making a world for myself

surprise bitch, I bet you thought you'd seen the last of me!

I love games.

Anyone who has ever been at a party with me knows that at some point in the evening, usually once I’m inebriated enough, I’ll call out for the GAMES to begin. I love made up games. “If We Were Famous” and “House or Pancake” to name a few. I love board games, card games, not so much hand games, but yes mind games (see image 1) and the occasional team sport if I’m really up to it. What, kickball is fun!

Games are fun. That is, presuming everyone knows how to play.

I’ve never seen an episode of Survivor.

This is partly because I don’t like reality TV and I especially dislike ones that makes people “survive” something. Maggie Nelson has a whole chapter on reality shows in The Art of Cruelty. If I were putting more time into this piece I would cite it directly but the gist of her argument is that the reality shows where people have to survive something or complete seemingly insurmountable tasks (Fear Factor, The Biggest Loser, etc) are various forms of torture porn for cash prizes. We all saw Squid Game, right? We get the picture.

To me, a person who has never seen it, Survivor, seems like the kind of game where you have to be strategic and for lack of a better word FAKE in order to succeed. People talk about “game play” and alliances and it all seems very High School to me. I mean you vote people off the island because you think they’re useless but you also vote them off because they’re too big of a threat? Very petty. Very 2000s mean girl behavior if you ask me. I apologize to the Survivor lovers in my life for slandering a show I only know about from hearing your discussions. It just isn’t for me. You see, I’m learning a lot about myself these days and one thing I’ve learned is that I am inherently anti- voting people off the island.

I used to say that I am not nice, but I am kind.

Nice is a simple pleasantry. Niceness lies in the little things you do out of impulse like smile when you make eye contact with a stranger. Kindness goes deeper, it’s reflective of what lies in the heart. I used to say that I am not a nice person. That I am instead a kind person. However, I’ve recently come to the at first concerning then liberatory realization that I am nice after all. I guess I had been thinking about nice as a have it or not quality, but like everything it’s a spectrum. When I imagine a spectrum with nice on one end and mean on the other, I really am quite nice. Which is to say that some people really are just so fucking mean! Mean for the sake of being mean. Mean like they think being mean makes them better than you. You know what I mean? I am both nice and kind and I really like that about myself. I choose to be nice.

“each of my children taught me a lesson and you taught me to be nice just because”

My Mom, famously a Mother of one hundred and one children, once said the above. This was years ago and I probably rolled my eyes at the time. But I’ve found myself remembering this conversation recently because I’m learning just how many people really aren’t nice at all. It isn’t that they’re mean per say but rather, they do not make an active effort to be nice. They don’t bother to learn the names of people who work in their building because they only ever see them in the elevator. They don’t say Good Morning to their neighbors even though they pass them at the same time every day. At best, they just stay focused on themselves. At worst, they choose to be mean. Because someone was mean to them once maybe and now they think it’s their turn? Or because they consider themselves above everyone, you know— those clout chasing assholes who wouldn’t give you a second glance unless they thought you could be of use to them in some way. Or my personal favorite: the ones who think being nice is for idiots. The ones who are sooooo intellectually superior that they couldn’t possibly bother with something as plebeian as following any form of social etiquette besides the one they create for themselves. These ones are my favorite because they don’t even try to hide the fact that they look down on you. They want you to feel the ways they consider your little niceties to be a weakness.

It is at the extreme risk of sounding like a Hallmark Card or that crying chick from Mean Girls that I say— being nice is one of my greatest strengths.

I’m a big believer in “lifting as you climb” or “pulling up a seat at the table” however you want to phrase it. In the words of TroyElan Richardson “one thing about you, you gonna get somebody a job” and yes I sure will. We have all heard the phrase “surround yourself with people who say your name in the room when opportunities come up”. I am someone who says people’s names. Period. I always have been. And I always thought we were all out here practicing what we preach? But COME TO FIND OUT, some of y’all are not saying bitches names! Some of y’all are too busy saying your own damn names even though you already in the room to begin with! I thought we were all in this together!! But some of y’all are playing Survivor!!! And what’s the prize?!?! Troy??????

anyways…

I fear I’ve lost the metaphor, so let me be clear—

Kindness is a strength, being a nice person is a strength. For me, being nice is inner child work. I look at pictures of myself as a child

she was so happy.

She always made sure no one felt left out of the games. She told her Mom to be nice just because. She lived with an open heart. She gave kindness and received kindness in return. At some point, she like many others learned to close off in protection. Because to be nice is to be perceived as weak and having an open heart, means being susceptible to pain. But she is finding her way home.

I am learning that my truest self is a person who is kind and intentionally and thoughtfully nice. I am learning to have a wide open heart once again.

Epigraph:

I may have cited this exact passage in a previous newsletter but it is my favorite piece of writing maybe in the whole world.

At night when everyone else is silent and everything is still, I lie in the darkness of my windowless room, the place where they exile me from the community of their heart, and search the unmoving blackness to see if I can find my way home. I tell myself stories, write poems, record my dreams. In my journal I write— I belong in this place of words. This is my home. This dark, bone black inner cave where I am making a world for myself. - bell hooks. Bone Black, Memories of Girlhood