Dreams of the Quill

I tend to claim that I am a cold, unemotional machine. This is not so much a lie as it is a vast oversimplication of the truth. The thing is, I experience emotions in much the way a small child does. I feel pain, I am distressed. The pain passes, the distress passes. I live very much in the now, unbound by future and past. Other people go what will they think of me? and those people hated me all those years ago… while I… I don’t care. The past is past. It is irrelevent. The future is uncertain. It is��irrelevent. The present is all that matters. The people who hated me a thousand lifetimes ago, who are far and away in a time and place that no longer exists… they don’t matter. The people who might hate me for something I am about to do… their potential opinions are irrelevent.

Similarly, the possibility of future pain does not sway me. The possibility of future reward does not sway me. It is only visceral, immediate things that mean anything at all to me. Placing a candy in a location you want me to go to could convince me to go. Telling me you will give me candy for going there… nothing. I chase visceral experiences. Sensory input. I feel pain, I grow angry, or afraid. I find myself in a potentially dangerous situation, uncertain what to do, I grow afraid. I find myself well-fed, and I am happy. I find myself ill, and miserable, I grow sad. But someone telling me that they hate me… what does this mean? Does it mean they won’t feed me? Won’t play with me?

It’s meaningless. Abstract nonsense. Their emotions are of no consequence. All that matters if their behavior. I’ve known people that hated me, but were no different to me from any number of people who held no particular interest in me. Either way, they have little to do with me. I’ve known people that would tell me all day long how much they liked me, but never played with me, or gave me food, or helped end pain, or anything of the sort. They too, were no different from the faceless masses that have no interest in me. Then there are those that had no opinion on me either way, but would respond to my actions. Teachers, neutral teachers, who would take the side of a blubbering bully over the actual victim, they were a threat. That they did not care about me either way meant nothing. The neutral teachers that rewarded particular behaviors, they were useful allies. That they did not care about me in particular either way was, once again, irrelevent.

Other people’s emotions are inextricably tied to the emotions of those around them. What do other people think of them. What should they think of other people. What should other people think they think of them. And yet the question of what these people are doing to or for them is never asked. Someone whom loves them very much but takes, takes, and takes some more is better than the authority figure that hates them but nonetheless rewards them as appropriate. Never mind that this makes no sense. Never mind that this is a suicidal approach to existence. It’s how most people operate.

I can’t grasp this. Social networking is beyond me. I feel no sympathy. No pity. No desire to reach out and help others, just because they like me or I like them. People think I’m stupid. Or cruel. Or hateful. Or just plain evil. They hurl these words at me, attempting to sink emotional barbs into me, to get me to stop being what I am, by implying that what I am is hateful. And I see that they hate these things in me, but I do not see how it matters that they hate these qualities. I see that they judge me, but I don’t see how the judgement means anything to me. They grow afraid when I respond blankly to their words, because I should be hurting. I should be in pain. And yet I take no notice of what they have done, as though they are nothing more than a gnat buzzing around my ears. And this frightens them, this inability to control me, influence me. I’m rogue. I don’t play by the rules. I’m outside the system they understand, and therefore my power is limitless.

They don’t see it. They don’t see that I live by a set of rubricks. I work to ensure my continued survival. To improve my existence. To maintain my sanity. To reduce the risk in my life. There are ways to influence me, but because the social spectrum has no effect on me, they see me as some horrible beast, immune to their every effort to influence me.

They simply don’t understand.

When they do gain a glimmer of understanding, it is still wrong. When they realize that I don’t think that way, that I am incapable of such thinking, they come to believe that I am some sort of cripple. A blind man in��a world of vibrant colour. They pity me, or mock me, or feel contempt for me. They continue to hurl these strange sentiments at me, completely missing that they mean nothing to me.

Their ignorance astounds me.

Those with a moderate understanding of how I think believe I am little more than a beast. I walk, I talk, but I cannot possible reason, or understand. I must be impulsive. Unthinking. Inconsiderate of the consequences of my actions. An animal in human skin, to be talked down like a particularly unintelligent child.

They still don’t get it.

Those with an extensive understanding of my internal wiring conclude that I am brain-damaged, and that I need to be ‘fixed’, made like all those around me, so that I can function properly in the world around me. They try to manipulate me, ‘educate’ me, instill caring, compassion, ‘human’ traits in me, so they can show me to others like I’m some sort of trophy. ‘Look!’, they say, ‘I made a gentleman out of this ignorant savage! Am I not incredible?’ even as I continue to advance, paying little more than lip service to their strange conventions so they will stop interfering.

It is like speaking to a brick wall.

I don’t care. I can’t care. I don’t want to care. Social rules, conventions, niceties. They mean nothing to me. These people mean nothing to me. Their lives mean nothing to me. They provide nothing. No information. No food. No electricity. No water. Nothing. At all.

And nobody ever seems to fully comprehend these facts.

I am what I am.

It’s not that hard to understand.