Fifty-six years. You spend that long looking in the mirror, you watch the goddamn show in reverse. The body starts to rot, and the mind, it just gets sharper, meaner. I’m not sure when I became one of them, or if I was born this way, a bad seed from the start. But it’s a permanent condition now. The rot is in for good.
You see them around, the ones with the quiet disconnect. They’re the ones who come off as gentle. The perfect marriage material. The honest broker. The good cop with the kind eyes. Always wearing that calm, easy smile like it’s a well-worn coat they picked up at some thrift store for souls. They give off this vibe of being upbeat, cheerful even. Like they’ve got the whole damn world figured out, and they’re happy to be here.
But if you look close, if you look past the performance, you can see the coldness in their eyes. They’re not hiding a secret pessimism; they are the pessimism. It’s the bedrock they’ve built their whole goddamn life on.
They have this knack for seeing things clearly, for thinking everything through. They always imagine the worst-case scenario. Not because they’re gloomy bastards, but because they’ve been kicked in the teeth enough times to know that the rain is always coming, and it’s best to have your goddamn boots on before the storm hits.
They don’t have anything they’re crazy about. No one they’re dying to have. They can’t get all fired up or hung up on shit. It’s not that they don’t feel; it’s that they’ve seen what feeling does to people, and they’ve decided it’s a sucker’s game. Crowded, lively scenes? Not their thing. But they don’t mind being alone, either. They just enjoy the quiet freedom of their own company, a small kingdom where the bullshit of the world can’t get in.
When a friend is falling apart, they’re the first one there. Not with hugs and tears, but with a steady hand and a clear head. They’ll say the most rational, kindest goddamn thing you’ve ever heard. They’ll patch you up like a battlefield medic. But they can’t really feel what you’re feeling. They see the wound, they understand the mechanics of the pain, but they can’t bleed with you.
They talk less and less to family, to the old buddies they used to be glued to. If life pulls them apart, they won’t reach out. Not because they’re heartless, but because they get it. Most people are just passing through your life. They come, they go. No one’s an exception. So they keep this gentle distance, never getting too close, never pushing anyone away.
They know how the world works, and their personality is solid as a rock. You can’t find a flaw. People praise them for it, call them “mature” and “understanding.”
But only they know the truth. Only they know that behind all that warmth is a profound, natural detachment. An inability to really dive into the messy, beautiful, stupid chaos of emotions. It’s a quiet pessimism that comes from seeing through the whole goddamn show and just… dealing with it. They’re not living. They’re enduring. And they’re doing it with a goddamn smile.
We all agree, don’t we? It was just yesterday we were in high school, spitting on the sidewalk, thinking we had all the time in the world. It was just yesterday my own 29 year old daughter had a goddamn cord hanging out of her belly.
Time…it’s the illusion. The grand, beautiful, murderous illusion that you have a lifetime to live, and that you only get one shot at it. Meanwhile, the animal inside you, the real you, the primate, is screaming its lungs out, clawing at the inside of your ribs. Don’t waste your time. Don’t idle. Don’t slow down. Don’t you dare fucking compromise. Don’t stop searching for the reason you’re here.
With only so many trips around the sun left, the universe, or whatever you want to call it, it hopes you finally get the message. It hopes you hit the bottom so hard you bounce. It hopes you see the weather turning and have the good goddamn sense to pack your shit and move on.
You look at a guy like Jesus from the bible. Forty years old, never married. He was the master of the quiet disconnect. He had to walk out into the goddamn desert, away from the noise and the crowds and the bullshit, just to figure out who he was. He had to endure.
And that’s what this is all about. Enduring. But not with a goddamn smile.
