#empty wallets; end up here; emotions; easy for you to say (5sos)

[faithfromanewperspective]

When did my ambitions change? When did they grow? From wanting to do something, anything, for the dozen or so people sleeping rough I meet in my city on my daily commute to the statistics I see of homelessness, of asylum seekers? When did thousands start not to feel overwhelming, oh no I have to fix it all, to what if? What if I could really be part of catalysing this? I watch fashion styles out of the window of my bus. Read body language, who is included, who isn’t? I complain about the train line and how far away it is, but, oh, if we let buses take over all of our streets, replacing the trams we tore up last century? Oh, if we replaced the automotive with something kinder, gentler, to our macropods and the little joeys we see out on the streets, if we connected our suburbs for every animal just like I’ve drawn pictures of a thousand times over the course of my uni degree. What if we capitalised on our amazingly functioning ecosystems? What if we were the next Shanghai, but better, better in so many ways, what if they saw what I did, whoever I work with, what if someone wants to work with me to do something similar for the orang-utans in Borneo? My mother and grandfather were born on those lands, among the jungle. What if?

I know I have to watch my mood, keep me on the ground. But I feel calm, it’s not worth stressing over, I haven’t had any caffeine and I’m not even buzzed. How much better I feel when I’m off all of that, when I let my mind wander and solve things like it does best. I said I’d work on my fic on the bus, this is good enough. I need to get a second job, this one is making me hypomanic. But I know I can handle it, I always do. I need to find what grounds me and I’m going home to that. Never really considered much about whether I can support myself, not when I’m only one person—who really cares? I know people do. And I wish they’d stop, I wish they’d let me be free. Maybe that’s why I look through millions of pages for characters who I see myself in. Maybe I should go back to my roots, Southeast Asian collective cultures, or is that what I’m running away from, people who worry for me, just so I can worry for a much larger table I call family? I’ll bring honour to the clan, the hodgepodge scatter of genetics I carry in my cells, but I’ll do it my way. In a way that builds up everything and every organism I touch. I’ve got seven hundred dollars in my bank account, once I pay my bills, to carry me into the next month, and that makes me poorer than most of Southeast Asia. I do need a second job, to take my mind of the impact a few times per week. I seek out community. I find only lost sheep. People searching, just like I am, who don’t know what I do. I think I can help them. I know I can. No wonder I never did care if I had a roof over my head, not when I’m starving for love I can stomach. Why bother looking after myself when I could look after millions instead? Then treat myself like a machine and a vessel towards this I have to cherish and care for, as if I’m the planet that sustains us itself?

I live for the impact. Visible disabilities, I’m looking out the window again, on the arterial road I have grand plans for. It’s like a major river, delivering droplets, billions and billions of them down from the mountains to a massive fanning delta. It’s the Mekong, the minor city us commuters are heading for is Ho Chi Minh City and my parents’ suburb is Saigon. I see people along the river, people like droplets of water, with various physical disabilities and I’m reminded, no matter how I feel about this, all this, and whatever it might lead me to, it’s still a disability, I still have to manage it lest it sweep me off my feet again and I get frustrated because, what about my impact? Sugar coated brain. The fluid ain’t to blame. Living our lives, dancing on empty wallets. Spend it all on you. I want to be as sonically diverse as this song. I want my cities to reflect that. Generosity. I always believed in second chances, I always believed in you. Millions of you. Do you believe in me?

Maybe I’ll bring my favourite characters along for the journey. Maybe the fics I’ve written for them, the headcanons I made, the friends I bonded with who are so much like me, are because I see myself in them. This idealism. No room for self-preservation. I’m not the only one experiencing this, living like this, hoping no one finds out lest I have to face their criticism. Six, seven, eight, nine, ten more things to change. You can’t change me, only kill the only part of me I have driving me forwards. Mirror in the text, I was enchanted to meet you. Can you tell my song library is making its way through the letter E? Is this the very first page of my arc? Don’t let the storyline end without me saying the words I held back. Here they are. I’m not crazy, right, no crazier than the next person (fingers crossed I’m reclaiming this word properly and using it properly) because this stuff has to happen. I don’t—can’t—do it all on my own. All I have to do is a little sketch there. A little post that someone sees who thinks something who tells someone who builds something that helps millions. A little idea, a little drawing, a little bit of the monotonous grind because when it comes down to it, my company might be as idealistic as me but I do have an employer. And I’d wager a bet that I’m a lot less sheltered by wealth and unrepresentative connections than nearly anyone else there. And I still believe this is possible.

I’m tired, so tired, because as I work to convince them I know they all think of filling their own stomachs first before anyone else’s. I can’t help it. I can mask it for a bit while I pull on my own oxygen mask but I didn’t do that naturally, I did that because I was told to. Because someone explained the logic to me that I can’t help anyone else if I’m dead. And now I’m doing the same, back on it again, educating, opening eyes with logic all around me: you can’t feed yourself on a planet that’s dead. They’re just like me aren’t they? Just got a few things plugged in the other way around. So I’m in a good place to help them see. But I’m tired, because no one even tries to see things from my perspective. No one knows they have to. Why would they? I’ve got a million things to help them see first. Maybe I should do this the other way around, maybe that would be more productive, but I don’t trust it. I mask to connect, it’s the only language I know. I don’t mask more than anyone else. I don’t know how all of them survive it. Barely, clearly.

The traffic is getting heavy as the bus pulls into its little station between the two shopping centres. I forget Christmas is coming, a stupid consumerist holiday I no longer see the connection with my religion. Can’t we bring back connection instead of this? I can. It’s the four letters keeping me from coming undone. It’s the thing that people admire most about me, but they don’t understand. I have to. I have to do this. I’m sick of pretending I can be okay just going through life when I have all these things holding over me, things I care about that won’t go away. I’m calmer when I face them head-on. The way we were in Saigon. Maybe I can rewrite my story with my parents’ suburb. The things most people turn away from. I’m sick of the way that I had to fill every waking millisecond with exciting distraction until I lost my ability to sleep in order to attempt to distract myself from it. I simply won’t do that anymore. Look at me, looking after myself for the first time ever. Maybe I can be the girl from End Up Here. Maybe when I acknowledge my burdens and process them enough to realise they need to be handled collectively and I have the skills to drive the machine, I don’t have to use my shoulders instead, I actually feel less burdened for the first time ever.

And it’s reflected in the choices I make. How long have I felt that my time is running away from me, how long have I longed for more free time, just to have it taken away from me, so incrementally that I was supposed to get used to it, but instead each step up was a micro-aggression that built up inside my uterus and left me hurting and unable to move? Unable to use the part of my body designed to create life, to do anything but hurt? Is it because I finished university and don’t have that starting line hanging over me anymore and I feel like I’m moving for once? Why did I require this level of privilege just to start living?

Either way, all it is is fodder to the ambition. Everyone should get to experience this. Everyone should get what they need. So I’m letting my mind wander, letting my time be free, choosing to trust that I will get done whatever needs to be, organising my schedule to allow for this to happen. For the first time, I feel like I have some sort of control over this. Everyone should get to have this experience. I can work towards that dream.

So my bus got me home at exactly the right time. I’m tired, in the bedroom of my teenage years, my rowdy birds making a fuss outside (who dumped who? Or was it a miscommunication to begin with? Or did he just want to go to bed, Violet, but you still want to be outside so you’re calling for him but he’s chosen you everyday for the last four years, let a man get some rest). But I’m a little less tired knowing that this can come out. I don’t have to hold it all in and pretend. I can work towards solutions, one step at a time.

[edge-oftheworld]

ttpd meets 5sos yet again

denial playlist

bad omens vapor lie to me not in the same way midnight empty wallets lost in reality broken pieces bloodhound haze voodoo doll daylight perfect lie money* no shame disconnected complete mess san francisco baby blue kiss me kiss me safety pin 18 don't stop valentine straight to your heart* break up* garden life* wicked habit* close enough to feel you* blender* girls talk boys* mrs all american*

anger playlist

hey everybody she's kinda hot easier me myself & i over and out teeth (live from the vault) tears! good girls rejects social casualty greyhound monster among men* broken pieces she looks so perfect starting line easy for you to say talk fast if walls could talk lost boy castaway catch 22 permanent vacation airplanes skinny skinny kill my time rebel at heart* just saying* blood on the drums* red line* youngblood* take what you want*

bargaining playlist

catch fire heartbreak girl outer space why won't you love me more lonely heart a beautiful dream when you walk away moodswings the girl who cried wolf the only reason 2011 everything i didn't say shakes scar mum drive broken home best years have u found what ur looking for? lose you* greenlight waste the night out of my limit promises* i'm still your boy* benny* motion* never be*

depression playlist

invisible red desert bloodline* wrapped around your finger you don't go to parties caramel amnesia woke up in japan beside you wherever you are close my eyes the sweetness close as strangers story of another us fly away place in me slip away ghost of you diamonds* gotta get out try hard comedown* moving along last night of my life* take my hand* high indestructible* saigon* repeat*

acceptance playlist

carry on heartache on the big screen babylon teeth who do you love long way home better man carousel lighter bleach old me tomorrow never dies* english love affair flatline sunshine matter of time meet you there best friends end up here want you back i see the angels* jet black heart wildflower lover of mine i'm to blame unpredictable older emotions* hearts upon our sleeve* best friend*