In the world today, it is not cool to care. If friendships end, you find new ones. You hang out with people but never get too attached. You jump from one friend group to another. If your boyfriend cheats on you, you tweet something ’savage’ and get thousands of retweets. Apparently, that’s a healing process now.
Unfortunately, I’ve never been like that. For as long as I can remember, I have cared. A lot.
About any and everything.
I am a “text me when you get home” type of person because I’m scared something will happen. I assume the worst, pretty much always. I try to catch up with people from my past every once in a while, even if we haven’t spoken in months and left off on bad terms. I just want know how you're doing. If you are not absolutely thrilled to see me, I will overthink it. If someone is being short with me, I’m gonna automatically assume they hate me. I need constant reassurance about any friendship or relationship I am in.
If you ask any of my friends “Who’s the crazy one?”, there’s a 99% chance all fingers will point towards me. And I’m completely okay with that. I am crazy because I will fight for what I love, even if it’s a losing battle. I am crazy because I make my friend's problems my own problems. I am crazy because I will text someone 10 times in a row just to make sure they’re not mad at me. I’m crazy because I feel every emotion so deeply, and I’m not sorry for that.
Sometimes my tendencies come across as annoying or "too much". And trust me, I know this. It is hard to control how much you care. It is hard to be protective without being overbearing. It is hard to try to pretend that you're okay with something when in reality, it tears you apart. Caring so much can sometimes lead me to overreact, snap, or just breakdown.
David Jones once said “It is both a blessing and a curse to feel everything so very deeply.” And Mr. Jones was completely right. Our society tells us that you’re not cool if you care. If you care about someone, whether it be a friendship or a relationship, there’s something wrong with you. If you’re willing to fight or, God forbid, cry over something, then you must be c-r-a-z-y.
According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. there are tons of different definitions of the word “crazy.” It can mean “full of cracks or flaws” or “mad or insane.” However, it can also mean “out of the ordinary.” That’s what I believe my type of crazy is. Yes, I am full of cracks and flaws, but everyone is. I’m not ‘mad or insane’ enough to gain a membership to a psych ward (Check back with me in a year, college might just do me in) But in 2016, a person who still cares deeply IS out of the ordinary. If a boy cheated on me, I would not be posting about it on social media, making myself feel better with likes or retweets. I would be genuinely hurt. If I lost a friend, I would not be able to find someone else so easily. I would be heart broken.
So, go ahead and call me crazy. I will completely agree with you. I have a big heart and a lot of feelings. I feel an entire spectrum of emotions within a 24-hour period. I’ll cry my eyes out one second and then be grinning from ear to ear to the next. Sometimes putting up with my ‘craziness’ might get hard, but once you do, I think it’s worth it. I promise it’s just all because I care. And I care a lot. And I will never apologize for being crazy.
