Some kind of awkwardness, some kind of sadness. Some kind of call from within that would like to say something..
Let’s try and listen.. My throat is tight, words need to come out. My heart is heavy, a bit closed, it would prefer being open and welcome light.
My breathing is short making my body think that something is threatening. I run in various directions for food, shopping, school, admin, cleaning. But not much of it all makes sense because the main goal isn’t clear.
I was born in 1979, during a snowy night. When I was born, the city had never seen so much snow in many years. Both my parents surprisingly discovered my blue eyes as they both have brown eyes. I was welcome in a city and ready to open my eyes to the wonders of the world. Some wonderful days of course, but also some confusing days, living in a world where cars would throw nasty fumes to my nostrils, where adults were smoking cigarettes in our cars, getting us to breath tobacco at a very young age. Living in a world where we had to show off our branded clothes to display our social class at school. Teenagers would be drinking alcohol and smoking for fashion. Living in a world where the most important is to come first in sports, have the best school results, show how perfect children we are, ready for a bright career in a bank, as a doctor or a lawyer. Certainly not as an actor, singer or writer, that would be unwise. Of course you would be expected to be straight, married and with children to keep this whole non sense going. In the 1980’s we reached the highest point of individualism, competition, rat race for gathering money and goods, careers and masculinity. Interestingly enough, as a child, you can tell that something is not right, you can tell that the life your parents live doesn’t make so much sense. But as a child, you can’t put it down in words or analyse it. So it becomes a lasagna of emotions, sensitivities.. Usually coming out during teenagehood with excessive reactions for some of them, rebellion for others.. Their way to tell their parents : What on earth are you doing? What kind of a future do you prepare for me? Why should I be focusing at school when you guys don’t inspire me?
Some parents can see all that but don’t have the strength to face it, or simply can’t understand it. They might burn out, get into depression and sometimes the consequences are so much that the couple divorces, bringing more concern in the children’s minds.
The world is reaching it’s maximum capacity to deal with this way of life, run for money and prestige, run for being bigger than the next door neighbourg, having the best polluting car.. We, children of the 1980’s, were born in the ‘plastic’ world, the petrol world, divorcing parents and watching this mass of people running towards supermarkets and packaged holidays. We are now adults, we remember how it felt to have this weight on our shoulders as children. Now that we are becoming parents, this is our duty to do what we can to change the way we look at life, to inspire them, guide them to their creativity to lead a meaningful life fed with human values.
Let’s believe in a more feminin world, let’s be in touch with our sensitivity, our desire for curves instead of straight lines, community instead of individuality. Let’s draw freedom, union, support between us all, humility, respect of nature and kindness on this new page for our children. I believe in a better living, I believe in us all painting with our children the new colours of the world.