by Neesa Suncheuri
I’m at my psychiatrist’s office for a routine visit. I go every four weeks, mostly to get my prescriptions. I haven’t changed my medication dosages in months.
“Hello, Neesa, how are you?”
“I’m doing really well!” A smile on my face. “Last week, something amazing happened to me. I’ve become a Christian!”
Dear Lord, or deity that is out there… if You are…
I’m not sure these days.
I offer an obligatory thanks to You, for creating me.
For shaping me in Your image.
I know that I will never have prayers answered,
Unless I thank You.
Such I have been told by the church community’s rhetoric.
And so I do, I thank You with compulsion.
The sixty-eight rattles down the tracks filled with tired, tattered humanity on their way home from the workday, or on their way to start the night-shift. The pungent odor of sweat, diesel, and vomit assault the senses of a man sitting by the door. He looks around. The young, well dressed man in the adjoining seat gazes intently at his Kindle, his body language stiff and withdrawn as if saying, “leave me be.”
Guys do not cry, do not feel like they are going insane. They provide stability in any situation, a solution to all problems. So I was taught. Drilled into me was the John Wayne, Clint Eastwood type of man. But that really wasn’t me.
But I learned to act at a young age. You could say I began my career in theater at church: no matter how I felt at home, or even if my family had an argument Sunday morning, you put on your best clothes, go to Sunday School, and spit back all the right answers with a smile painted on your face.
