me ominous warnings of how life isn’t all that I make it out to be and how I’ll end up on my knees, choking on my own words and breaking my principles and how I should think of them when that time comes – the tune of every doomsayer.
True, I can seldom navigate a straight path. There’s people and feelings and situations and circumstances and needs to consider – such is the politics of life. Of course I know there’s always shades of grey. I just cannot allow them in my inner sanctum of beliefs without deconstructing myself in my entirety.
I also mess up a lot, because I am so horrible at actually telling people how I feel and stating those lines beyond which cooperation and cohabitation become impossible. Not to mention the very blurry and shifting lines where it’s just unpleasant, by depleting my batteries of emotional resources. And it’s usually emotional resources that keep me at things. In relationships anyway, but even at work. Money is a nice bonus, but it has only recently become a more important incentive, due to objective reasons.
Admittedly, life has never hit me hard until now. I am perfectly aware that all my (self inflicted) mental torment is just a bunch of first world problems. I am tackling and constantly slipping off the upper layers of Maslow’s pyramid. I am therefore also acutely aware of how all my castles in the sky might yet crumble and how I could indeed end up broken beside my useless principles or views on life. May that moment never come. And if it does, may there be no one to pay witness to it and throw I told you so’s in my face (‘cause I goddam swear I’ll get up just to punch you in the nose).
May they be able to play My Way at my funeral.
