Just sitting here

It's funny to be just sitting here, no one around, TV on, computer, phone, ipad, thoroughly connected and yet engaged with nothing. Confronting my health, listening to my body, being in tune with myself. It's just a bit funny.

I sit here with chills running up and down my body. My good ear (see my blog Living With Herbert for details on why I have a good ear and a bad ear now) throbbing strangely, inciting the fear that what remains of my normalcy may disappear. So I sit here and think, what is normal. Who gets to decide? I certainly don't, at least not for myself any more.

Then I realize how perfectly fitting my blog name is for me now. I am perfectly imperfect. There is not a thing about me that is not tragically flawed, and that is me and I am okay with me. I'm just sitting here, surrounded by stuff, surrounded by things that cannot fill the void in my heart. A brain tumor. I have a brain tumor. WTF. How did this happen? None of the stuff makes it better. It makes life seem that much more urgent. I think of my friends - do they know I love them? Should I cut those I don't? Worse yet, do I cut out the friends who I loved fully and never returned my joy, my love, my friendship? Will he commit to me? Will I end up alone? Will I have the strength to walk tall and alone? Will I even ever need to have that strength? Will I stand alongside those people who share my beliefs and stand up to those who don't? Will I stop being such a door mat? I'm not a door mat. I'm just me. I'm okay with me.

It's weird, to let the clutter fade and just sit here, alone, with thoughts that arguable don't make any sense. I am regularly contradicting myself. I consistently, even here, in this place and moment of expression, shield my thoughts in anticipation of judgement or backlash. I'm the doormat on the inside of your door, the one you walk on so your feet don't get cold when you take your shoes off on the cold tile. I suppose that is better than a regular doormat. Who knows. What the hell am I even talking about????

Peace - Samira

Looking for my medium

I'm in an LSAT class, which, to most people is a ready indication of your full and adequate desire to attend law school and in most accounts to become an attorney. I still, however, have not overcome the pit of doubt that resides in the bottom of my stomach. I attend my class and study as I can. My blue books are these haunting reminders I carry with me and a weight on my shoulder; the reason I carry a bag rather than a purse. I'm trying really hard to want this and most of the time I do but on days like today I think, is this my dream?

There is this part of me that refuses to take any job, rather do any job that doesn't directly or positively affect other people in a good way. That is why I wanted to do Teach for America, to affect people, to make a difference in their lives. I often look to what I used to want to do and realize I must not look to what I wanted in the past or what made me happy then, because I have evolved and I have changed and I must now look to what makes me happy. I so often look to what might may make a direct impact and am reminded by stories of history, politics and even my family that maybe I don't need to be directly touching someone to impact their life.

What I mean to say is, I often look to programs like TFA or other non profits and volunteerism to directly impact people thinking this is the only way I can impact people; that that may be my only medium or means of reaching the world, making my mark. What I so frequently forget is that if I maintain my integrity and strength of character in what I do, always, I will make that impact in what I do, whatever it may be. That is not to say I no longer want to reach people, but I so narrowly defined my focus. I look at people I admire, newsman from past and present, film makers, artists, writers, even lawyers. Their impact is not always in what they do one on one to meet us in our lives but in the way they interact with us through their public mediums. I'm looking for my passion, for my dream, for my medium. I'm really just looking.

In the meantime, the studying continues....

“Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn't mean you are wiser than when it reached only to the end of the bar.” -Edward R. Murrow