sugar, spice, and everything nice

Perhaps instead of searching for a fabled love with a dashing rapscallion who will sweep me off my feet, I should instead look within myself and eliminate the impediments that have convinced me this cannot be so. These obstructions are bold, red, and flashing, imprinting in my mind that soulmates are for fairy tales. If you repeat an idea enough, it marks its territory and maintains control. To dream is to break through the barriers that reality establishes. Impracticality may be the only path to the clouds.

My days are neatly packaged and squared away, surrounded by bubble wrap sheltering me from some harsher realities. I’m inside the plastic jungle, so I cannot even pop the bubbles and release some of the tension from this endless routine. Nothing is wrong now and I know that everything will be society’s definition of okay, that I will not suffocate inside myself. The fresh air is so inviting; if only I could get it into my lungs and begin resuscitation, the start of a new me.

I have been doing a lot of thinking this week, with one conclusion: life is not a guarantee. It is a privilege. In the face of certain death, we must be determined enough to overcome any obstacle that comes our way, to do things with full heart and conviction. You never know which moment will be your last.

Take time to tell someone how much they mean to you. See everyone for who they are, and help them steer clear of the shadows that block their sunshine. Show everyone kindness, for we are all fighting our own battles. Stay strong. Be optimistic. 

Live.

It was a still night, but I felt turbulence in your gaze. “It is about time to escape, don’t you think? A fresh start, to a place where it can be us, somewhere no one has even imagined. A place that only we will know about.”

I stared into your misty eyes, haunted. I tried to recollect a time when there were not passerby surrounding us, leaving their own trails. For what place has remained untouched by humans? Maybe the depths of the ocean, buried beneath the sandy desert, inside a volcano, or upon a star? Even the air we breathe is dense with the reminder of human inhabitance. The feat you asked was impossible, I grew to realize, because not only does it not exist, but it would be a new place - solely mine - and I would not be willing to share.

By defining human nature, we admit first and foremost that there is no single being without flaws and that interactions with the world around us are infused with the ebb and flow, give and take; compromise provides solidarity. It might be easy to to argue that we do not deserve life, yet we have been given all these chances with each molecule of oxygen inhaled. I cannot give enough gratitude for Nature’s present to me. Each day I feel charged by the weight of her trust.

Fear is pervasive, demanding to be felt. Admitting that we have this unease hidden within us is a first step that many refuse to take by those who see trepidation as a sign of weakness, a blemish on the human condition. But as soon as we try to share it with others, the apprehension is mitigated, sometimes disappearing entirely. The more we conceal, the more we acknowledge the crushing hold that fear has over our lives. It is time to break the shackles. 

graveyards

It turns out, my dear, that I am digging my own grave. You see it there, just off into the distance? From here it looks like a mere indentation; a trick of the light, nothing more. I assure you, it sinks deep into the earth. In my satchel I carry a rope so that I can climb out after an arduous day of digging.

I apologize dearly for my shortcomings, but I do not understand at present your look of consternation. There is a puzzled look in your eye, as if you do not know how to interpret my words. Do not tell me to stop, sweetheart. I have a head start, certainly, for many years have elapsed in my case. You have an illustrious future ahead of you, as I thought I did for too long of a period. I lived in a fantasy. Illusion became my reality.

How hypocritical this is! For you to tell me to cease, to destroy all the progress I have made.

Why live in ignorance when it is a universal knowledge that our breath will cease, that our bodies will disintegrate back into the soil and start anew? Some people desire this union with the earth, while others walk away. Feel free to move in another direction, but perhaps when I am here, perhaps afterward, you will return. A scratch in the dirt already exists now, not far from here.

We live only to die.

Forever is a long time, you repeated. The words are now scorched into every fiber of my being. I watched as you bit your chapped bottom lip and a trickle of blood flowed out, the harsh winter weather taking its toll. You were the one who always said that eye contact was so critical, that eyes were a window to the soul, but at even the slightest chance of that connection, your eyes darted away. When your soul has disintegrated into emptiness and disarray, I suppose you do not want anyone to witness that. Your pupils were oddly out of focus that night. What were you afraid of? I will never know.

Maybe you were right. There never is enough time. Clocks make fools of us all.