Isolation

I prefer to be alone. Growing up, I felt as if there was no one to defend, protect, value and recognise me. Early on, I learnt the benefits of separation as a way of coping with this reality. But, the emotional stuntedness, detachment and isolation I began to experience as a result, left me feeling disconnected from others, especially the people who were “supposed” to love me. I don’t pretend to speak for all people with dysfunctional backgrounds, but we tend to feel numb and consequently unable to form healthy relationships. Because we feel like aliens, the best we can do is to imitate behaviours that help us pass off as human. Even when we are besotted with someone, we struggle to connect on anything more than a superficial level because we are afraid of exposure.

The wasteland within

To me, love is an unattainable ideal, an experience I must be denied. Somewhere, in the recesses of my soul, a siren sweetly sings of how hateful, shameful and worthless I am. My relationships fail because I subconsciously engineer them to do so. My inner landscape is so devastated that I am incapable of inviting anyone in. In fact, I dread visiting there, myself! If they saw what a wasteland it is, they would run for the hills! I don’t invest much of myself in a relationship—I dare not! Too many forbidden forests would have to be visited and too many treacherous tombs excavated in order for me to open up in any meaningful way. And so, I play along until the relationship comes to its inevitable end. With the self-sabotage complete, I can retreat again to the familiar places.

Beautiful barrenness

One gets used to the wastelands. So much so that the barrenness becomes beautiful. Any green is regarded with suspicion. How can there be green when there is no rain? When the storms bring only darkness and howling winds, blowing up disorientating clouds of dust? Surely, there are only thorns and weeds to choke the ruins of what could have been? Aren’t all the landmarks hills of anger, pain and sadness, the constants we learn to love over time? They seem inextricable from the landscape, how can one ever abandon them for happiness? Is happiness not just an unexpected flower that wilts and withers the moment it is seen? (And what a relief when it does, no longer there to remind us of our loss!)

Finding the fields

And yet, there is hope! Occasionally, I come across fields of wildflowers, miraculous and wonderful. I discover them in the wastelands when music, like an irresistible siren song, draws me to where they are. Once there, I can destroy myself on the rocks of beauty to be reborn for a moment into something free, hopeful, vulnerable, honest, unspoilt and untamed! I wish I could remain there, but as I wander the wasteland, traversing vast stretches of everyday life, the fields are soon forgotten. I even forget that music is who I am, it is what I should do. Distracted, I stumble aimlessly along. And that is why I created Forgotten Fields. It is like a map and compass, reminding me that the fields exist, that I must not forget them, that music is the way to find them. Dear reader, what is your music? What is your map and compass? May you find it, soon!

FORGOTTEN FIELDS