Honestly? Meh

For years I spent my life thinking my ancestors just willingly gave away their culture with so much ease, because if it was ever taught what truly happened, Italians might actually wise up and riot. They might actually want to remember who they were, where they came from, what their history actually represented.

If Italians were taught about the way they were once described as 'worse than the n----', if they were taught about once upon a time being the second most lynched people, if they were taught about the real reasons Columbus Day was pushed so hard (to avoid a war with Italy after the lynchings of 11 Italian immigrants), if they were taught about the execution of two innocent Italian-American immigrants, how they were used to do the jobs freed slaves left open (for minimal pay ((and this is not to say Italians had it worse by any means bc they very much did not have it worse))), or about how even holding an ounce of love for your homeland - or worry over your loved ones back in Italy - would get you sent to internment camps, maybe they would stop falling into the hands of right wingers. They might actually feel the boiling rage I do at being tricked into believing my ancestors were outright traitors to their fellow immigrants.

It's a very hard thing to face, and I feel like I've wasted so much of my life ignoring this side of me out of shame. I turned this part of me into the butt of a joke. I called it spicy mayo. I scoffed at anyone who tried to take pride in their Italian-American history growing up because 'we're just white, cope'.

It's embarrassing, and I am now ashamed that I was ever ashamed.

And while the book will be a painful read, it will be an eye-opening one as well.

My hope is to feel less isolated. I never got to know ANY Italian-American traditions. I don't have family recipes. I don't have large family reunions. I feel deeply cut off from a culture my soul seems to long for. The more I learn from other Italian-Americans online over what they experienced, and the traditions and fun they have, the more alone I feel.

This isn't even an issue regarding the walls being thin because we don't hear their TV unless they are blaring their fucking sub-woofer during a movie.

It's just so frustrating because I genuinely wanted to have neighbors, we were excited to meet them, give them a gift basket and welcome them in but it has been non-stop for 3 weeks of loud noises, drilling at 11 pm, blaring movies that rattle our walls, and a yappy ass dog.

Their ring camera can also see directly into our apartment front door which is fucking gross but can't do anything about that.

This place is gorgeous and I want to stay here for a while as we save up for a house but I will go insane if these neighbors don't relax with the fucking sound bullshit.

Outside of that my day was actually quite nice and relaxing. I'm trying to find a decent combo of what type of content I want to make, or what I even would like to do with this life.

I'm not built for typical grind culture content creation, and my goal isn't to go viral. All I want is to build a community of people that lift each other up, that do good things, and supports each other. Hell, maybe even fight for the environment. I don't want to be working 12 hour days, but that's absolutely what people have to do in CC just to be given a chance to be seen by the algorithm. It's sad.

I miss old youtube honestly.

I miss when you could do stupid and silly shit for fun, not worry about ad revenue and just did your own thing as you pleased.

I think that's just a better way of life if I'm honest. A better way of creativity.

what a fucking dystopia we live in, eh?

The world offers us so many things naturally and we created a fake means of hierarchy to feel bigger than others, more important. And now our food supply is riddled with diseases and chemicals and our water supply is depleting quickly while also being destroyed.

Our planet's on a forever verge of climate crisis and there's so many simple things we can do to stop it but God forbid the micro-dicked men that run these organizations be told how to do anything for the good of it all.

The commitment to being the villains is mind-boggling to me.

I understand this idea that a few select people own 90% of companies. I just don't understand why they view gaining a public status as 'actually trying to better the environment and the populous' as a net zero.

If you deplete the world of its resources, you struggle to make products. If you horde all the wealth, the people cannot afford your product, and therefore you no longer have a stream of income.

They only stopped when they over heard me shouting that it was 11 god damn pm and they had all day to do whatever the fuck they were doing.

I know we should have just knocked on their door but something tells me they aren't the type to actually be kind and considerate even when you ask politely.

If it happens again we'll likely knock and ask them to turn the bass down in their settings on the TV, and if they refuse or ignore then we'll have to start recording for the front office which I'd really rather not do.

I expect noise, and if it were just their TV that would be completely different, but blaring your bass for a movie/tv show is truly a level of inconsideration that I find mind-blowing.

We have great speakers for my vinyl player. I, however, keep that to a moderate to low level even though I really love listening to music loudly to enjoy for myself without care of who is around me.

Even just writing this down is working me up again it was so infuriating. I really hate when people just lack any and all consideration for others like this. I walk basically on my tiptoes to ensure that I'm not disturbing anyone in other apartments with my steps for Christ sake. And I'm not saying everyone should do that, I am aware that I have an extreme case of consideration due to anxiety. But even a fraction, just a single thought about those around you would have made you think 'hey maybe this is a not so great idea'.

I cannot wait until we can own a home, or even just a place that doesn't have connecting walls like this? I don't know. A trailer even! A trailer would be beautiful in the right area. Like ?? I don't know man.

And what's worse is we were so excited to have new neighbors and say hello when they seemed settled in, but every day they'd been busy with stuff so we've put it off.

I'm trying to get better at simply existing. I'm finding that if I'm not doing something that can be seen by others, be profited off of, or be discussed in some way it no longer feels worthwhile. And I really hate that.

I don't enjoy playing games without streaming them because I want to enjoy them with others. I find I'm most excited to read if I know there's a space to discuss the book with others online about it. I don't really watch movies or TV shows but feel like I would if I made reaction content on them or began writing reviews.

I struggle to simply do things I enjoy for the sake of self-gratification.

Whether that stems from late-stage capitalism, a sense of deep loneliness, a desire to just be heard or feel as if my opinions matter, or due to my dad's insistence that hobbies are only worthwhile if you turn a profit or make them productive I truly don't know. Maybe a combination of all of them.

I think ideally I would live in a world where none of that exists. We really fucked up by getting rid of bartering systems I think. It may not be a perfect system, but it's a system that is communal, forces us to get to know each other and to care for each other, and doesn't abide by a dog-eat-dog type world.

Or maybe I'm just romanticizing it because it's something that isn't capitalism.

I think I just miss simplicity.

And learning about where my family comes from (small islands off the coast of Italy; Ponza and Ischia) it's a little odd to feel pieces of my personality - who I am at my core - be represented in the culture of those places. The slow living, the romanticizing of just enjoying the moment, loving the coast and ocean. And it being what many people believe to be the Island Aeaea from The Odyssey is also fascinating given how much I adored that book growing up.

I've blamed a multitude of things for this before. Late stage capitalism, monetizing every hobby I have, the state of the world and politics, simply not being good enough to deserve to take up that space.

What it all really boils down to though is that I'm burnt out. I'm burnt out of trying to stay positive and creative while the world gets worse and old friends would turn to me as a positivity beacon. I've cut every one of those friends out (some for good reasons, others because I was not being treated with the same level of care, and very few others simply because I wanted to start over).

I will say, I'm happier for it. Even the loss of friends that didn't really do anything wrong outside of not check in on me. I think I needed to recluse for a while, dig into myself and rip out the parts of me that I adopted from other people's personality.

Unfortunately, what's left is a person in their 30s that doesn't have a God damn clue who they really are. When you've spent that long abiding by what people believe you to be, what is left once that's stripped away from you? Even worse, it would be so easy to go back, but now I don't have those personalities around to adopt the quirks from. I can't mask anymore. I took the mask off and in a bittersweet irony lost that mask like my ADHD brain loses my keys, or my phone, or the fork I just set down after remembering I was in the middle of doing some other task entirely.

I've boiled myself down to know a select few hobbies I genuinely do enjoy.

Reading - especially if it's sapphic and fantasy.

Gaming - but there's a caveat. I only actually enjoy it if I am streaming the game for others to enjoy with me. I rarely find myself playing a game for the simple sake of enjoying it on my own.

Politics. Annoyingly. - I use an app called ActiVote that has daily activities, daily civics quizzes, bills that are being discussed in my area, etc etc and I love to look at it. I love checking on it. I love reading the bills and its lawyer speak. What I hate is how this interest affects every other social media I use.

My Instagram used to be so beautiful. Superman edits, Surfing updates from the WSL, gorgeous travel vlogs, humans enjoying life and smiling and maybe an update about the world once in a while.

My TikTok (before I deleted it) had a stunning algorithm of nature, beaches, coasts, quite small coffee shops near me, and again humans simply enjoying the world they live in.

But as my interest in Politics grows, alongside my desire to keep as informed as possible, those algorithms have warped.

I can't open Instagram without being terrified of what's to come. I can't catch up on what's happening and then take a breather and numb my mind with watching the ocean waves, or someone getting barreled, or any scenic view from someone else's hotel. It's all bad, all the time.

And that's not to say I kept my head buried before, but there was a buffer. I could manage it. I could stay informed without falling into doomerism and 'we're so cooked' entering my mind every single time I opened my phone. I could stay active in politics, sign petitions, call my reps, share info about harmful laws being put in place. But now I just absorb that information and find myself scrolling endlessly hoping for a reprieve. A small break to bring my cortisol down again. To make me feel the way the Bentio Bowl did.

But it just doesn't come.

And then I have to take yet another social media break. I have to stop looking so that I can regroup, get my head on right again, and dive in once more when I feel better. When I no longer feel like the world is ending and that my voice will help make a dent in some way.

And even then, during my social media break I'm reading these idealized lives that don't exist in the world I do. OR I'm reading books like The Climate Book by Greta Thunberg and learning that my country and many others have been being warmed about climate change since the 1950s and refused to do fuck all to stop it from getting this bad in the name of mega corporations continuing a profit.

And we're right back to 'what's the point?' If these powerful men and women have known how bad it was, and how bad it would get this whole time and consistently put profits over the good of society since the NINETEEN FUCKING FIFTIES what the fuck is the point of trying to push for them to listen now? When they clearly don't want to, don't care to, and won't?

I miss being the positivity beacon.

At least then when I was suicidal I could find my creative outlets worthwhile. they were a break in the devastation and desperation.

Now, those creative outlets feel a lot like the mask.