Shooting

There was a time when I would frequently contemplate unleashing shoot after shoot on people. I always liked the idea of being blatantly, harshly honest. Stingingly honest. Nothing, I thought, was better than the truth. Nothing.

But I have a problem. The problem is that, deep down, I don't actually want anybody to know the truth. I don't want people to know the truth about what I think, what I feel, what I believe. I have said before that I tell lots of people lots of things about my life, some more than others, but nobody ever gets all the information. And all the information has never been given. Even if all the people I've ever befriended collaborated, the story would be dreadfully incomplete. And that's the way I like it.

I found it was easier - and sometimes more fun - to simply work people. I mean work as in "working the system," I suppose. Part of this was from necessity. A survival tactic, so to speak. I don't mean survival in the sense that I would be dead otherwise, but survival of identity, of self, and of the appearance of normalcy. If I didn't deliberately, carefully pick and choose everything then life could go terribly awry.

Clearly, I'm a control freak. I don't so much care what other people do, but I need my situation to be controlled. And, I suppose, that sometimes means I need to manipulate others to fit into a particular strategic plan. I use people. The funny thing is, I don't use people for horrible things. I don't use friends for money, women for sex, or anything horrible like that. I use people to fulfill needs. Real needs. Mental needs, emotional needs, the need to be able to not just be a part of a situation but to be able to maintain control over a situation.

You see, I'm not very spontaneous. I'm not whimsical (or whimish, as I may have said in a past life). I'm calculating. I'm big on details. I plan for everything and back up the back-up plans. I like to be prepared. Always. Of course, I've acted as if I were spontaneous. I've pretended to act on a whim. I've faked this idea of some freewheeling experience. Where we end up, nobody knows. But I would always know. Or, at the very least, I would have a decent idea.

I'm not saying this works perfectly all the time. Far from it. Being this way I am entirely devoid of any skills necessary for real, proper social interaction. I never learned those skills. I learned pretend skills. I taught myself how to get by undetected. I taught myself how to make others believe that everything was 100% fine. I worked others.

Recently it has occurred to me - rather painfully, I might add - a few important things. The first is that I do not always consider all the possibilities. The second is that sometimes a person simply is not capable of being worked. And, the third, is that failing to create that ideal situation in my own demented mind can lead to a complete irreparable collapse of the entire circumstance. It has happened that the one possibility I did not account for, primarily because it's far too ridiculous for anybody to even comprehend, has occurred. My refusal to adequately pass along information - about self, intentions, etc. - led to false notions. And those false notions inspired actions and feelings that I did not anticipate.

And I'm not sure I can fix it. In fact, I'm almost certain I can't. And I'm a fixer. For me to not be able to fix a problem is traumatic. That is especially true when the problem was my fault. I screwed up. I'm not sure how, exactly. I thought I had everything properly communicated. I thought I had revealed enough, but for once, I did not. And it cost me.

Most people seem to have a problem with properly discriminating between "do tell" and "don't tell." I usually don't. For reasons that I will keep to myself, I absolutely must hide from others. Not everything. But enough. Most people jump out into the open, there, ready for the world to see it all. I guess I'm just a little more modest than that.

This is a shoot. This is me being honest. Yet, still, I'm working anybody who reads this. I have omitted details. I have chosen to only tell you so much. Have I opened up? Absolutely. But, like always, I have opened up just enough. So, to everybody out there, I apologize because I will not change. You must let the story unfold. All I can promise is that one day the pages will be laid in front of you and then, just maybe, you will understand. But until then, unfortunately, I have to make a difficult decision. I might have to take another person's book away before they get to the end.

So it goes.