There’s a meme on the internet called Well, Actually. It’s making fun of a person who likes to go into other people’s conversations on Twitter and correct some nitpicky point that really isn’t germane to the conversation. It was a perfect encapsulation of that annoying person at a party who tells you that avocado is a fruit, not a vegetable as you’re eating a delicious guacamole and joking about getting in an extra serving of veggies for the day. It’s similar to the Someone’s Wrong on the Internet, but not as angrily self-righteous. Like most memes on the internet, however, it quickly morphed into meaning something else. In the case of Well, Actually, people started to label anyone who corrected them on anything as a ‘well, actually’ person. I saw a lot of, “How dare you come into my TL and disrespect me like that?”, and when I’d check, the interloper was actually right. And, it wasn’t some piddling little thing, it was something germane to the first person’s argument. It’s easy to accuse someone of being a ‘well, actually’ person, too, rather than consider the argument being presented. Do I sound a little defensive? If so, it’s because I’m the ‘well, actually’ gal, at least in my head.
A little background. As I wrote yesterday, I was not allowed to show any negative emotions when I was a kid. In addition, I never felt as if my opinion mattered. I can’t say exactly why, but by the time I left for college, I had an abnormal fear of stating my actual opinion. I would agree with whomever I was talking to, or not say anything at all. I went to ridiculous lengths so it wouldn’t look as if I was being disagreeable, and some of that was rooted in my belief that I was responsible for other people’s emotions. I was a shadow person, not really existing in and of myself. That’s not to say that I didn’t have opinions–I did. I have very firm opinions about almost everything, but I kept them to myself. During the second semester of my sophomore year at high school, I started having periods of disassociation in which I would disappear from my body for several minutes at a time. I’d be talking to someone and ‘come to’ a few minutes later, and we’d still be talking, only, I had no idea what I had just said or heard. This also happened while I was driving, and I was very fortunate in that I never got into an accident. I believe that this happened in part because of all the repression I was doing on a daily basis. You cannot suppress every aspect of yourself for an appreciable length of time without suffering some kind of consequence for it. I’m fortunate in that I’ve always had a spark inside of me that refused to be quashed. No matter how hard I tried to put it out, it steadfastly continued to shine. Even during my darkest hours. Even during my deepest depressions. Even when I wanted to die. That little spark kept burning.