Toast.

I still have

this dumb feeling

you're something special

but that stung.

Voice Over.

Lately all this is starting to fade...like dusty haze and heat waves on a hot road in summer. I start thinking about life and love and living, and one thing seems to pick itself outta the mass...I think back to when you said I've figured it out, I've figured it all out and I didn't even know it. You didn't know how much that terrified me did you? You don't know how much everything does.

People always look at me and want to tell me what they think, and I guess I've decided its gotta be some kind of curse...people look me up and down and tell me how I look. People look at me all the time. Like somehow I invited all this shit. Like somehow I asked for their opinion. You're so young. You're so pretty, I love you.

I live alone. Sometimes I don't want to be seen.

Lately none of this seems to matter so much...I realize if I have time I'm gonna take it. It seems like so much right now. I know that won't last. People say your twenties are for being stupid...I smile a little when they say that. I wonder why people think I wanna spend my time being stupid. The way I see it the stakes are higher now but things ain't much different than being a kid was...it's all fun and games till someone gets pregnant or dies...Go live your life, be stupid! I'm too smart to be stupid. Always have been, that's why it's been so difficult. I always knew I saw things different. The stupidest things I ever did were listening to other people...doin what they said I wanted. What they wanted.

Figured it out huh? I just can't get your voice outta my head. If I have time, I know a few experiences I'd like to have. That's it isn't it? I'm holding the reins but the horse has a mind of its own. And I know it can feel me on its back. I think at some point we all chose this...like rides in an amusement park...like, hey, lets try Life...you don't know where you'll start or where you'll end up but it's just a cosmic blip, and you can't take anything with you but you get it all when you come back...in the end you laugh and say well that was something...if I get time, there are a few experiences I'd like to have. I think about buying some land in the country...raising a few animals. I'd like to have kids. If I'm lucky I'll fall in love, but Daddy I don't think I'll ever love again the way we talked about...I know too much now. Not in a bad way. People say I'm young, and that's good. When you look at things the way I do everything seems a bit like a business arrangement. I'll hold on to the control I have, and surrender to what I don't...

You ever think, if it all was taken away from you...if you were born into a different body, same soul, knowin nothing...could you ever find yourself again? Could you leave clues for yourself to find, clues that transgress the boundaries of your own body? What truly speaks to your soul...is there anything you could do now to call yourself home again someday?

To act in love

Misty, grey morning. I pull myself from a dream as unpleasant as the reality to which I wake. I set out, not ten steps, before I deem this day unworthy, the sinking feeling in my chest a match step for step for skies on the brink of collapse...tumult, mouth open wide, seconds before the wail. I inhale, trying to find relief in this humid blanket. Runners running. Boys and girls walk in time with each other, fingers laced, absorbing each other and buzzing, melding together into single units. I look, silent and detached, accepting what I cannot control, succumbing to routine. I only wish to act in love. 
Pup's always so excited for the day, I could learn a little from his exuberance. He expects only the best from me, and forgives the worst. He never fails to hold the bar high even when I fail to measure up. Its that kind of love I want you to know, that kind of engulfing patience and sweetness that I cannot abandon, I wish to show to you. Each day, you fail to measure up, but I wake up every morning expecting things to be different, anticipating only the best, forgiving yesterday.
Familiar pressure, a tightness in my chest. I know how this goes. Why I hang on? Belief, faith, because I know no other way. I will always hope for you, I will always shelter you. No matter which direction you take, no matter where you plan to go, I will only show you love and hold you fondly in the recesses of my mind. I will always be grateful that you opened up the world a little wider for me, so that I could share your space and come to know what you know. Palm outstretched, if you want to fly, then fly. I won't keep you from where you need to go. It's not in my nature.

Prayer.

I am happy here. So happy that I can make fun of the reasons my life isn't perfect because they don't matter. I am happy. Please, let me stay so lucky.

Chapter One

The sliding doors open instantly, she passes through them and the cold, sterile air hits her in the face. She barely notices, making a beeline for the front desk. An exhausted looking nurse spares her a polite smile. “Visiting?” the woman asks, “What's the name?”

She says it, and it feels strange upon her lips, to speak out loud a name that for so long has only existed within her mind. The nurse glances at the computer, and with a slow, deliberate hand types the name into the blinking search bar. “Room 427,” the she replies, “take the elevator on your left, its the fourth floor...” but trails off. The girl has already gone, the sweeping end of her long skirt slipping through the closing elevator just in time.

The cheerful ping at each passing floor undermines the fluttering wings of urgency she feels within her stomach. One...In this long moment it seems that this could be any elevator, in any place, with doors that open to a different day, to what now felt like a different life. Two...she is...Three...uncomfortably aware of her heart, trying its best to beat itself out of her body. Four.

The metal cage releases her onto an otherwise empty floor, save for a push-cart that bears a barrage of old flower baskets, their blooms wilted and hanging in defeat over hastily scrawled get-well notes. You are in our prayers and You are thought of warmly in our hearts. She pauses to finger one of the notes. What does that even mean, she wonders. As if the senders were already severing emotional ties at the time of post, as if the recipient were already dead. A preemptive, even if in hindsight, not entirely unsuitable gesture.

She sets off in the direction of his room, the clacking of her strappy Prada heels rebounding off linoleum tile.

Outside a recursion of identical doors, a metal plaque reads “427.” She reaches for its handle, but stops short to stare through the tiny glass pane in its center into the vacuous hospital bedroom . He lays in a bed, his face turned away, searching for something he'll never quite find out the large window on the opposite wall. She takes a deep breath of resolution, and twists the handle.

Upon hearing the door, his head turns and his familiar brown eyes come to rest upon her figure within the frame.

The corners of his mouth stretch into a smile and in a raspy, British lilt, he whispers: “Maggie.”  

The truth is I like being with you more than I like being by myself

I'm not the type to have bad days, more often than not I find a good attitude can conquer all. Last night I found myself vulnerable, scared you could see right through me, scared you saw something you didn't like.

So when today, a series of ill-timed events makes me believe perhaps nothing I could do would get me to where I thought my day was heading, I found myself vulnerable. Plans thwarted by a higher power. Alright, I'll listen. And in that moment my emotions got the best of me. This rarely happens. I hate crying, I resent this side of myself, but worse I hate crying in public. I felt it well up inside me, a part the needed to cry, for once more powerful than the part that needed to be strong. All the while arguing with myself that it could be so much worse, I excused myself into the women's room. Just two minutes. Two minutes to react, to feel more with my heart than I think with my head. And something became clear. I am so resistant to asking for help, because I think I am setting myself up for disappointment. I actually chastised myself for not being a mechanic today, so that I could have fixed my own car, or at least made my own decision. I feel I have to do everything on my own because I can't count on anyone else. Or at least, I haven't been able to count on anyone else. I resist an emotional bond, because I believe it will fail me. You see that, don't you.
You see that I'm not all powerful, that I don't have it all together, that even though I accept, and moreover anticipate, failure from everyone else, often before giving them a chance, you see that I at times fail myself and I find that's unacceptable. Today I failed myself. I broke, and a whole swarm of things came to the surface. I came home and dreamt I was in a place in my past I've tried to forget. I failed...And yet in that failure, I realized something. My vulnerability does not have to be a fault. And if I continue to let it be, I'll miss out on the beauty it has to offer. I need to accept my vulnerability as a part of me that is inherently human. Accept that sometimes my tears, my emotions, are just part of being the female gender. And maybe in that acceptance, I'll find a way to coexist with my vulnerability, and to maybe even allow myself to be really, truly, and unconditionally...loved.

November.

No Reason to Pretend- Aaron Sprinkle

We come around
A circle meets
At last I feel I'm closer to beginning
A gentle word
A quiet heart
A soul that stirs another one to start

You'll never know dear how much you breathe
Strength and courage into me
And as the day comes closer to an end
I find no reason to pretend

When morning comes
You'll doubtless be
Awake without a worry I can see
You open up
Clearness comes
A look divides the clouds I see the sun

You'll never know dear how much you breathe
Strength and courage into me
And as the day comes closer to the end
I find no reason to pretend