4/4
Sometimes I wonder why I woke up at noon again; why there were no clanging pots acting as my alarm.
Sometimes I wonder why the house is so quiet; why noisy phone calls in another language decided to stop being my ambiance.
Sometimes I wonder why my comfort zone stopped resembling the creaky swings of my childhood playground and started looking a lot more like the monkey bars I was too afraid to ever try.
But then I remember what I said.
"Mom, take the step. Mom, you're not happy anymore. Mom, why are you still here? Mom, he doesn't make you happy anymore."
I learned that I am as good a motivator as I am a liar.
This house has lost an occupant - current population: four.
One less mouth to feed, one less feeder of mouths, one less pair of arms to be held in, one less person that rebelled him.
Sometimes I forget I can't run down our carpeted stairs - yes, still carpeted - to find you in the kitchen chair closest to the door drinking your daily cup of chai. But then I remember you were always close to the door.
I don't blame you. Peace was an urban legend in our house, I need my dictionary to stop forgetting what it means.
Peace - noun - freedom from disturbance; quiet and tranquility.
Our household was a disturbance to your freedom, loud voices breaking through walls you hid yourself behind, tranquility long gone with your mental stability - I don't blame you.
Later this month it will be an entire two trips around the sun since you last called yourself a resident in this hemlock green townhouse. Oh right, it's not yellow anymore, I don't know if you've seen it since the repaint.
I'm still learning to accept that this house is not an incomplete fraction. 4/4 has become our new whole, this house has finally become a home.
You took the tension with you, and I hope it's not a strain, but thank you.
Thank you for bearing 13 more years’ worth of barely surviving for me, for withstanding the words from his mouth that made you doubt all the magnificence you are, for leading by example.
On the worst night, he told you to get out of the house and I am proud of you for standing your ground that night. More importantly, I forgive you - I am more proud of you for finally taking that advice on your own terms.
The Optimist
When I made the decision to see the glass as half full, my world was more or less the same. The mundane stayed mundane, plain Janes still plain, but somehow life started to reek of champagne. Of unexcused celebration, like there was always cause for it right around the corner. But I stayed the me I've always been, only now on the lookout for corners.
Sure, maybe the coins being tossed into the fountain rang a little louder, maybe cough drops tasted a little sweeter, maybe vibrancy wanted my company. Saturation spilled its way into my seams and suddenly I could see similarities between traffic lights and fresh-cut grass, split ends, and parkway paths. Suddenly I could see the appeal.
With my glasses brightly tinted and my eyes a little squinted, optimism didn't seem a plane ride away from the truth anymore.
It was a shift in the lens people wanted to see out of, a skip in my step people wanted to walk. And so I let them.
The first time someone called me a ray of sunshine, I never wanted to stop being one. I took proud ownership of that title, of my adopted skies. It was the first thing that seemed to fit me, so a tight grip was necessary, if I ignore the soreness it’ll go away. It became something people wanted a taste of, a bite of, I didn’t know it was elusive all I knew was I wanted to keep feeding them. I wanted my resources exploited.
‘Optimistic’ was a trait that I declared my goodbyes to, these skies were too large for such a small piece of an identity. I became The Optimist. I needed to take up all the space in the sky I built for myself, there could be no emptiness -- not when I had finally found something I could supply.
It was a formula I had down to a T, T for twinkle in your eye, U for you have to keep going, V for voluntary responsibility, WXYZ
I was a factory, pumping out positivity like canned energy drinks, drinks ready to make those half-empty glasses full.
Somewhere between likability and my capacity for pliability,
my factory on full blast decided it needed to break down for it's own good. Keeping my skies always free from grey didn’t really work out the way I had in mind.
Yet The Optimist never wants to be anything but. The Optimist titled herself. The Optimist let herself succumb to a very overdue storm.
Make it stand out.
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Be clear, be confident and don’t overthink it. The beauty of your story is that it’s going to continue to evolve and your site can evolve with it. Your goal should be to make it feel right for right now. Later will take care of itself. It always does.
Cold Shoulders
I thought I knew what was best for me. I was ready to be my own exterminator, save myself from a relationship producing all the wrong chemicals. I swore that there would be no trace of torturous torpid toxin left on my bare body, your departure was due.
My shoulders are definitely tired of your heavy head on my bed semi-spread - I’ve already bled enough.
And I wanted to be as bold as the colour of my blood, so I bug sprayed your blaze away. Breaking the news was no easy feat but I marched into that conversation like it was a war I wanted to fight - there is no subtle way to drop a bomb.
So I took my first breath of fresh “freedom air”... but my lungs did not appreciate it. My shoulders with the strain lifted off them did not thank me, turns out they learned to love being used. My muscles had already made the acquaintance of pressure, and Pressure was supposed to stick around, Pressure was not supposed to leave this soon, Pressure became my body’s best friend - at 0 PSI my body was cursing my mind for its cells ever forming into the solution of letting you go, I had to re-learn reflex.
No longer did my fingers have to jerk themselves awake and push my comforter aside at 1:53 in the morning, grasping my phone like a career, ready to type like a therapist at whatever problem you threw at me.
Turns out bold actions lead to underlined eradication, italicized to sanitize, and soon my bare body got burned from overwashing itself.
Turns out you weren’t the one who needed me, you had sets of shoulders waiting in queue, waiting for the weight to be put on them. Your concern didn't lie in who was holding you up, the only prerequisite was affection for tension.
I was left with only eraser shavings. I was left still wanting to be your go-to corkscrew do you, even miss me?
Un-familiarizing myself with familiarity wasn’t something I was familiar with, you chose the perfect time to enter my life. A time where development was the only thing moving forward, a time where habits would be instilled in you longer than just your first crush, a time where I became someone who liked being depended on. I grew with you, but I never learned how to grow out of you. And your toxins, though heavy, and scalding, and baleful, were warm.
And it turns out I would take tired shoulders over cold ones, any day.