We gonna stay here 'til we soothe our souls.

     What strange creatures we are; ignoring that small, wise piece of us that whispers the right direction to move: up up and away. The quiet fragment of relief that might be our saving inspiration if only we let down the prideful walls which stand guard against it, armed and ready, with a clear shot to the head.

     Smother this insistence for change, this offer for help, because we fear being wrong, because we fear the process that will surely be filled with such tears and remorse that we will crumble and drown in the salty water. We accept this as truth; we accept remaining here, in this grave, as survivable. Thinking that if we turn on our sides instead of being on our backs that we can survive underground, gasping for the small pockets of air that still linger. We accept the brief, teasing window of light that flashes just out of reach as enough. We convince ourselves to shift the realities of our emotional spiritual physical psychological everything else states to make that flash enough for our survival and happiness and purpose. Surely that flash will become more frequent, surely it will touch us with its warmth, envelop us in its knowing and ready arms.

    What creatures we are, ignoring the voice that does not tease, but promises. Promises that with a leap of trust and faith (not in some mystical god of wisdom or in the unknown) but in ourselves, that we can be fulfilled instead of vacant. A promise that with this leap, the light will never again leave our eyes, arms will never release us, but will enable us to transcend the damp and drab darkness that is our grave. 

    Why do we choose (because it is a choice) to justify such pain and loneliness when there lies a real and perfect opportunity for unimaginable change that (if we let it, which we so often don’t) will hold us and tell us that “it’s okay”? Will repeat that until we have released our last nostalgic and regretful sob, until we’ve finally caressed the self-destructive army of emotions within is until it sighs a tired breath and surrenders.

    All we have to do is listen, to move. Because the greatest danger lies in staying still and waiting for that voice to diminish, to lift onto some higher plane so that we can ignore its call. 

    We have to move, we have to say “stop” to the powerful dark pieces of us which multiply quietly and incessantly. Until we say stop, enough, no more; until we scream that command, we remain subject to thick and uncompromising desolation in which peace cannot possibly reside.

    So, choose-no, demand your happiness and freedom from sadness and monotonous struggle. Because you know it cannot possibly end unless you break it now, in this moment of clarity. Choose that or fall back into obscurity and suffocation. You’re the only one strong enough to throw off the weight of disillusioned happiness and false justifications. Lift the weight so that you can breathe, so that you can stand on that higher plane on which everything will finally be clear and okay. Where things will be peaceful. 

    What we are, feeling these impulses, and stopping them in their tracks (when there is so much potential for life peace love okay dreams knowledge help meaning enlightenment choice experience light clarity never going back to that place).

Someday, this is all going to make for an incredibly hilarious, heart wrenching, embarrassing, “I don’t believe it” sort of play or book. Being able to laugh at myself is a blessing. I lost it for a few months, or maybe several. All I can hope for is somebody else, minutes or miles or oceans away, who is as awkward and accident-prone as I am. Somebody to share my life with, somebody who will just shut up for a few minutes and let me stutter out stories, and then know whether to laugh or cry or tickle me or make me cookies or just not say a word. In any of those cases, I hope they make me cookies. Every time I tell a story, I want a plate of warm chocolate chip cookies waiting for me as a “congratulations! you did it!” I’m not high-maintenance, I just know what I want. I want somebody who will pull me onto a white mustang as it gallops across a beach at dawn. I want the mustang to have a bottle of wine in its mouth, and I want it to throw its head back so the bottle lands in my hand, and then I want to throw that bottle away in the nearest trash can because wine is gross. Then I want the mustang to throw me a bottle of apple juice, instead. I want somebody who will swim in the ocean with me and whisper “If you’re a bird, I’m a bird.” Maybe not. Noah says that to Allie and they wind up dead in the end. On a side note, my plans for a cat farm are coming together quite nicely.