It really shouldn't matter to you.

Deleted a helluva lot of posts that had to do with the person I once was. I don't want reminders of that. I've been a lot more positive and level-headed (I was giggly and immature, a glass of lemonade). I'm still a scattered mess, but I am finally moving forward (baby steps, tottering in a vaguely northward direction).

I don't know if anyone actually ever reads this and to be honest, I don't really care if they do. My words (strung along prettily like pearls in a necklace) will soon be forgotten to myself. Nothing is indelible, not even the ink smearing my skin in a few choice locations (UV rays from the sun triggering reactions that break down the chemicals in the ink, fading them into grey whirls).

I am neither a poet nor a writer. I am a dreamer. I live on castles of air made on a foundation of ocean mist and heady smoke rings. My arms are scarred from past hurts. I am at heart, a survivor.

This is a rant.

I am not a victim of my circumstances. I am, despite them. I am not of them.

I have been tested and found wanting when it comes to my Emotional Quotient levels. On the other hand, the last time I took an IQ test, I scored a 133. Do not treat me like an idiot just because I don't understand your social cues. Walk me slowly through things.

I support the QUILTBAG (the utterly new fab name for LGBTQ) community and their need for rights. I am being deliberately ambiguous here because. Well. I have very good reasons.

I am the star of my own story. I save myself. I also have a fantastically huge ego in contrast with my currently crap self-esteem, and it's all for the best if you don't try to understand me.

I like taekwondo. A lot. I currently hold a second dan blackbelt in it. Yes, fairly common. I have five medals for sparring and two for taeguek. When I was younger (angrier, more aggressive, prone to trouble), it was the quiet and authoritative voice of my master that stilled my impulses. To you, and to the rest of the world, it may be a farce of a martial art (I could agree; I never cringed more than when I watched the Olympics). But all I can say is that taekwondo is divided into three branches roughly: traditional taekwondo, sports taekwondo and... combat taekwondo (somehow, this involves nunchucks- I literally have a pair of practice nunchucks hanging behind my room door...).

(I am, however, a complete failure at completing ninjutsu. My bokken and tanto lie in my room, watchful and dusty but unforgotten.)

I have a hang up over being called 'pretty' or 'beautiful' or... Just anything relating to my looks, in general. I tense up when someone compliments me on the way I look (not that it happens often, mind you) and I tend to change the subject. This has nothing to do with self-esteem and everything to do with past situations. Don't take my lack of acceptance for a lack of manners. Again, I would thank you to stop trying to comprehend the way I work.

Sometimes, I actually do feel that I look good. This one, I'll have to attribute to my bigender tendencies.

Which brings us squarely back to the genderqueer post I meant it this to be.

Gender and sexuality are inherently fluid. Neither are mutually exclusive to the other and may be completely unrelated. Stop assuming what I am.

And for now, that is all I have to say about the matter. That was supposed to be the focal point of this entire post, but my thoughts have once again gone awry (playing hide-and-seek in a unfamiliar location of their own devising; I cannot grasp hold of them and they slip past the gaps between my fingers).

This has somehow turned into a ramble.

Lately, the subject of love has weighed heavy upon my mind.

Odd.
Why?
Because I have never fallen in love before.
But didn't you...?
I did. But the point still stands. I have never fallen in love before.

Limerence is my fair friend. Infatuation, a comfortable ally. Love? Agape, eros, and above all, romantic, no. I can't say that I have.

Let us start at the beginning. I am a dreamer, yes. But a cynical one. I watch the ending of dreams with my eyes wide open, living in reality, coexisting (one foot in a world of my own, the other firmly attached to the destruction of this universe). Jaded. World-weary.

I do not dream of Prince Charming on his stately stallion stealing strong, steady heartbeats from my chest. My thoughts are not full of the knight in shining armour, lance strategically placed steadfast at the side of his stabled steed. (All alliteration produced out of boredom; I am bored bored bored bored bored)

It could also be said that I have been replaying Wonderland by Natalia Kills (a guilty pleasure and one of my favourite songs). Dark and grim.

In all honesty, I understand that aromantics exist. In all probability, I could be one of them. I'm not sure.

An aromantic is a person who lacks the instinctive need to create an emotional attachment to someone in a romantic sense.

This would normally be a good thing since I really don't like having visible weaknesses except that I would like to one day fall in love (negation: I am not an aromantic). A dizzy, headlong rush, adrenaline shooting through my veins, intoxicating my mind and body the way only a chemical can.

Or so I've been told.

It's almost 3AM and I have better things to do. Screw it.

“We're frightened of what makes us different.” Otherwise known as: An excuse to use Anne Rice quotes.

And truly, I understand that I stand apart but most importantly, alone.

No, don't get me wrong. I have a duo of beautiful sisters (ultimately younger than me and so untouched by the cares and worries that plague me) and amazingly supportive friends. But I have this superstitious taboo of speaking aloud my hopes, dreams and fears. I keep a notebook on my bedside table for this instead, dark ink spilling across the pages with my thoughts scrawled with disregard for margins.

(It could be said that margins are unnecessary anyway, why limit myself?)

Sometimes, I find myself taut and stretched tight like the E string on a violin (held in place, gripped with the littlest finger; climbing up almost to the bridge, sounding a note close to the third octave above middle C).

At other times, I feel my bones drape languidly, restful as a calm puddle in the aftermath of a thunderstorm (still, ripples non-existent, giving into sensation only when there is a lack of stimulation; paradox, irony).

Through it all, my thoughts remain a maelstrom. A terrifying whirlpool of intensity. A lying mess. The repetitive but unpredictable Brownian motion of words leaving trails across my mind.

“There are too many other inexplicable things around us--horrors, threats, mysteries that draw you in and then inevitably disenchant you. Back to the predictable and humdrum. The prince is never going to come, everybody knows that; and maybe Sleeping Beauty's dead.” 

I understand that I stand apart, eccentric in an incomprehensible sense to everyone else around me. Standing apart inevitably leads to standing alone. Being alone results in a freedom unlike any other (my mind descending and ascending to levels unknown- never on the same wavelength as anyone else but never having to be either), but occasionally it does bring me to loneliness.

No, this is not a teenage rant on heartbreak or love or romance.

No, this is not an asexual cry for companionship.

Neither is this a pseudo-intellectual gripe about the oh-so-thoughtless fools I am surrounded by.

This is wondering: Does being different detract from your chances at the Russian roulette game that is love? (Why is love so important that people would kill, fight wars, bloody history, smear the actions of mankind with fathomless evil in the name of something that is universally regarded as fundamentally good?)

Cynical. Enigmatic. Pessimistic. Cryptic. I dance a clumsy tango around the subject that seduces me with one hip cocked and puckered lips.

Oxytocin. Serotonin. Human evolution. Proven by science, anthropology and history.

Skin meets skin, a rush of adrenaline, fumbled sentences, a compilation of clichés and stereotypes. From the calm and steady romance of Pride and Prejudice (“In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”)  to the insane selfishness of Wuthering Heights (“May she wake in torment!" he cried, with frightful vehemence, stamping his foot, and groaning in a sudden paroxysm of ungovernable passion. "Why, she's a liar to the end! Where is she? Not there—not in heaven—not perished—where? Oh! you said you cared nothing for my sufferings! And I pray one prayer—I repeat it till my tongue stiffens—Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living; you said I killed you—haunt me, then! The murdered do haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts have wandered on earth. Be with me always—take any form—drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! it is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!”) what are we but pawns to our invention, our creation? The emotion we esteem above all others? That which we have raised on a pedestal over the millennia, until fact and fiction have blurred to become one.

Society has become what we have made of it and love is our twisted, crippled child.

Blood is more viscous than water.

I remember this morning, my eyelashes fluttering as I awoke gently for the first time in days. It was then I became aware of an arm and leg slung across my body. Panicked, I slid my sleep-weary gaze to the side and my eyes collided with the sight of another's stare, stricken and wide-eyed. I relaxed. It was my youngest sister, six years my junior and in possession of a height six inches superior to mine. She had a larger hand up in my hair, stroking the tangles and curling her fingers in the ends.

(I was reminded of a time ten years ago, when I was in the reverse position; protecting her smaller frame against the cruel, cynical world)

"Good morning, Zarrah," her voice rang out softly, careful not to startle me. I turned over and stuffed my face in the hollow between her neck and her shoulder, wincing at the bright sunlight streaming through my curtains (note to self: get opaque drapes).

She curled her body against mine, attempting to nudge me awake with her elbows. "You're very pretty," she whispered and I hid my smile.

Now THIS is awkward.

I discovered today (a sudden epiphany) after many weeks of this happening that when someone calls me Zar or Zarrah in a certain way, I will automatically reply with "Yeah baby?"

This has made some people think that I think that I have odd player tendencies.

Actually, it's because that's how I placate my youngest sister.

The awkward part is that I do this to everyone, including my parents and on one very memorable occassion, my boss.