IRL

You appeared in real life quite suddenly & very unexpected. Terrified I was not ready for you, for me, for us, I could hardly stand to look you in the eyes, yet could not stop. I gazed your face, seeking recognition, a reason for the feeling that you could be my future if we could only get past all this present without being utterly consumed by the overwhelming, all encompassing igniting of our minds and bodies. We stared into one another, at once enamoured & humoured by the thrilling ridiculousness of this, our first moment together. I could have easily kissed you. Instead we settled for a hug that unsettled us both. Our bodies said hello and goodbye as we each held tight, and then tighter still. Your strong arms made me rise, and I fell for you. I could barely bear to let you go. My arms longed to linger an hour longer.  That was simple folly. An hour spent encompassed in your embrace would not have been nearly enough. I could have lived a lifetime in that doorway, drowning in bliss while you held me up.

Lone Wolf

My next step is to accept I am a lone wolf. Alone wolf. Although I know I'm strong & can capably make my own way, it fills me with an empty sadness. I'm all I've got. No one is guaranteed to me. I have no secure commitments. I'm free to falter and free to love & be loved, but no one owes me anything. I am untamed. I belong to no one; this is my freedom and my trap. 

What of the nights when my only companion is my untamed mind? In my state of melancholy I feel alone, even though I'm not. I want to belong, I want someone to come home to, but the only place left is myself. This is not a comfort. Sometimes I'm not the best company to be alone with. There are no guarantees in life, but the parameters of being in a primary relationship give me comforting structure, even if it's false security. 

Reluctantly I'll agree this next thing is the best for me. 

I love fiercely. It’s my natural inclination. I'm wild about those I hold dear, historically to my detriment. When I give my very all to assuage someone else's unhappiness there is nothing left of me. It's a caged domesticity that drains my ferocious desire to devour all life has to offer. Experience has shown me I need to be just as passionate about myself. Selvage the savage. Autonomy is the key to security. Set me free to feel safe. If I can be my own home, I'll never fear solitude. I am a lone wolf, not alone. 

Outside In

I stood alone in your living room the last day I saw you. It's your space, but I feel comfortable in your home because you've welcomed me into your life. I'm still standing on the edge, looking in, but I love everything I see. 

The Unaccomplished Woman

Do nothing.

Not only nothing, but be unproductive. Even that is too much. Abandon guilt & revel in the now. 

Don't follow a perceived suggestion based on outside impact. Do your own thing, which is no thing. No time to please. Please yourself. Be yourself. Free yourself from spectral speakers crying disproval in your mind. Ignore them. Carry on with tenacious listlessness & list-less-ness. There is no to-do today. Be peacefully reposed in unemployment. Nada, zip, zilch—these are my purpose-free trilogy. Dear Self, please accept this afternoon nap as demonstration of my veneration. 

Stay

I said it the wrong way yesterday. All is impermanent, I said. What a simple platitude. It was a wall, a fence to guard my heart. My feelings are far more nuanced. I cannot possess you, neither can you do likewise to me. Of course, no one knows what the future holds. Life decisions are weighted in the certainty of the unknown-but-hoped-for. I feel balanced by your presence in my life. I would not give up the pleasure of your fucking lovely, ridiculous, handsome company without severe reason. I like you. I lust you. I love you. I'm here, with every reason to stay. 

You Can

I don’t know if I can.

You can

You will

You must

You do

You have

You should

You care

You choose

You feel

You try

You win

You lose

You fail

You fall

You stop

You sleep

You climb

You top

&
You repeat.

Depression

Originally written May 2014

How can I sustain both sides of our love? You feel nothing. I feel everything. I feel it all. How can we be together when you are nowhere? I've always fallen for you. I'm falling deep into the helpless dark. I jumped down, searching for you. I was planning to pull you up, but it's too sharp a climb. We both need both hands. I'm trying to talk you out of it; now realizing that you have to want to save yourself is heartbreaking. You haven't the strength to make your own way—how could you possibly support me as well? I need to be adored. I need to be loved entirely so I can be filled back up with all I give in kind. Instead, I'm slowly sinking and I don't know how to get us together.

I ought to stop trying to love you better. It's not the answer, despite my attempts. I have so little to give in proportion to what could possibly quench you. I am pouring myself into your scorched aridness. I'm gushing over you. My showers of affection fall on your parched landscape, drying so quickly I cannot tell if they sink in, or simply evaporate into nothingness. What does it matter? My love won’t save you. While you cannot feel a thing, I am drowning in your desert. 

Power Outtage

Originally written April 2014

I’m reeling at my losses. They are what I’ve known my entire life. They stand, point to point, marking each moment I’ve become more alone. Oft times when I open up to someone they eventually close me down. Now many of my closest friends are people I hardly know. One has to start somewhere it seems. All the starting is disheartening when it will only lead to ending again. I’m frayed and I’m wary. Still, I feel the impulse to plug myself fully into loving others. Despite this, I can't seem to muster the energy required to trust again. My bleeding heart has a faded pulse. I am drained. Won’t someone please, please, please recharge me? 

Disconnect

The woman screaming at her six year old daughter at the thrift store today is absolutely breaking my heart. Oh, that young child, how she cries. I hear the tremor of shame and powerlessness in her sobs as her mother verbally berates her for being impolite. 

Look down, here I go, I am the little girl. I'm so sad, I'm so bad, I'm unloved, unworthy, alone. Why does this always happen to me, why is mommy so mean? Why can't we be happy?

A flick of my eyes to the right, I zoom into the stressed-out mother. I'm so goddamn tired of taking care of this kid, she's being such a little brat and I'm not going to take it. Kids should be respectful, someone's got to teach them. Someone taught me. 

Eyes shift left, a tall salesclerk with a kind face and terror in her eyes, that's who I am. I tell the mother it's okay, her daughter is just a little child. I'm so upset, I see this all the time—these angry, cruel women who yell at their kids. Sometimes I just can't handle my job because of it. 

I come back to myself to find my hand reaching out to pat the mother on the back. To what end? To distract, to console, to de-escalate her abuse towards her child. I tell her it's okay, she's just a little kid. She angrily tells me it’s not okay for kids to misbehave.

I want to reach out, I want to prostrate myself across her path and tell her to calm the fuck down. I want to hire a babysitter so she can get a break. I want to take her child away from her. I want to teach her how to be soft and kind; show her how to discipline without cruelty, and teach with love. I want to surround her in community so she doesn't have to go it alone, so she never reaches her breaking point and lashes out at the vulnerable child at her feet. I want to hug and hold her daughter, look deep into her lovely young eyes, and tell her that she's wonderful, tell her it's not okay for anyone to hurt her. I want to protect her from her mother, and I want to protect her mother from herself.

All I can do is nothing at all.

The mother storms off out of the store with her crying child in tow. My hand is at my heart. I try to hold it together but it's too late. Oh, my fragile heart, you're no good to anyone. My feelings won't change a thing. I'm helpless. It's hopeless. 

The salesclerk and I make eye contact, lean into one another and hold hugging each other for a moment. We've bonded over our joint fears and hopes for a little girl who doesn't know how much we care. I hope she's okay. I hope she'll be okay. My tears fall, but they don't cleanse me. I have no relief, and I'll never know. I have no connection to her. I will always feel the acute disconnect of not being able to really help her. It's not enough, and there is no more. 

Coasting.

I will not let my past dictate my present. My losses do not define me. 

It's as though I've been burdened by a load of bricks on my sternum, weighing down my chest. This is what it is to have a heavy heart. Each burden has a name: sorrow, dejection, regret, loneliness, and doubt. As I progress westward, they’re slowly being unloaded. Perhaps by the time I make it to the coast the pressure will be off. I'd finally be free to breathe again.

Though I long for a hit of blissful happiness I don't know how to safely feel it any more. The possibility of plunging into emotional peaks and valleys, high-highs and low-lows, feels too great a risk. I've been trying to flat line. I've weighted my wayward heart, trying to keep it in place. I'm a bit terrified to relinquish my emotional compression. I ought to know better. This heart is a wonderer and a wanderer. She's searching. She needs to soar to better have a viewpoint of where to nest. Happiness is uplifting. I can find my way with far more success when I’m up.

The road sign says Hope is 25 kilometers away. I can’t wait to find it. Nightfall’s shadow has gathered by the highway’s edge. Everything will be a bit brighter when I get there. The exit sign is well lit, pointing me to what I could use a good dose of. Instead I pass by—not stopping. Or, is it Hope passing me by? I’m not sure I’ll ever find it again. I’m headed for the edge of the country and don’t have time to linger.

I enter Vancouver by midnight. Is this the darkest hour or the start of a new day? It’s hard to tell, driving in the dark, when I feel like breaking down. I’m exhausted in every way. The travel almost done, the rest is to come. Endings are really the start of the next story. I want to believe this is where I once again begin.

Settling into my lodgings, I take in the past few months’ disappointments. I’d like to sleep it all off. Can I dream away my doubts? Slumber off my sorrows? It’s time to shut off the bedroom light, and try to shut off my mind. My restless thoughts should just give it a rest already. I want to be here, present. I’ve come so far. I’m miles away. It takes me so much focus to fall asleep but I eventually get there.

Morning arrives, filtering into my room with tranquil, creamy light. I dress in like colours, to reflect my conscious attempt at a sunny outlook. A day spent wandering aimlessly about, with no agenda, is precisely what is needed. Walking along the seawall I can see how far I’ve come. Moving forward means walking away. Holding on to the past will only hold me back, so I let go. I feel my remaining heart-weights cast off. This un-anchoring sets me free to coast along. I shall carry on.

With my recovered light-heartedness, I find space to fill myself with improvement, and only optimism will do. Hope comes before Vancouver. I thought I’d left it behind. It’s a delight to discover it has accompanied me upon on my arrival­—an unexpected, but much welcome, companion. 

Nothing matters most.

Life is so exquisitely meaningless, yet it means so much to me. There are a thousand reasons why every instant has beauty and wonder. The small curve of my young son’s cheek catches my breath with its form. I shaped that face inside myself; now, he strides forward to face the world. I am in awe of the miniscule beginnings that stretch larger, outward, into each of us and beyond. He and I both come from the elements of stars, and will cycle back again, in turn. The profundity of how absolutely connected everything is, on an elemental scale, remains astonishing.

A cluster of cells—united in purpose—divide to multiply. Repetition and pattern, the rules of formation engage. Are you flora? Or, are you fauna? There are rules for your making. Why do you form thusly so? We cannot say exactly why, only how. As such, then, how curious, and how marvelous; how remarkable it all is! The lifespan of a person is usually within the confines of only one century. This proves to be no more than a mere speck in the ever-expanding continuum of time. The lifespan of an adult mayfly is usually within the confines of only one day. It is a fully lived life, though brief in comparison to our own human experience. This extraordinary brevity causes me to pulse with gratitude for the chance to even exist. Look closer and you will see lifetimes lived within a moment. Epic dramas of tiny proportions are contained within a single dewdrop.

There is nothing exceptionally exceptional about existence. It occurs hourly, and is ended likewise. There is nothing special about being alive, other than that it is happening to you. The conscious framework of your own being is the only reason you have any meaning at all.

The meaning of life is what you make of it. My life means nothing, but I shall make the most of it. Nothing matters, really. How, then, do I find that all the nothingness matters most of all?

Drifting

My life ebbs and flows in every unexpected way. I used to believe it was my duty to commandeer my own ship, and, thusly, always set a direct course for my final destination. In recent years, I have found the journey to be far more enjoyable taking a rafting approach. The learnings I’ve taken from past experiences provide me with paddles to steer through dangerous or tricky circumstances. Trusted, supportive friends are the life preservers I use to keep myself afloat through times of difficulty. Other than that, my only job is to let the current guide me through these winding waters. I cannot see around the bend, but I will experience it when I get there. I am part passenger, and part gentle navigator. Now that I no longer need to constantly focus on what may be coming, I can finally appreciate the scenery surrounding me. It’s nice to be here.

Bittersweet

I am willing, but not always able,

To be what I think it is to be relatable.

Everyone else seems to have read the manual

On how to accomplish life correctly.

Most days I feel an awkward fulcrum

The tipping point of uncertainty,

Between confidence and people pleasing,

Where I falter and withdraw.

It's all the people and all the stories

Of everything I am and never will be.

I feel the heavy weight of failing other’s expectations.

I am a disappointment, and it crushes me.

I know it's all just false idealism.

Why won't my feelings follow reason?

I don't know the banal comfort of blissful ignorance.

I am bittersweet.

I'm wrong, I'm wrong, I'm wrong.

I would willingly admit this a thousand times,

If you tell me how to never make

A hurtful mistake again.