Don't judge a book by its cover.
I've been hearing this quote since the beginning of time. For some reason, the idea behind this quote has been spinning in my mind.
I love meeting new people. What entices me the most is the slow discovery of who they are. With some people, it's easy to read exactly who they are from first glance. I used to love those people because understanding them didn't take any work. Nothing really surprised you.
But lately, it's the people that you can't categorize immediately that are a intriguing me. Who are these mysterious people? What are their lives like? What thoughts run through their minds?
I think that as we get older, we get more mysterious. More of our lives start getting hidden. But why? Why does society support people to keep their lives private... almost as if it's a shame for people to talk openly about their struggles and burdens. I'm only referring to being verbally open. Pouring one's heart onto the internet is a different story. It's easier to do when no one knows your face.
If you met me for the first time, I doubt that you'd think that this smiling girl was in the midst of a custody battle, receiving threatening calls from the father's crazy girlfriend and basically scared shitless that she's about to be a single mother in less than 2 weeks. You'd never know or guess unless I explicitly told you. But why? Why do I go to such great lengths to hide this from people? The moment I leave my house, I plaster a huge, fake smile on my face in hopes that I'll soon feel that way. To be truthful, it usually works. Those precious moments I'm out of the house, I can pretend that I really am happy and delude myself.
No one would know that when I'm home, I spend most of my time hiding in my room. I hide from my mom who at a moments notice can backlash me with harsh words blaming me and the baby for shaming her, for ruining her life, etc. etc. I haven't seen the rest of my family in 9 months. Anytime someone drops by, I have to crawl under my bed covers and pretend I'm asleep in case they barge into my room.
I don't know why I hide my true feelings from people. I think it's because I'm scared they'll shun me or think less of me. I used to be very judgmental before I got pregnant. I'm afraid people will think that I've brought this on myself... or that I've done something to deserve this.
I was at school today. As I was walking to the bathroom, I felt a bunch of people looking at me and I couldn't help but think how much more this sucked for me than it does for D. People look at me and they think, "Look at that chic who's knocked up. Wonder what she did to get herself into that position". I bet when people look at D (and know that he got his ex pregnant), they probably think, "Wow. Poor guy now has to spend the rest of his life paying child support for a child he didn't want".
My mom pities D. She worded it as me ruining D's life by forcing a baby on him with my decisions; he had no chance in the matter.
I don't know what I think about that. I do feel guilty sometimes for having changed so many people's lives because I didn't abort the baby.
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