You made it to the river..

Not out loud. Not in a message. But in my spirit, in that place where too many unanswered texts and too many one-sided conversations live.

It’s not even rage. It’s tired. It’s quiet. It’s the kind of “fck everybody”* that sounds more like:

“Stop taking from me if you don’t know how to give back.” “Stop asking for softness if you can’t hold it right.” “Stop calling it love when it only shows up when it’s convenient.”

It’s the line my soul draws when my mouth is too polite to speak it.

I don’t want to become bitter. I don’t want to carry armor I never asked for. But god… sometimes it feels like being kind just means bleeding in silence.

So yeah. Sometimes it’s “fck everybody.”* And sometimes it’s “please, someone see me.”

It’s wild how you can try to have a real conversation with someone someone in your own family and the moment you say something real, something that matters to you, it gets brushed off.

I brought up how it felt seeing the thrones of the monarchs who started the colonization of Puerto Rico. How heavy that is to carry as someone with Taíno ancestry.

And her response was just: “Ok.” Then: “It’s good to appreciate the past, but being present is the only way to progress.” Like… what?

That’s the kind of stuff that makes me pull back. That makes it hard to feel close. I wasn’t trying to argue, I was just being honest. But it’s like everything gets reframed to protect her comfort, not my truth.

My whole family has their demons. Their avoidance. Their need to make everything “make sense” instead of just sitting with what is.

I don’t hate them. But I’m not chasing connection that only exists on their terms anymore.

Sometimes you see things from a distance—patterns, contradictions, harm that gets swept under the rug—and you wonder if you're the only one who notices. You’re not close enough to be in the room, but close enough to feel uneasy. That tension sits with you. You don’t want to start drama. You just want to understand.

So you dig a little. Watch quietly. Ask questions that no one else seems to be asking. Not because you’re nosy or bitter—but because you care about truth. About safety. About people.

Eventually, you see what you need to see.

You realize the problem isn’t hidden—it’s just protected. Hidden in plain sight, behind shiny accomplishments, performance activism, or curated vulnerability. You realize some people are shielded not because they’ve done the right thing, but because they’re politically useful, or publicly sympathetic, or simply too “connected” to be questioned.

And that’s when it hits you: there won’t be justice here. Not the kind that restores, or transforms, or tells the truth out loud.

But there was truth. And you saw it. That matters.

You walk away not because you're defeated—but because you won’t waste your life chasing people who’ve mastered the art of being untouchable. You’re not here to be their mirror, their enemy, or their footnote.

You're here to live in integrity. To move forward with softness and strength. To remember that silence is not complicity when you’ve already asked the hard questions and listened deeply for the answers.

She changed her name.

Wiped everything clean.

Posted a new photo—soft curls, red lips, pearls like a shield.

It’s composed. Deliberate.

But her eyes…

Her eyes still carry what her words never did.

There’s a sadness there—quiet, restrained, almost buried.

I used to reach for her in that sadness.

I used to read between the silences,

decode the pauses,

build bridges across the void.

Not anymore.

This time, I saw it—

and didn’t move toward it.

I didn’t shrink. I didn’t fix.

I didn’t offer more of myself just to feel close.

Because I know now:

some people dress their pain in polish,

and some silences aren’t meant to be filled—

especially by the ones they pushed away.

So yes, I saw her.

The curated softness. The grief behind the gloss.

And for once,

I chose to walk on.

Not because I’m bitter—

I watch the news and feel nothing and everything.

Missiles fall, buildings collapse, children cry in the rubble. But my anger isn't just at one side. It's at all the leaders, all the regimes, all the militaries and armed groups that choose power over people. IDF, Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran none of them are innocent. Not when the bodies keep piling up and the excuses sound more hollow each time.

This isn’t about religion. It’s not about flags. It’s not about which side is “right.” It’s about how we’ve let power rewrite what it means to be human.

We’ve seen this story before. We’ve seen apartheid, displacement, genocide, cycles of retaliation dressed up as “defense.” And still, the bombs fall.

If history teaches us anything, it’s this: Those who don’t learn from it will force others to relive it.

I don’t have a solution. I’m just tired. Tired of pretending like this is normal. Tired of grieving strangers. Tired of governments playing gods with mortal lives.

There’s a kind of exile that doesn’t take your body — it takes your belonging.

You stay in the room. You smile in the photo. You laugh at the joke. But inside, something has already left.

Maybe it was the moment your voice was ignored too many times.

Maybe it was when your softness was treated like weakness.

Maybe it was the way you always noticed everything — and no one noticed you.

Emotional exile isn’t loud. It’s not even angry.

It’s the quiet decision to stop offering parts of yourself to people who don’t hold them with care.

And in that distance, you begin to find a different kind of home — one made of silence, honesty, and small, sacred boundaries.

You learn how to return to yourself.

I’ve walked through a thousand versions of myself to become the one writing this.

Some parts of me were shaped by silence. Others by screams no one heard. There were seasons when I disappeared into myself so deeply, I thought I’d never return. And yet… here I am.

I’ve known what it feels like to be misunderstood, to carry pain in the bones, not just the heart. To dream in shadows and bloom anyway.

My story isn’t wrapped in bows or painted in gold. It’s etched in scars, softened by petals, and laced with the blood-memory of ancestors who refused to vanish.

I used to believe I was too much and not enough — both at once. But now I see: I was simply becoming.

If you’ve ever felt like the quiet one, the one who sees too much and says too little… this space is for you too.