Okay. I've been stewing about the paparazzi thing for a whole day now. I think it's not so much that I'm mad at the guy, because I don't give two shits about him. I think the incident triggered one of my deepest fears.

I grew up in a house where there was someone who could exhibit the most awesome, destructive, senseless violence at a moment's notice. You never knew where it was going to come from, when or why. It would just happen. Like I said, over spilled milk. Over not eating fast enough. Over wanting to eat too much. Or for absolutely nothing or everything, because he was angry at our mom or overwhelmed by life's stresses. It was like being caught in a terrifying storm that came out of nowhere, and it would leave you broken and wrecked when the sun came up, wondering what it was that caused this and how you could possibly avoid it next time. But here's the thing. You couldn't. You have no control over this force, and you can't reason with it. You can kind of predict it by reading certain signs and making yourself scarce, but there was an inevitability to it. I was completely helpless.

So I have all these feelings in me, the fear, the rage, the anger at myself for not having protected myself and my brother. The helplessness, the vulnerability. Look how strong my body is--I have the body of a fighter, a warrior. I'm obsessed with keeping it strong because I guarantee you any physical attack anyone launches at me, I will fight back. And I will fuck some shit up. Look at how angry I get when I finally decide that someone is not on my side but is trying to do me harm. I have no qualms about using the words that will cut deepest and cause the most damage. Truth in words is my sword, and it is always at my side. And should I not be able to draw fast enough, I still have my hands for survival.

I have worked very hard to gain the spirituality which allows me to not get to a point where I feel cornered, where I don't need to be on the defensive or need to be at arms. I've worked to make my mind incredibly strong, to analyze both instantly as well as continually to find perceived threats, to know very quickly who someone is (even their secrets and repressions), and where they're coming from. I've learned how to be aware of my body, to relax myself when I'm feeling threatened, to know that unless it's a dangerous threat of bodily harm, that I can handle anything else, that I'm not helpless. It works in that I have ways to consciously keep my heartrate down, I can keep my body relaxed, I can process everything logically so I don't become overwhelmed by my emotions. I can get irritable but it takes a lot for me to become angry because I've got a lot of discipline, because I delineate everything logically and process information bit by bit rapidly rather than as a large chunk so I don't become overwhelmed too quickly. But in those moments when I get overwhelmed and feel threatened too quickly, if my mind loses its grasp...I'm scared of those moments. Of losing control, of what might happen. I have the storm in me. I have stored in me the vibrations of my father's rage.

My soul and my mind can say, it's over, you aren't in that place anymore, you're safe now. You aren't in that house anymore. Nothing can hurt you that way anymore because you are no longer helpless. And I absolutely know that. I'm completely conscious of that. But there's a part of me that I'm scared of, the part that lays dormant in my unconscious. A part of me that has to take over when I feel backed in a corner, because it's the last resort when my mind, which is always my strongest defense, becomes too overwhelmed to handle the threat. Then what? How deep is my rage and what can it do? How dangerous is my rage?

I meet certain people and I can see it in their eyes. It's an intensity. We are drawn to each other because we know each other's secret--that we are terrified of something that lays deep within ourselves, something that we did not ask to carry but we can not help. And even if we so desperately want to get close to other people, we are afraid we will someday lose control and hurt them. Razor hands. What if we hurt the very ones we're trying to love? There is no forgiveness in our own souls for that. So we keep our distance from people. We go through life and we can learn how to be gracious, how to be kind, how to be wonderful jovial company, even how to give the good parts of ourselves unconditionally and nurture and protect others, because we give to those that which we always wanted. Sometimes we convince ourselves that we enjoy being alone, that it's the ache of loneliness that truly reminds us that we are alive. But we are lonely, so wary of others and so afraid of ourselves.

What if someone gets too close to us and hurts us, if this thing could unleash and be so primal, that it could do things that would morally horrify us in the aftermath, where everything that we have built of ourselves comes crumbling down, and all that is left is one ruined, fucked up individual with blood on his or her hands. How could life possibly go on after that?

You don't want to believe it. You don't want to believe it could be so bad. So you have faith. And you hope. And you believe with the right kind of love, it will heal you from this burden. And you try to meet people like you, so scared but so aware, and you want to see how they can work through it, because if they can diffuse this bomb and extricate it, then so can you. That maybe if you can talk them through towards healing, that once they achieve it, they'll in turn be able to help you set yourself free, because that's the irony--the only way to free yourself, is to let someone get close enough to you to touch it, but that's the absolute thing you're most afraid of. You don't want to believe that this is who you are, this darkness. You don't want to believe that you are destructive. People tell you it's just in your head...it's just fear, trauma, but you're okay. Look how gentle you are. But deep down, you worry. You always worry.

All I have in my life is faith and hope -- that there is order to this chaos, that there is a reason behind what can not be explained, and at the end of the day, there is healing if you work hard enough. My greatest hope, is that there is light at the end of my journey.