On Being Seen

Philly, people pleasing, and pulling weeds

In two days, I've visited five states, and by the end of the week, I'll add two more to my travel list. Vacation is going splendidly, if you've been wondering.

Yesterday, I spent the night in Philadelphia after attending a friend's graduation party in South Jersey (congrats again, Vanessa <3).

Philadelphia became my home in early 2021 after feeling uncomfortable (re: losing my shit) under lockdown orders within the four walls of my Harlem apartment. The house was my grandmother's and, while fully furnished, stood uninhabited as my dad's side of the family left the area for New York City and Florida many years ago. With COVID's resilience, widespread closure of NYC attractions and services – but the same 'ol NYC rent, Phil's germaphobia, and my feral need for outdoor space, it was the perfect storm. Like many people nationwide, we saw it as a time for change. Phil and I offered to buy Grandma's house and promptly moved.

Mom, my brothers and I in front of my grandmother’s home in Philadelphia

Yesterday was a perfect time to return after months away, as I'd be in the area. Moving around for work as a travel tech is a lot of fun but at the end of the day, I make sure to return back to the city of Brotherly Love to check on things, pull weeds and tidy up around the house because citywide street sweeping was only implemented this year(!) and honestly, I'm not really sure if they come down the tiny side street by my house.  

I'm a plant lover and generally a fan of organization. Landscaping is my thing, so cleaning up my property's corner is cathartic. After a night's rest, I woke and readied to go outside. Though it was later than I would have liked, 8am, it was overcast, which is perfect for yard work. I grabbed my tools of choice, a serrated knife, a garden trowel, my yard gloves, and a heavy-duty contractor bag, then strapped on my all-weather boots and headed out the door.

I began by shaping the large bush in the front of the house, ridding it of stray branches and extensions to create a manicured look. Swept away the fallen leaves that littered the ground just below it and moved on to the more tedious work – weeding. Actually, weeding isn't all that tough.

It's all of the stuff that gets stuck in them. 

Candy wrappers and cigarette butts. Mini liquor bottles and soda can tabs, the debris, as random as they come, get stuck in the weeds and linger like ornaments. Over the years, I've watched my father maintain and field back nature when it bursts to life between cracks in the sidewalk. As a kid, I'd offer to assist. My desire to contribute was always a way to be validated as important. Because, by extension, I knew the task at hand was salient.

It was one occasion amongst many where I desired to be seen.

My younger self was set on finding areas where I could be seen as what I knew was true deep down inside – worthy and important. The challenge arose because aligning myself with what I believed was important was perpetually outside of myself. Being seen for who I was and what I enjoyed never occurred to me because no one ever said you're more than enough as you are.

The thought that I am complete never crossed my mind until adulthood, and certainly not as a child.

However, in my final year of elementary school, I found what I'd been looking for.

Home after elementary school graduation.

In light of my transition to middle school, I started receiving mail from some of the city's most selective schools with the intent of testing for their admissions exam.

My adolescent mind swirled from the recognition and wonder. Who were these nebulous figures? How'd they know of my abilities? And was I finally being acknowledged as out of the ordinary? Unique?

The combo was intoxicating. First, what little kid doesn't want to receive mail in their name? It is an act within itself that is proof of being seen and even more than that, it was for something educational. An easy validation point for immigrant parents.

Only a few people frequented my home, but I have distinct memories of carrying down my stack of envelopes of varying thickness to show my grandmother, visiting cousins, and uncle, indeed anyone who would listen, that I was being sought out. And the thing about it was it was easy. I liked school, reading specifically, and the notion that I could receive attention for something that came to me easily – even if I wasn't passionate about it – stuck.  

An association of my worth was built on external validation. Shape-shifting into what others thought was important became my anchor instead of nurturing and cultivating the radiant happiness within. And just like the greenery I would pull decades later in Philadelphia, the root of people-pleasing existed, but there were so many smaller things that decorated the stems and vines. Prioritizing what other people thought infiltrated the standards of my dating life. It kept me on a career path far longer than I should ever have been, and it had me believing that there could ever be something more important than telling the truth about how I feel.

Sometimes I believe I've pulled this weed, but time later reveals it was just one of the various things that got stuck in its limbs. That's where my tools, trowels, and gardening gloves come in, and next time I'm aiming for the root.