LONELINESS: WE PRIVATELY BLEED AND CRY

They say, and I agree, that many of us are lonely regardless of the surrounding people, be it family or love relations. But this is a conversation many are unwilling to have, reason, we think we need not scratch the immortal bruises within us—these might be wounds from previous traumas or heartbreaks that we have never healed from, even when we later on in life find people who immerse us in enduring and overwhelming love.

As an individual, I have incapacitated such acute realities by wearing a mask—identifying with a face that is not mine, and painting it with words, unbelievably, many people have fallen for it, and that is exactly what I want them to see.

Being a writer, I pretend this is not me, and I want to write about you from an unquenchable fountain of emptiness that has deprived you of your true self—you are shrunk, but you still have the strength to conceal your trouble—loneliness in that shimmering smile.

Sometimes, I have wondered for how long this goes on; for how long we must assume all is well even when, within us, we are on the verge of surrendering ourselves to the burdens perched on our shoulders; for how long shall we sit in pseudo solitude, alluded, while deep down pain melts us?

One thing I am certain of is that it is not only me who wakes up in the middle of the night, with a heavy head, just to think about that which weighs me down. I can tell you—that hour is ruthless, when all is left is the country music introduced to you by your old friend, and you have to hear it—at this time, you hardly listen; you care less about the lyrics.

It is horrible—when you sit in your bed, maybe on your phone scrolling through Twitter or Facebook, and you have to laugh at weird posts (a leaked sex video of a university lady, who might not have shaved for two or three years) because you are bored—you are Christian and you don’t have time for beer. So, you pretend social media is making some magic—relieving you from your misery, but indubitably, there is no difference—it is the old you!

For the spoilt chaps like me, stretch out for the remaining bottles of beer under our beds, and drink to a death point, when we no longer feel anything or pull out a packet of cigarettes that a doctor friend instructed, we would throw away—it causes cancer, and smoke out our worries, when the cigars are done, bottles of beer emptied, we are no better. At that point, something like an insect buzzes in your silly head. You are tipsy ‌and have a cough; your eyes are red and your nose is mucusy.

So, this becomes a ritual—an everyday thing—drinking, smoking, listening to music, which you no longer comprehend of the too much pain, and sitting out there alone like an orphaned chick, claiming to enjoy peace of mind and when people ask you whether you are fine, you stare in their eyes and gravely tell them that all is well.

It is painful that we spend a lot of time talking about a minister who secretly embezzled five hundred million shillings meant for a local hospital, or a speaker of parliament who has focused more on stealing public funds than legislating meaningful laws, but forget to talk about how lonely we are—how a young lady, somewhere, still suffers from her father’s wrath that he inflicted on her mother many years ago.

We are furious (not because we want to, but because people have to think we care) at leaders, who, with no iota of remorse or fear, suppress whoever they disagree with for having lunch with their opponents; we hardly bother to ask why that man in the slums hanged himself to death.

Many of us have become gods of irrational discernment that when someone, unexpectedly, does a thing that scares our grit—isolate themselves from society, attempt to commit suicide or even take their lives, we say they are stupid, or they did so under the influence of drugs, the same drugs that suppress their pain.

People are dying from within. Some have even given up on their healing processes; others are scared of opening up to us for fear of being judged. But as they continue to hide their trouble from the public eye, it suppresses them—and now we see the symptoms of the problem instead of the problem itself—imagine that quiet girl, gorgeous and composed, picking up a quarrel at a restaurant with a waitress for taking so long to serve her a cup of coffee; and all we shall say is that she is crazy; but do we know for how long she has suppressed her pain? That is a symptom.

As a victim, no one ever wants to be lonely, and it is a lie we always tell that we enjoy loneliness; we are scared to speak up for fear of being judged—we need someone to hold our hands and tell us it is normal and we shall recover from whatever crunches us; we are hurting, but we suppress the negativity within us—we try to save those around us from our negative energy; sometimes we carry their problems, but we privately bleed and cry.