I've come to realise that I've always put too much faith in what people tell me. Much grief has been caused from the belief that words imply meaning, that statements reflect intention. Whether violations of these beliefs were from flippancy or a genuine ignorance, I don't know. But I know now to place no faith in assured proclamations that I'm told in utmost confidence.
When, as now, I reflect on alternate timelines, I am struck by the desire to bring up those words to the accused, and ask: did you ever really mean them? If not, I wish someone told me; I wouldn't have stayed up so many nights in worry, and could have done other things with my time. Maybe then I wouldn't have felt the need to escape, and seen false hope in a fresh start that took from me more than I thought I had. It's not the giving I take objection to -- it's the giving when there was no need, when there was no value placed on it, when there will never be any acknowledgement of a sacrifice of self. Knowing no that no arbiter takes note of one's selfless acts, except perhaps to damn you further should they be performed unquestioningly, I wonder just how much is owed to those youthful errors.
It's a cruel irony that others seem to have reached my epiphany much earlier, because in my own time of need, there's no one to listen to these words. Now that everyone's world is brighter, and the struggles deemed but memories of a past to be forgotten, I seem to be no longer needed. So I sit trying to sort through these memories and regrets, because I don't remember what else there is to do. As soon as the thought of reaching out surfaces, it is flattened by reality -- no one wants to go back to something they deliberately left behind. I didn't realise it at the time, but I now see what my station was -- a collector of nightmares, insecurities, and sorrows, one who relieved the sufferer of their malady by bravely wearing their problems on my own crown. It was only when I realised that the words of thanks were as hollow as those of torture that I started to feel the weight.
What use in saying more? That is how it is. Newly enlightened, I can only shake my fists at ghosts who will never haunt me again, no matter how much I taunt them.
When, as now, I reflect on alternate timelines, I am struck by the desire to bring up those words to the accused, and ask: did you ever really mean them? If not, I wish someone told me; I wouldn't have stayed up so many nights in worry, and could have done other things with my time. Maybe then I wouldn't have felt the need to escape, and seen false hope in a fresh start that took from me more than I thought I had. It's not the giving I take objection to -- it's the giving when there was no need, when there was no value placed on it, when there will never be any acknowledgement of a sacrifice of self. Knowing no that no arbiter takes note of one's selfless acts, except perhaps to damn you further should they be performed unquestioningly, I wonder just how much is owed to those youthful errors.
It's a cruel irony that others seem to have reached my epiphany much earlier, because in my own time of need, there's no one to listen to these words. Now that everyone's world is brighter, and the struggles deemed but memories of a past to be forgotten, I seem to be no longer needed. So I sit trying to sort through these memories and regrets, because I don't remember what else there is to do. As soon as the thought of reaching out surfaces, it is flattened by reality -- no one wants to go back to something they deliberately left behind. I didn't realise it at the time, but I now see what my station was -- a collector of nightmares, insecurities, and sorrows, one who relieved the sufferer of their malady by bravely wearing their problems on my own crown. It was only when I realised that the words of thanks were as hollow as those of torture that I started to feel the weight.
What use in saying more? That is how it is. Newly enlightened, I can only shake my fists at ghosts who will never haunt me again, no matter how much I taunt them.
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