An inside look at the musings, ramblings and daily life of one terribly confused boy.

Sunday, February 6, 2011

You can have it, Kid.

You can have your dignity for a price, $10,000. You want your sense of self? $700 more. You want that name on your ID to match what people call you? $200. How about the love life you dreamed of as a kid? $45,000. Want a safe, loving home and a life that fairy tale characters are jealous of? $250,000. Not so bad is it? The vanity society requires to be beautiful? $15.25 and another $45 to match the color of the week. $400 on therapy to make it all work in your head and $50 a month to keep it that way. Itll take 3 months if you are lucky, 12 if you arent to make that $700 well spent. 1 month for your name, 2 years of pain for your dignity.  5 years for those 5 minutes in the limelight and a whole life time of insecurities and a blown sense of self to ever make it out alive in this world.

16 stitches to make up for the ignorance on 45th street, a month of antibiotics to fight that infection you got from the bar fight. A few months of crying to deal with three very angry words you hear far too often and 361 lonely nights spend wondering why. A broken arm and a bruised eye. A concussion and a shot of adrenaline. 49 scars visible to the eye and 490 under the skin. 15 new words you learned describe you in the eyes of others and 15 new words youve learned to hate.

So yeah, Kid. you can have who you are, but not without the price tag attached.

Nothing in life comes free and especially not a sense of self. You gotta fight for it, pay for it and swallow it whole to keep it for yourself. And even then, with a broken jaw and a stomach full of glass, the world will spend every waking moment trying to rip it, still beating, from your chest.

When you wake up in the morning and can still hear that low thudding in your chest, realize that for another day, another 1440 minutes, you made it out alive with your head held high and your pride in your hands.

itll take you years before the respect will show, before you realize that nothing in life comes easy, but each and every day that you wake up with a heart still beating in your chest and with dignity hanging on your shoulders, know that no one, not a single soul on this planet, can take what you've accomplished away from you.

-Joji

6 comments:

  1. I really love this.

    Words can't describe how accurate it is.

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  2. The glass, the tears, the sudden respect and dignity... It's all worth it. When you realize the hardships you've put yourself through, and the realization that you survived through it all.. even if you left some pieces of you behind.

    It all matters, and it's all worth it.

    Hear Hear, Joji.

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  3. This is so, so true, Joji. Beautifully written.

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  4. Damn... I wish my therapy was $50 a month. Mine's $150 a VISIT and I go twice a week. Thankfully my parents/insurance cover that now but I have basically no hope of transition once I'm out of their hands...

    In other news. This hit hard. I can't relate quite yet; I've been lucky. I haven't had to fight too hard to be who I am. More of who I am is on the computer, in video games, with my real friends and family, than it ever has been or ever will be in my body. To anyone who can see me talking and breathing. That just isn't me, and I guess on some levels I'm lucky to work like that...

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  5. I got chills reading this at points.
    I only wish some people on the outside could read this and comprehend.

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