Kairos

From a very young age, whenever a child near me used to cry. I saw their parents pick them up, caress their cheeks and kiss away their sorrows, kiss away their pain, and then that child would be happy again. Nowadays, whenever someone my age cries, it's viewed as a common occurrence. Tears stop mattering at a certain age. People wonder why teens don’t talk about their feelings to anyone. Why do they instead draw on their bodies with silver pencils, and lean on other substances to be able to take their sadness away? After having spoken to many teenagers, I have learned that most of their parents and society in general have told them to stuff their feelings in. That the word “feelings” after you reach the precipice of 13, is quite menial. So, their throat clenches as their tears desperately try to escape the prison that is their eyes, and their mouth purses, trying to hold back the words that express what they really feel. In a person’s formative teen years, tears are seen as shameful. Crying over school means laziness or procrastination. Crying over parents means you should have listened to them in the first place. Crying over friends means you lose people, you gain some. Crying over life, means, “Why do you need to cry over something that hasn't even started yet.”  My friend’s mom told him that when he said why he was sobbing in his room. Not all teen tears are related to the fluctuation of hormones in their body, some are, but others are due to the whirlwind of thoughts in their mind. One of my friends mentioned how she was just staring at her test paper when tears came pooling out. Her mind was overworked, she started calculating every possible outcome of failure, and her brain short-circuited leading to her test paper being drenched in salty droplets of water. Another friend mentioned how they were just staring at their body in the mirror. “The worst thing about this society is that sometimes you want to rip apart every piece of yourself, and build it back in a prettier and more perfect form.” I reminded them that being gifted with a “perfect” body doesn't mean the same thing as being gifted with a better mental sanity. They understood what I said but added to their initial thought, saying, “Sometimes when you stare at a word for too long it doesn’t look like a word anymore and you begin to dislike it, that’s what I do with my body, as soon as I see it I despise it and start crying, thinking of how better it would be to have another one.” I myself remember a time, when I was sitting with my thoughts and sorrow as company, and was staring out the window. Contemplating my future, my life, my reality, and everything in existence. I just started crying, but as soon as I felt my parents coming up, I wiped my face because I felt like it was a dumb thing to shed tears about. Tears are called the blood of the soul, and when the soul bleeds, you cry. One should never be ashamed of their weeping essence, as it is these tears that are the words that hearts can’t say.