Becoming Invisible

It isn't bad. It certainly isn't what I imagined. Considering how much of my life has been consumed with a fear of being mediocre, being consumed in anonymity is actually almost reassuring. I thought it would be like drowning, but it's just the opposite. I feel free. Invisible but free.

As a kid I was paralyzed by shyness but craved attention. Both my parents worked and we moved often enough that I didn't have many friends. I've never made friends easily. So I was alone a lot and lived more in my imagination than in the real world. This was fine until those chemical changes started and my drives shifted.

The shyness and desire for attention both became stronger, but so did the poignancy of my being alone. Luckily this was about the same time that we settled down for a few years and I came into a group of friends who accepted me and encouraged my imagination. My shyness was removed from the equation and I was getting attention.

But it was adolescence and I was on my way into young adulthood. Sadly I believed things I was taught and so was ill-equipped when it came to love, romance, sex and the general melee of the man-woman paradigm. Love was all I needed but no one explained that it's only the beginning of what a woman needs to stay with a man. If anyone had told me as a boy that stability and ambition count for a lot more than being a great lover or being a poet, I probably would have just focused on my art and not wasted what's amounted to decades in pursuit of what has only been a satellite to my own life.

Don't get me wrong: the women who've been in the picture have brought color, depth and resonance to my existence. I am grateful and appreciative that they were a part of things for the time that they were, I just wish I'd know that none of them would be sticking around.

It also would have been nice to know that the pain of a woman leaving would always be fresh and brutal.

So now that I've landed in middle age and stepped away from the fracas, removed myself from most social media, I'm left with simplicity. My shyness dissipated long ago and attention is about the last thing I want. A few years ago there were thousands of people following my interweb and career efforts, posting to my pages and reaching out to me constantly. I would get hundreds of notifications daily about things. Women from all over the world thought me interesting enough for all manner of banter and some even broached the possibility of starting something in the real world. My ego was overfed and glutted. I had carved a niche for myself in the musical community and was being invited to perform and to speak in addition to holding down a couple of jobs.

How could I let that go? Why would I??

It was easy. And it was time.

The internet can be lovely. For someone like me who will never make an entrance like Cary Grant, it was a goldmine. One can craft the image he or she wants, develop an entirely different persona than what people see at the day job and there is the luxury of being able to filter communications. Distraction and entertainment are everywhere. Porn is more accessible than data and appearance is more significant than accomplishment. It's a Fellini-Dali dream come to pass.

And it was too much for me. "Be careful what you wish," the wise man cautioned, "for you will surely get it."

I did. And as is the case so often, it wasn't what I thought. All that attention left me more painfully alone than when I was a confused teen. The flirtatious words connected with the enticing photos, real time chatting and the flurry of activity to try and keep up with it all left me cold. I'd shut down the devices and look around me to find no one there with me. Those who moaned and rallied when I announced it was time for me to leave the zoo rarely made any effort to keep up with me. Maybe that last part is what's amazed me the most.

My friends dragged their feet when I embraced social media. By the time they began to find in it what I had, I was over it. I didn't need or want to play games, take surveys or find out what character of (fill in the TV show or movie title) I was. I knew who I was and I know who I am.

I don't have conversations about what's happening on Facebook. The latest wave of hate has no more interest for me than whatever video of a cat or child is making the rounds. People are talking politics and it's getting heated? That's fine.

Maybe someday I'll return to that milieu. I think if I can tone it down and stop the notifications, there might be a time I resume a virtual presence. But until then I will glory in no one writing to tell me what an awful being I am or to demand I give them free things. In real life most women don't initiate contact of any sort so I don't have to reject anyone.

And I'm good with this. No one takes a second look if I'm out walking or standing in line. My phone isn't ringing and the number of texts I get in a month is nominal. It isn't a point of contention that I don't do hands-free calling while I drive. In fact no one is curious when or if I drive. My whereabouts are of no interest to anyone but me. No one seeks out my relationship status. Those things about me which are broadcast to the world are not from me and are all but overlooked.

On some level it would be nice for this blog to find an audience, but I'm simply glad that the documentation exists. That satisfies my vanity and insecurity more than anyone 'liking' something posted online. Let this be an archaeological anomaly, some odd token stumbled upon long after I'm gone.

In the meantime I'm gonna be in the world, wandering unseen between beauty and horror, waiting for sunrises and counting blue moons. It turns out invisibility is everything it's cracked up to be.