Discontented and Restless
So
what do I mean by well being? I simply never experienced the ecstatic feelings
that follow peak life achievements. By the age of fifteen I was expelled from
school for smashing up a Home Economics classroom and allegedly assaulting Mr
Brittan who taught Modern Studies. My achievements up to that time and
afterwards were not the norm. While people have memories of achieving academic
and sporting success during their school years, my memories include being the
first among my mates to climb the tallest tree along the banks of the River
Clyde, becoming a skilled slalom skateboarder, and being first in my street owning
the latest Jam record. I could relate to these small achievements but didn’t
derive any great feelings from them. My attitude also made it difficult for me
to relate to the nature of the achievements attained by my classmates, and I couldn’t
comprehend any of these providing me with a sense of intrinsic reward. Life
events like successfully completing school, obtaining favoured employment,
settling into your first home, getting married, having a family, achieving
promotion are massively important in people’s lives and cause ecstatic
emotions, igniting feelings of gratitude, excellence and happiness. I witnessed
this excitement in other people however I could not relate to the feelings they
expressed as I had never felt that way about any event or any achievement in my
life. I could not muster genuine emotion regarding feeling great about myself
or about anything I had achieved or nominally achieved. It was as if I was
missing the necessary buttons that had to be pressed before these positive
feelings could ignite. In other people this expressed exuberance appeared
natural, their celebratory whooping and hollering and smiles seemed congruent
with their enlivened body language. I had no sense of, and found it difficult
to grasp the concept of reward as the catalyst providing these type of feelings
that I saw other people intuitively react to and express. I felt like an impoverished
being without the very feelings that were the enrichment of the human soul. I
had been robbed of an integral part of the human experience and would wonder,
stunned;
how come I am not completed,
not whole, there are pieces of me missing, and there is a song in other
people’s hearts I am deaf to and that my heart has never been able to learn, I
had been overlooked by the heavens, the angels know nothing of my existence,
the full mystic and majesty of human experience would never be mine, I would be
without its warm brotherly embraces, hugs and handshakes, my form has not
attained shape, half made, half
finished, abandoned.
Shielding
my emotional limp and ugliness from everyone around me, fearful, angry, evasive
and as profoundly yearning as the hunchback Quasimodo and like him imprisoned
within the confines, not of Notre Dame Cathedral, but the clipped limitations
of my emotional range, that were my very own Notre Dame, attached to me like
the shell is to a snail, sloth and lumbering I plodded to keep up with other
healthy vibrant beings who tasted the heights of joy and gratitude, the zenith
of liberating humour and greatness, they tasted as one as there back slapping
denoted harmony and togetherness, achievement, well being and reward. And each
time with each pang I receded deeper into the tiny font of the yawning loneliness
that had become my tone deaf and unmusical heart.
Instead
of feeling a rich sense of well being on a par with my contemporaries the
windswept barren ache I sensed was the ominous silence of a torn wound I
carried whose origin was befogged from my inadequate emotional rummaging. The
emotional pain I felt not only regarding my feeling alien to the richest life
affirming feelings of being human, and my feelings of disconnectedness, but
arose also from the human capacity for love and affection I perceived that were
outside my ability to become engaged with or to develop. I viewed other people
engage easily with each other; their interactions seemed poised, intuitive and
relaxed. They appeared secure in each others’ company and glad to be there.
Their conversations meandered unhindered through peaks and troughs of
flirtation, fondness and tempered cheerfulness. The elements of their body
language were suitable and appropriate to the particular occasion, whether at a
children’s party, a wedding or just meeting on the street. Engaging with other
people I always found awkward, perplexing and pained. I would look upon the
relationship skills proficiency of others as a threat towards me, I felt
belittled by my inability to match their aptitude. Their perfectly combed and
honed competence towered over me, their flair and ease in accord with each
other I found overbearing and anxiety provoking. The anxiety and the resultant
feelings became too painful, far too difficult to manage and I withdrew from
socialising, especially from social events. Included to be avoided also were every
day chit chat, tittle tattle, and simple ‘how is your day’ community exchanges.
I kept my interactions with other people to a bare minimum; I kept a distance
between myself and others, I did not develop any type of intimacy with anyone
where I could express the difficulties I had with being comfortable within
myself and being comfortable among people. My perplexity at the ease of how
people lived and get on with their lives was relentless, causing me to
continually compare myself and conclude I was less than those who seemed to be naturally
equipped to do life.
For
me living with others and living with myself became unbearable. In the early
spring evening just inside the entrance to a concrete pedestrian subway, that
had became a hangout for the local youths, I found relief inside a stolen
bottle of Bullmans cider. Just before becoming a teenager I had tasted my first
alcoholic drink. My anxiety and the feelings that had been unbearable had
become much easier to contend with, I felt the most at ease I had ever been, I
felt part of the human race, and I felt like the other people who appeared to
do life with such grace and poise. Alcohol was providing me with a sense of
well being and positive connection I had never experienced, I looked at people
with a camaraderie alien to me, there was a new enmity given to me that made it
easier and painless to be around people. Alcohol seemed to provide the solution
to my discomfort that I was not able to discover under my own resources or with
another human being. The respite I felt became a release I hankered after,
longed for, ached for.