debating as to whether or not i just posted a semi nip slip picture
you be the judge!!!
I yearn for spontaneity. My entire life has followed a set path. Go to school. Get a part time job. Apply for college. Get accepted to college. Graduate. Go to college. Go to grad school. Get a full time job. Get married. Have a few kids. Have a few grand kids. Retire. Die.
I am not a product of whimsy, but rather a slave of carefully planed conformity. I don’t know what I want anymore. I understand the need for my education but my strongest fears idly hang beneath a life of material dominance. My soul cannot exist in conformity, and I dread the day I will be inevitably stuck between happiness and financial security.
My relationship with prose will only carry me so far, and with the death of the written word dangling around the next corner, our future together seems inexplicably limited.
Do you remember when we swam through islands? We were no older than six and the world lay in the tips of our tiny fingers. We submerged ourselves in the ocean. The sea’s injury’s were not regretted, but bragged about to our family, who never really understand, but smiled politely and warned us to be careful. I held your left hand as you held my right. We wandered the shore as if it were nobody’s but our own. And it was.
Do you remember when we ran through forests? We climbed trees, scraped our knees, and ripped my dresses. Each night we’d wander back at the last call of daylight, drenched in sweat and youthful passion. That was the summer we discovered our opposite anatomy. We simply shared a confused giggle in our findings, as we continued to wade in our creek. The water was always freezing; so freezing it stung and spread to my body instantly. I learned to tolerate the pain. I had an unspoken desire to please you.
Do you remember the years we spent making your house into our own adventure? We hid in laundry baskets, built forts in the guest room, and lit fires in ant piles. We explored your street as if it were our own suburban kingdom. Those were the years of “Crystal City-” our private aquatic castle within your pool. Our hands rapidly pruned as the clock turned but we ignored it; our imaginations overpowered physical sensation.
Do you remember when we started to say swear words? We whispered them under the covers at first. We were terrified of their implications but intrigued enough to permanently initiate them into our pre adolescent vocabulary. Do you remember when we traded our Crystal City for Grand Theft Auto’s Vice City? Our suburban kingdom diminished to nothing but the screen in your bedroom, our games permanently residing behind the word “video.”
Do you remember the first time you drank alcohol? We were 14 years old, freshmen in high school, and it took an hour of convincing for me to believe you. You always had been one to take advantage of my gullible nature. I wish you’d been lying.
Do you remember when we smoked together? It was my first time being high and you told me my vision would soon switch to black and white. A tearful, panicky hour passed until you admitted to the fallacy in your claims and the night spread out before us as we drove through my innocence in a smoky haze.
Do you remember when we were accepted to college? We stayed on the phone until midnight waiting for the decision. The clock struck 12:01 as we anxiously struck the refresh button. We were going to college together, something we’d talked about ever since we lived in the sea.
Do you remember when you dabbled in hard drugs? Do you remember when you made your mom cry? Do you remember when you caused my dad to be suspicious of my after school activities? Do you remember when i didn’t even drink and smoke very often? Do you remember when you did every weekend? Because I fucking do.
Do you remember when you brought alcohol into a school function? I know you remember. It was just last week. A week away from your graduation. A week away from the culmination of your 12 years of education. A week away from the long awaited right of passage we’d spent 18 years waiting for. Do you remember that?
Do you remember when i wrote all of this because i’m fucking worried about you? You think you’re not being punished. Your diploma is being sent in the mail. You’re still graduating, but you cannot walk with your class. You will never be in a graduation picture. You will never sit among your classmates, collectively thinking of the bitter sweet closure of the past and hasting anticipation of the future. Your mother is devastated. You know this but i don’t think you care. You stopped caring the minute we stopped imagining things and started saying curse words. You’re no longer the boy i grew up with. You’re no longer my partner beneath the waves, nor are you my companion above the trees. You’re the man i no longer can save. I really fucking hope you can save yourself, Will. Because I’m done.
the last clink of metal
slam of red
closure
the lock is loose now
a walk through the stares
a few words of reverance
a polite applause
a few photographs snapped
a slew of promises to stay in touch
the future is forward
the past is a blur
the present a waiting room
“America The Beautiful”
The taste of a hazed memory
I am sad before rising
Questioning intelligence and quiet authority
A post-Taliban empowerment
Falling down
Once and then twice
The exception to traveling
I love getting to know somebody, relishing in each and every new found similarity and endearing quirk. For two weeks or so, he’s golden. He has few flaws, remaining shielded in this euphony i create time after time. I stay out until the last dying breath of my curfew for a whole weekend. I brag about him to my friends, maybe even let my mom in on my prospective relationship. For about 8 days I am happy.
But then I realize he can’t spell worth shit. He kisses too much and talks too little. He listens to All Time Low. He is suddenly fallible. Once an archetype of perfection, he now becomes a manifestation of intolerable imperfection. I stop texting him back. He texts me every few days, but the texts grow sparingly as does his respect for me. I won’t explain anything. He might wonder why I stopped texting back, why I’m such a fucking bitch, why our once promising relationship has boiled down to nothing but a few awkward coffee shop glances and the occasional status ‘like.’ I could lie. I’ve tried that before. I’ll tell him that my phone broke. Or maybe I was going through a hard time. Perhaps I scared myself away with my thoughts. It’s all bull shit. He isn’t the perfection I once saw him as, and this terrifies me. So I’ll ignore him, just like the last one. He’ll probably delete me on facebook. Even my cyber presence will become too much for him to endure on a daily basis. I’m a bitch. He’s not the first guy I’ve fucked over like this, and a deep futuristic regret in the pit of my stomach tells me he won’t be the last.
Guilt will eat at me two months later. But it’s selfish guilt. I’m sitting alone in my room on a Saturday night. I’m suddenly depressed, lonely, and horny. I’ll text him and apologize, but he won’t hear any of it. He’s taken the high road and it’s a road of utmost contempt. I deserve it. His only wrongs toward me were driving a truck, not liking the Beatles, being only an inch taller than me, etc.
But above all, he liked me and time and time again this terrifies me. I don’t know how to be in a relationship. I don’t know how to accept somebody for all of his quirks and flaws. I don’t know how to shop for obligational birthday and Christmas presents. I don’t know how to meet his family, or how to introduce him to mine. But I know how to fuck a guy over. I know this better than anything.
I’ll be sad and regretful for a month or so.
But then I’ll fuck over the next one.