Write, Mind

I'm sorry. Sorry, I feel like that needs to be said sometimes. Sometimes we apologize for doing, saying, and being exactly what we say we are. Are you listening properly? Properly listening could've saved us from these awkward situations. Situations we went into with open eyes and very honest expectations up front. Didn't I choose my words wisely? Wisely stating that I'm emotionally drained. Drained. Empty. Not willing to commit to the scenario you want because my heart is spoken for, and although it may be a lost cause... I think my track record proves I'm willing to bet on at least a couple throughout my life. Life gave us a chance for the things you wanted. Things you couldn't handle at the time. Time changes perception though, and I realized you were right. When the descriptors started pouring in.... Well, I listened to what you really thought, and I cringed at how you saw me. Me: Arrogant, self absorbed, headstrong, selfish, needy, not ...

I am drowning.  Having spent all eleven years of my life at the shallow end of the kiddie pool, splashing anyone near me with loud, obnoxious, water hadoukens, I am struck by how quiet my struggle is beneath the water’s surface; but struggle I do. I am flailing my arms and legs in futile desperation, receding into the depth of the pool, further and further away from the sun. I curse Baywatch for leaving out the secret to floating, my mother for granting her first born son the freedom to explore, and my own bravery for being foolish and untrained. The chlorine in the water burns my eyes, and since staring desperately at the surface of the pool does not propel me towards it, I shut them. Now blind, harried, and on the verge of panic, years of useless competition with my brothers comforts me. I know I can hold an inhaled breath for forty-five seconds and have fifteen seconds once I exhale before I need to breathe again. But time flies when you’re drowning. Before I know it ...

Ask around. If I’ve ever said I promise, I promise I did what I vowed to, so it’s hard for me to say, I promise. I am here in front of someone deemed by society as a go-between for us and the Higher Connection that permeates between us all, and am asked to make a promise. They are here, the audience behind us, I mean, as witnesses. Each of them an important body in the heavens of my universe. With these cosmic dancers seated behind us, in front of someone deemed by society as “more connected” to the connection between us all, I am asked to take an oath. If I am the sun, surely the woman across from me is the earth in my universe; where life, for me, begins and ends. She has told me, in her universe, I am the same. I believe her. Across from my earth, cosmic dancers behind us, in front of someone deemed by society as “more connected” to the connection between us all, I am asked to make a solemn vow.  The more connected reads this vow; Richer, Poorer, Sickness, Health, G...

I’m not ready, but with every step forward of my quivering legs, that fact matters less and less. I have decided I’m going to dive into this death pool even if it kills me.  I am thoroughly convinced it will kill me. Baywatch, having become equal parts life coach and spiritual advisor as we inch ahead, checks on me periodically with words of encouragement. When he sees they aren’t helping, he tries to convince me to leave the line. “Little Dude,” he says, “you don’t have to jump. You know that right?” “Yes, I do.” I reply defiantly. “You do? Why?” I think about the question and remember a line my brother’s little league baseball coach screamed to his players during every practice when he believed they weren’t putting their best effort into each play. I give this answer to Baywatch. “Well, because you gotta commit.” I leave out the part about a family trip taken to Wild Water Kingdom, a water park in Pennsylvania, a year ago. There, on a day not much different tha...