There. I said it. I'd like to go back to work, now, please.

It is almost too new to talk about? But I'm kind of squirrelly, so I need to say something.

First of all, I'm feeling  . . . happy. For the first time in an age. I mean, I'm still panicking, and I just wrecked my car, and I need a new job, and just thinking about all of this is making me ill, but. I don't hate my life for the present moment. I feel something strangely akin to hope. This is . . . huge.

And maybe, just maybe, I'll be direct at the moment instead of oblique, as has been my habit. I may or may not have feelings? About a person? But I'm desperately worried that God is against this whole thing, and I am trying not to commit my emotions to anything. I don't want to rationalize my way into a situation that will just be bad for everyone in the end.

Long story time.

With my last boyfriend, I kind of really wanted it to happen, and I sort of kickstarted it into happening, even though I prayed for a sign and didn't get it. So. About 6 months before it ended, I got another clear indicator that this was a bad idea. I thought my way out of it, convincing myself that surely that wasn't what He meant. It went sour a few months later, and I can't help believing that it would have been better to end it . . . earlier.

It's been like. Years. Five years? Wow. I've been single for at least five years now, just sort of waiting. I've prayed many times over for His will to be done, and I think, maybe? Maybe. That there might be some sort of a green light. With someone I would never have considered five years ago, but maybe I've been waiting all this time for a reason? Like. I can come up with all sorts of reasons why this is okay, but maybe I'm overthinking. Maybe the sick feeling in my stomach is the pizza I shouldn't have eaten last night.

See, I thought I got the same sort of "Nope" signal that I should have listened to back then, but then I kept listening, and I think what I was actually hearing was "Wait for it." But is that me implanting what I want to hear? I mean, He keeps reassuring me, but I'm very Gideon of late, and . . . well. I'll go in circles for days if I keep thinking. I speak from the last week or so of experience.

Really, for real now, I'm good.

This is something I jotted down on receipt paper while musing at work. Very organic, no? I had a whole argument with someone about how doing that sort of thing on purpose negates the hipster feel, but I suppose I have no room to talk about contrived originality . . . anyway. It would seem that a very long, rather frustrating chapter of my life is closing, not to be too dramatic or anything, and this sort of articulates how.

__

Not much is different, but everything's changed
where it counts.

Cuz you're still you, and I'm still me, and that will never change, but what that means to us both? Who knows. I can't speak for you, anyway.

That fact . . . those facts used to make me angry, or sad, or a whole host of other negative emotions.

Those facts used to light me up and make me sing before they brought me down.

Now, I think . . . I think I'm leveling off. Those facts sort of ground me, in a way.

You're you, and I'm me, and that hasn't changed for so long that I'm not sure how I'd function if it did. That's a lot to put on someone.

I'm sorry for that, but. Thank you.

For being you, and letting me be me.

Poetry and form

A poet I will never be with ease,
Though rhymes and rhythmic tools confound me not.
I order words in lines just as I please,
But find that eloquence cannot be taught.
I yearn to put my passion on the page,
To move the soul and mind with what I write,
To pen soliloquies worthy of stage,
To bring to cry, to laugh, to love, to fight.
I've lived these things, but cannot find a way
To make them real and living once again.
My words, mechanical, precise, just say
Exactly what they say, not what I mean.
Farewell, then, structure, lines perfect in form.
To speak good poetry, look past the norm.

Didn't realize I was so angry...

I may have said this before, but. Saying it again because it is relevant. Again.

Don't you ever. Ever. Assume you know me. Don't do it.

Don't act like you can predict what I am doing or thinking or feeling.

"I am so proud of you. I know that was really hard for you to do."

No. It wasn't. If it was hard, I wouldn't have bothered. You are not in any way a person whose approval I want; I do nothing for you. It has nothing to do with you.

You don't know me. Don't presume.

Surprise, sucker...

It was one of those flashbang grenades, and it went off somewhere behind my nose. My mind couldn't see straight or make sense of anything it was hearing. I mean, I heard him and saw him, but processing? Nah.

I said the right things, I think, and made the right faces and was generally how I needed to be right then. You couldn't tell by looking at me how hard I was shaken up inside, neat boxes of feelings and thinkings and paradigms in my head tossed around like an earthquake had hit, epicenter: me.

Putting everything back in its place was a chore for later. It was like cleaning your room, a journey of discovery and recovery all in one. How long has this been hiding here? I thought I had thrown it away. This should go in a different place, and this one I want to try on and see how it fits me now.

I'm repackaged, but not everything fit right. Guess we'll see how it goes.

sorry for gibberish

i'm on an edge
about something
about several things
so i guess i am balanced on blades

i'm waiting all tense for something? anything? to happen
but it's up to me to make it happen
or it's inevitable and bearing down
compressing my gut into an anxious knot

i also feel guilty
and alone
and jealous
and angry
and bored
and tired

one more makes it perfect, so . . .

i feel
afraid