Disappointment. Weekend commitment. Week 260.

Disappointment. Weekend commitment. Week 260. | Ecency

Forgive me, distant wars, for bringing flowers home.

-Wislawa Szymborska-

We have all suffered at some point from events that have significantly affected our lives, so much so that you never manage to forget them and they never stop squeezing your heart even though you have supposedly overcome them. Time may even pass, and one day, like bright lightning bolts, déjà vu's appear, bouncing off your spiritual tranquility and trying to unbalance the slow life you lead... then, inside, the inevitable survival instinct quickly pushes them away, just like you do to an annoying and insignificant insect that insists on morbidly landing on one of your precious eyes.

I remember my mother trying to calm my crying accompanied by deep sighs because my best friend from the neighborhood didn't want to go out to play... "That's nothing, don't worry, you have ten more girls to play with"... but it turns out that it was with that girl that I ran, jumped, sang opera, and secretly watched the handsome boys from the neighborhood while they did their thing... and the others, the others were just silly and dull girls.

_{Nature is beautiful even behind bars.}

But I guess none of that is as important as the things that happen to us as adults, because children, luckily, learn to forgive very quickly.

This is my entry to participate in the weekend proposals our host Galenkp brings us every Friday.

What has disappointed you most in your adult life and why, and how have you solved the problem or improved the situation?

_{...And the flowers will continue to expand even if there are barriers...}

I still remember during my childhood, one day, at the age of eleven or twelve, when I was sitting alone in my living room in front of the television, watching and listening absorbed, part of a speech that was broadcast in the prime time slot at eight at night, while I thought about how incredibly lucky I was to have been born in the most perfect country in the world with the highest levels of equity, equality, internationalism and thousands of opportunities accessible to every human being on that earth.

I later learned that opportunities always came to some, those who stayed within the norms of the same discourse, because the best way was/is to crawl like snakes to climb quickly in life.

I may be a little cruel with some statements in this post. But I assume the subject matter allows it.

My biggest disappointment as an adult was the apathy, betrayal, and hypocrisy of so many of the people I worked with.

If you manage to survive in a world that is plagued by individual interests, people who get promotions at the relationship level, flattering and acting to manipulate the reality in which you live: Sincerity can be a 500 S&W Magnum caliber revolver to self-sabotage.

_{...People should be like plants, taking advantage of every space to look beautiful even if the container looks broken....}

Now I look back and ask myself: Why must I admit I made a huge mistake when I criticized my country's system in front of certain coworkers? Is that why they denied me travel when I was awarded one of the best free scholarships available to young people in Latin America? Is that why they censored all the invitations I received to postgraduate courses and other events in anothers country? Can a person feel discrimination within their own country as if they lived in in the former Apartheid of Nelson Mandela?

Yes, that was the biggest disappointment of my adult life, and I'm no longer a child to forget or forgive... because there are super-important moments in life that never come back, and I know how to appreciate that Manichaeism and arbitrariness happened in their fullest expression.

There were so many dreams, efforts, and expectations dashed that it's still sometimes hard to breathe when a brief memory of that time returns.

But these issues are resolved by working hard, and by proving that a political party doesn't define the extent of your professional capacity. Oh my God, such human stupidity!

_{...And even if you only see a crooked tree, the most beautiful thing is its freedom...}

I only know that all of this didn't distance me from myself, from my passions, from my plans, from my projects... because I decided to live in a thousand sustainable ways, and I was a seamstress, I was a cook, and I was a merchant, and I am everything I can do to survive honorably without stealing, without lying, without hypocrisy... and loving my profession very much, even after all.

If you ask me if I've overcome it, if I'm doing well?, of course I have. Today I'm stronger, more resilient, and better prepared for life, but the one thing I haven't been able to stop being is VERY HONEST.