As She Lay Dying

Death is such an enigma.You think it's a usual happening,an inevitable toll to be exacted from humanity, a sort of a plague that hits a distant continent and wipes out its residents, but as long as it leaves you alone,all is good.

All is good, until it steals someone close to you.
----------------------------------------------------

News of a demise should never be conveyed through phone. It is an inhumane gesture and extremely crude; as you never know what the person on the other end is doing at that moment ;they might be engaged in a mirthful conversation and thinking that life is quite peachy and gay and generous, when they open their phone and get a terrible,shocking blow.

Not everyone can handle sudden blows to the jaw, It's something else when you don't see it coming.
If one had a weak heart they might lose their footing, or worse, their stability. In that case the bearer of the news becomes an ominous raven that causes another calamity by their lack of tact.

It once happened that a close friend of mine passed out when she heard of her cousin's death. She didn't wail, she didn't have the time; she just fell backwards, and hit her head upon the impact. Just like that.

News of a demise should never be conveyed in a manner that is not coated with caution and delicacy.
But I received a curt text.

It took some time to register at first, and for a while I didn't understand the very shortened text until I read it a few times. And then a fit took possession of me, something that rarely ever happens because i rarely ever lose my composure; I gasped for breath for a few seconds, i could hear my heart beats drumming right through my ears, drowning all the sounds around.

i was scared because i was alone at that time, scared of losing my breath and scared because the ceiling was rotating and getting further for some reason.
I dropped 5 tears. Exactly 5, to my horror and wonder. They dropped on my open notebook and dried up,visible on the white page; an everlasting reminder of all of this... a memento frozen in time. I thought they would evaporate and disappear but they didn't...Probably because of the salt.

Death, it is such an enigma,

I was saddened, I was convulsive and wincing in pain, though i wasn't hurting any where, I cried, but I...wasn't crying because she was gone.

I go on and on about compassion, about being able to relate to others and feel what they feel, but it is only when i'm a witness of the misfortune that befalls someone else. When I'm directly hit by its magnitude and depth..I couldn't relate to her, the most unfortunate of them all..

I dropped tears, but they weren't for the deceased, they were for him, his boundless sadness which its echoes i could hear across a thousand miles. His sadness that reached me, and shook my being, vibrating through my limbs and sending shrills through my nerves. I wept for him, and for his suffering that i could hear in his voice, sounding like a a formidable castle about to fall apart.

I was so horrified at my apathy and lack of sentiment I felt bad receiving all these calls, people I haven't heard from for over a year suddenly calling out of courtesy like it's important to make a good impression on a person they've lost their connection with. They would offer their condolences and then disappear for another year or two, when someone else is dead.

Until this moment I still didn't grasp the full reality of my situation, occasionally i'm obliged to make a face and assume a sad tone when i answer a condoling phone call,and momentarily i'm reminded of my spinelessness and apathy, and resort to melancholy brooding for a while. But most of the time i'm fine. I'm perfectly fine,i'm capable of resuming my life with perfect normality one wouldn't doubt that I lost someone close.

Her departure from this life seems to me like a vivid dream, as if it happened in a parallel universe, a separate reality that I could observe through a looking glass. Something trapped in a transparent basin;

She lays there,in her bed, motionless, breathless,pale, cold, dead.

And the whole scene keeps moving further and further beyond reach,and beyond vision,
to the back of my mind,where i can't think about it..

Is this what they call denial ?

To You, Adorato

Let me tell you something
About my strange soul
About my fickle heart

And dreadful malady

My chest, it has a void
For a heart-a black hole
'tis abyssal, for the night
Clouded it in tyranny
And It feeds on affection,
Sentiments and passion
Tries to fill that hole
Without a spec of infamy

As I had an abundance

Of stolen emotions

The only choice I had

Was to feign my devotion
So I told my dear ones
How much I regard'em
How their avid love was
What's kept me around
But this 'love' I pledged,
It lacked all zest
And its bashful echoes
They didn't recur a sound
Though,"love you", I'd say
In vain joie de vivre
To the gracious souls
I met along my way
As their boundless affection
And unwarranted tenderness
I could in no other way
Adequately repay
Though I split my heart
Into frivolous pieces
And along I shouldered it
In a smart cyst
And,
To the ones that showered me
With love and care
I gifted my sentiments
Right and left
Though these feels are benign
And are almost sincere,
They never sent shivers
Down my spine
It is "love" alright,
But arduous it is not
Like the Alps and the Rhine
Were neighbors, but taut
So, to the one I adore,
My beloved Eugene
I say,
You may only live
In the dungeons of fiction
I waited for you, darling
In our secret tryst
But you left me expecting
Drenched in depression
This is not a reprimand
For standing me up
But,
Against my skittish reason,
T'is a verbal insurrection

O, the one I adore,

To whom my heart calls
The one I waited for
Holding a rose

I may never say "I love you"

Nor would I give you
A fragment of my heart
Like the rest of the beaus
For true love is lived
Not verbally conveyed
Bargained in a market
Of supply and demand
Love is not a rhyme
You can jot on command
It's a thousand jolly rainbows
You can hold in your hands
Love ,
Is mental buoyancy
Love is a state of mind
When your heart soars ,evading
The mind's supremacy
All of these sentiments
I've described piano
That's not how I felt before
And this is not a blunder
But I can only tell you
With absolute certainty
That
The pouch of hearts i'm carrying
Poses as a hamper
This feel they call "affection"
Maybe
It isn't worth the trouble
This ambiguous sentiment
Is making me dander
Stay, Eugene, my dearest
Can't you see at all
That my poor soul is
Trapped between an anvil
And an atrocious pestle ?
That this wretched loneliness
Is way beyond perpetual ?
And that you've been languid
In your grand arrival?

And can't you see that I am
Trying hard to buy
That this emptiness I feel
Awaits you to occupy?

I may have been awaiting

But really i'm convinced

That if you actually did come
You would've been dismissed
That's because deep down
At the bottom of my heart
I believe in all honesty
That you. Don't. Exist

L'Albatross

The Seagull

When I close my eyes, I could always recall
Vivid memories in white and black
Every moment my poor little heart
Received a good thrashing and 
Got itself cracked
I looked and looked for a wise doctor
But no one had a knack for mending the broken
When it can't be touched
So when the bones of my soul started to whimper
And pride and vanity became a cumber
I decided that I should learn the trade myself
At first I was my only patient
But with time I became an excellent quack
Patched a good deal of chests
And my patients would flock 
Their sorrows they'd stack on my desk
And I believed I could fix the world, if broken
Even grow rich if I could collect some tokens
With every examination, grapes of rage grew
Along my ribs
These fools with riches to spend and hearts so sickly
How could these louts lack the courtesy and tact
To compare their scratches to my smashed bits?
When I was in your shoes you were so self absorbed
To notice the agony that I would hide behind a smile
So meticulously
My compassionate conscience would wring and chide
So to listen, as I do, I would soon abide
But the weight of the aches was too much to bear
An Albatross off my neck I couldn't tear

My fragile heart couldn't take the shear
Pressure of emotions clasping from every side
Being a doctor, for fun, takes its toll on the soul
This causes wear on the long run
Though I made it my trade and transfigured it
Into some form of art
Alas, a doctor that gets sick by healing folks
Is better off becoming a hack
Spreading patches of poetry on their sores.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is addressed to no one,
This is addressed to everyone,

Why do you think it is okay to open up to me, to let me know about your miserable encounters, all the misfortunes that befell your sorry life and weigh me down with your 'sufferings', totally ignoring the fact that i, too, not only have my own problems, but that i need you to listen to me as well......and fix me.

Wretch.

It is the height of exploitation and abuse to take advantage of someone's compassion, knowing fully well that they are always willing to shoulder the weight with you, because that's what they do, because without the weight of compassion, their existence is just too light to hold still on earth...because the unbearable lightness of their being is what makes them soar in the air like a stray balloon, desperately trying to cling for salvation.

"For there is nothing heavier than compassion. Not even one's own pain weighs so heavy as the pain one feels with someone, for someone, a pain intensified by the imagination and prolonged by a hundred echoes."

You don't need to tell me how broken you are, i'll figure it out myself, and i'll fix you. Without you noticing.
That's my life-long curse, and it's also my pride and joy.
You'll get better without ever knowing that i was the one who fixed you, and if you did; the patient shall never repay the doctor for his services because he thinks the doctor does that for internal satisfaction.

Well, what do ya know ?, maybe he's right.

It's very difficult to constantly have to weigh your words and always try to think of the right thing to say, because you know well that every syllable you articulate is going to have dire consequences.
It's a tough responsibility that comes with wisdom; a wisdom that i don't really think i possess, but allegedly attributed to me by virtue of my good counsel.

The question is, why do i care so much ?
Why do I have to be so compassionate as to think ahead of the consequences of my advice lest it ruins a life? The one who seeks solutions should handle all the side effects themselves.

Why do I take it upon myself to fix people, when nobody bothered,bothers, to fix the broken ME ?

And why do i think i'm special enough,being on a higher mental plane, that I was assigned a specific role in this life ;to fix what's broken ?

Compassion is such a dire malady, dear batushka.
I don't want it.
I didn't ask for it.
I was looking for an anchor to keep me down, but instead I got a seagull wrapped too tight around my neck it's becoming harder and harder to breathe.

It's true that i find it delectable to fix people, and it is true that no doctor out there can heal me when i'm sick , for even if there were; i would defy them out of spite; because i know better and i have more experience in fixing wreckage i'd rather spare myself the trouble and the embarrassment.

But i'm actually hurt that no one really ventured to examine me for emotional ailment.

Do I look, by any chance, like a problem-free person ? A happy person that has the luxury of offering counsel to the unfortunate ? because that's the reverse vibe i get from people around me.
Doctors get sick too, haven't you heard ?

“To have compassion for those who suffer is a human quality which everyone should possess, especially those who have required comfort themselves in the past and have managed to find it in others. ”

Confound you, Bocaccio. You are a fool, and you don't know what you are talking about. It is those who did not find comfort in others that know how empty it feels, how light it feels, and make it their life's mission to be the balsam of the heartaches and the Atlas that shoulders everyone's weight.

5 Seconds

I don't cry......often.
I added that "often" because i'm a human being, not a robot, and above all, because i'm a woman. And women are naturally disposed to crying.
When i say 'cry' I don't mean the silent tears that one usually drops when upset. I drop a tear or two when i'm stressed and having a bad day, when i fight with someone that is dear to me or when i yawn (oddly enough)...By 'cry' i mean whining, squealing, the real thing that females do when they finally lose every bit of self-possession and grace they have.

When i do finally lose it- something that rarely ever happens once or twice a year, it's usually when i'm laying my head at night, muffling my sobs with my pillow. It hurts my eyes a lot when i do cry now...because my eyes aren't used to producing tears, i guess...My head hurts so much and my face gets hot and red it becomes really uncomfortable to do this crying thing...

I almost never cry in front of people at all. Nobody must see this pathetic display of weakness and vulnerability. Nobody needs to know that there is a side like that to me : I listen to people pouring their hearts out all the time, and i'm usually the one doing all the comforting and patting and hugging, but you know what ? i judge these people...Severely...For being so weak and helpless as to do nothing but cry and depend on someone like myself to provide them with emotional security. That's just pathetic if you ask me.
So I wouldn't really like it if i'm one of these people as well; unreasonably breaking into tears in front of someone that probably doesn't give a crap...i do, but i don't think many people have the same capacity to process all this drama and solve the world's problems.

I also think that people would take advantage of me if i show my vulnerable side to them ; i noticed that some people change the way they treated me in the past, like i'm some sort of fragile material that needs to be handled with care....The only thing worse than having to show your weakness to somebody is being pitied for it.
And some of them used to "pry" on this weakness of mine, dropping hints and bringing it up around other people, taking advantage of my total submission to them having no hidden cards to defend myself... this kind of people is the reason i used to hear a snapping voice in my heart in the past...“something seemed to give way inside me, like the snapping of a tightened bow.”
So i just avoid all that bulshit by keeping my complains and troubled confessions to myself and a very narrow circle of people i deeply trust.

And hence it was established that I'm a very calm person : i don't lose it, i don't panic, i don't freak out, i don't cause scenes and all that; i'm known for being cool and collected it ceased to be a pretense anymore... i don't even remember the last time i lost my temper or yelled at somebody; really yelled out of anger -not pretending to be angry to keep appearances because that's the normal reaction, i don't remember the last time i felt angry to the point that i didn't care about ruining my image...Being calm becomes a life style you forget how to snap after a while.

I've been rolling just fine although i've led a difficult life for an average 22 years old living in such a comfortable country (al 7amdulellah in all cases ) ; i rarely ever think about all the difficulties and bs that i had to deal with that much because i keep myself busy ...But when i do, when i realize how unbearable sometimes things could be; and my tears start to flow and breathing becomes difficult and everything looks blurry, i immediately check myself and stop.

It's not that I feel "ashamed" of crying per se ; it just dawns upon me how utterly useless it is to cry in reaction to a certain devastating event, instead of directing my whole emotions and efforts to sort it out. I just truly believe that crying like a baby doesn't solve anything. Does it feel good to cry ? yes. But would it solve the problem ? absolutely not. Well, unless i'm in mourning. So my shame comes from the fact that i actually did something stupid and pointless being completely aware of its stupidity and pointlessness.

Therefore I only allow myself a very limited time before slapping myself into awakening :
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
"What are you doing, Rawan? Stop this childish huff".

A sudden, short burst of emotional breakdown actually helps a lot in reducing frustration -if there was actually a need to cry out of frustration, and any more than that is just a pointless waste of emotions...and time..and a fall from grace..And it is actually healthy to know how to control my emotions and know when to stop. One reaches a certain mental age after which they stop needing someone to tell them to pull their shit together. Maybe i learnt that in the few years i've spent living alone in a strange city where i had no one to comfort me when I felt down and needed a hug, or someone to tell me that everything is gonna be okay...
Maybe that's the reason i grew to be emotionally independent ; i just don't frigging need anyone to "be there for me", regardless of the fact that i don't really have such a person anyway.
When i left home I was still that cry baby that used to call her parents everyday and tell them that she wants to go back home. I don't remember when exactly did i stop being "weak" and started confronting people and life...and my own weakness.. but it just happened that i grew out of that crying brat, the spoiled little girl that thought tears would help her go about surviving life, that appealing to the compassionate side in others and showing them my weakness and fragility would make them go easy on me. I grew out of the naive girl that needed her parents to interfere and save her from this cruel, chaotic, so unpeachy world at some point..and for good...
I told myself that I shall be an independent girl. I shall be strong.
I shall be strong.
A strong woman that needs nobody to summon strength to go on, a fierce survivor that is perfectly capable of being on her own.
A strong woman...Let me repeat it again for my own sake: a STRONG woman.
And strong women don't cry, ladies and gents.

It's actually funny how I feel so fresh and humored after i explode for these 5 seconds, mostly because i see how funny my face looks in the mirror. I look very unseemly...Sometimes looking at my teary face and my red eyes and swollen lids and cringy face in the mirror shocks me into silence for a while i forget the original problem...

On Remembrance and Forgetting II

I'm often told that i have the memory of a gold fish.

Well, because I forget way more than an average young adult my age does. Or at least that is what everyone says.
I forget events that happened less than 6 months ago. I can never tell a story because i keep forgetting its details and the logical sequence of its events.

I always get into unpleasant situations when i forget to congratulate someone or offer my condolences and then realize that they were upset because they thought i lacked tact.

I forgot that i handed my ID card for cancellation the other day, and kept looking for it and calling my parents back home to check if i forgot it there.
And I would prolly forget your name after 5 minutes of our first meeting.

This is a bad thing, i'm told, as i'm supposed to be a fully-responsible individual and an effective part of society as an adult that will have to work, earn a living, be alert and quick-witted, get married and build a family, which can't be done properly if i'm gonna forget all about a task i'm assigned at work or go home forgetting my kids at the supermarket one day...
I know this is a bad thing, but I would like to think that i have a selective memory, not a bad one.

It's funny how i forget some of the most important details that could affect my daily life, but i still remember memories from my distant childhood with the utmost accuracy.
i remember being carried by a woman, while descending a staircase made of clay. it was noon...that was probably in Sudan. I remember knowing that that woman was not my mother, i couldn't see her face, but i knew that she wasn't my mother because she smelt different; i remember her scent and the bright red color of the toab she was wearing.
Thing is, I've only been in Sudan when I was a toddler.

I remember the first time i said "papa" and "mama".
i stood on a small green stool which i vehemently positioned in the middle of our hall, i was wearing a diaper so i'm guessing i was around 2-3 years old, and i said "papa!", my mom came running from the kitchen with a surprised expression on her face "Say that again ?"
"papa !"
She called my dad and asked me to say it again, so i did.
"Say mama !"
"pama !"
"mama!"
"mama!"
They both stood there looking so happy so i figured it was a great thing and that i should keep saying it over and over "papa !" "papa!" "mama!".
Boy, did that make them happy..I wonder where that green stool is.

I still remember my class mates from kindergarten, Malak, Mustafa, Khalid, Sara, Abdullah, Rawya, Dana, Abdel Kareem, Mahmoud...I remember our art teacher Alia..she always looked like she was about to cry..with her droopy eyes and square glasses and distorted voice..I remember when Mustafa witted his pants; we were sitting at the rear and no one else saw...poor fellow was too embarrassed, trying to hide the mini pool below him and he asked me not to tell anyone..I told no one. I remember when it used to rain and i would get excited and sing out loud, interrupting the class :

سعودي راح مكه .. يجيب ثياب عكه .. واحطه في صندوقي
صندوقي ماله مفتاح .. والمفتاح عند الحداد .. والحداد يبي فلوس
والفلوس عند العروس .. والعروس تبي رجال .. والرجال يبي عيال
والعيال تبي حليب .. والحليب عند البقر .. والبقر تبي حشيش
والحشيش فوق الجبل.. والجبل يبي مطر .. والمطر من عند الله
It used to rain a lot in these days...for a whole week sometimes...and good things used to happen when it rained .My mom would make sesame sweets and its smell would fill the house; you could see the warm steam condense against the frosty windows. I would stay home all day, looking through the window, looking beyond the mountains at the grey sky, waiting for the first signs of a rainbow..My mom wouldn't let me play in the yard lest i catch a cold (i was a sickly child), so the big window in our old hall was my window to the whole world..and the rainbow was my favorite childhood friend because it told me it was okay to go out and play now..
How many years has it been since i last saw a rainbow...I yearn for the memories it brings back so much it's probably the reason i enter a state of ecstasy when it rains now...i still unconsciously raise my eyes to the sky after the rain stops, searching for my friend, searching for a glimpse of the happy, old days, a reminder of joy and pureness but , alas. My friend shows up no longer.

I even remember when my dad used to smoke, not even my older sister remembers that because he stopped when she was a kid...it was a warm night and there were many people at our place, talking with my dad...they were setting in our yard under the palm tree and i was idly setting on my dad's lap.. they were talking  and laughing but i couldn't understand anything....my dad was smoking, and i noticed how his teeth were yellow..but oddly enough, i don't remember being irritated by the smell of cigarettes.

This was carved into my memory because, amid my boredom and childish reverie to which i used to resort when everyone else is oblivious to my existence, a little star fell on my lap out of nowhere. i was dazzled; It looked so, so pretty with a multitude of shades and colors that change when you look at it from different angles.. I kept staring at it wondering where it came from, thinking that someone might've tossed it at me as a prank, but when i looked at the people there, not a single one of them seemed to notice my wondering eyes.

When I asked my dad ,he said, with a wide smile on his face being engaged in telling a funny story, that it probably fell from the sky and that i'm lucky it fell to my hands and i should keep it as a memento because it rarely ever happens.

And I did, i kept it as a treasure, thinking it was a real star...And for many years to come i did believe that the stars i see at night were small pentagonal, glassy objects that shone so fervently through the darkness even though they were this small..and that they eventually fall from the sky when they run out of light. well, until we studied about stars in science class.
Who tossed that little star at me, i wonder..

No, I don't think I have a bad memory, because i wouldn't be able to recall all these details from my childhood.. i think i remember the individuals and events that made quite an impression on me; facial expressions that told me about the words kept unsaid, random lines that sat me thinking, scenes that became idylls springing every now and then in the form of Deja vu.
"I've been here before, i've met this person before, where have i read or heard this line before now ?" thinking about it now, i'm sure that 99% of these Deja vu pangs i've had were actually real, they are just fuzzy memories that wore off by the passage of time.

That's right, i don't have a bad memory, i only remember what really matters, and because these recollections consume much space in my mind, it becomes necessary to delete what i can do without...you know, some fragments of our childhood are too precious to let go, to be replaced by the present.

Well,i hope that i start allocating more space in my mind to keep what i need for my everyday life at least.

The Dying Tree

"Would it feel my touch ?", i thought while pressing my palm against the coarse bark of the tree under which we took shelter from the rain that night. It felt so dry and wrinkled with age...I don't remember what we were talking about ; two human beings have so much to share while waiting for the rain to stop.
How does it feel, i wondered, to be in the place of this poor, wrinkled creature in such a cold night, forgotten in a secluded corner where no one looks ,shivering in the cold, drenched in the rain, alone.
Yet it warmly embraced the two of us, as though it was happy to have the consolation of a company at last.

There are moments you would like to carve into your memory forever, and this was one of these moments. I feel livelier than ever when it rains. I'm the happiest when the rain drops land on my face and slide along my temples, because it reminds me that i'm still loved by God, and is still included in his mercy. if you could imagine, dear batushka, a torch burning even more zealously when it is showered by a heavenly hail, that is exactly what happens to my soul when it rains.
It wasn't November yet, but my soul was wide awake and could hear the feeble sounds usually smothered by the mighty noise of the living. I could hear the loneliness of this dying creature. It seemed that none of this blissful shower could seep through to enliven the poor thing amid its seclusion. It was dying slowly, horridly unnoticed.
I pressed my palm against its bark because i wanted to remember the miniature humps and dips engraved on it. I pressed my palm against its bark, and closed my eyes, hoping that i can convey a bit of the warmth i felt that night, standing next to a dear friend, talking about everything, talking about nothing, i wished to transfer this warmth somehow to its mortified core, hoping that it might revive it a little.

For You In Full Blossom IV

The Iron Lady

To the girl that walked about greeted like a queen, but flung by rotten tomatoes when she turned her back.

Quite honestly I've heard a lot about you before actually getting to know you. And trust me; you don't want me to repeat what I heard. Lucky for you, I made it my golden rule to never judge any individual based on anyone's opinion of them , and thanks to that i was able to know many great people throughout my life, people that were great in their own ways.

Females always have something to say about each other and they always make it their sport to find faults with every girl that is the center of attention.

And ,well, you were the Queen Bee among your friends.

I thought at some point that it's impressive to be so sociable and popular, having people to chat with at every table you sit at, until I heard what these same people say about you when you left.
That was horrifying in every way. It was (honestly) the first time I witnessed such a gruesome social behavior :
If you don't like a certain individual ,wouldn't it be the logical attitude to stay away from them ? you don't have to deal with someone you dislike. End of story. Why girls feel the need to pretend to be friends with someone they evidently can't bear with was confusingly beyond me.
I understand that in the real world there are hierarchical positions to abide by and connections to keep in order to survive; but in an social environment where there aren't any material benefits to gain from keeping good relations with a peer whatsoever, what would make anyone fake their feelings towards someone ?

It's because people need a place to fit in, and they need a person that gives them attention and make them feel accepted. 

Maybe your strong character made some girls feel the need to get along with you, to get your "approval" despite having issues with your attitude. I don't really know nor did i care honestly. It's because I was the neutral side in all this that I could see the ugliness of the entire scene : People smiling at your face ,then devouring your rotten flesh behind your back. I reached a point where I started to avoid most of the people in your circle whenever i could and I believe I showed it too much, more like in an a hateful way. i'm sorry about that but i was just too disgusted and done with your dramatic life and all the "rumors" and "plots" and the constant shocks in people and the crumbling of every meaning of the word "friendship" i learnt throughout my life.

Watching this soap opera reminded me that we are not in high school anymore ; the female population isn't gonna shun a girl because she's mean and conceited and a bully, she will be hated if she's pretty, attractive and charismatic and especially if she is opinionated and strikingly honest, even is she is a good person at heart. I think that's why you were disliked ,but no one came forward and told you that to your face because they know they had no right to hate you. Honesty should never be a vice. Never. You say the truth aggressively but regardless, truth is already ugly for those who don't want to hear it.

I'm really glad i didn't mind your rude attitude while dealing with you alone, though, because i realized that you have a really pure heart after getting to know you better. I was especially glad that you don't get offended when i treat you the same way, being honest with you and all, not bothering to choose my words. I just feel so comfortable while dealing with a straight-forward person because they would rather shoot a rude comment at me than trash me behind my back.

I must tell you that I'm able to be honest with people because I taught myself to be a self-reliant person; I need no one to provide moral support for me and make me feel "accepted". And because I don't need anyone I'm consequently not afraid of losing anyone by declaring my real views and feelings. I think people become able to bond better with each others when every one of them acts as a single atom that has the option of breaking on its own and joining different orbits at its free will. 

What I'm getting at is that the way you dealt with all that hatred was an interesting example.

What was special about you is that you knew the people around  you were two-faced, yet you held your chin high and walked about with confidence, receiving their poisonous arrows on your back proudly. You didn't surrender.

I used to act passively when I couldn't fit into a group; I had a few friends i could hang out with of course, but i didn't care to enforce my social presence and be part of any social entity...I just didn't care enough to be part of something, i guess, because I've always got my own thing going on, my own interests, my own sense of humor, my own values , my own meditations that not many people understood anyway.. And i didn't have to change for any one's sake...I thought it  Though I never thought of it this way : that I am being my own group, I'm being an atom, and atoms attract other atoms sooner or later. I've always thought I needed to work on that, but after meeting you, I came to believe that it is okay not to fit in.
It is okay not be liked. If you like yourself enough.