Off-Clock Musings

On Care and the Lack Thereof

No one cares about you.

And that's a truth I live by. You might not, but I surely do, and it's something many people would consider quite sour and sad, but it's the truth. And the truth doesn't really care how you feel. It is what it is whether you like it or not.

In the past year, I've built relationships with a small number of people whom I deeply care about, relationships that are extremely intimate, personal, and vulnerable. I had decided to have friends some time ago, and I honestly do have a few (though you can count them on your fingers) at this point in my life. Now while I'm not in the market for new ones, I must admit I am not sure the people I've formed friendships with recently are what I've been searching for, the truth being that the people I want to form friendships with either are imaginary or long gone—but missed opportunities are for another time.

I won't disclose much, but my personal life is filled with very ugly things, things that don't relate to anyone but myself, things I deeply wish for on a daily basis weren't a part of me, things that make me vulnerable in ways most people aren't. Let's simply call them things because that's what they are. Now these things are a part of my identity, though many people would argue otherwise, in which my response to said people is that you are damn arrogant. I can't change these things about me, so I've had to learn how to navigate through life with them.

I am simply saying I was born with these things, thus they will always be a burden on my shoulders. There are ways to manage them, but I will never abolish them completely, and that's the painful truth I must acknowledge as well as the truth people need to understand. I have people who come to me thinking they can remove these things from me, but they can't, and frankly, I wouldn't want them to anyway. Being born with something becomes your normal, and you wouldn't want it to be any other way despite all the trouble and pain it may cause you.

I sit here, writing this late at night because I can't sleep. I'm an insomniac who is currently waiting for her physician to prescribe a refill, so naturally I am retrospective tonight. My eyes are closed as I'm writing this (though slightly cheating), and I see. . .well, I can't see anything, but I can feel a strong pressure in my head from the damned withdrawals I'm experiencing. And it's this very pain that reminds me that no one cares—absolutely no one cares about me enough to fix my problems.

Foolish I am, for I once told myself I will not go beyond a certain point in helping anyone who is not my blood, only to have my back broken by the same blood I was rooting for. She does not care. He does not care. No one cares. I see myself: I put myself in people's shoes, quite literally even, to help them get any sort of dirty work they need to get done, and I do so because I love the damned life out of them. Service, service, service. I am in service to anyone close to my heart, and they serve me too, but not in the ways I serve them. For the longest time, I thought love did not have to be reciprocal. Indeed, I am a fool.

Because no one cares.

The people I've mentioned so far love me and care for me deeply, but the fact of the matter is that they will not hold my hand on a second to second basis and work with me when I need it. It's cute to help your friend by telling them you believe in them, but that won't get them anywhere when they are on the verge of dying every night for months on end. Would I drop everything just to be with said person every night to ensure they stay alive? Without a doubt I will, and have done, but how far have people gone to reciprocate that for me is just a question that I refuse to answer because—well, it doesn't even have an answer. Zilch. To clarify, I am not referring to suicide, but I am using suicide as a metaphor of some sort.

Because no one cares. No one cares enough. No one cares about you as much as you care about yourself. On the off chance you are an exception, you will meet someone who will save you, but for most of us, no one will save us. People care more about saving themselves than saving others. Unless you are Amelia and have a Zayn, absolutely no one will save you. You will have to save yourself. It's either that, or you are dead meat.