I Know I'm Imperfect

now playing: "tell him" by lauryn hill

...i know im imperfect / and not without sin...

this was supposed to be the last official day of my summer.  today, my lease ends and i was gonna take my Black hindparts back to the parentals house and live for free.

it's a difficult thing to do--to be early 20-something, college graduated and working--to return home to your lovely parents who have sacrificed everything for you to be what you are.

it's hard because you develop a sense of autonomy and independence while out in the world.  you witness what they've been trying to tell you all your life about being an adult.  you grow up out in the world without the cushion and proximity of mom & dad, messing up and fixing it all by yourself.

so to return to their dungeon/castle (because it is simultaneously both) is hard.  it's hard to have to tell someone where you're going. it's hard to have to tell someone when you're returning. it's hard to come back at a decent hour.  for real, it's hard to leave at a decent hour.  it's hard to have to answer to anyone after 4-5 years of hopping and skipping, coming and going as you please.

it's a blow to your ego, to this sense of autonomy and independence you have developed.

and such is my life.  my situation is made that much more viscous by an extreme falling out with my parents.  for a year, we did not talk.  the left me or we left each other and i struggled to get on my financial and psychological on my own.  but i sort of did after a while and came out all the stronger.

all that i endured was very strange, dangerous, fun, exhilarating, and humiliating all at the same time.  but i am so STRONG because of it...sometimes.

therefore, i just don't like to be told what to do.  i have never, ever responded well to authority and i have never wanted to be given directions but after suffering and conquering like i did, you definitely ain't about to tell me nothin.

however, i love my mommy and daddy. there are not two people in the world for whom i have such admiration, such pride in.  i brag about them all the time to friends and complete strangers because they are extraordinary people who have done and continue to do extraordinary things.

but this family is fractured, damaged, burned and in desperate need of healing.  i am a good person and i come from a good family with big, big issues.  are't we all?

there is nothing in the world i want more than a functional nuclear family.  but i ain't got it.  after all the damage, i was never able to return to trusting my parents as the big superheroes i grew up thinking they were.  regardless of all my horrible anxiety, i have always had a sense of security that my mom and dad would always support me, always love, always make a way for me.

until one day, one day i needed all that the most, they didn't.  and i have never recovered.  i find it hard to share little inconveniences with my parents.  i don't trust that they'll help but hurt, not fix but fracture.  when i was alone, figured out a way to do everything and that sense of self-reliance has not left me. and they resent it.

they interpret it as ungratefulness and "liking my American friends more."  my parents have always been in this awkward competition with my friends.  in reality, there was never any competition.  i'd pick my family over anything. but after enough let-downs, those friends became my family.

gwenny, brittany, christina, ravi, forrest, and will are a family engineered in Heaven.  my parents told me all my life not to trust my American friends; that they wouldn't weather storms with me; that they're there only for the good times.

in recent years, there haven't been many good times and none of them have left my side. not once.

i'm not ungrateful.  i thank God everyday for everything and everyone i have in my life.  i thank Him for the broken things, for the lost things, for the people who don't like me, for the people who want to do me harm, for the people who wouldn't spit on me if i was on fire...because all of it--negative and positive--constitute a life and a life experience i can never repeat again.

i am especially grateful for the family and culture i was born into because i wouldn't be the crazy, loving, lovable, giving, kind, airheaded, bleeding heart that i am.

but i am tired of suffering because of my mother and father.  no opinion in the world matters to me quite like theirs and i've never been able to get any real approval.  they nod their heads for achievements they expect and scold you for mistakes and inadequacies they do not tolerate.

i know i'm imperfect, but i think they have no idea that i'm human, that i have to mess up, that i have to fall short, that i have to be inconsiderate, that i have to be self-absorbed, that i have to be rude, that i have to be demanding, that i have to whine...sometimes.  i'm only human.  but i'm not allowed to be.

i feel inadequate.  in everything, i feel a tinge of inadequacy.  i crumble when people don't like me.  i may not show it and usually act like i don't care and i don't like them either. but the truth is i feel small, i feel unlovable. as if my parents hate me and everyone else that does is in cahoots with my parents.  it doesn't matter that so many relative and friends love me.  my unspeakable thoughts say that they are wrong to love me and i don't deserve it.

i hope i don't spend my life looking for approval. but that seems to be the trend.

i know i'm imperfect and not without sin.