This is a post about masks derived from an old posts about masks from 2017. In 2017 I was still writing the first Hannibal Smyth novel, COVID was yet to be a thing and I was not the same person I am now… I reread that original post for reasons… and the middle section stood out. This is a reworking of that original post based on how much I have changed, six years and a lifetime later…

Everyone wears masks…

I know that this is a cynical viewpoint to hold but it doesn’t make it any less true. Some of us, however, wear more masks than others. Some of us wear masks over our mask because woe betides we let one slip then at least we have another mask to hide behind. That is the point of masks after all. They are there to hide behind, to obscure our true selves from those who might seek to know us.

It is, and always remains, a truism that the more insecure we feel, the more insular we become, and thus the more masks we wear. Masks of confidence to hide those insecurities. Masks of bluster to hide our lack of confidence, masks of cynicism to excuse the bluster…. and so on.

Then of course there are always those most pernicious of masks, masks of humour.

Oh but it’s so much easier to make a joke out of something than face a problem head on. We build masks of smiles designed to hide our depression from the world. We grin , we laugh, we make a joke of it all and never let the world see we are broken inside. Cracked porcelain facades just waiting to shatter.

We all wear masks even if don’t know we do. Masks protect us from what we fear by obscuring our true selves from all, an all that includes ourselves. For our darkest fear of all, is the fear of letting all the masks slip, just once, not in front of anyone else, but in front of a mirror so that we can seeing ourselves for who we truly are are.

I have always found it hard to let my guard down, to let a few, just a few, of those masks fall away because I really, really, don’t do people. From my perspective everyone else seems to know how to interact with people. Everyone seems so much better at being a person that I am, and if they are hiding behind masks, they are seamless disguises… Yet I know this isn’t true either.

Don’t misunderstand me when I say ‘I don’t do people’. I don’t mean I cannot deal with people, can’t interact with them, or can’t seem to be one of them. It’s just I’m one of those people you meet in the kitchen at parties, the one who sits on the edge of everything talking quietly to those who might listen or just to himself. And I am not unhappy about this, this is not one of the causes of my occasional bouts of depression. On the edge of things is where I prefer to be. I wear black a lot, its suitable for all occasions. It lets you merge into the shadows just a little if you keep to the edge. (And yes I also have every Sister’s of Mercy album, what of it?)

Basically, I am not good with people, I have found I don’t like them as a rule, people in general that is, I like individuals. Which is why I have a few really good friends and very few casual acquaintances. Small talk has never been a skill I really managed to learn, and its why I have a mortal dread of actually talking to people about my novels. I have never found a way to reply to that most awkward of questions ‘what’s it about…?’ not least because I expect I will look like a bumbling fool when I do. 

Six years ago I really needed to find a ‘confident writer guy’ mask to wear, but I was not even sure I know how to make one… Yet somehow I have cobbled one together of the intervening time. I have grown as an individual, I am older, wiser and in many ways happier. I have a larger circle of people I would call friends, if i was the kind of person who would call people who’s continued existence I cherish ‘friend’, I may have even done so…

I have fewer bouts of darkness and the masks, well some have slipped a little…

Occasionally, just once in a while, but occasionally all the same, I can stand before the mirror and take off the last mask.

Occasionally when do, I even open my eyes.