What I learned from being gothy in high school.

I live in a world of almost, and sort-of, and partly, and yes but also no, you see, it depends.  I live in this world because it was the only one available to me.  I never had a choice.  I am made up of almost, and sort-of, and partly, and if you don't mind asking, what are you?  Sometimes two things are true at once, and sometimes those two things are mutually exclusive, they cannot exist at the same time, and yet they do. 

I never met a binary opposition I couldn't take apart.  And once I started, I didn't know how to stop.  Even when things really are black and white, there are shades of black and shades of white.  Just look at anyone wearing a black t-shirt and black jeans.  They're never the same.  I had a gothy phase in high school.  I know all about shades of black. 

We make words for things because we need words for things.  We categorize because we don't have the brainpower to keep everything separate.  We look at this

 And turn it into this

 

 And in this scale, it makes sense. 
 This is orange:

This is red:

 But when you look closely at that line, it is never as obvious as it seems.

When you live right next to that line, sometimes you can't figure out what that line is doing there at all, it is an arbitrary barrier that someone else put there, between you and what you could be, if only you had room to stretch out, if you could just reach across—