The Case Against Myself

I am very good at this.

At taking the good thing and turning it over until I find the flaw, the hairline fracture, the evidence that what looks like solid ground is just the pause before the familiar story of collapse.

I have been doing this since before I had language for it. Since before I understood that not every bright thing is a setup.

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The therapist calls it catastrophizing.

I call it being prepared.

We have agreed to disagree.

We have agreed that the disagreement is itself the point.

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Here is what I know about the armor:

It works.

That's the problem. That's always been the problem. The thing you build to keep the damage out works exactly as designed and keeps everything else out too,

the good thing, the bright thing, the person who showed up with no agenda and a song and the specific, terrifying patience of someone who isn't going anywhere.

The armor works.

And I am standing inside it watching something real happen on the other side of it and trying to figure out how to take it off without feeling like I'm falling.

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If I fully trusted myself I would let the good thing be good without immediately beginning the case for why it won't last, I would let the bright thing be bright without cataloging the ways light fails, I would let the person who sees me actually see me without redirecting the gaze to a more manageable version of what I am.

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I know how to be the more manageable version.

I have been practicing my whole life.

The manageable version is competent and composed and keeps the difficult parts in the rooms she doesn't take guests into, and she is good at this, she is so good at this, she has been so good at this for so long that sometimes she forgets the other rooms exist.

She forgets she is also the other rooms.

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But here is the thing about the person who sees you:

they're not looking for the manageable version.

They sent a song.

They meant it.

They are standing at the door of the unmanageable version not because they don't know she's in there but because they do,

and they're still there,

and the case I keep building for why this won't last has not convinced them to leave,

which means the case has a flaw,

which means I have been arguing the wrong side this entire time.

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What if I just

let it.

Let the good thing be good. Let the bright thing be bright. Let the person who sees me see me,

all the way, the manageable and unmanageable both, the armor and the person who is tired of wearing it, the careful version and the one underneath who is not careful at all, who is actually just hoping,

just quietly, terribly, beautifully

hoping.

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I am working on the trust.

I am working on letting the good thing be good without immediately building the prosecution.

It is the hardest thing I have ever tried to do.

It is also, I think, the most important.

The good thing is here.

Let it be here.

Just

let it.