Jake: My Liberator, My Tormentor

These words are always tormentingly liberating. I fear every phrase, wondering if some passing reader might one day recognize my same utterances. Will the forbidden words of “Jake Smith” one day reunite with his physical embodiment? Will this refuge become tumbling dominoes of horror? Will my hidden home become a glass house, left exposed for the world to cast stones upon its fragile frame? Every passing day I feel as though another grain of sand falls in the hourglass of my discovery.

It is the part that writes every word that screams for liberation. It is the part that just wants to be understood and accepted. It yearns for resolution to the daily dissonance. To be able to speak the truths of “Jake Smith” outside the confines of the few. For Jake Smith to reunite with a living me, not the subsequent memory of me.

These words are the compromise. They are dissonance mediated. These words are the truths so few have ever heard. Some have never been shared outside the confines of Jake. These are the words of fear.  Fear of misunderstanding. Fear of career destruction. Fear of anger. Fear of everything a real me might bring.

Tormented into fragmentation, the words of Jake are my Tyler Durden. Jake is the id, where I am the ego and superego. Jake is the words I feel compelled to share. He is my true self, exposed to the world through pseudonymity. His words are the words I so desperately want others to understand. I want them to know they are not alone. Through Jake, I want to know that I am not alone.

Occasionally, I present the words of Jake to my wife, my friends, and even my family. Some unspoken rule compels my wife to silence, only some gesture of understanding or the melting embrace of that hug held slightly tighter and longer than normal. The friends who know cryptically tip their hats.  Those who do not, remark on Jake and I’s similarities. I often wonder if they too are merely tipping their hats. 

I meticulously sort the words of Jake to share with my family. I share the words of Jake with reckless disregard of the very words and thoughts I hide from them. The words of Jake serve as some litmus test. He serves as the unknown writer, removed from the complicated fracture between my family and me. His words are validation. His words show to them how ubiquitous I am in my unique milieus.

Jake’s existence, his words, give peace to the daily dissonance. Jake can enter the world in a way I fear I may never. He can be read, shared, liked, hated, and judged in sincerity. I feel compelled to share his words. I feel ashamed of silence. Until the final grain of sand falls, Jake will forever be my liberator and tormentor. 

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Jake Smith is a law enforcement officer and former Army Ranger with four deployments to Afghanistan.

As the Voice of the Veteran Community, The Havok Journal seeks to publish a variety of perspectives on a number of sensitive subjects. Unless specifically noted otherwise, nothing we publish is an official point of view of The Havok Journal or any part of the U.S. government.