When I was a kid I believed that every time I wanted something I would get it. I would stay up late at night watching the sky, and whenever I managed to spot a falling star I would try to think of something I desired. “My wish will come true! I just know it”. Of course, I knew that there was nothing supernatural about it — still, deep down, I believed there was some sort of benign presence watching over me and making sure I would be happy, no matter what. That positive presence did, in fact, exist: it was privilege. I was born in a wealthy white family, and I did get pretty much anything I wanted, yes — but because we could afford it. Interestingly enough, my belief extended to things that you can’t buy with money (like people’s affection, for example), so when I wouldn’t get them I could easily brush that off by thinking “Yeah, you know, I didn’t want it bad enough, that’s why it didn’t happen.” So clever. “The Fox and the Grapes” comes to mind.
Years later, after our wealth vanished, I finally realized how privileged I had been. Then, five years ago, my father passed away and I went through years of mental health issues. Bad things could happen to me and my loved ones: I was no longer invincible. It was quite the blow for my over-inflated ego.
A couple of years ago I had my first chat with a new doctor, and I expressed the lingering anxiety for my father’s death. I don’t easily open up to new people, but that one time I inexplicably decided to do it. She raised her voice and told me that I had to move on, that I shouldn’t have relied on him anymore — whatever that was supposed to mean. “It’s been three years. You have to move on!”, she barked, as if she knew anything at all about my relationship with him or about how much I had suffered. I was shocked; I felt attacked for mourning my father. I left her studio crying, promising to never let anyone else humiliate me for feeling what I need to feel. Perhaps ironically, what she said back then sounded exactly like what my father would have told me in the same circumstances.
Needless to say, I changed doctors a couple of days later.
While painful experiences may have taken a toll on my mental health, they ultimately couldn’t take away my desire for honest connection — as hard as that can sometimes be for me. I still need to heal, and that’s okay. Sometimes I’m told that I’m too optimistic, and that’s okay, too. I like being me, and I like believing that things will ultimately be alright, even when they aren’t. I’m just now starting to accept that it’s not a defect I have to fix.
I’m an adult now, and I don’t believe in shooting stars anymore. Still, when I see one or when I find a dandelion, I still make a wish— perhaps by reflex, or perhaps because it reminds me that, after everything that happened, I’m still able to feel and to want things, and in the end I think that’s magical on its own.
