Curiosity, Gift or a curse?

A gift or a curse?

Since I can remember, I have always been very different then many. I was always trying to figure out the world and understand everything that was going on around me. I loved so innocently my whole life, no matter how hurt I felt. I felt more for others then I did for myself . In my younger years I never really thought anything of it , to me it was normal to feel close to everyone I came in contact with. I wouldn’t know you from a hole in the wall but if you wanted to play, we were best friends. It seems that I have carried that over into adulthood as well. Everyone has something to share and I love learning about them.

Life teaches people to become harder and jaded in order to protect themselves from pain. Society teaches people to only accept people who are acceptable. I have to say that those life lessons never really stuck with me, if anything they were just too much work. Of course I have had heart break and disappointments but it never discouraged me. Many people would call it vulnerable or weak but I have to tell you there is nothing weak over here giggles. What I’m trying to say is those feelings have never stuck around enough to effect who I was. I loved being kind and fun. I love the idea of love and caring. Those feelings are natural and easy in a sense. Anger, fear, and resentment were never appealing to me and drained me just thinking about them. Trust me as nice and sweet as all this sounds, it was nowhere near easy going through teenage years with rainbows and unicorns. I experienced the rejection from kids who were probably a lot meaner than adults are. I was teased and picked on my whole life. I never understood what was wrong with me, I just wanted to be everyone’s friends and yea that wasn’t at all what I was accomplishing. For some time I felt very lost, I knew I didn’t deserve to be the outcast but I just didn’t understand why. I never really hated those kids to be honest. I wanted to understand them. I think that was more my curiosity then my caring nature. I was less interested in the fact that I was being teased but more interested in why. Well since that wasn’t going to be a question I found an answer too at that moment, I did the only other I could do and started to internalize. It was constant questions about myself over and over. If I couldn’t figure them out, I was going to figure me out. Someone had to suffer the curiosity I had, Unfortunalty that someone was me.

I was one lost puppy in this world and after years of constant rejection and never fitting in, made my compassion grow more. I know doesn’t really make sense until I did what I always do and started getting curious so digging I went. I came up with the theory that because it was already in my nature to feel for people, the internalizing period of constant beating myself up made me realize how much pain a human can suffer and I didn’t want anyone to have to feel that. I went through physical and verbal child abuse until the age of 11. It never really made me angry as most child abuse kids would be. I felt sadness, can’t really say it was sadness for myself in fact Sadness was never really about me , It was always more of a compassionate sadness if I had to describe it but never really about me.

I seemed to always be this way. Even though, I didn’t have a mother and I was taken away from my father due to abuse, I never felt bad about it. My grandfather was my only guidance and he was one old school Colombian man. There was nothing womanly or nurturing about him, so that part was non existing, but I always knew he loved me even if it wasn’t in your traditional loving way. He always showed his love in his own way, even though I could not see it at the moment, I always felt It. He didn’t say I love you or hugged much for that matter but somehow I knew. Knowing is still different from understanding especially when I would see how parents were with other kids. It was a very frustrating feeling , not that I wanted the same as the kids around me, but more of a fustration of knowing he loved me, but not understanding why he didn’t show it like all the other parents did. It wasn’t until my adult years that I understood he was showing me love the only way he knew how. His love was just as strong as the love of the parents that hugged and said I love you to their kids. It became priceless knowing that, he didn’t need to show his affection physically in order for me to feel it. He always knew I was different and didn’t worry as much about me as he did for my sister. Of course a little jealousy was felt but my sister needed it a lot more than I did. She experienced a lot of abuse and rejection as well and it affected her a lot more than it did me. It wasn’t that he had a favorite, that old man knew that I was going to be just fine .

I viewed everything around me as a teacher. Music, TV, people, kids, animals, and so on was all my teachers. Maybe it was not having that one person that you look for when you need guidance, as sad as that might sound, it really wasn’t. I was able to look for guidance from everything and everyone. I was able to choose what I wanted to take from each experience because it worked for me. I think that is a gift in a way. I never had anyone there to guide me but I was able to find exactly what Evelyn wanted at a very young age. I struggled and questioned a lot sooner than others but it has made being an adult so much easier. If you ask me adulthood sucks wayyyy more than childhood so I’m not complaining.

So is it a gift or a curse? Well I guess it depends on how you look at it or how I feel that day. I say a gift that was wrapped in barb wire and sand paper but once opened contained the beauty of life. The true beauty in this world, which many can’t see because of barb wires and sand paper. Why a curse? A curse because as beautiful and simple as I see the world, its hard understanding exactly how to use it. So I guess that’s my next adventure to satisfy my curiosity , I know I was given something beautiful but how do I understand it well enough to know exactly what I am supposed to do with it ?