I think a lot about the luxury and privilege of being born into a brain that knows how to play games with unspoken rules. Mine definitely doesn't.
A coworker DMed me today during a meeting we were both in and asked me, "Is this kind of killing you?"
I immediately thought of a viral post on [social media platform du jour] where the author explains that she was asked to turn her camera off on Zoom because she was facially emoting too much.
I love Medusa because she can turn people to stone with her gaze.
And I nod enthusiastically in agreement when I heartily endorse a message, grin foolishly when it stirs in me the feeling of renewed ambition.
One time a different coworker told me she felt calm during her presentation because I was there. I still don't know why though, haven't let myself think about it.
Sometimes I hold deep restraint in my jaw when I disagree with something, but have yet to find the words outside of my gut.
Sometimes an unplanned soliloquy thoughtlessly arrives out of my mouth and I don't know when it will happen. I can't manifest it by wishing it alone.
In classic Greek mythology, Medusa is a deeply hideous woman and her curse befalls anyone that simply looks upon her.
In Ovidian poetry, Medusa is a beautiful woman cursed by Minerva with a head of snakes. Her gaze petrifies.
Earlier this year, I killed a service called Minerva.
And sometimes it feels like I have the thousand-foot stare.
According to Plato the eye sends out rays that make contact with what it sees. Extramission.
Seeing someone and being seen by them is one connection with two ends.
Meeting her eyes is the event, and it doesn’t really matter who started it.
In a relational graph, this is two nodes, two edges, A sees B, B sees A.
To Plato, the two edges compress into a single, bi-directional edge, unspoken but implied.
Anyway.