the elephant has made its loudest roar
the elephant made its initial appearance during a rainy July night in the middle of lockdown. at that point my heart and soul were at its most vulnerable, with all the time and space I needed to find the answers i have frequently needed. i may have been broke as a depression-era newspaper salesman, surviving only on tofu, vegetables, beans, rice, lentils, eggs, coffee, beer, tobacco, water and weed but i had everything I needed to overcome the uncertainty that certainly marked those days. when i think about that era of my life, i remember my mom being constantly concerned about me being alone, but I’ve never felt more surrounded by all the people who truly love me. of course i used to wander the empty streets by myself, drive around town late at night chasing storms and there were many consecutive days where i was the only person hearing my voice, but i was in constant communication with my closest friends and Dina and I had just mellowed down our months long episode of talking on the phone for 14+ hours per day.
if i remember correctly, i didn’t sleep the night the elephant came into my life and stayed up thinking all about it. ive been known for knowing when someone will matter the most to me the moment we meet, often because that importance has been tied to an idealized version of themselves but at that time those feelings were gone; i was fully aware of how damaged my soul was after doing it most intensely seven months prior. but the moment I sat on that bench and took in the entrance the elephant made, I knew everything was going to change. that night/morning Dina moved back to Mexico City and i knew how all of it would impact our interactions moving forward, how i was now forced to deal with this sudden reality on my own and not with her as my most treasured life companion, the first person I have truly ever loved without any romantic shadows looking over us. i briefly talked to her as she was at the airport terminal, i mentioned the elephant and she started to judge the nature of it all as she usually does but it didn’t matter. whatever statement she could make about it wasn’t going to change how I felt, how i knew deep deep down that things were not going to be the same.
many people have happened since. the criminal came back into my life multiple times, i met the person who showed me there was life after her, i had some-months situationship with a person who blew up my life, i started a job then i started a new job but the constant remained me always waiting for the elephant to roar back. my feelings have always been in-flux regarding her majesty, it’s as if i am constantly overwhelmed by everything that can, has and will happen so i end up grounding my feet in my instant reality and realizing that the immediate present and future is what I can control. nonetheless, I’m always in awe.
i am very proud of the fact that i posses the rare talent of writing as i truly think and speak, there’s really no other way around it. it took me years to unpeel what writing and creating means to me, but it’s become a natural habit to start typing or writing as the thoughts come into my brain. i often write first, then think. due to the nature of my interactions with the elephant, no one has gotten to know me as deeply as she has since that first night. one of the main signs i see when someone will become a before and after in my life is when we spent a full night talking about everything and nothing. these nights are my most treasured memories even if the aftermath was catastrophic, heartbreaking or soul crushing, mostly because it is when i have felt the most alive. and with the elephant, every letter is a night like this, where there’s really no push or pull and it’s all just us pouring our soul into the nature of our interactions. of course I’m going to develop feelings towards the person that has had the biggest window into my soul—at this point it’s even absurd calling it a window when she can freely walk through the door using the key she forged for herself.
a little more than a year after our initial interaction, the elephant switched up how we communicated and we became more personal. she now knew how my reality looked like and it wasn’t all inside her brain, whatever images she created about me were gone and now my name had a face, a nature and a certain way of walking through life. with time, our eternal nights of talking were now accompanied with brief hand wavings, nods and subtle details acknowledging the secret world only us know about.
how the fuck am i not supposed to feel my soul rumbling whenever the elephant roars back?
i don’t think I’ve ever felt as alienated as i do now. i do enjoy my job and the nature of it, the people that i work with and im noticing that certain conversations and solutions come natural to me, but I’m constantly reminded of the fact that i am and will always be at odds with my contemporaries. my identity and the aura around it are seen as something out of a museum, an amusement park, a quirky souvenir shop, a time capsule digged up a while ago — all depending on who you talk to. for the life of me i can’t relate to the people my age there and they feel the same way towards me. there may be some kinship and we ultimately spent more time just a few feet apart than we do alone or at home, but it’s all a constant reminder that i will never fit in with someone my age, that all my life has been full of situations like this one. i remember back in summer camp when i was 6–7 years old i’d always befriend older kids and now i can’t even remember their names. then in school the same thing happened, specially in grades 5th-9th. i used to think that the fact that i could hang with an older crowd meant that i was smarter, more mature or straight up better than people my age. until i quickly realized they were all losers too.
I also went from spending many days and beers with someone that needed no explanations when i would bring up the nature of David Lynch into the conversation, why Raymond Carver is El Paso and how a 700-entry The Beatles iceberg isn’t as crazy as it sounds, to spending my days with people who have a brain aneurysm whenever i even slightly touch the surface about any of these topics that make me Me. and i get it, i really do. my whole life has been miserable and i am only alive because art and my interpretation of it has constantly saved me from myself. and this is a curse that i wouldn’t wish on anyone. yet, i feel like i am alone in a cloud that no one even wants to touch, that i am invited to all the parties as long as I stay in my corner and of course no one wants to drink with me. adding the fact that my friends are also drifting apart, that some of them are getting married, others thinking more about who they want to be and how time is impacting us definitely doesn’t help.
and lately I’ve felt that the elephant fits this description as well. that even though we know each other better than anyone could and the world we created only makes sense to ourselves, there are substantial differences in the core of who we are and i do not know if we can actually overcome them or if they matter. this realization made me feel even more alone, it felt like i shattered the elephant and probably there was always just a person behind it. but it didn’t matter, i have been trying my best to accept the people that i love as they are because if not, then I’ll probably kill myself in a year or two.
but then today, the elephant made its loudest roar and once again wants to deepen the nature of our world, to make it more real and cross all the boundaries we set when it all started. and it certainly can’t be a coincidence that it happened right when my life is solitary and dreadful, right? I’m sure her wisdom is once again creating a new world. and i know i must keep my expectations real because this thing reminds me a lot to what happened three years ago and we all know how that ended. this time it has to be different because i am different too.
it all can’t be a coincidence. i can’t wait to meet her. I’m almost falling asleep. I’ll explore more of this later this week. and talk about Dina coming back and the Frances Ha moment too. I’m so happy I’m alive, i guess.
