Solitude

Assigned: ~Decemeber 16, 2012
Alone. Solitude. Silence.
These words have never meant so much (and on a bigger, metaphorical level) to me the past two years. I remember the discussion we had in class once about No Exit and what was one's personal hell. I remember someone saying that isolation and/or physical pain was probably most people's hell.

Then maybe, I've been in hell the past two years. It's waking up to a migraine, with bright, blinding lights in your face. It's anxiety and panic attacks that you can't explain. It's a looming, brooding emotion that clings onto you. It's a disease that everyone wants to explain to you. Want to fix for you. Want to give solutions to you. But you, yourself, don't even know what it is. It is depression.

Trapped in my own head, my own mind. Filled with racing thoughts at night. The only thing at night accompanies me along with insomnia. There is no true outlet, because it is almost impossible to articulate to anybody, despite how "professional" in the field they are and despite how intimate my relationship with them is. This mental isolation is hell.

However, it's not so much the physical isolation that bothers me most of the time. In fact, one of my most favorite things in the world, is to be alone with myself. Not in any self-righteous way. But walking around the city with a very observing, pensive outlook. Sitting on the train and not knowing where I'm headed. Stopping where I want to stop. When I want to stop. Watching mothers cradle their precious child. Watching girls cry to their girlfriends on the phone. Watching "Steve" carry a sign that reads "Disabled. Please HELP". Listening to the wind chimes as I pass creaky, old houses in Uptown. Listening to children's laughter as I pass Lincoln Park Zoo. Listening to the waves of Lake Michigan crash the concrete just below my feet.
It's a paradoxical feeling; being physically alone- but because of the stillness, the silence, you realize you are not. And you become so small, yet so fulfilled. So much more than just one being.