1 in 14,000,605.
Words by Jitro Timbang
How often have you imagined the whole world listening in to your story? Not through fame, spotlight, or by choice — through paranoia.
Living in a mansion in my head, I imagine rooms bullet pointing every whispers I’ve made from young to now; screenplays revisiting choices I shouldn’t have; based-on-true-story reenactments altered to picture a what-could’ve-been reality.
“Be in the present” they say, but how can I, when the past and the future are spontaneously unfolding. Eager to get out, disciplined enough to play the game.
Living in a mansion in my head, I still choose the one that I have in fourteen million six hundred and five. My paranoia is an academy filled with lessons, keeping me grounded in what I’ve survived.
I’m proud that I’m stronger than the character I imagine the rooms imagine me to be — through reflection, I am. And you can’t take that away from me.
July 21st, 2023.
