8 Alexcya Hopper The living room floor was cold. It wasn’t hardwood-cold, but it was cold. The fan had been running all day, cooling the carpet down considerably. The scratchy material on my bare back was almost . . . comforting. Usually, I wouldn’t dare walk across the dirty carpet, not without socks on at least, what with all the cat pee from the previous tenant. Yet, here I lay, completely nude on my living room floor, surrounded by the litter of my junk-filled life. In my ear played the buzz of a random “classic movie.” You know the one, the movie everyone has seen and declared to be a cinematic masterpiece only to find that it’s lackluster and a huge waste of anyone’s time. There was no reason for my basic need for human comfort to be met by a floor needing to be vacuumed, for nothing had happened. The nothing might be why I needed comfort, though. Because, maybe, a lifetime of nothing makes a longing for something. Maybe the nothing was what I needed, maybe it would ‘build character’ or something. But if that were true then I would have built more character in my childhood than most other people in their lifetime. Possibly the opposite is true, and you need something to build character, in which case I’m as boring as they come, I have nothing. Maybe you need something to be something. And, just maybe, I’ve never been something. Maybe my whole life I’ve been what everyone says, nothing. That’s the price of thinking, I suppose. Worth is realized only when it is tested. Mine was tested yesterday, today, and it will be again tomorrow, but it isn’t tested by me or some other unknown god of the universe. It’s tested by the average man, the everyday co-worker, the casual friend. The test is always simple, unnoticeable, can be hidden in something as simple as a handshake. Every time I am tested, I fail. I see it. I see it in their eyes as they appraise me; I always measure up to nothing. Then again, what does it mean to measure up to nothing? Who decided that the average man, the everyday coworker, the causal friend gets to be my judge? Why should I have to worry about such things? Is it my duty to be what everyone else wants? And who said anyone should be the judge of anything? I have as much of a right to judge a movie as the average man, the everyday co-worker, the casual friend gets to judge me. But who cares, certainly not the landlord coming to collect my payment, and certainly not me. I am just a nothing anyways. What good is the opinion of one who amounts to nothing? I further relax into the carpet, the smell of cat urine ever more potent swirling around me, and accept my place as nothing significant in this world. l0nging for s0mething
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NzkyNTY=