Earlier this week a friend of mine shared a meme on Instagram that got me thinking & connected a few dots that I’d had floating around my mind for a while now. In the post, that I also shared, we see a woman sitting on a bench with a man flirtatiously leaning over her. The man’s side of the post says “do you have any hobbies?,” the woman’s “yes, pattern recognition.” Cue the instant resonance with me & clearly a few others who commented on the post after I shared it to my own story.
Pattern recognition is one of the key “symptoms” of neurodivergence. It is a trait found consistently in both Autistics & those with ADD/ADHD. It is one of the reasons that so many of us are able to get through life without proper diagnosis because we are able to recognize the societal standards or expectations & develop a ‘mask’ to fit in with the world around us. Naturally some of us wear these masks better than others, but in doing so it is often extremely draining because we are forced to mute or, inversely, inflate certain aspects of our personality in order to be seen as ‘acceptable.’
Another aspect of this pattern recognition is that we are often right about things specifically where social issues, historical applications to modern times, & behavioral predictions are concerned to the point where many of simply get to watch & wait for the other shoe to drop before giving a knowing nod or an ‘I told you so’ look. This would all be great & incredibly useful if our premonitions weren’t often viewed as hyperbolic, dramatic, or fantastical. Maybe part of the problem is that if we are listened to, then things that we predicted don’t come to pass, so our credibility is tanked. Either way, our precognition gets pushed aside in favor of status quo & comfort & we end up frustrated that those around us either couldn’t see the dominos cascading, or had no interest in listening to those of us who do. We are, in a sense, cursed to be the modern day Cassandra.
Let’s divert for a bit of a history/mythology lesson here & refresh you, my reader, on who Cassandra was…potentially…if she existed at all.
Princess Cassandra of Troy, as she is formally known, was one of the daughters of King Priam & Queen Hecuba who ruled Troy during the Fall of Troy. She gained favor with the God, Apollo, who granted her the gift of foresight. When Apollo’s affections for the woman were not met he turned his gift into a curse allowing her to keep her ability to see the future, but making it so that no one would ever believe her predictions no matter how many of them came to pass. & they did, all of them, each of Cassandra’s predictions came to pass & each of her predictions fell on deaf ears each time she proclaimed them to be so.
Cassandra warned Hector that if he returned from Sparta with Helen as his wife, that a war to end their kingdom would follow. He did not listen. Cassandra predicted that the Trojan Horse was a trap set by the Greeks, even going as far as to try & burn the equestrian vessel down. She predicted that her captor following the war, Agamemnon’s wife, Clytemnestra, had taken a lover in his absence & that the two planned to betray & murder Agamemnon upon his return to Argolis. Which he did not believe, & which they did resulting in the death of Cassandra herself. in each instance Cassandra saw the signs, read the stars, had a vision, whatever her method of reception of these messages was, spoke them aloud to those who chose not to listen, & was forced to sit back & watch them all come to pass one after the other.
There is lies the parallels. We voice our concerns, our predictions, the plan chugs on ahead despite our warnings & we end up watching the trap get sprung over & over again. This has been a problem especially in the political realm of the recent years. I can only ever speak from my own experience & the experience of those whom I share a dialogue with, but I can recall innumerable times when I warned family members, friends, randos of the exact happenings that are occurring right now. Each time I was told the same things “they’re not coming for people’s rights,” “there are checks & balances in place, they won’t be allowed to do that,” “you’re being dramatic, it’ll all go back the other way in four years.” Hell even a couple of weeks ago I was told to watch who & what I call fascist or a Nazi because it delates the meanings of the words. I agree, 1000%, it deflates the words, until we’re talking about literal fascist actions & people behaving like Nazis. The play book is there, it’s an open note test & a lot of you are failing or are too busy doing your best to ignore the news & the chaos because it “doesn’t concern you.”
So here we are, your modern day Cassandras. Your canaries in the coal mine screaming at you to do something or move or open your eyes just to be told we’re crazy until a few months later when, lo & behold, we were right. It’s an incredibly frustrating place to be in, especially around people who claim to care for you & value your intellect or your thoughts. At a certain point the “I told you sos” lose their vindication & just ring hollow, because you know that the next time you give out your warnings it will be met with yet another pat on the hand & a “that’s nice dear” instead of being taken seriously.
Here’s wishing you all a fantastic whenever it is that you’re reading this. Let’s hope that this all gets turned around sooner rather than later & that those of us with eyes that see the oncoming floods will start to be taken seriously.
As always, much love to you all,
-C