I would thrive in a doomed narrative
Oct. 19th, 2024 06:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
resolute1. I was nineteen when I realized that, in any Heinlein story, I would be one of the millions, billions, left behind to die on Earth. It was my first understanding that I am not a protagonist. I am too fat, slow, and sickly to be a protagonist.
2. When I was ten I realized that I would not live to see my thirtieth birthday. That the world would end in nuclear conflagration before then. We had just moved to the Chicago metro area, and I was grateful because it meant my family and I would be killed in the first waves. Every day the bombs didn't fall, I was glad to be alive.
3. On a family vacation when I was fourteen I had a dream of the end of the world. It was crystal-clear, incredibly detailed, and it said I died, along with everyone and everything else, the summer after my twenty-ninth birthday. I woke in tears, sobbing silently on the couch in the basement rec room where we were staying. Anything I wanted to get done would have to be done before then.
4. When I was twelve I discover the Uncanny X-Men and New Mutants comics. As I devoured these stories through junior high and high school, I internalized what I believed was the primary message of those comics -- Everyone will hate you no matter what you do. The world will try to kill you, over and over again, simply for what you are. You are going to die; what matters is how you go. Go fighting. Always make them work for your death.
5. When I turned thirty I realized I wasn't dead. So, now what?
Every day past my thirtieth birthday has been a gift. Every day has been another opportunity to spit in the face of those who hate me, fear me, would see me dead. Every day I am alive is at the caprice of an uncaring universe; I dare not waste them. Every day I yet live is a twisting thorn in the side, a sliver in the foot, a papercut between the fingers of small-minded apocalypse-humping unloved unwanted kleptocratic wannabe feudal lickspittles.
I'm not afraid to die.
I was, when my kids were little, because I wanted to see them grown. But now they are adults, and I'm back to being unafraid. I mean, I don't WANT to die, there's so much left to learn, to see, to do, to know! Existence is friggin' AMAZING and I am in no rush to stop enjoying it. But I'm not afraid of death. It might hurt, sure, but so does healing surgical laser burns in my throat. So does walking. I'm not afraid of pain. I dislike it enormously! But I'm not afraid.
I hesitate to tell people that I am largely an optimistic person because I'm ready to die at any moment, that I'm not afraid because then at least there will be no more "I" to feel "pain," that I have had twenty-one years of days I never expected, days that contained my partner, our kids, decades of friends, multiple accomplishments of which I am proud --
-- I just, I --
If this narrative is doomed, well, no, it's not. Humanity has been doomed multiple times. And I mean, DOOMED at least once. Will the world as I know it last? Well, that's a different question. Worlds end all the time. Ask the fucking Lakota. Ask Gazans. People die, and humanity goes on.
If this narrative is doomed, so what? Our world might end, and us with it. If you're dead, if I'm dead, there won't be a "we" to form an opinion about it. And if the world ends and we live? Ask Ashville. Ask Ukraine. Ask the Lakota.
However doomed I may be by the narrative, it doesn't matter. Every day past age thirty is a gift.
Being a part of the narrative, however fucking doomed, is a gift.
2. When I was ten I realized that I would not live to see my thirtieth birthday. That the world would end in nuclear conflagration before then. We had just moved to the Chicago metro area, and I was grateful because it meant my family and I would be killed in the first waves. Every day the bombs didn't fall, I was glad to be alive.
3. On a family vacation when I was fourteen I had a dream of the end of the world. It was crystal-clear, incredibly detailed, and it said I died, along with everyone and everything else, the summer after my twenty-ninth birthday. I woke in tears, sobbing silently on the couch in the basement rec room where we were staying. Anything I wanted to get done would have to be done before then.
4. When I was twelve I discover the Uncanny X-Men and New Mutants comics. As I devoured these stories through junior high and high school, I internalized what I believed was the primary message of those comics -- Everyone will hate you no matter what you do. The world will try to kill you, over and over again, simply for what you are. You are going to die; what matters is how you go. Go fighting. Always make them work for your death.
5. When I turned thirty I realized I wasn't dead. So, now what?
Every day past my thirtieth birthday has been a gift. Every day has been another opportunity to spit in the face of those who hate me, fear me, would see me dead. Every day I am alive is at the caprice of an uncaring universe; I dare not waste them. Every day I yet live is a twisting thorn in the side, a sliver in the foot, a papercut between the fingers of small-minded apocalypse-humping unloved unwanted kleptocratic wannabe feudal lickspittles.
I'm not afraid to die.
I was, when my kids were little, because I wanted to see them grown. But now they are adults, and I'm back to being unafraid. I mean, I don't WANT to die, there's so much left to learn, to see, to do, to know! Existence is friggin' AMAZING and I am in no rush to stop enjoying it. But I'm not afraid of death. It might hurt, sure, but so does healing surgical laser burns in my throat. So does walking. I'm not afraid of pain. I dislike it enormously! But I'm not afraid.
I hesitate to tell people that I am largely an optimistic person because I'm ready to die at any moment, that I'm not afraid because then at least there will be no more "I" to feel "pain," that I have had twenty-one years of days I never expected, days that contained my partner, our kids, decades of friends, multiple accomplishments of which I am proud --
-- I just, I --
If this narrative is doomed, well, no, it's not. Humanity has been doomed multiple times. And I mean, DOOMED at least once. Will the world as I know it last? Well, that's a different question. Worlds end all the time. Ask the fucking Lakota. Ask Gazans. People die, and humanity goes on.
If this narrative is doomed, so what? Our world might end, and us with it. If you're dead, if I'm dead, there won't be a "we" to form an opinion about it. And if the world ends and we live? Ask Ashville. Ask Ukraine. Ask the Lakota.
However doomed I may be by the narrative, it doesn't matter. Every day past age thirty is a gift.
Being a part of the narrative, however fucking doomed, is a gift.