Acts of Indifference

Some people are comfortable sharing their emotions, while there are others who take that to an extreme, wearing those emotions on their sleeves, daring and defying the world to deal with them. Despite the shocks and wounds a generally uncaring world tends to deliver to such people, they persist in that in a kind of ultimate validation of irresistible force meeting unmoveable object. For some, it's an act of confrontation, of facing down the demons and the ghosts, while for others it's a kind of validation, a platform on which to play out a psychodrama as it struts and frets its hour upon the stage.

He had never been one of those people. For better or worse, everyone is a prisoner of their own history, locked behind bars not entirely of their own making or choice, a cell from which there is no escape. The world had taught him, through harsh and bitter lessons, to be wary of exposing his emotions. Better to lock those things away, keep them carefully hidden, only allow the trusted few, and hold even them at a safe distance. If you expect nothing, then you can never be hurt, never be disappointed. Wittingly or not, everyone will betray you, will cross a line beyond which they should not go and, once crossed, can never turn back from.

Acts of indifference, acts of betrayal. In the end, they amount to the same thing, a Rubicon which Caeser should not pass. Trust is a funny thing, hard to earn, so easy to lose. A conversation that should never have been, perhaps a miscommunication or just an inability to communicate properly, recriminations, aspersions and confirmations. And, quietly, almost as an afterthought, trust evaporates like a morning mist, stealing softly away so as to not disturb the silence in the cathedral of the ego.

All good things must come to an end; so banal in its triteness, but nevertheless true. What is there left to say, to do, other than sack Rome? There are some events that, once set in motion, can not be stopped. It would be wise for people to remember to settle the disorder in their own homes before advising others on the chaos in theirs, but people are not wise, just prisoners of themselves. As that other truism goes, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

And so some things end, not with a bang, nor even with a whimper, but in a terrible vacuum of indifference. Just one more thing to be locked up, hidden carefully away, mourned in its passing. Better by far to be guarded, to maintain that wall, than be exposed and vulnerable to the caprices of others. It hurts less that way, and it only costs a small piece of your soul.