Embracing The Darkness

[My struggle with accepting rejection]

"Spill your soul, tell it how it is, share your heart," they say with their stupid shit-eating, straight edged sheltered, topo-chico drinking grin, that would make even the most epically tooled douche vomit. "Don't worry about the darkness, embrace the darkness," they exclaim with a bright eyed bullshit twinkled smile. And finally, my personal favorite, "No one is too far gone!" Again, another fuckin bullseye.

What homeschooled dipshit A, self righteous preschool martyr B, and [insert your favorite cunty adjective] C, fail to understand on even the most primitive instinctual level, is that they know nothing about "darkness." They know nothing about "Telling it how it is." They certainly know nothing about being "Too far gone." If they did, they would be in the trenches, not the suburbs. If they did, they would be in the streets, not the Cadillacs. If they did, they definitely wouldn't be so blindly giddy about light heartedly encouraging others to let their "darkness" shine. That shit's dangerous. Fuck around with that, good intentions or not, and you're bound to absorb that darkness to your core, most certainly under duress. It doesn't matter how righteous you think you are, how many divinity PhD's you have, how many prayer groups you attend, or how tight you and Jesus may be. True darkness, the kind oh so many speak of and claim(as if its some hard-knock badge of honor) yet know nothing about, devours the soul.

True darkness, the likes of which most will never know, ravages the human spirit like a helplessly wounded cub in the midst of bloodthirsty, sadistic hyaenas. It vaporizes innocence, slowly yet malevolently taunting its subject towards an early grave until all that remains is an unrecognizable, callous shell of its former "self". For their sake, and my own hard fought-for sanity, ill spare them of the "darkness." Ill spare them of the ever so beautiful, earth shattering mindfuck which would most certainly demolish their 4 Bed 2 Bath 3500 sq ft white picket fence glass house belief system. I'll let em "make it" as the homies say. There was a time when I would metaphorically, figuratively, and quite literally derive copious amounts of pleasure from being their emotional, mental and spiritual undertaker, ushering them beyond the veil of their own disgustingly small, closed minded existence, into the deep dark realm of "the real world," far far away from their pretentious chai mocha lattes, G rated family vacations to Disney world, and holy sanctified missionary style only sex lives. God forbid someone really "tells it how it is."

For the record, they are not at fault, they are just being themselves. Which, if you haven't been able to tell by now, really pisses me off. Some would argue that I am the one with the problem, due to my unrealistic expectations of others. They aren't wrong, they also piss me off, but they aren't wrong by a longshot. It's kind of like waking up and expecting my dog to recite Shakespeare, in perfect King James style old-English. No matter how hard I train that little asshole(he's actually quite wonderful), pray for him to "see the light", and wish that he would quit being so god damned difficult, it just ain't gonna happen Jack! My therapist would gently correct me if we were currently mid-session right now just to remind me that, "using words of finality, sets us up for heartache, and keeps us closed minded!" So, I shouldn't say ain't. But sue me, I'm going to anyway.

Underneath all the dry humor, brazenly obvious anecdotes, and picture perfect spot-on impressions of all those "people that piss me off", lies an ocean of pain, undeniable hurt, and childlike rejection. Having someone ask you to let your "crazy" flag fly in their presence, which you blindly oblige to with flying colors(pun intended because life is too short to be proper all the time), only to have that same someone tell you that "you're crazy" is just too much- fucking sucks. Its also chickenshit, if you ask me. It's akin to being epically dissed in front of the girl you like by the goofy homeschool kid on the playground who can't walk and chew gum at the same time. It's like being called a faggot by your cousins when you are 10 years old because you were that goofy homeschool kid. Its like being targeted and preyed upon by a serial pedophile when you are 16. In other words, its another reminder of all your childhood traumas that you experienced, nicely wrapped up into one moment, disgracefully validating all the things you wished weren't , but you know somehow are.

You see folks, it's all connected. Truth be told when I see the stupid church people tell me my darkness is too much, or see the spiritually dead recovery people shun me because I lived on the streets, I don't actually see any of them. I see everything that ever hurt me, broke me, or rejected me. I see all the evidence of my failure served up on a silver platter in one moment.

However, thankfully I have learned that just because I see something doesn't mean I have to believe it. I can choose to accept things for how they are, acknowledge my part in the matter, and move the fuck on. Or, I can believe every lie that was ever presented to me, and use it as fuel to power an excuse ridden train of chaos. Some days are easier than others, some days I do believe the lies, and some days I knock that shit out of the park like Barry Bonds on every steroid under the sun. It's not about the win or the loss, its about the continuous fight, stepping up to the plate, and giving life my best, most honest swing I can muster up in the moment.

Spencer Brooks Otto [2024]