I didn't cry when my childhood dog died, when my mom was diagnosed with cancer, when my grandma died, or when I found my brother. My tears would not bring them back, my caring would change nothing, so, I did neither. I used to consider this a logical and pragmatic behavior, one I worked towards but hid. Every smile and every frown was a performance. After my brother overdosed, the mask fell. I once thought I was mature in my emotionlessness—even selfless—but I was wrong.
I realized this when I read The Stranger by Albert Camus. The inner dialogue of the protagonist, Meursault, was an echo of my own defensive apathy. Tragedy is nothing special to him: death akin to spilt milk, he skips the grieving. I think I did too. I accepted anything and everything happening around me, no matter how profound, with ease. I coddled myself in a blanket of indifference and kept my eyes shut tight. My means of coping was not new, and the lump of guilt it left in my throat was all too familiar. Mersault’s amoral perspective dismissed this guilt. I saw myself in both a comforting and concerning way. Logic and empathy may co-exist. I am not crazy, but I should be better.
Camus made me realize I depended on apathy out of necessity. I do care, I am only aspiring to be indifferent, constantly trying to convince myself, to end the dissonance. To be logical in an illogical environment is not ideal. How can I feel happy while other people suffer? How can I make other people happy without feeling nothing myself? Existence is irrational, so why must I possess reason? I really do not like it.
Camus basks in this paradox: the absurd. He showed me comfort in what used to cause me pain. Each new book was an oasis punctuating sand dune weeks consoling my mother, and keeping my own tears within bedroom walls (where no pity could be awarded). I cried-I was not myself. The Plague, The Fall, and especially The Stranger, were cherished reflecting pools making the barren desert of my mind hospitable. I could finally see what was wrong. I am correct in failing to find inherent meaning, but emotionlessness is not the solution. Life is meaningless, and that's a good thing. Accepting a meaningless and indifferent world is not a get away free card, it's not a tragedy—it is a gift.
As though I was raised existentialist, and after a failed conversion to nihilism, I have found solace in absurdism. The human condition is accepted for what it is: pointless, repetitive, and painful. Nevertheless, Sisyphus is happy. I used to look at my brother with fear, knowing the person in that body is not the one I loved. I used to look at his hospital bed like an open casket at an indefinite and premature wake. It's too early to mourn, so I simply stopped looking. I ignored him when he needed me. Camus reminded me I can pull my brother out of that training-coffin, drag him into his wheelchair, and roll him alongside my boulder. So what if it's heavy? I love my brother, the one I lost, and the one I'm lucky enough to get to know.
Avoidance, dissociating and apathy are tools of the past. Camus has a little red tool box of the absurd, and I use it every day. I can accept what I cannot change, and I try to change that which I can not accept. I can endure the inevitable, and my brief moment of joy are small rebellions against it. Camus showed me how to feel without abandoning reason, to be happy and selfless. I'm glad I love my brother, even if it hurts a little.
Lauren S
12th grade
Writing is cathartic. Life is a book, and for me, the figurative is often more accurate than the literal. I hate reading what I write, but I like writing it. So even if I don't like my life, maybe I'll like living it.