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I remember more than one experience as a child and teenager when I would be the only person at a table in a restaurant whose full order would be forgotten. I could disappear in the middle of crowded rooms and was encouraged to do so when my parents took me to adult parties. But it was an experience at my college graduation which really made me think I was invisible.
After the full graduation on the field in the burning sun, graduates of IUP went back to their departments for the departmental graduation. It was a chance for the families to actually see the graduates receive their degrees, something only the doctoral graduates did at the full graduation. My family and the friends I had in the department went to Davis Hall and saw that many people had skipped the department graduation. I talked with my adviser, the department chair at the time and the MC for the ceremony, introduced him to my family, and then found my seat in the midst of a sporadically attended row of graduates. When the time came for me to receive my degree, my mom came out of the crowd and waited at the edge of the stage to take my photo.
The MC called the person to my right and then the person to my left. My mother was trying to get my attention, frantically whispering, “don't cry, don't cry,” as it dawned on me that I had been skipped. Remember, I had JUST spoken to the MC, my ADVISER, prior to the ceremony—perhaps 10 minutes before he should have called my name. He called a few more names while tears poured down my cheeks before he happened to look up and see my mother at the edge of the stage. He then looked back at the stage and saw me crying. He shuffled through papers and pulled mine out before calling me up and making some joke about his helpers being too efficient in sorting out the graduates who hadn't attended the ceremony.
Had I graduated from a huge department, this might have been more understandable but there were 72 graduates in my class, of whom about 25 showed up for the graduation. The Journalism department was small and close-knit. There were never more than 25 people in a class and in the upper-level classes, there were even fewer. I was a member of the college newspaper. I was NOT invisible for my college career and yet on this day, I was.
There have been other moments, some funny, others painful. One of the funniest was when friends conspired to have the waitstaff at a restaurant sing happy birthday to me despite my objections. I was coming out of the bathroom when I heard the song start up and I laughed hysterically. They were singing to the table and I wasn't even there. I had been so invisible when we arrived that the staff had no idea I wasn't at the table when they started singing.
I know that I can shield myself so hard that people can't feel my energy anymore. I wonder, sometimes, if our ability to sense other people is so keyed to an ability to feel that person's energy that if I shut down my shields hard enough, I slip off the radar. When I'm stressed or tired or just wanting to recharge, I shield. I don't remember if I was shielding those days, but what if I was? What if what we need to be invisible isn't a cloak that covers us, but a shield that blocks our energy from reaching others?
I sometimes wish I were less invisible. There are times when I want to be seen and heard. Unfortunately for me, those times are so often stress-filled that I lock down my shields. It's so frustrating to be working hard to be seen only to have people's eyes actually skip over me that it becomes a vicious circle. I shield because I'm afraid of the pain that comes from not being seen and that shield makes me invisible.
