You Never Seem to Recognize My Face

preoccupation (n.): The state of being preoccupied; absorption of the attention or intellect.

preoccupy (v.):
1. To absorb or engross to the exclusion of other things.
2. To occupy beforehand or before others.

Many words have multiple definitions, but preoccupation and its root, preoccupy, have been on my mind for a while now. If a thought or a subject has completely preoccupied you, has consumed you completely, are you occupying that thought pattern before anyone else? Have you claimed that preoccupation as your own? Does it belong to you? Or, is it just the opposite? Does preoccupation own you by preventing you from owning whatever the preoccupation is?

Usually, the verb "preoccupy" is modified by the preposition "by." In effect, this means that whatever follows the "by" is what's doing the action of "preoccupying." The actual subject of the sentence then becomes that which is being preoccupied rather than the preoccupying agent.

When I am preoccupied by something, I feel helpless, unwillingly transformed from the agent to the recipient of some other action. I know I don't want to think about this thought or subject anymore but, try as I might, I cannot get myself to think about anything else. Preoccupying me wholly, it takes over my sensibility and, like an unavoidable demon, forces my attention on something undeserving.

"She was preoccupied."

Maybe what all of us are looking for is the less common form. "She preoccupied him." "The fate of the world preoccupied them." Maybe this switch of the agency is all that we need to feel meaningful rather than powerless: to occupy beforehand or before others, rather than to be occupied at the exclusion of all other things.