The Fear

As quickly as I grasp it, it slips away. The Fear is constantly undulating, serpentine, through the hills and meadows of my mind. Where it goes the grass grows purple, and the sky is clouded with a thickness that is hard to breathe. Two glistening teeth curve out below its lip; it is a smile I know. I turn my face away.

The Fear is a void with clasping, clawing arms-- the graceless movements of an insect gathering its prey. Hastening it to fill it, I try everything I can think of: food, stories, idle thoughts. Anything I can do to keep from seeings its faceless form, terrifying in its emptiness. I run from it because I always have, I run from it because I am paralyzed and have always been.

Clarity comes in those quiet moments when there is no sound jar against my ears, and in those moments I gather what courage I can to face the Fear. In those moments I feel whole; I do not feel the pull of the void, the ceaseless and thoughtless need to fill it.

Peace comes, and then I feel it rush over me, a tide of people and feelings and thoughts and colors. It is my world; it can only exist where nothing has existed before. The Fear cannot quench it, cannot kill it, cannot force it away. I am full. I can succeed. My dreams are inspired and my hands are magic.

The Fear will not conquer me.

The Bottom Line

I get caught up sometimes in the different expectations and obligations that have pull on my time. In the end I need to remember one thing:

the most important thing to me is that I work, work my fucking ass off until my fingers bleed. I have words that need to get out. I have stories that need to be told. I have to be committed in a miserable and one-track way that defies all things and abandons all things. I need to be crazy in pursuit of my goals. I need to be committed to dig deep and find the true things inside of me that my characters crave; that my readers are entitled to. People need to hear me. I need to be heard.

That's the bottom line.

Love

Lately I've been feeling like a crybaby, because everything I see makes me teary. I should clarify, not everything, mostly just touching, beautiful, or amazing things are making me cry. The only problem is that I find a lot of things that fall into one of those three categories.
Part of me thinks that since I have started to feel the ticking of my internal baby clock, and as my body is pumped full of hormones I have fallen into some estrogen-induced happiness-coma in which I attempt to love as many things about the world as possible. Maybe there's something biological about it? It ruins it to overanalyze, but sometimes I wonder. It just seems unreasonable that one person could be as happy as I am, or in any way deserves to be. And yet, I am.
As I go about my day I am sometimes terrified that I don't deserve this, that the universe is fixing to serve me up a nasty slap in the face in the form of something horrible happening to me, some new kind of devastation that mirrors my current jubilance perfectly. Isn't it strange that I've grown up thinking that happiness is unattainable and that I don't deserve it? There's nothing in my upbringing to suggest this, so don't get the wrong idea. I just keep waiting for the arm to reach in and snatch back all the wonderful things I've been given.
But meanwhile, I've decided I'm going to enjoy it. It isn't part of me to give in to those feelings, to feel depressed, to let my fears diminish my appreciation for my life at all. So I feel sappy and lovey all the time, so what? What's wrong with telling all the people in your life how much they mean to you, or crying over the way a song makes you feel? I told my husband that all I wanted in our relationship was for him to always feel that he was loved, appreciated, and adored every day. So far, so good. I told him that when I die I don't want there to be any question in his or in anyone else's mind about how much I loved them. I did. I do. I love my friends and family in the way that you love something that you know you were lucky to get, and that you will be torn apart to see it go. I know that I am lucky, or blessed if you prefer that term, and I guess I will just take this time while it lasts to be in constant appreciation of it.
On that note, I cried watching this video today. It's lovely.


I hope when I am old, when my heart has been broken, when I have lost many of the things I today appreciate and love, I will still have the capacity for joy. Please don't let it die before I do.

Twinge

I see the shape of my future in your shape. I can pull it around me, tuck me into it, feel complacent. But complacency won't bring me closer to my future, and it won't bring you to life.

I feel your breath on my face every time I fall into you. I know you're real, real as anything I've seen and held and touched. I feel your sadness, I feel your victory. I feel you with everything raw and untouched and unfiltered inside me, the power that grows into that impossibly bright light that is always buoyant, always white. You are alive and you are demanding to be seen.

I love you completely and I will never leave you until I die. You make me feel whole and powerful, wholly powerful against anything that tries to defeat me. I will not be defeated. You want to live too badly.

They say you are just inside my head, just thoughts floating invisibly though the graspless ether in my mind. But I know better. You are in every atom of my being, every cell of body. You are the light that fills my soul. I would not exist if not for you; our lives and our future are inextricably intertwined.

I found you, and I will free you. You protect me, have always protected me. But you don't have to do that anymore. We can hold each other's hands. We can do this together.

Live! Live and be real and laughing; be what is at the darkest heart of you. I will always love you.

You will never die, and neither will I. We will always be together.

Live!