still walking

I had a terrible blow out with my roommate yesterday. After a year of living under her controlling rules and three weeks of irritated silence about our newest roommate - her recently acquired dog, despite her no pet policy - I lost the ability to just silently take it. This will likely resolve in my immediate eviction, despite my leaving the country in less than three months. I tried to turn to my closest friend for advice and solace, but that only lead to his chastising me in an even more affecting blow out. (We dated for a year and in that time my roommate objected to his presence in the apartment. In my attempt to appease both of them through various compromises and to preserve my place of residence, I infuriated both of them, eventually leading him to break up with me.) I'm reminded of something a former co-worker said to me during one of our arguments concerning our political differences: "You're a sheep. You'll always be a sheep," referring to his perception of my inability to take action and stand up for myself. It obviously still haunts me. This is my third round of roommates in the two years that I've lived in Taiwan, and with each group I've ended up getting cheated, which makes me question the strength of my own character more so than their insincerity.

I ended up browsing this dead space of a blog because even after reading their summaries, I couldn't remember if I had read either of James Baldwin's most famous novels. Apparently I had read one, though nearly eight years ago. Eight years....

In this space (curious to browse around the time period I had read Baldwin's work), I found someone fixated on a future of action but unable to instigate it. (These tirades feel alien to me, replaced by less determined new ones.) I found someone desperate to break away from the norm that surrounded and consumed her, but now I rarely interact with people who qualify under this norm. Nowadays the average, middle-class office worker's life seems no more real to me than a Dilbert comic strip.

At one point I spoke of the likelihood of meeting fellow travelers, but mostly I encounter young adults from affluent backgrounds experiencing exotic Asia either through bars and nightclubs (both of which are staples more of Western culture) or dating locals.

What I have in my life now, in place of those frustrated hopes of past, is freedom in all of its wayward open-endedness. I can just as easily do anything as I can do nothing. There is no one that I feel yields any control or say over my life (especially in the ways that once so preoccupied my thoughts). So though I can pick up and leave at any time, it also means that there is nothing connecting me anywhere.

I continue my shy, ghostly journey, not happy, nor sad, but at peace.