Prison

I noticed after dark how much snow had fallen - and was continuing to fall. Inches of it, coating the ground. For once, my dad hadn't shoveled the walkway before I got a chance to appreciate the pristine nature of an unmarred snowfall. The porch light was on, illuminating the snow on the ground, and the snowflakes in the air. It was pretty. Very pretty. Seeing it makes me feel excited. It makes me feel desire. Like I want to do something, but I'm not entirely sure what it is. I want to sit there and watch the snowfall, but I know I can't stay long before I have to go back up and hide in my room. And then, the porch light will be turned off and it will be night and there won't be much to see in the darkness.

The snow is transient. I know it will melt away soon enough - and even before that, it will harden, and it will be trampled on and shoveled aside, and its beauty will be impaired. Sure, it snows every winter, and more than once, but there are only a handful of limited time periods each year when the snow can be fully appreciated - as it is falling, and while it is covering the land. It's not enough for me. I understand that it's fleeting, but it's /too/ fleeting. I want to capture it and keep it with me so I can enjoy it anytime I like. Like trapping light in a magic vial to use when the shadows overtake you, I want to trap the snowfall in a bottle, to be enjoyed at my leisure. But I know this is impossible. I feel antsy and anxious - I want to go out in the snow, I want to immerse myself in it, I want to stay by the window and do nothing else all day, yet I cannot. I want to make the most of it, because I know it will be gone so quickly, and I'll have felt it a wasted opportunity.

I can think of nothing else. I can do nothing else. My attention is forever drawn towards the window, towards the outside world. I have to be there. But I can't. But I have to. I feel the same way during any form of strong weather, particularly thunderstorms. But thunderstorms are often even more transient than snowstorms - though they tend to occur slightly more frequently in this climate. So the pain doesn't last as long.

I can't move, I can't act, yet I can't let go either, until I move, until I act. But I can't and I won't, and so I'm frozen in place. Stuck. Paralyzed. I cannot move forward, and I cannot go backward. To do either would be a release from my pain, but I do not have the power. I am powerless. Impotent. A slave to forces outside my control. I know the key to breaking their hold over me is simply to cast off my chains and march, yet I cannot do it. It is no easier for me than it is for a man locked up in literal chains to break them apart with sheer will power. It is an impossible feat. And I know thinking of it that way makes certain my defeat, but still I cannot change. I can imagine only the many ways things would go wrong, and each one is strong enough to discourage me from advancing. From where ought I to get the strength to plow forward? Where does that resolve come from? I want it bad enough, but that alone is not sufficient. For it is not my only concern, and the other concern is my fear, and it overpowers everything. It is omnipotent, it is stronger than my desire, stronger than my frustration, stronger than my reason. Nothing can overpower my fear, it is absolute. The only way to change this would be to accept scenarios that I cannot abide. How can I do such a thing? I would be a different person. Yet I want to be a different person. Yet I'm afraid to do it. I'm terrified. Frightened, like a scared puppy. I don't know of what, exactly.

I can imagine a world where I am ridiculed, openly and constantly. Just like I am in my head but in actuality. I don't know what the effects of this would be; I imagine it could not be worse than the internal pain I suffer from merely imagining it. In fact, I want to believe that it would be beneficial, that it would cure me of my fear. And yet to walk into it is impossible for me. On the other hand, I realize that my fears are irrational, and I would not be ridiculed to the extent that I imagine. However, one thing I know for certain is that I will continue to imagine it - that will not go away, certainly not at first, at any rate. And as long as I imagine it, I suffer. Since I cannot stop it, the next best thing is to reduce my exposure. I crawl away and hide from people, to give them less opportunity to observe me and judge me, and therefore give my mind less room to imagine criticism. I avoid the world. The solution, you say, is to step out and face the world, and yet doing so would be to immediately increase my suffering to an immeasurable extent. I understand the reasoning, the potential longterm benefits, but can you really expect me to do this? I'd just as soon stab myself in the heart, and that's not about to happen.

So I sit here, frozen, and do the only thing I am capable of doing. Feeding my anxiety.