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Last May I turned 30. I'd always feared thirty, and I think in some way, my fears have come true. I'm not the same person I was when I was 29. This time last year I did not have a brand new car, I did not have a cel phone, I did not have a day runner. I did not have a house in the city. I did not have 20 bottles of wine in a closet. I did not spend hours in the store every few weeks looking for the right things to purchase to wear. I did not style my hair in the mornings and dress nice for work, only to come home in the evening and unwind by switching to sweats and putting my hair up in a more comfortable ponytail. I didn't worry about how many calories things had, or when I could make time to be with my lover.
In the last year, I turned into one of them. It scares me. Moreso because it feels comfortable. I still recycle, I still garden, I am still very active in my art, and I think in some way, this is an effect of finally normalizing and getting past all the things that have happened in my life and being something like a normal person. There's a german film titled, 'Wings of Desire' about a being who, like his breatheren, has watched mankind from it's infancy. In the end, he lets go of his immortal watch of mankind to experience being human himself. I think I feel that way a bit. Watching, but not participating. Yet something has happened. Somewhere along the way, I lost a bit of my dysphoria. I don't wake up every morning filled with self-loathing and scar myself with the memories of what I am and am not. These days, once in a while, I get a flash of memory that I was once something different, but it is distant and fleeting as if the memory of another rather than my own. I remember having such pain about what I was and I can remember why, but the emotion is gone. When I made my detective movie, it didn't even occur to me that I was doing something (dressing up in a suit and tie) that I once would have been completely emotionally unable to do.
Its strange... And yet, I wonder how it relates to being the thing I've turned into. It frightens me. I loathe yuppies and I'd like to think I'm not one. I make best efforts to be polite, even to drivers rude in traffic, and I never shove in line. I avoid talking on my phone in the car... But... I love my London Fog overcoat, sleek and black, and I like looking nice instead of always wearing jeans and tee-shirts. I don't miss riding my motorbike to work in the rain, though it has a certain nostalgia... I like feeling sharp, crisp, and professional at work, then coming home and switching effortlessly into a different mode... So I'm left feeling baffled. I like the person I have become, but a year ago, I'd have dispised her.
-Samantha
In the last year, I turned into one of them. It scares me. Moreso because it feels comfortable. I still recycle, I still garden, I am still very active in my art, and I think in some way, this is an effect of finally normalizing and getting past all the things that have happened in my life and being something like a normal person. There's a german film titled, 'Wings of Desire' about a being who, like his breatheren, has watched mankind from it's infancy. In the end, he lets go of his immortal watch of mankind to experience being human himself. I think I feel that way a bit. Watching, but not participating. Yet something has happened. Somewhere along the way, I lost a bit of my dysphoria. I don't wake up every morning filled with self-loathing and scar myself with the memories of what I am and am not. These days, once in a while, I get a flash of memory that I was once something different, but it is distant and fleeting as if the memory of another rather than my own. I remember having such pain about what I was and I can remember why, but the emotion is gone. When I made my detective movie, it didn't even occur to me that I was doing something (dressing up in a suit and tie) that I once would have been completely emotionally unable to do.
Its strange... And yet, I wonder how it relates to being the thing I've turned into. It frightens me. I loathe yuppies and I'd like to think I'm not one. I make best efforts to be polite, even to drivers rude in traffic, and I never shove in line. I avoid talking on my phone in the car... But... I love my London Fog overcoat, sleek and black, and I like looking nice instead of always wearing jeans and tee-shirts. I don't miss riding my motorbike to work in the rain, though it has a certain nostalgia... I like feeling sharp, crisp, and professional at work, then coming home and switching effortlessly into a different mode... So I'm left feeling baffled. I like the person I have become, but a year ago, I'd have dispised her.
-Samantha
