Major change is emotionally charged. Transition is transformative. Growing up puts into perspective how small she really feels.
She's going to college in three months, but when her parents leave on a week-long trip, her emotions are a storm and her fears are a monsoon. Homesickness looms on the horizon and every fear she ever had creeps up to the surface within day one.
It's not much fun to go it alone.
She comes home to an empty house, and the cat greets her at the door. An uneaten dish of food in the corner. Even a primal feline acts out, because something isn't right. No lights are on. The blinds are all closed. There's no music playing in the kitchen, the TV isn't tuned to the sounds of Dad's hockey game, and the grating screams of heavy-metal don't seep through the floorboards from her brother's den down in the dungeon.
She doesn't like the empty house. The deafening silence. The overwhelming quiet.
At least dorm life will be overwhelming with others and noise. This is too lonely. This is too motionless. Dark. Numb. Her footsteps sound on the floorboards. Her breaths whisper in the vents. She is alone in the house and for the first time in forever, books are not the adequate company she seeks.
Where are the comforting sounds of kitchen rummaging? Where is her mother's embrace in the morning? Where is her father's tentative expression of "I'm proud of you" from the office? Where are the together dinners and the fights for chores at the end of the night? The routine TV shows in the living room, together, and the hugs and kisses for the late-night turn-ins?
She misses family, when they're not even gone. She misses her parents when she's not even alone. Her hope in herself, for survival, is dim. If this is change, she wants no part of it.
Don't cry. You're okay. I swear.
And you know they will be home soon.
She's homesick, and she hasn't even left her home yet. Home is family, and when family is away, the loneliness settles to stay
stay
stay.
But the Crying
 |
| Peace |
Until it's all over. But the crying.
Again.
Salt-tracked stains and puffy eyes. Blood-shot, bleary, self-told lies. When the crying starts, there's one of two things - there's the lies she tells herself, to make it go away, and there's the days spent crying, wasting away.
All the heat of life comes to burn her at the stake, all the storms of living come to tear her away, and every ounce of pain and hurt and trial breaks in all at once to shatter her resolve. To end her.
But it's not over today.
Not this time.
Not yet; not here; not now.
That's her one choice this time. That's her one decision. That's her one resolve for now, and it stands as firm as it can. In spite of everything. Really,
she's made it this far.
Really,
she's come to this point.
What good would it do her - where would the sense be? - to cut the whole thing short? That end, that finality, is past the point of no return. The end is the end - that decision is final. But will she yet base that final thing on a situation that is - must be - she knows it has to be - temporary?
 |
| Comfort |
Maybe,
hopefully,
fingers all crossed,
when that day comes, she'll have found a breath to hold. A rhythm to set her heart to. A limit to pour her tears out, maybe a place to think about, when she closes her eyes and wards off the idea that it would be better never to think at all anymore. Or ever. Ever. Again.
 |
| Hope |
War Games
She has been turned against herself one too many times; she has been played by the opposing team to force herself to lose, and this is her response. This is her refusal to take their abuse for even one more day.
She placed her trust in something; something she may have thought was good. She let herself be vulnerable, pained, and culpable, and those feet walked all over
every
part of her.
It will be a struggle, not to hate herself for letting things get this far. It will be a struggle not to condemn her mind as broken. Ruined. Weak. Impetuous. Useless. And very much at fault for all of this. Because that is what she was told. That is how she was looked at. That is how she was perceived, and that perception was like a disease to which she is not immune. To which she may never be immune.
She must keep up her strength. She must keep up her health. A downturn, a backslide, could send her to the sick bed and closer to death's door than she would ever dare stray. They have injured her. They have battered her. They have ripped everything out of her and strewn it about the stage for an audience of scoffers and scorners and self-absorbed critics. Their bias has muddled her mind and twisted her own. She must claw her way back
to truth.
The realization of her naïveté pains her. Her ignorance. Her mistakes. Her failures. And then theirs. Theirs overshadow everything - or they ought to. Theirs are magnanimous in comparison - or they ought to be. Theirs are worse, far worse, than anything she has ever done. She knows this. She feels this. It is a crushing weight bearing down upon her with no regards for her sanity or well being-
And yet.
Her mind plays against her. A game that's hardly fair. This desperation for a way to stop losing again, and again, and again, is draining her of everything. She's had enough. She cannot play the game anymore. Go on without her. Find someone else to play your game. She's given her everything. You've taken all of it. That's it. That's all. No more.
Trampled. Tormented. Tortured. They cannot turn around and say that they did not do these things. But that is exactly what they do. They look back and say it did not happen that way - you did not feel that way - you had no reason to take it that way.
But she did. Because she could. And really, there was no other way. She took it at face value. It backhanded her into oblivion.
It happened. Uproariously. One time too many.
Better than build up a wall, she can now spring up a barricade. Protego, and whatnot. A shield. A force-field. An instant form of don't touch me. There are rules with this shield, rules not to be broken. That would set off the alarm. That would activate all defenses. There are rules in place now, and if lines are ever crossed again, consequences will be severe. Immediate. And effective.
This is not a game they can play. This is not a game they can win. This is the battle for her soul, and it is not theirs to take. They had a treasure available once, not so long ago, and they soiled it. They reached out and dropped it, just to see if it would shatter.
It exploded instead. Shards. Sharp. Cuts. Blood. There is no mercy left for these pieces to collect and form. There is no pity that can seep from the cracks, there is no repair that can fix what was done.
It is over.
She placed her trust in something; something she may have thought was good. She let herself be vulnerable, pained, and culpable, and those feet walked all over
every
part of her.
It will be a struggle, not to hate herself for letting things get this far. It will be a struggle not to condemn her mind as broken. Ruined. Weak. Impetuous. Useless. And very much at fault for all of this. Because that is what she was told. That is how she was looked at. That is how she was perceived, and that perception was like a disease to which she is not immune. To which she may never be immune.
She must keep up her strength. She must keep up her health. A downturn, a backslide, could send her to the sick bed and closer to death's door than she would ever dare stray. They have injured her. They have battered her. They have ripped everything out of her and strewn it about the stage for an audience of scoffers and scorners and self-absorbed critics. Their bias has muddled her mind and twisted her own. She must claw her way back
to truth.
The realization of her naïveté pains her. Her ignorance. Her mistakes. Her failures. And then theirs. Theirs overshadow everything - or they ought to. Theirs are magnanimous in comparison - or they ought to be. Theirs are worse, far worse, than anything she has ever done. She knows this. She feels this. It is a crushing weight bearing down upon her with no regards for her sanity or well being-
And yet.
Her mind plays against her. A game that's hardly fair. This desperation for a way to stop losing again, and again, and again, is draining her of everything. She's had enough. She cannot play the game anymore. Go on without her. Find someone else to play your game. She's given her everything. You've taken all of it. That's it. That's all. No more.
Trampled. Tormented. Tortured. They cannot turn around and say that they did not do these things. But that is exactly what they do. They look back and say it did not happen that way - you did not feel that way - you had no reason to take it that way.
But she did. Because she could. And really, there was no other way. She took it at face value. It backhanded her into oblivion.
It happened. Uproariously. One time too many.
Better than build up a wall, she can now spring up a barricade. Protego, and whatnot. A shield. A force-field. An instant form of don't touch me. There are rules with this shield, rules not to be broken. That would set off the alarm. That would activate all defenses. There are rules in place now, and if lines are ever crossed again, consequences will be severe. Immediate. And effective.
This is not a game they can play. This is not a game they can win. This is the battle for her soul, and it is not theirs to take. They had a treasure available once, not so long ago, and they soiled it. They reached out and dropped it, just to see if it would shatter.
It exploded instead. Shards. Sharp. Cuts. Blood. There is no mercy left for these pieces to collect and form. There is no pity that can seep from the cracks, there is no repair that can fix what was done.
It is over.
Undeserving
Her heart screams at her, more shrieking than a banshee, and her mind demands she turn out the light. Smiles are too bright, eyes are too alive, and she needs something drab now to get her through.
"Do you ever feel like things are too delighted? Like there is too much joy? Like the happiness is much too high?"
Too much joy? How can she have too much joy? How ludicrous. How ridiculous. How inconsiderate of the mind. And yet...it seems not so far off. It may not be her who holds that joy, but all the same, there is too much of it and is it so wrong to want to snuff a little of it out?
Because she has convinced herself that she is undeserving of two things.
The first is unhappiness. She doesn't deserve to be unhappy because she has no good reason to be. There is nothing in her life to cause misery or depression. She should not be unhappy. Unhappiness is the result of some trick of the mind - some weakness of her thoughts.
But she is unhappy.
And therefore the second thing of which she is so undeserving is...happiness. Because why should she be happy if she is so undeservedly unhappy? She would dare to put herself on the level of those who have just cause for their emotions? Who does she think she is? No, if she dares to steal unhappiness from those who deserve it, she cannot have both. She does not deserve either. So she will be deprived of the one that is already out of her reach by some...weakness of her thoughts.
Self-pity is its own form of conceitment, and she is bathing in it. And of course, with these - her own thoughts, trapped forever in the cages of her mind - she is ruined. She has given herself hopelessness, knowing full well that it is no way to live. Knowing full well as she falls, unable - or unwilling? - to grab the rope and pull herself up again.
How far she has fallen.
How low her spirits drown, choking, in murky mulch of despair.
She is her own worst critic, far too biased, and far too unfair. That alone should revoke her right - her self-imposed ability - to judge her own mind, and yet-
And yet.
These excuses will be the literal death of her. She knows this. The figurative is seeping in - leeching from reality and infecting it. Changing things. But not her. Only burning these dangers more deeply into the lining of her soul. She should sew the seam between the two. Fix it. Fix this.
And yet.
"Do you ever feel like things are too delighted? Like there is too much joy? Like the happiness is much too high?"
Too much joy? How can she have too much joy? How ludicrous. How ridiculous. How inconsiderate of the mind. And yet...it seems not so far off. It may not be her who holds that joy, but all the same, there is too much of it and is it so wrong to want to snuff a little of it out?
Because she has convinced herself that she is undeserving of two things.
The first is unhappiness. She doesn't deserve to be unhappy because she has no good reason to be. There is nothing in her life to cause misery or depression. She should not be unhappy. Unhappiness is the result of some trick of the mind - some weakness of her thoughts.
But she is unhappy.
And therefore the second thing of which she is so undeserving is...happiness. Because why should she be happy if she is so undeservedly unhappy? She would dare to put herself on the level of those who have just cause for their emotions? Who does she think she is? No, if she dares to steal unhappiness from those who deserve it, she cannot have both. She does not deserve either. So she will be deprived of the one that is already out of her reach by some...weakness of her thoughts.
Self-pity is its own form of conceitment, and she is bathing in it. And of course, with these - her own thoughts, trapped forever in the cages of her mind - she is ruined. She has given herself hopelessness, knowing full well that it is no way to live. Knowing full well as she falls, unable - or unwilling? - to grab the rope and pull herself up again.
How far she has fallen.
How low her spirits drown, choking, in murky mulch of despair.
She is her own worst critic, far too biased, and far too unfair. That alone should revoke her right - her self-imposed ability - to judge her own mind, and yet-
And yet.
These excuses will be the literal death of her. She knows this. The figurative is seeping in - leeching from reality and infecting it. Changing things. But not her. Only burning these dangers more deeply into the lining of her soul. She should sew the seam between the two. Fix it. Fix this.
And yet.
To Be Vulnerable
She tends to second-guess herself. In everything. Her last thoughts were of the promise of adventures, and now she wonders if that was safe. She last promised to take the risks that breathed life into her bones, but now she wonders if those risks aren't what killed her in the first place.
Second-, third-, and fourth-guesses.
What if? What if? What if? There is nervous, and there is anxious, and she is the latter because the two mean very different things. Anxiety is a constant companion, and when she places her hand under her throat to ward off the escalating pulse, she shows a little piece of it to the world. She is small. She is lost. She is vulnerable.
Is that not the essence of adventure?
Or rather risk?
But are they not one and the same?
More guesses, and re-guesses, so twisted and turbulent in a brain that never sleeps that she begins to forget which ones are real and which ones are imagined. The emotions inspired by the what ifs become reality, and then she cannot remember how she truly feels about the present. She is too caught up in the possibility.
Why can she not understand herself? Because she has confused possibility with reality and the emotions are too vastly different and intertwining to find the beginning or the end.The past haunts her, the future terrifies her, and she clings to those feelings too strongly. That is how they become her twisting, unidentifiable present. That is why she does not know how she feels about the adventures at hand.
She cannot know.
There is too much to sort through, too much to toss, and she cannot decide what to keep and what to throw away. She is a walking,
talking,
tripping,
falling,
crying,
screaming
mess;
of what ifs? and how comes? and why nows?
And no one can sort her out, because she cannot sort herself.
It is not a job for anyone else, other than her and the Voices in her head. There is a guiding Voice, somewhere,
there
and then it's gone for a few days longer.
More of a whisper than anything; it's a struggle to catch it for any one moment at a time. There are circumstances, environmental and mental, that must be met. But most of all she must choose to hear the Guiding Voice.
And all too often she does not.
She is learning to. There is no overwhelming despair here to keep her under. But that despair bubbles beneath the surface, trembling and twitching for her attention. The past begs her to remember it. The future hollers at her to succumb to it. The present must become her resistance
her tether
to deny it.
She knows this. She believes it. And that is her first step
towards adventure.
Second-, third-, and fourth-guesses.
The numbers keep
Rising.
What if? What if? What if? There is nervous, and there is anxious, and she is the latter because the two mean very different things. Anxiety is a constant companion, and when she places her hand under her throat to ward off the escalating pulse, she shows a little piece of it to the world. She is small. She is lost. She is vulnerable.
Is that not the essence of adventure?
Or rather risk?
But are they not one and the same?
More guesses, and re-guesses, so twisted and turbulent in a brain that never sleeps that she begins to forget which ones are real and which ones are imagined. The emotions inspired by the what ifs become reality, and then she cannot remember how she truly feels about the present. She is too caught up in the possibility.
Why can she not understand herself? Because she has confused possibility with reality and the emotions are too vastly different and intertwining to find the beginning or the end.The past haunts her, the future terrifies her, and she clings to those feelings too strongly. That is how they become her twisting, unidentifiable present. That is why she does not know how she feels about the adventures at hand.
She cannot know.
There is too much to sort through, too much to toss, and she cannot decide what to keep and what to throw away. She is a walking,
talking,
tripping,
falling,
crying,
screaming
mess;
of what ifs? and how comes? and why nows?
And no one can sort her out, because she cannot sort herself.
It is not a job for anyone else, other than her and the Voices in her head. There is a guiding Voice, somewhere,
there
and then it's gone for a few days longer.
More of a whisper than anything; it's a struggle to catch it for any one moment at a time. There are circumstances, environmental and mental, that must be met. But most of all she must choose to hear the Guiding Voice.
And all too often she does not.
She is learning to. There is no overwhelming despair here to keep her under. But that despair bubbles beneath the surface, trembling and twitching for her attention. The past begs her to remember it. The future hollers at her to succumb to it. The present must become her resistance
her tether
to deny it.
She knows this. She believes it. And that is her first step
towards adventure.
Trembling Days
"For a star to be born, there is one thing that must happen: a gaseous nebula must collapse.
So collapse.
Crumble.
This is not your destruction.
This is your birth."
- n.t.
There are too many trembling days,
Days when she can't keep calm for trying and her heart is bullet speed and thunder loud.
There are too few static days.
The days that she's used to. The days that make more sense. Nothing unexpected. Nothing terribly good, nothing too positively terrible.
What is she to do with herself on the trembling days? She staggers there and back again, not sure where to stand or what to do with her feet. With her hands. With her eyes.
Her ears are useless; deaf to anything but her own thundering pulse. Her tongue is too twisted to let her speak. Any illusion of grace falls short and she staggers; she resigns herself to a standstill. Is that not the safest way?
Her heart doesn't approve of the safest way. What is life without a taste of adventure, and the small promise of risk?
There came a day when she had to decide
To stop wishing for confidence and to take it upon herself to laugh confidently. To smile with surety. To take a few graceless steps and look back at them without regret. Or better yet, to not look back at all.
At least for a while.
She has come farther than she has ever been. She has talked more than she ever thought she had the words for. And she has smiled more in a day than she used to in a month. Because she forgot to look back.
She doesn't remember how long its been since before she stepped ahead. She stepped out of the standstill and the fear of graceless movements is all but forgotten.
The trembling days do not tremble with uncertainty
But with excitement.
The static days are reduced now, to nothing but moments;
Moments in a day that she hardly recalls
Because they are moments so void of adventure.
She smiles. Her heart flutters a little - trembles, with the day.
An Unfamiliar Present
She feels strange. There is something unfamiliar about the present place she is in. She is not used to this kind of present, and to her, that is a little worrying.
She is not used to being okay.
That says a thing or two about her, about her past, about her life. She has grown accustomed to the feeling of not-okay. And now the feeling of okay is back and she does not recognize it - or she didn't, not right away. She's not sure how to treat the appearance of okay. As an old friend, with a hug of acceptance and welcome? As a temporary respite that she will have to hold onto, and that she will eventually lose again for a while?
How long will this present last?
If it lasts, she feels that she could begin to understand how the here-and-now could be a gift - what we call the present could, for once, live up to its namesake. But then again, if this old friend okay does not last, she wonders if it's worth it. If okay is only here to build up new hope that will only be crushed anew, is it worth it?
She hopes so.
She is not used to being okay.
That says a thing or two about her, about her past, about her life. She has grown accustomed to the feeling of not-okay. And now the feeling of okay is back and she does not recognize it - or she didn't, not right away. She's not sure how to treat the appearance of okay. As an old friend, with a hug of acceptance and welcome? As a temporary respite that she will have to hold onto, and that she will eventually lose again for a while?
How long will this present last?
If it lasts, she feels that she could begin to understand how the here-and-now could be a gift - what we call the present could, for once, live up to its namesake. But then again, if this old friend okay does not last, she wonders if it's worth it. If okay is only here to build up new hope that will only be crushed anew, is it worth it?
She hopes so.
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