The other night, Mimi and I watched “The Perks of Being a Wallflower”. The title alone made me a little “oh this is a chick flick isn’t it?” and since I’m more boy than girl I prefer a movie with a least one good car chase, a few blow em up scenes and then of course the obligatory hurrah of the super hero over powering the villain and bringing peace to mankind for another day. Like the good Manwo (a term coined by my most awesome brother-in-law Adam) that I am I know the rules of any relationship must include the occasional chick flick….
Surprisingly, I loved this movie more than I thought I would.
In fact, it might just be one of best movies I’ve seen in a long time.
It’s very rare that a movie will provoke a lot of thought for me. Again, because I’m more of a “shoot em up” “Bang! Bang!” sort of girl/boy but this movie provoked a lot more than I was anticipating. Most of my life I was (am) Charlie. The wallflower. The kid mostly gone unnoticed or at least that was (is) my perception growing up (living life). The secret that Charlie kept was the very same secret I kept (and still keep mostly to myself) because the people that could help with some closure are long gone and what’s the benefit of pointing fingers in accusations when there is no one in front of you to ask the burning question: Why?
Charlie says this line at the very end of the movie:
“You Can’t Control Where You Came From but You Can Control Where You’re Going”
I can’t control from where I came…
I couldn’t control my mother’s mental illness that had already dug it’s claws deep into her soul long before I was conceived. I couldn’t control that she looked for love in the darkest corners of the loneliest places and found my father waiting for her, to give her his definition of love while she grasped at anything close for comfort. Soon after, I came along. Another reminder in her already scarred life that love doesn’t come without pain and pain can be forgotten more easily when you’re drunk.
I couldn’t control the cloud of depression that invaded every aspect of the family I was born into. My mother, my brothers and eventually me. I couldn’t control the undiagnosed conditions that wreaked havoc on my small body. From the days of rocking in a crib, banging my head on the railings to throwing a tennis ball against a brick wall almost every day of my primary school years, to the uncontrollable urge to hit myself in the head, pull my hair out and dig at my skin until I bled at the first sign of a tough emotion because back then, the word Aspergers hadn’t been spoken.
I couldn’t control the intense survival mode I felt towards food as a kid. The over eating as a child because no one was taking control of my upbringing which led to shoving utensils down my throat to find some sort of control over food, emotions, my life, anything. I couldn’t control any of it. It is what it WAS but it is NOT how it has to be.
I can control where I am going.
I write a lot about things most people would prefer to sweep under the carpet and forget about. The only problem is that underneath my carpet was the collective heap of a mess from all the sweeping I tried to do for so long but without success. I couldn’t continue to “sweep” away the emotions of the past and hope to continue forward into the future. I don’t necessarily like to write about mental illness, gender confusion, abuse, food addictions, drug addictions, and my own transgressions but I do because while I couldn’t control where I came from you can sure as hell bet I could control where I was going and if I wanted to go anywhere I needed to start by cleaning up the shit around me so that I could begin to lay a good foundation of understanding who I was, who I am and who I want to be.
I’m open about my life because there’s an off chance that someone else is out there sitting in the same heap of crap I sat in for so long. Wondering how long it’s going to take for things to change or wondering if this is everything called life for them. I wanted for so long to blame my past for where I was standing. To point the finger at my mother, my brothers, my teachers that saw the signs but didn’t say anything and lay blame for who I was (or who I wasn’t). I wanted to point the finger at relationships ended, at social anxieties and depression that seem to never end and at the never ending barrage of food that I shoved down my throat as my heart raced knowing eventually I would bring it all back up and finally feel a short-lived sense of comfort as the blood vessels in my eye burst and my throat bled from the forceful vomiting. I wanted to point at the big dirt pile under the proverbial carpet that I’d spent forty years sweeping and blame everything else on everyone else for what I had become.
But I control where I’m going.
It’s one of the reasons I have no ill feeling towards the first part of my life and I’m able to (at least to the best of my ability) stop looking over my shoulder trying to lay blame where there is no blame to lay. Everything I am today and everything I strive to be is because I am in control of my direction. From the food I eat and the miles I run to the emotions I feel and the gender I choose; I am in control.
People ask me why I love to race. Is it to add to the medal or racing shirt collection? Am I trying to place in an age group or beat a personal time? To be honest, it has nothing to do with any of those things (though I do love a good medal). I love to race because each time I step up to a starting line it reminds me from where I came. The starting line (the life) that I couldn’t control. As I cross over the beginning , the struggle to reclaim control over life is played out with each forward step.
I feel good as I start out. Strong. Weaving in and out of people as I find my place among all of those trying to accomplish the same thing but each of us, while running together are very much alone. Much like everything in my life (in our lives) I start out strong. Confident. This time will be different. I can do it. I am in control. No matter what happens during the race I decide my next move. I cry, I laugh, I wonder what the hell am I doing out here? I decide when to rest, when to stop and take a picture and when to thank those for volunteering. I decide when to refuel or pace behind someone to help get my mind off of all that is around me. Just like in real life every choice I make during a race is because those are my legs moving not someone else’s.
That is my heart beating.
Not yours.
As in life I become tired. Muscles are sore. I feel alone. I want to quit. So many times I looked in the mirror and gave up on myself. Hung my head in shame knowing that I was never going to be good enough. Wanting to be something but slapping that “NOTHING” label on my heart over and over again. I looked around and pointed outwards. “It’s your fault”, “You did this to me”, “You didn’t love me”, “Why????” Darkness would envelope me and I would stop where I stood, giving up…
Sometimes (most times) I feel that darkness during a long race. The “just give up” feeling tapping me on one shoulder while the “you are still nothing” feeling taps on the other. It’s in those moments, where all I can think about is sitting on the ground and giving up that I remember that I’m in control of everything I do. I stop worrying about how fast I’m (not) running and start remembering that it’s the commitment to finish by any means necessary that urges me forward. I allow the emotions to overwhelm me because I know that this is life in front of me and I can either sit down and give up or I can fight for every step forward until I am right where I need to be; at the finish line.
Life is a struggle. It’s a constant swim against the current. An uphill battle. We often feel defeated and then spend so much time comparing what we haven’t been able to do against those that have been able. We feel out of control with almost everything in our lives. Our families. Our jobs. Our addictions. Our mental illness. Our gender confusions. Our weight. We feel inadequate and with that inadequacy comes the pointing of the fingers and the outward lay of blame. What we forget is that WE are in CONTROL of everything we do going forward…
You can’t control where you came from.
But you can control where you’re going.