IBK’s JOURNAL (Entry 21)
April 15
1:32am… Mood: I want someone to grab my butt and tell me I’m good looking.
Part of being older is learning to deal with your own issues. Learning to identify when you are being unnecessarily you – in my case, being too paranoid about my future and relationship and all that. In the past, I’d carry my problems to my friend’s laps and moan and groan about my deep insecurities, but now, I just try to figure it out on my own. Sometimes it can’t be helped because who you would have loved to talk to is probably just as paranoid as you are and withdraws into his shell when you bring your issues up.
So, I tell myself “Down boy, sit! That’s a good boy. Now what is the problem?” I become my own shrink, like Aku in the new Samurai Jack series. And usually, I realise there wasn’t a problem to begin with or I realise worrying wouldn’t solve anything or I work myself up worse than I was before.
Like right now, as I’m writing this, so many things are on my mind. School, mother, father (my father has become a problem, but not in a way I’m inclined to share), boyfriend, existential crisis, artistic crisis, same old shii. It doesn’t help that I have become vainer than I usually am; these days, I hate that my stomach swells after each meal and that I have laugh lines which make me look like an older, uglier version of Sasuke’s elder brother, and that my face feels chubby. And I’m wondering if this is old age catching up with me as my metabolism slows. And then I’m thinking, the fuck! I am 23 and I’m growing older, and that in itself is scary, and I don’t know why it is scary, but maybe it’s because I was 18 just a little while back and now it’s crept up on me, and fuck, I’m growing old and I’m here accomplishing nothing… Yes. This is how I panic.
Then I try to do something. I paint. I sing. But it all seems like rubbish or like I’ve not moved past where I was last year. It’s the same old brush strokes or the same old strumming pattern and I still don’t have the hang of what this ‘Show, don’t tell’ is in writing that seems to be the magic key to unlocking unbelievable writing skills.
And it kind of just spirals down like that till I have to distract myself with a movie or something. I wonder how I do it and not crack under the weight of my thoughts. Maybe they really aren’t that heavy. Maybe I’ve just gotten better at telling myself that people have it worse than me so I shouldn’t complain. Maybe I’m scared of complaining because it’d either show cracks that have always been there or cause new cracks to appear.
I guess one of the blessings I have is routine. Routine helps. Part of the reason I probably (remember to) feel like this is because I have time to. We are on strike. If we weren’t, they’d go to the back of my mind as I attend my 8 – 5classes.
But yeah, I keep things to myself mostly these days. And if I share, it’s probably not that serious.
*
My mum told me in the car as she dropped me off at the garage that she got a revelation that I’d be a professor. I told her that I’m not going to read another vet-related book because of school. She was like, “Masters will be different.”
How?!
I have wavered between being miserable to being sort of okay (more of the former) while doing this course. What makes you think me doing my Masters for the course will make me feel better. Are you trying to kill me? And why are you still blind after all these years? Is it really for my own good or because you want to burst with pride while telling your church pals that your son is now a professor? Is it some sort of inferiority complex that I have started to smell on you that’s starting to show itself?
I wish I could say all that I’ve said in the above paragraph to her, but I couldn’t, because home training and I’m a coward.
*
3:17am, on a Saturday, and I am pretty intoxicated. So I am going to write what is on my intoxicated mind and I am going to send to Pinky.
First of all, I love Pookie… I think I do… I dunno… I hope I do.
Secondly, being intoxicated is awesome because you know it feels like you’re floating on air and your inhibitions are gone. But my inhibitions aren’t gone too much because I don’t think I’m going to tell my people to fuck off and let me live my life.
I need to pee… But I have a shy bladder and humans are around me.
I’m such a sucker. I hope everything ends out right in the end, but I have a feeling it won’t and then I’m going to have no choice but to kill myself because the pain will be too much. But right now, I feel like I’m floating on air, and it feels good. Is this how people become alcoholics?
I didn’t write for a while because I got scared of writing. I’m not good at it. I’m not good at a lot of things. Maybe singing, but I’m just faking it till I make it.
It’s so difficult when you’re a Nigerian. And it sucks to be a poor Nigerian. Otodogbame is a good example, with the vicious Lagos government and the woebegone denizens. Somebody fucking died and I feel helpless, so helpless. I don’t know what to do because people have lost their homes and it sucks and all people are doing about the horror is tweeting and retweeting, and that won’t do much good in the end because people’s lives have been disrupted, and I have all this privilege because I was lucky in a way.
I hate myself. And I love myself. I have a rocky relationship with myself and I’m tired of it. I want to be happy in the end. Is there happiness in death? I don’t know… I want to know.
In the end, we will all be free… In life or in death, we will be free. As atoms or in the sky as angels, we will be free.
Written by IBK
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14 Comments
Kenny
April 16, 08:27“I wish I could say all that I’ve said in the above paragraph to her, but I couldn’t, because home training and I’m a coward.”
You actually can, in a way that depicts your home training. You should ‘stand up’ to her on certain issues respectfully of course. I mean it’s your life and you’re an adult now.
And I always wondered why you never opted for something else apart from vet medicine, you could have been happier and with better grades sef.
IBK
April 16, 09:40One day, one day. But today is not that day. Nor is it tomorrow. But one day sha.
beejay
April 16, 08:49“Somebody fucking died and I feel helpless, so helpless”. *heavy sighs*
Canis VY Majoris
April 16, 08:56Join the line.
Mandy
April 16, 09:16This is a nice ramble. Put out your insecurities on display. Shows the mind of a person going through life’s uncertainties.
And boy, life’s got plenty uncertainties. I’m happy one moment, then sad. Then angry. Then helpless. Then positive. Then depressed. Then sunshiny. Then loved. Then heartbroken.
The way life keeps spinning us like a yoyo, I just want at it: “WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU WANT!”
IBK
April 16, 09:38You’d think it’d be over once your hormones as a teen have settled but nooo. You just learn to function better while you’re slowly chipping away inside. Gotta love adulting.
Mitch
April 16, 10:13“I have wavered between being miserable to being sort of okay (more of the former) while doing this course. What makes you think me doing my Masters for the course will make me feel better. Are you trying to kill me? And why are you still blind after all these years? Is it really for my own good or because you want to burst with pride while telling your church pals that your son is now a professor? Is it some sort of inferiority complex that I have started to smell on you that’s starting to show itself?”
This is exactly what I want to tell my mother whenever she comes up with her expectations that by the time I’m 30, I would be a professor married with kids. Most days, I feel like slapping her to the polar opposite of where I am. It’s just so bloody frustrating
Delle
April 16, 11:11I do not know if it’s just me or if it’s my paranoia rearing it’s head but I think I sense a suicidal undertone in this entry and I’m seriously hoping I’m wrong.
You are fine the way you are. And I think you have come to that stage in your life where you know exactly what it is you want and what you don’t want. You put a lot of things into consideration and you think a lot. It’s not always healthy and yes, it’s one of the reasons there are alcoholics.
I’ve stopped living for anyone but myself and life has never held more meaning.
Lopez
April 16, 12:35Its not only you Delle that saw that undertone. This is not u Ibk nd this cant be u… u r stronger than most of us when we were ur age. u’ll be fine it is just a matter of time, trust me.
ambivalentone
April 16, 13:07I am feeling I just read the thots of a raving lunatic. *crosses self*
Michael
April 16, 13:48While you’re busy here body shaming yourself, just know that someone is here crushing on you.
Pink Panther
April 16, 13:53Awww…
Icarus
April 16, 15:02Ok. This write up just put a lot of fears in me. Especially the whole existential crisis thing.
I feel you are in a dark place now.( maybe I’m wrong) but always know that it will pass. Troubles will come, there will be days that you might contemplate the unthinkable but always remember that life is always worth living. Don’t give up.
Write down all your fears in a paper, acknowledge them but don’t let them hold you down. Just promise yourself that you will live life little by little. Making sure each day is better than the last. When you’re done, burn the paper and move on. Keeping all this in mind.
Jide
April 16, 19:21I didn’t (impatiently) wait for you to return to your journals only for you to pen suicide notes. Please, its never that bad. Stay cheerful.