Things Are Getting Hard Again

Things are getting hard again, and I don't know what to do. I don't know where to go. My belly is juggling coals. My skin is crawling to escape. And my mind is rotting. I am so tired of being scared. Being judged. Being fearful. Being less. Being mocked. Being excluded. Being looked at. Laughed at. Sneered at. And all I do is beg in disguise of fantasies. I sit here in a corner and make up castles that are filled with nonsensical hope and delusion. I have limited myself so much to a point of complete erasure that it is almost a crime. And I am just sad. Sad to be. It pains so much. To be lack of something. To be looked at and not accepted anywhere. To be not allowed to dream. What is it that smells so much? What is wrong with me? Why me? And why not me? I have dreamt so much to a point of praying to God knows who that it is almost a shame. And I hear back nothing. I get back nothing. More exclusion. More limitation. More nothing. I have lacked so much to a point of loneliness that it almost feels natural. To be unloved. To be understood. To be not believed. And it is cold. Lonely. Dark. 

It’s as if the walls are closing in, each brick a reminder of all I’ve lost and all I can’t reach. I want to scream, to break free from this suffocating silence, but the words twist in my throat. Silence chokes me. I watch life unfold from a distance, a spectator in a world that seems to move on without me. Life excludes me. Each day blurs into the next, a disposed thread of longing and despair. I search for a glow—a thread of connection—but it slips through my fingers like sand. Why do I keep trying when every effort feels futile? I think of the castles I build, elaborate yet fragile. They’re my refuge, but they crumble at the slightest breeze, the slightest connection with reality. Hope feels like a joke, a cruel trick played by fate. What is it that I truly want? Love? Understanding? A voice that echoes back when I speak into the void? I ache for the simple comfort of being understood, yet I feel like a ghost haunting my own life.

I hide myself underneath these flimsy covers and end this to force myself to fall into sleep with yet another delusion of the possibility of not waking up tomorrow morning. Please. If anyone is listening...

- Oizys.

A Collage of Micromanagement and Masquerades

Last week was a whirlwind. One of my professors finally defended his PhD, a momentous occasion that left everyone in awe. Meanwhile, another killed his father for being debt-ridden. The contrast was stark and unsettling, setting the tone for the week. It has been painting thoughts in my mind lately, filling my head with vivid images.

I decided to take a leave from work, my first in a long time. The reason? My new team lead. Once a close colleague, her promotion had transformed her into a micromanaging tyrant. She insisted on hovering over me or sometimes having me on her lap, her breath hot on my neck, as she nitpicked every detail of my work. Our relationship, once cordial, had soured. Her yellow highlighter slashed through my mistakes, while her use of a whitener to obscure my hard work and hardships felt like a cruel joke.

My family does not know I am on leave. I lie and sit in front of my computer, acting like I am working. I have been hiding a lot of things. Each click of the mouse the moment I (fake-)clocked in felt like another step deeper into the labyrinth of my hidden truths, where every corner held a secret begging to be screamed out. A week of leave passed by, which began with thoughts of accomplishing tasks and ended with the burden of being unable to accomplish them, with a garnish of regret for procrastination, of course!

But I did not entirely waste it. I fed corporations my same details again and again that I have been feeding since time immemorial to get a job. Inducing action verbs into my personality while keeping it compact and one-page since it is only an infant in profesh terms. Making it parse-able for the AI to grab it as someone exciting yet oppression-worthy. I did make one of those rejection email collages* to end this ephemeral week off. But I do not have an offer letter at the end to add the effect of success. Just a museum of failures. Normally, I delete one as soon as I receive one. I had a few lying around. Revisiting them was... fun and a masochistic ritual. The wounds are surprisingly fresh. It is good to keep picking up those past reminders of being unachieved and underqualified.

Amidst the chaos, there was a brief moment of joy. On Wednesday afternoon, I made sandwiches with my mother and sister. It was a rare, serene interlude. But even in that moment of nicety, my inner critic, the animal within, roared in disapproval.

- Oizys.

*Here it is: