For so long I've been told that I'm a smart and creative person. That I am too smart or creative to not do something awesome with my life. It's not something I see in myself, so I've honestly never taken it to heart too much. But parents, teachers, even friends have said it to me at different points in my life. It's not like I think I'm stupid or unimaginative, I'm just not sure how to exercise this potential they see in me. But if it is there, it's something I'd like to get in touch with, which is why I've been stepping outside my usual safety net lately. Taking public speaking class to get over my fears and voice class to finally learn a skill I've always wanted were two ways of doing that. Yet, it still doesn't seem like enough.
Like the Katy Perry song, I do feel like a "plastic bag drifting through the wind." It's such a silly metaphor when taken at face value, but when you feel as out of touch with yourself and the rest of the world as I usually do you get a much more meaningful grasp on it. The whole song has, since the first time I heard it, resonated with me on a very personal level. It's about how everyone has this beauty and capability inside of them, this fuse that needs to be lit so you can show the world what your capable of. For me, it's all about this potential I've been trying to tap into for years now. I just don't know how to let all my colors show. I feel like I'm still a work-in-progress, a fuse that's been lit but hasn't reached its detonator yet.
But I want so bad to reach this potential within myself, or in the very least to find my limits so I can say, "See everyone? All that stuff you thought you saw in me never existed in the first place." Mostly, right at this moment, I want to show my parents my capabilities. My dad has always been hard on me: when I was working and had an apartment of my own, he was disappointed that I had no plans to go to school. When I lost my job and apartment and decided to go to school, he was disappointed that I didn't have a job. Since I became a teenager it feels like he's always been incredibly critical of me, never proud of what I did achieve. Part of me just wants him to be proud of me, another part just wants to shove it in his face so I can say, "Look at me now, Dad. I'm more than you ever thought I could be."
My mom has always been a lot more accepting of me, to the point where I would even define it as coddling. Lately, though, it seems like she's getting disenchanted with me. I enrolled in school and she was happy for a time, then it wasn't enough. I got a job and she was happy for a time, and now it doesn't seem to be enough. She's told me that if I don't act more responsible, then I'm not allowed to live here anymore. I'm not sure what kind of responsibility she's looking for, though, as if balancing school and work wasn't enough. Maybe she's just pushing my limits, looking for the same thing I am, to reach this potential that she's always told me she's seen in me. Somehow I doubt it, though. I feel more like she's tired of having her 22 year old son live with her, while her other adult children live away from home.
Just to clarify, though, it's not as if I want to live at home with my mom and step-dad. Besides the obvious social implications, we live 20 minutes out of town and that's a tiring distance. The fact of the matter is, I don't have any options if I want to keep going to school. When my older sister moved out, she went to beauty school in Anchorage. But during that time, she lived with her biological mom until she graduated from her year-long program. One of my younger brothers dropped out of college and now works two jobs to afford his apartment. The other younger brother works at his grandfather's bar in the village we grew up in, living in a small shack on his grandpa's property. My younger sister never went to school, instead she works housekeeping on the North Slope, making enough money to live comfortably enough but also having to spend two weeks out at the camps they work from.
I want independence more than anything, I'm just not sure how to get it without giving up the future I want for myself. I want to keep going to school, I want to become a teacher, and I want to make a future for myself. I want to travel the world, meet exciting people, do memorable things. I don't want to live in Alaska all my life, and I certainly don't want to live with my parents the whole time. I know there's a lot of stress on their side, too, but what options do I have? How do I get everything I want in this equation? Maybe if I really had all this potential everyone sees in me I would already know...
