u/alessyaaaaaaaa

Ever think about how some people speak in disclaimers before they even speak honestly?

Like adding “lol,” “idk,” “maybe I’m dumb but,” or turning everything into irony before anyone can react to it seriously.

It’s like wrapping fragile objects in layers and layers of bubble wrap before handing them to someone. Not because the object is funny, but because it would hurt more if it broke uncovered.

I don’t mean insecurity in the obvious sense. Sometimes it’s people who seem the most confident socially. The ones who always joke first, reply instantly, and control the mood of the conversation before anyone else can.

But if you pay close attention, some of them never fully place a sincere thought down without immediately softening it first. As if they’re tapping the brakes before the car even starts moving.

I think a lot of people are terrified of being perceived without a filter. Not rejected...Perceived.

Because once someone sees something genuine in you, you lose the ability to pretend you “didn’t really mean it anyway.”

Irony is such a comfortable escape hatch. You can always crawl back into it if the room gets too quiet.

Makes you wonder how many personalities are actually just emergency exits with good lighting.

I’ll go first

Today was our baby sister’s 6th birthday party, and Eliana was put in charge of ordering the food while my parents were busy hosting everyone.

Meanwhile, I was running around handling the younger kids, setting up random games with my other siblings, and trying to distract everyone because the food was taking way too long

Then she suddenly comes up to me looking genuinely stressed, shaking, hiccuping, sniffling, and teary-eyed like “I think I messed up ☹️”

Turns out this girl somehow sent the entire food order to the wrong address and paid for all of it already 😭😭

I had to call the delivery guy myself because she was so nervous, and the guy said: “bro the whole location is wrong, I’m like 2 hours away.”

The funniest part was that he was Arab and at first said he didn't speak English. But suddenly, he was swearing in perfect English

and apparently the random people there accepted the food and ate everything too

so my dad had to secretly leave, reorder all the food, pay again, and go pick it up himself while the rest of us kept the party alive pretending nothing happened 😭

my mom was entertaining guests, i was distracting the kids, my 13 year old sis was helping set things up, the 9 year old was distracting the birthday girl who was just happily dancing around clueless

and somehow… my parents STILL didn’t yell at her because she already looked so guilty and upset 😭so unfair

The party survived, though. Barely. Hope that the family enjoyed their free feast

The human body is terrifyingly good at continuing.

People think sadness looks cinematic but it doesn’t. Sometimes it just looks like someone becoming unusually kind. Unusually quiet. Unusually understanding about everything. Unusually funny. Unusually good at pretending joy still fits correctly.

Like they’ve privately concluded that nothing here actually belongs to us for long.

Eid is soon. A house is trying very hard to feel alive. Lights everywhere. Relatives are already gathering for pre-Eid traditions. Kids running through hallways loud enough to temporarily overpower grief.

A father smiles at other children while subconsciously looking for his son. A mother opens the door with warmth and hugs but her eyes keep drifting upstairs like part of her is still waiting for footsteps that won’t happen again. A friend visits with their family and somehow the entire house feels aware of who is missing.

Someone quietly admits they don’t really want to celebrate Eid this year with the kind of exhausted honesty that only appears when a person no longer knows how to celebrate around an absence that large. Like joy has started feeling disrespectful somehow.

There are people who move through celebrations like ghosts wearing expensive clothes. Not absent exactly. Just emotionally somewhere else entirely.

Grief changes your relationship with happiness. Not because you stop loving joy, but because joy starts feeling morally confusing.

Especially after funerals. Hospitals. Certain phone calls that divide a life into before and after without asking permission first.

I don’t know. There’s something deeply unsettling about people who continue being soft after discovering how temporary everyone is.

Sometimes a person attends the gathering, wears the nicest clothes, smiles in every photo, says Eid Mubarak perfectly, and is still mentally sitting beside a grave somewhere else entirely.

This Eid: hug your friends longer than usual. Answer the text. Drop the ego. Forgive people if you can. Say what you mean while they’re still here to hear it.

Because one day you’ll want five more minutes with someone and realize life already spent them without asking you first.

Saw someone today, and it made me think about how some people introduce themselves like a punchline before anyone even gets the chance to know them properly.

At first, it comes off funny or unserious, but after a while, people stop treating them like a full person and start treating them like a character they can project onto. Kinda sad, honestly.

I don’t even mean quiet or awkward people, by the way.

Some of the nicest interactions I’ve had were with people who were a little weird, nervous, overly talkative, whatever.

But there’s a difference between being genuinely yourself and constantly performing a version of yourself that leaves no room for anyone to see beyond the bit

So we had a movie night yesterday, and I swear to God I am still mad at her.

She was sitting in my spot for like half an hour, wrapped in blankets, refusing to move, so I moved her myself because apparently asking wasn't working. Immediately, she falls sideways and goes “OWWW THAT HURTTTT” at full volume, and I told her to shush, but of course, she cried even more

Dad looked over so fast, too. He was actually horrified and said, “Alessya?? Why'd you do that??” before rushing to help her up while she was sitting there sniffling. I said she's fine, chill.

Mind you, she is literally the oldest sibling 🤦‍♀️

And then my parents made her sit in the middle between them after, like, she needed comfort and recovery time from the severe injuries she sustained from this ''v!0l3nc3''

Everyone was looking at me like I b3at her up. Meanwhile, 10 minutes later, she’s magically fine, eating popcorn and talking normally again while being cuddled, and listing her demands to dad.

Never touching that girl again, because why did everyone immediately side with this 5ft minion??

Isn't it interesting how older people speak with so much certainty and wisdom while still carrying confusion they never fully solved?

When you’re younger, you assume adulthood is this stage where everything finally starts making sense, but then you talk to older people and realize many of them are still questioning life in quiet ways too.

They’ve just learned how to continue living despite not having every answer. I think that’s where a lot of wisdom actually comes from, not from knowing everything, but from making peace with the fact that some things stay uncertain forever

Your thoughts?

idk what im even doing here. eli just told me that the people here are funny. and nice.

so, hello fellow teenagers in my phone 👋