I hit reject all as a way to feel powerful in a powerless world where cookies aren’t made of sugar but made of things I don’t fully understand. I reject the ads and the cookies because I think I am supposed to. These cookies I can’t eat. These invisible cookies. The internet is a vast world I pretend I comprehend.
Hello again, internet friends. Hello to the new ones, hello to the old ones. Some I’ve met, some I haven’t, but there you are, in the internet. Inside the internet. And here I am, talking to you, writing to you. Writing into existence. Inside the internet. Inside your screen. Through the tempered glass I go, reflecting a parallel reality. I hope you’re well, happy and healthy, and that the beginning of fall is treating you nicely.
I grapple a lot between the image I project on the internet and the thoughts I have of the image others perceive of me. What is it really that others feel, others think, when they look at the tiny squares that echo my orange hair? I’ve obsessed over this question in an infinite way I am sure is not unique to me. Does anyone actually think anything? Do we really think we are that special that others think of us?
Instagram vs reality. The idea of who I want to be vs who I really am. Who is it that I am? What is it that I want to be perceived as? What is this never ending loop and what’s the trick to getting off it? Avatar or not, I can’t seem to find the exit- and the truth is, I’m not actually seeking it. We complain about surveillance, we complain about comparison, we complain about the perfect staged lives and when the messy ones take their place, we fail to remember those are thought out too- and that however sloppy or chaotic, however natural, however barely there… We are still existing within the app.
Every month or so I go onto instagram and delete images I’ve posted of myself, of my face. I archive them into eternity because I know (this is a knowledge no one has told me but I have decided is the truth) people will see my feed- this constructed world we millennials take so seriously- as vain. If I post my face I am self-obsessed. I am superficial. I am vain. Un-tethered to the reality of where we are, of where the world is, of what society is falling into. But. If I post myself I know I will get more likes- shooting up doses of dopamine every time I look at the number go up.
Days or weeks later, I’ll look at the photos of my face and look at the likes underneath it and the only thing I feel is… the insecurity of scrutiny. No more dopamine. I just see the obsessive construction of the girl I crave to be. The woman I want to be perceived as. The desire to be everything and nothing at the same time. But more importantly: A never-ending judgment created from the deepest corners of my soul.
What do I want?, you might ask. Oh, easy. Real easy.
I want to be the smart girl, intellectual and admired, but also sexy, but not sexy in a way that is cheap, but slutty enough that I seem empowered. Naked enough that I seem body positive, however much I mistreat my body. I want to be pretty and elegant and chic, in the way Carolyn Bessette was but I know I will never be. In the way society (and by society I mean the patriarchy) has whipped up for us, especially nowadays, when either you’re too much or too little, but never, ever enough. I want to be artsy and talented, to be thought of as an artist rather than a face. I want to be part of the ‘I’m a cool director slash photographer slash creative director slash artist slash cool chic’ world, a world I know I’m not in because I haven’t shot a job since I got appendicitis, and that was 7 months ago, and 7 months without working as a director slash photographer slash human that works and is cool, is a lot of time without working, no matter the other jobs I have been doing. Other jobs don’t matter on the gram. Other jobs don’t count if they’re not cool like the cool kids.
Cool is a word that haunts me.
I want to expose myself and post every single word I write on my notes app because I want to be seen and felt and I need an outlet where I can share the shit I think of because I haven’t spoken to my therapist in weeks. I want to look beautiful enough that I’m desired because I am now single, and being single means getting out there and getting out there means posting photos of your face or people won’t know you’re beautiful and desirable and single. I want to be transparent and vulnerable so I seem relatable. I want people to feel something when I do something. I want to be everything and nothing at all. I want to be funny but know I’m not. I want to disappear and be thought of, at the same time. I want bigger boobs but also my small boobs. I want to be alone. I want leaner legs, a leaner stomach, I want to be famous and not famous at all. I want to be a poet. I want to be. I want. I want as a means to replace the quiet. The depths of quiet that are scary enough to make me rethink everything I think I know about life. Everything I think that I am.
I don’t know what I am when it comes to social media, I don’t know who I am when it comes to instagram. I live in between states of being and obsessing. Hating and loving. Haunting and hating. I hate the internet, I love the internet. We all do. But we stay, we stay in this toxic relationship, because it is ever so satisfying. I think about the reality of quitting- and I can’t. Not truly. I am not brave enough. I am addicted to the need to be liked, the need to be seen, the need to be wanted. The satisfaction I get when I’m thought of as anything other than I have ever thought of myself is too big, too filling.
I pick up my phone so many times a day and refresh it I am aware it is a problem. And then I don’t pick it up at all. I pick it up so many times that I disgust myself and the thought of this extension of my arm seems ridiculous. The thought of posing. The thought of uploading another photo of my face. But I look pretty. But I look good. I want the world to know that I am having fun. I want the world to know that I’m in a good place. Because I am. Even when I seem lost in this grid, in this feed. Even when I feel repulsed by my face on repeat. Even when I think I don’t know who I am on the internet. Even when I write, today, now, I know: I am genuinely in a good place and I know this when I’m alone.
I also know what I am when I’m alone. I know what I am when I write, I know what I am when I’m sitting on the toilet, scrolling into infinity. I know what I am when I wake up on my friends sofa. When I’m drunk on the underground. When I read. When I sit with a sentence, when I sit with an image. When I look at someone’s stories. I know who I am when I’m traveling.
When is it that we truly are ourselves? Is it when we’re alone? Is it when we’re with others?
I am a dreamer. I am jealous, envious. I am soft and tough. I am open and vulnerable and willing. I am power hungry, ambition hungry, life hungry. I am 27 years old and living off suitcases for another 4 months. I am flexible. I am understanding. I am moving on. I am a woman that bleeds. I am mean. I am.
I hope she- the one on the feed, the one on the gram- I hope she’ll be happier.
What are you?
qué maravilla; solo puedo decir millones de gracias por esta honestidad visceral, Chloé. no sabes hasta qué punto me identifico con todo lo que has escrito. es jodido ser millenial: llevamos mucho a las espaldas, demasiada dinámica tóxica a la par que placentera en las redes sociales. somos un poco paradojas andantes y nos balanceamos en una espiral un tanto esquizofrénica de esa mezcla de mundo real y mundo digital. pero ahí estamos. atravesamos el dolor y cada día sabemos nadar un poco mejor en él. somos resilientes y hay una belleza muy potente en eso. te envío muchos ánimos, fuerza y amor.