Guys, I gotta apologize for something. I know I look like such a friggin lumberjack in this brown plaid. I didn’t do my laundry and I had to steal one of my moms shirts 😔.
Sorry, that’s a reference to Danny’s most recent video. The opening made me want to throw my iPad at the wall. There was some self-aware irony in the deprecating comment about his glasses, but perhaps not enough. This man would have you believe he knows nothing of what goes on on tumblr dot com, and for some reason I don’t think that is the case.
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I’m afraid I wasted all my luck on the first day of the year, on dumb mobile games at that. You know I’m not doing so hot when the gacha games get re-installed. I’ve been playing Azur Lane –
- and full disclosure, it is a guilty habit in the most literal sense. I do not endorse it at all, for the simple fact that they push way too far into characters that are drawn to look too young. I’m somewhat desensitized to it from my weeb childhood, but please do not give this company your money.
That said, I’ve been playing for 2 or 3 weeks, and I decided to pull a character on the standard banner. If you’ve never played a gacha like genshin impact, imagine those capsule vending machines that they’d have at the local mom ‘n pop fast casual place. One quarter and you’d get a random toy. ….Ok I’m realizing….that comparison is dating me a little bit, because blind boxes are almost certainly a more timely point of reference. Anyway. My first pull, no rate up or anything, at 2am the first day of this year, was a Super Rare!! A 7% chance, so slightly better odds than rolling a nat 20 in DnD.
But then tonight, I also got a shiny in Pokémon Go!!! And it was my favorite of the event mons! That’s either a 1/64 or 1/128, probably the former.
All that yellow/gold! A very auspicious color where luck and joy is concerned.
I was out with my dad when I caught the HootHoot. I joke with him about synchronicities and spiritual stuff. It took me a while to get comfortable with that. I experienced such a cartoonish wide eyed rack zoom a few months ago, at this terrifying realization – the final boss of my inner child work was not actually my mom, but my dad. I don’t even want to call it a twist “villain”, because he isn’t, but that’s what makes the problem so invisible.
It’s hard not to put my dad on a pedestal. Objectively, he is a one in a million guy. In terms of compassion, intelligence, love, humor – he has flaws like anyone, but it’s green flags everywhere you look on his character sheet. That, coupled with my mom’s abuse in a single child family, made my dad the life raft. The life line. My mom showed me what abandonment felt like, and losing my dad’s approval would make that abandonment total. To a toddler’s nervous system, that is life or death.
Dad is very warm and friendly, but it is a curated openness – there is never vulnerability. You don’t notice at first because it looks very different from the way it presents in most guys. It’s a subtle editing of the narrative, one that keeps ugly or embarrassing emotions out of sight. One that is looking for any opportunity to turn the conversation away from himself, away from who he is deeper down. He is also not naturally physically affectionate.
So I had imprinted in my mind the template of a male savior who was kind, encouraging, loving, even, but emotionally distant. Mom was binding my feet, and dad was praising how daintily and demurely I walked – not realizing what was really happening to facilitate that “good girl” behavior. Mom did not show her harsher side when dad got home from work, and I was calmed down or at least disassociated. “Don’t you go running to dad. You wanna turn him against me? See what happens, you little liar. You wanna be spoiled? Go ahead, let him spoil you. Be the pretty princess. Let him turn you into a selfish brat.”
I hate that my mother becomes the bad guy in all these stories – that’s a very one sided picture. In all honesty, I believe she had good intentions. Unfortunately, she had intense projected self-hatred. Her Dad was almost always away for work, and her Mom was left alone with 5 kids to raise. It cultivated the worst kind of Elder Sister, Co-Mom guilt. She would tell me “I never did enough for my mom, she was an angel but she didn’t hold me accountable. I should have done more, she should have taught me to do more. I don’t want you to live with that.” The problem was, her guilt and self loathing kept her from feeling, or even believing in, the love around her. She thought she was unlovable, and wanted to mold me into someone who was. Instead, I reflected back her fear, her neurosis – taking cruelty as truth and love as lies. She was incredibly intelligent, and had a deep capacity for self awareness, but her own childhood trauma and emotional issues made her unable to take that understanding into moments of overwhelm.
Here is where all that ties into this moment, in a very Pixar, generational trauma sort of way. I find myself, cautiously, noticing and accepting signs of spring. After a long, harsh winter in the hermit’s cave, I see rays of golden sunshine peaking through. It feels like a trap. It could be. At least, there are traps to fall into. Will this outdated and toxic survival strategy poison the well when it comes to the best the world of men has to offer? Will I lose myself by becoming only a mirror to the men I admire, and finding familiar comfort in men who neg and abuse? I refuse.
When I was learning to ride a bike, I practiced coasting downhill at a local park. At the bottom of the grassy indent was a drain. I used to stare at it intently, chanting “don’t hit the drain, don’t hit the drain, don’t hit the drain.” Of course, I barreled right into it. That’s where all my focus was. Self awareness is not enough, I need to also have an alternate trajectory. Were I so blessed that more needle-in-a-haystack men like my dad came into my life, what would a healthy relationship look like? Be that as a friend, a mentor, a partner, whatever.
Healing most of the self hatred was an essential first step. Choosing to disengage from my mom and our co-dependant relationship, even when it triggered my deepest fear that my dad would see me as a bad, selfish, ungrateful daughter, was a turning point. We are on the other side of that trust fall, and I still have my dad’s respect, if not more so. However, in a fresh relationship, that same level of trust will not be there. The risk of abandonment is real. Fortunately, as I’ve come to see it, I’ve been through that as well. I was shattered and shattered and shattered again, throwing myself at situations where people were emotionally unavailable. Yet, I’m still here. It didn’t end me, in the way it felt like it would as it was happening. The more it happened, the easier it got.
I don’t have the evidence to trust that I won’t be constantly rejected. It’s not fair of the universe to ask that of me. Yet, I will. Why? I’ll explain, in something I wrote a few months ago –
When your younger years were defined by rejection and abuse, you develop the feeling that you don’t belong. That feeling extends beyond people or places, to your entire life on earth. You internalize the sense that you are inherently a burden. Your choices are to hide, or be useful – not a person, but a gift of service. In that sense, your right to take up space, socially or physically, feels tenuous. Conditional.
Understand that this perspective is rational, based on historical evidence. Often overwhelming evidence. For many years, perhaps decades, it was not safe to trust. You didn’t belong. You were a passive irritant, only valued for your utility. You feel gaslit when counselors or spiritual guides tell you can be loved for who you are, everyone can. Maybe that’s something you’ve never experienced before, despite people telling you that’s impossible. Maybe there were times when love was available, but you couldn’t believe it was real.
What makes you take the leap, and risk another round of trauma? It’s only when the pain of being unseen is intolerable. Life has meaning through connection. Life without it is not living, it’s survival. When the isolation becomes so profound that the dark suffocation feels like death itself, you aren’t risking your life when you jump. At a certain threshold, emotional pain will overcome the body’s will to survive. You can choose to silently drown, or you can risk splattering on to cement. But your chance at life is only on the other side of the jump.
The trick is, even if that leap takes place, the rejection that was predicted will almost certainly occur. It’s as brutal as you imagined – because again, the choice you made was rational. Once you learned to cope by being an invisible servant, you attracted people who were drawn to that energy. You found comfort in the dynamic because it was familiar. When you reveal yourself to those people, it’s unlikely they will respond well, even if it’s just because the change is uncomfortable.
So here we are. You took the risk. You lay with broken bones on the cold, hard ground. But you are still breathing. Don’t worry! Leap again. Keep leaping until you find something soft. You can do it. Everyone deserves love, everyone finds their people in the end, if they show up honest and loving like you are.
‘I’m not like other people. I’m different…that’s the problem. Show me the evidence. Why should I trust?’
If you want to live while your consciousness is here on earth, you have no choice but to try. Delusional trust will make the trying easier.
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It’s always interesting when Danny and Drew post on the same day, to compare and contrast their styles. I shouldn’t have a favorite, but anyone who knows me would rightly laugh in my face if I tried to say there wasn’t a bias. It’s not a rationally justified one. I don’t even rate one’s talent more than the other’s, genuinely. In fact, in many ways I relate more to Drew – the analytical approach, the dry cynicism, the intellectualizing. He scratches the same itch as Bo Burnham.
Danny is…Danny’s humor is a medicine that resonates with the deepest, most hidden part of my soul. The inner child that was locked away, one that believed in uncomplicated love and joy. Someone unabashedly sappy, and silly. Drew validates the terror and disillusionment I feel, and shows me how to accept the cold comfort of gallows humor and distraction. Danny makes me believe there is a sunrise within the human spirit that is worth gritting my teeth through this dark night for. Both are needed at this moment in time. Danny just, ironically, draws me in exactly because he brings out parts I push away, rather than reinforce what I already feel comfortable in. I believe he can be that light for millions more people, if he keeps following the creative spark inside him.
Still, I sometimes feel guilty that I am so true blue team Danny. Putting aside the obvious fact that there is no inherent competition, I want to share one more analogy in the form of a personal anecdote before I go, as unnecessary justification. There’s a little danger in this making it sound like my support for Danny is manufactured… actually, no, there’s 0 danger of that. I don’t think anyone could look at the art I’ve made over the last 5 years and call it cynical.
My dad took me to ASU football games throughout my childhood, starting from when I was a literal baby. I looooved cheering on the team, and making Sparky proud. As I got older, though, (maybe 11 or 12) something started to trouble me. We managed to keep pretty good seats behind the endzone because dad kept up the season tickets, and we were very close to the away team section. They were a little square, overlooking their mascot and cheerleaders. This, I decided, was unconscionable.
One day, when it was time to leave for the game, I came out of my room in all blue with my cat stuffed animal. “Dad, I want to root for the other team. It’s just not fair that they have so few people. I think they would like to see their color in our section too. I still want ASU to win in my heart of hearts, but I think it probably makes the other team play worse if they can barely hear the cheering, mostly just booing. It’s not really fair if ASU wins, then, is it?”
I don’t remember my dad’s exact reaction, but I do know he let me go in the blue with the cat. I wasn’t allowed to cheer much — “they have sections for a reason, and we have to keep our season tickets”. This was a bold choice because blue and a cat – that could only have been a UofA game, ie, against our rival team. But, as far as football goes, the beef was fairly tame. I was a kid, so no one took much notice. Plus, I’m sure my dad felt he couldn’t say no to me wanting to bring “justice” to football, despite it being so out of touch with reality.
That kind of mentality has stuck with me, I think. I see so many people online singing Drew’s praises, and rightly so. People who are more eloquent than me, more charismatic, with much more reach than I have. My voice feels unnecessary. Danny seems to have a much younger fanbase, at least in terms of who is engaged in the online discourse. I don’t believe his humor is inherently more juvenile, I think it’s just that minecraft thing: it has an all ages appeal, which can skew the perception of the intended audience. I find some use in lending my perspective on his comedy, for other people my age who would enjoy him if they understood the way his comedy was packaged. God forbid it could even be encouraging to Danny himself, if he ever saw it. I don’t immediately strike that down as a narcissistic thought, only because if I had a following and someone was constantly yapping about me, particularly in a complimentary way, I would for sure be snoopin’.
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This was a long one and it’s 4am, I can’t think of a neat way to tie it back to lumberjack me and shiny pixels with artificial scarcity. I guess I’ll say that finding your people, your tribe, does kinda feel like a friend gacha sometimes. I’m afraid I’m the type of weird that needs a Super Rare to jive with, and that means surviving a lot of rejection. But maybe this year, the first one I pull will be a One. The necessary next in my fulfilling, unconditionally loving few.
>>robyns_ramblings 