A metal mask in my hand is rusted. It is neither clean nor brightly colourful one as it used to be. It is full of dust and defective. I still remember when I wore that mask. It has been my only companion since I was born. I noticed how its looks back and forth and starred at how bad it has been. I recalled my memories that many thorns has destroyed it. I walked towards the mirror and looked at myself. “It has changed.”, I said. Then, I wore it and smiled.

Living in this world turns me to be an independent woman that I have to keep on dancing in the rain. Although I live with my father and sister, I prefer my favourite things or activities to be done by myself. It has been shaping my mind and soul to be someone that people may call it as nerd. They say I am not normal. But, how can you define normal? Is being normal amusing?

The life that I have is not like the others’s. I have to survive without a protection from a mother. It starts when I was born at a place in East Java. My mother has been suffering a mental disease that is called Schizophrenia since she was in her young age. She has been being taken care of doctors and nurses at the asylum regularly. It is apprehensive about the condition of my mother that once I could not face. I mean, as a woman, who is going to be your role model beside your own mother?

I am type of person who really fond of art. I live in my imagination that goes far and it is beyond my consciousness. Unfortunately, my father neither agrees with the ability that I have nor believes abstract things. Then, I have to survive in reality with being under pressure. I have to obey what he says and leave my dreams to be pursued. However, I love being a rebel child because I do not like to be ordered with things to do. I prefer making my own rules in my own world.

The imagination that I have starts with a sensitivity to feel some ambiances and invisible things which people call it as ghosts. In fact, I avoid seeing them even they pulls me out to feel their presence because I am a coward one. Sometimes, I can predict some circumstances that might happen to people who are beside me. Honestly, it is confusing for me to tell everyone, because mostly people will not believe in words, will they?

According to the information that I got from the doctor, I earned twenty percent from my mother’s disease. As a matter of fact, I never realize that the disease occurs to me when I face many circumstances, especially in difficult ones. Living in this body turns me to be an overthinking person. I can spend my hours to sit alone and think about what people might not think. My brain works continuously every time when I am at days and nights.

Once, I have been in the most difficult situation. Shortly, I have been in a relationship for four years. He has the place that my parents do not earn. We work together in a management of a group band. It really gave me pleasure and composure. However, fact said different. He left me for another woman because of some circumstances that was illogical. It was fully torturing me. I was dying at that time. The tears fell down as day passes by and I thought it was the end of my world.

Many experiences that I have been through by myself teach me many good things that I can not count. Although I have to sacrifice myself to be drown many times, I still can survive. I have to keep cleaning my mask and pull the thorns out. But, there is a statement and a question as well that keeps popping out. I stand on the mirror, look at myself and say, “Even a bipolar needs to be loved.”