Happiness to me feels like makeup…

On some people it not only makes them look good, they feel comfortable in it. For me after an hour or two i’m eager to get it off. Even when I have it on i’m never fully at rest because I can’t help but worry about how my skin will break out, or if it’s running or how it looks. It is so much maintenance that I never fully enjoy the experience. When I am happy, I am uneasy. Something in me is off kilter, i’m like someone standing on one leg just about to fall but wobbling haphazardly. Because happiness doesn’t fit me. Sure on the outside I look better, smile more and am generally more pleasurable to be around but under the makeup is a whole different story. Panic and happiness go hand in hand for me. Because why am I happy? When will I stop being happy? What is this unfamiliar feeling that has crept into my smile and my walk and my voice? It feels like those clothes that photograph beautifully but you have to take the picture from a certain angle. Those clothes that itch but look good so you’re desperate to go out into the world and show it off. But the longer you keep it on, the more it itches, no matter how good it looks. My mind is dark, not in a twisted and lively and vivid and atrocious kind of way; but in a there’s-no-light-in-here kind of way. You know when you’re sleeping and someone comes in and turns on the light and you immediately pull your duvet over your head? I’ve grown comfortable in the dark. Admittedly it becomes frustrating and heartbreaking and some might even say devastating not being able to see not only what is in front of you, but what is inside you. Inside the dark it is impossible to see this beauty, or intelligence or pleasurability that people keep throwing in your face and expect you to accept. Yet I am still comfortable, I do not strive to be encompassing of light and push away everyone who attempts to flick the switch. Happiness is fragile, happiness is a caged bird, happiness is a sequined dress, happiness is makeup.