Casa de Memoria – Part 2

Featured artist: Bunk, Armadale

Three pictures hang on the wall. Three girls that I knew in school, before boys, money and booze even entered into our lives. Three girls that I laughed with, cried with, and sang silly songs with. And boy, did I sing my share of silly songs. We fought off monkeys together, we prayed together, we daydreamed together, and yes, I confess, we chucked classes together. Not that I chucked that many classes in my years in school. But there were definitely a few chucked classes.

I think of them now, and I don’t recognize them anymore. The faces on the wall bear no resemblance to the women they are now.

That got me thinking. When I look at my girl-turned-women friends… girls that I grew up with, in high school.. and I look at them now… you can generally tell at a glance what has changed/influenced them the most. I look at the first girl.. tall, leggy, Indian beauty, really. She was always slim, but looking at her now… I can’t help but think.. ‘skeletal’. I hear of the constant stream of guys going through her life, and it’s not too big a mental leap to come to the conclusion that for her, the male race has probably changed her the most.

The second face is a lovely, laughing girl with wild hair. I remember her as the girl who was game to do anything, no matter how silly they were. She was an incredible listener, and one of my fiercest champions.. she was the kind who would go out on a limb to defend the people closest to her. Now all people have to say about her is how much she drinks.

Then I turned my attention to.. me. What’s changed me more than anything else? The usual suspects – money, boys and booze - while I’ve had my fair share of them, (boys and booze, that is) they haven’t quite changed who I am. With me it was more like… trying it on for size… then deciding that I didn’t like it, and then discarding it.

I’ve thought about it the past number of days. I guess.. the one thing that’s really changed ME.. the way I think, and feel, and act, is.. work. 6 years ago, I’d never have picked that I’d be managing a design studio. Me, with my lack of artistic flair, mismatched colours and sun-chickens*. I imagined myself in a courtroom, or in a social worker’s chair, or in a church, or even, in a prison**.

Instead, I’m working in an industry I had no prior knowledge of, no prior training in, and nothing but personality and hard work to get me by. In so many ways, and this is probably unhealthy, I measure myself by my work. When I know I’ve been productive, I feel extremely good about myself. When I haven’t really got too much done in the day.. I feel horrible.

I work with people who couldn’t be more different from me. Skin colour, hair colour, background, language, beliefs, habits, temperaments.. couldn’t be more different. I now expect less of people, and more of myself. I never imagined I would become a superficial person, but the truth is, I am. My relationships are superficial now, because I am too used to keeping people at a distance. I have settled into ‘never quite being one of them.’ I mean, sure, I laugh and joke and work with them, but I’ll never be one of them, no matter how hard I try. There’s a chasm between me and them that I don’t think I’ll ever be able to bridge.

You know that feeling you get when you were in school, and you kinda felt that everyone was talking about you behind your back? Well, it’s still there, only it’s not school anymore. It’s not just your reputation or ‘face’ on the line, it’s your job, your livelihood, your daily routine. You can’t pretend you’re sick and just stay home from school anymore, because it’s not playtime anymore. It’s the real world.

I know I’m being paranoid, and that’s the other way I’ve changed since joining the workforce. With so much at stake, the more I hide who I am and what I’m really thinking. Sometimes it’s hard to differentiate what I portray from what I really think and feel. It takes a bit of work digging beneath the public me and private me, and to be quite honest, most of the time I can’t be bothered.


*Chickens that I used to draw that looked like suns. Or the other way around. Can't remember.
** Prison Ministry, not incarceration.