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Describe Your Worst Failure.
Feb. 8th, 2006 12:46 amI almost wish that I could change one word there, and make it failing instead of failure. Questions like this just seem to lead to the overthinking and the rehashing, working through what's already happened, and what...well, no matter how we may wish it? May be beyond fixing. That's what failures sometimes are. A failing, well it seems like that bit of thought could be a a little more worthwhile. That's the cause behind the action. What parts of our personalities lead us to the failures, and are the steps that get us there. It seems like at least there'd be something to work with after.
Failures then.
It's still something that is divided in my head. It isn't just a failure. It has to be more defined than that. In all those actions did I just fail myself, or the people that I love, or most likely both. There's varying levels of importance too, and I know how they all fall for me.
I guess the way I most failed myself was not fixing Plyea for myself, not getting out and getting home. Angel came, I know that. They all came, and they saved me, and there isn't a day that I'm not thankful. But under all that is the reminder. The part where I wasn't strong enough, and smart enough, and I lost the math and then I eventually lost most of me all together. People keep pointing out how strong I was to get through it, but sometimes all I see is how broken I got in the first place. Wouldn't it've been better never to have that much to fight back from at all? The simple and truthful answer is that yes, it would.
I failed the ones I love right after...my folks. A letter, that's all I sent them to let them know I was ok, and one that didn't make much sense at that. Where I was, or the place that I was in shouldn't matter. Not then, and not now. I try and think what it would've been like, after that lost summer, to have gotten a cryptic letter from Angel or Cordy. The kind that gives more questions than answers, and just makes new hurts on top of the old. I should never have done that to them. I should never have sent that letter at all, or at least wait until things were better enough for me to present myself, at least halfway healed, back home.
But I saved my biggest failure for last, which I guess in dark sort of way makes sense. The one where it seems like we didn't learn any lessons at all, that maybe we haven't even even picked up a single book to begin with. Not taken a single note. And I let us all down.
I died.
I didn't pay attention to the world around me, a world I had willingly entered, and I made a single stupid mistake. But the failing can't be put anywhere else. Or the blame. I didn't follow the very rules I had put into place. I was careless, and reckless, and in the end maybe that's what it is. A small failure, to learn, or pay attention. And it becomes something there isn't any coming back from. Something we did, but don't always remember the doing. And then we get caught up in it, fighting and flailing what we know we did to ourselves. And to them. That's the part that hurts the most. Where my failings had to creep up again, just in time to contribute to that failure. Curiosity had already done it's share, but now stubborn had to have it's say too, and my inability to let go.
When I couldn't make the math work? When I couldn't get out of Pylea? I spent a lot of time watching, and waiting. Waiting to escape. Waiting to get captured all over again. Waiting to eat, and waiting to sleep. And watching a world I didn't want to understand. And one thing was always the same, from home, and from there. When an animal got sick, when there was no helping for it, it would crawl into the farthest corner it could find, lick its wounds as best it could, and wait for the rest. You leave the rest behind, and you certainly don't drag it down with you. You're supposed to take the hurt with you, not leave it with them when you go.
But I couldn't do that, could I? I couldn't go and fight in my darkened corner. It hurt...it hurt. But that isn't an excuse. Just all part of the stubborness. I had to fight, and be a part of fixing what was wrong. I didn't want to let go of the family we'd made, or the love I'd found, even when I could feel it slipping away despite all of it. That's more of the point. We know, I think. We always know. I knew they weren't going to fix it. I knew that they couldn't save me, not this time. But I let them all try. I let them go off and...I let him take me home.
When what I should have done was find my own dark corner, lick my wounds as best I could, and wait for what I knew was coming. Maybe it would have helped the part that came after. It certainly couldn't have made it worse. And maybe if I was that much farther away when it happened, she wouldn't have latched onto them. Maybe they never would have had to see what came after at all. Oh, I know it's a lot of maybes. But when you want to make it better, when you take those long hard look at things like failures, it's what comes after.
The part where, maybe, it might have been different. If not for me, then for them.
Failures then.
It's still something that is divided in my head. It isn't just a failure. It has to be more defined than that. In all those actions did I just fail myself, or the people that I love, or most likely both. There's varying levels of importance too, and I know how they all fall for me.
I guess the way I most failed myself was not fixing Plyea for myself, not getting out and getting home. Angel came, I know that. They all came, and they saved me, and there isn't a day that I'm not thankful. But under all that is the reminder. The part where I wasn't strong enough, and smart enough, and I lost the math and then I eventually lost most of me all together. People keep pointing out how strong I was to get through it, but sometimes all I see is how broken I got in the first place. Wouldn't it've been better never to have that much to fight back from at all? The simple and truthful answer is that yes, it would.
I failed the ones I love right after...my folks. A letter, that's all I sent them to let them know I was ok, and one that didn't make much sense at that. Where I was, or the place that I was in shouldn't matter. Not then, and not now. I try and think what it would've been like, after that lost summer, to have gotten a cryptic letter from Angel or Cordy. The kind that gives more questions than answers, and just makes new hurts on top of the old. I should never have done that to them. I should never have sent that letter at all, or at least wait until things were better enough for me to present myself, at least halfway healed, back home.
But I saved my biggest failure for last, which I guess in dark sort of way makes sense. The one where it seems like we didn't learn any lessons at all, that maybe we haven't even even picked up a single book to begin with. Not taken a single note. And I let us all down.
I died.
I didn't pay attention to the world around me, a world I had willingly entered, and I made a single stupid mistake. But the failing can't be put anywhere else. Or the blame. I didn't follow the very rules I had put into place. I was careless, and reckless, and in the end maybe that's what it is. A small failure, to learn, or pay attention. And it becomes something there isn't any coming back from. Something we did, but don't always remember the doing. And then we get caught up in it, fighting and flailing what we know we did to ourselves. And to them. That's the part that hurts the most. Where my failings had to creep up again, just in time to contribute to that failure. Curiosity had already done it's share, but now stubborn had to have it's say too, and my inability to let go.
When I couldn't make the math work? When I couldn't get out of Pylea? I spent a lot of time watching, and waiting. Waiting to escape. Waiting to get captured all over again. Waiting to eat, and waiting to sleep. And watching a world I didn't want to understand. And one thing was always the same, from home, and from there. When an animal got sick, when there was no helping for it, it would crawl into the farthest corner it could find, lick its wounds as best it could, and wait for the rest. You leave the rest behind, and you certainly don't drag it down with you. You're supposed to take the hurt with you, not leave it with them when you go.
But I couldn't do that, could I? I couldn't go and fight in my darkened corner. It hurt...it hurt. But that isn't an excuse. Just all part of the stubborness. I had to fight, and be a part of fixing what was wrong. I didn't want to let go of the family we'd made, or the love I'd found, even when I could feel it slipping away despite all of it. That's more of the point. We know, I think. We always know. I knew they weren't going to fix it. I knew that they couldn't save me, not this time. But I let them all try. I let them go off and...I let him take me home.
When what I should have done was find my own dark corner, lick my wounds as best I could, and wait for what I knew was coming. Maybe it would have helped the part that came after. It certainly couldn't have made it worse. And maybe if I was that much farther away when it happened, she wouldn't have latched onto them. Maybe they never would have had to see what came after at all. Oh, I know it's a lot of maybes. But when you want to make it better, when you take those long hard look at things like failures, it's what comes after.
The part where, maybe, it might have been different. If not for me, then for them.
