This way to the human race – indifference

Pull the blinds

on your emotions

Switch off your face. 

Put your love into neutral

This way to the human race.

–  Spike Milligan – 

I have to be honest, I don’t fully understand this short poem. It appeals to me, even if I do not completely get its meaning. Linguistically. It often happens to me with poetry, it remains obscure, maybe because it is not in my mother tongue. I had to choose among three poems one to talk about for a short essay for my English course (it started again today!) and I chose the only one I do not understand. This is ridiculous, but it is just like me. Always going the difficult way. It is in line with my character in general, if I can take a plane road or a winding path, I choose the latter. 

The question is: "what images does the poem create in your mind?" 

This is what appealed to me. I often speak about a sort of "indifference", the mask of an emotionless robot which steps in every time I could get hurt. In reality, I do care about people or situations which might hurt me, but I learned that indifference is the only way to react in order not to suffer too much. One of the examples I mention the most is my relationship with Marvin: does he care? Does he not? He sometimes ignores me for days, then he wants me to travel to Basel as if he could not stay one more day without me; sometimes he tries to make me jealous talking about other (attractive) women while he knows that I feel utterly ugly, and sometimes he makes me a lot of compliments – so many that the whole situation becomes quite soppy -. How can I rely on such a companion? How could I ever totally invest my feelings in our relationship, trust him completely? There was a time in which I used to do it, and it was like playing with fire. I burnt myself. I’m not doing it again. As a consequence, every time something goes the "wrong" way, I pull the blinds on my emotions. 

Also, I try to hide many things that go the "wrong" way. Not showing they are going wrong. Maybe this could be described as a sort of switching off my face. I am that accustomed to swallow so much sorrow as far as my social life is concerned that sometimes I believe I am the one I pretend to be. My social life is made of going to town to do the grocery shopping, going to my English lessons, going to therapy and being at home. No friends. A pseudo-companion in Basel. Some pseudo-friends in Basel. Many friends on the Internet, but I would like to be able to share with them (you) much more than words on a computer screen. 

I have dreams. Projects. Take the proficiency exams; go back to University and take a master in Philosophy; marry and give birth to little Gabriel or little Giorgia, be stable enough to take care of the child, have a happy marriage and work; take care of my parents and always be there for them. But a very important part of those dreams is also that I would like my parents to see them come true. My father is an old man. I pray that he might live to be hundred; but nobody knows what the future will bring. I am aware that some things which concern my projects depend on me, like studying for the exams; but many others not, for example if my father will see my University graduation or if my illness will allow me to go my way. 

Those existential fears – not just the fear of not being able to show others, in this case my parents, that I can do something, but the fear of not being able to reach my goals at all – are always with me, whirling in my mind, and if I want to live a normal quiet life I have to become indifferent to them and ignore them. In general, I know that I can rely only on myself. 

I always put my love into neutral. As a rule, I love my parents, and apart from them I try not to get too much attached to anybody. I live in line with the rule that I don’t want to depend on anybody else than on my parents, so that even if I lose someone, I won’t suffer that much. When thinking of "losing someone" I don’t really think of their death, but of abandonment. I experienced abandonment many times in my life, by people I used to love very much: as friends, as partners, as fellow students. My illness was maybe the thing that made me open my eyes on whom was at my side and whom was not. After the outburst of my illness, I lost so many "friends": they maybe visited me once in hospital, and then disappeared from my life all of a sudden. This rejection goes on even nowadays, every time I try to contact people from the past: either they are too busy, or they take another lame excuse to avoid me. 

It leaves a bitter test in my mouth but… is this way to the human race<span style="font-family: 'Bookman Old

Style’; font-size: 14px; “>?