flightless bird

Two out of three of my New Year's Resolutions resolved before the end of the previous year. This might be my year. Finally. Happy, hopeful and strong. I am strong, all on my own. I may not wake up to birds singing and sweet words but i can create both for myself. I am a little sad that I might be the cause of these impossible romances and not merely an innocent bystander. There is always a part that can't, that arrives too late or too soon, but there is always another part that is.. me. I am not regretful or angry, I don't hold anyone to blame. Not even myself. I only hope there is no such thing as a limit to how many chances you get. I have a knack for letting them slip away. I find comfort in knowing there is something i keep, and maybe you too, that stops us from ever breaking, falling away from each other. I don't know how to feel. New emotions for a renewed life, a new year. Maybe, just maybe, i do have some kind of beauty of my own. Maybe, just maybe, I will be worth, someday, to be chosen over complicated situations and situated complications. I'm o.k. with waiting. In the mean time, enough missing opportunities to miss an opportunity.

I hate Christmas. I've said it a million times.

I've only worn it twice and both times I've gotten myself into a horrible mess. A dress that resulted from my father's escape to Beirut. A beautiful silky dark blue dress. It is trouble. The first time i wore it - it was borrowed - i met someone who would shift me out of my comfortable non-existence and leave me hungry for more. The second time - after it was offered to me as a Christmas gift - it became the subject of a full blow-out of my unashamed pettiness (for which, due to stubbornness, i was unable to apologise). I wonder what memory will cling to it more adamantly. That of the first time offender or the misunderstood serial assailant? Perhaps unfairly, it will probably be the former. If only because should i want to forget, i would surely find it a failed mission. Either way, both break my heart, a little every day, and win it back without ever uttering a word. I suppose its rather fragile, my little heart. The dress, however, is truly beautiful, and worth its already heavy history, in all likelihood, due entirely to it. It seems my anger has dissipated and i may be able to rest tonight. I might be inclined to give Christmas another chance tomorrow.

Bang Bang. My baby shot me down.

I took a certain amount of pleasure out of packing this time around. Having had the unfortunate, albeit short, experience of alternating homes every weekend - some ten years ago - packing is not an activity I look upon with any sort of excitement. However, today, I enjoyed it. I chose a specific playlist and went about tidying the apartment meticulously. My goal was to leave no trace of myself. Of course, I love tidying, on my own time and terms. I left two piles of clothes for my remaining days with little notes on top; ‘Thursday – Last night out’ and ‘Friday – Flight home’. All beauty and hygiene products organised by order of use in the bathroom and on my dresser. All items not belonging to me that found there away up here over the past few months neatly stacked in a paper bag to return to their rightful owners. Not entirely sure what will happen to my pop-art Audrey Hepburn painting, would very much like it to find its way home shortly after I do.
I like chapter endings. In life, I mean. So many “lasts”, so many “firsts”. I like that. Goodbyes are never really permanent in this day and age anyway.

«As I'm sittin' in the taxi for the sky
He's off to slay some demon dragonfly
And he looks at me, that long last time
Turns away again and I waved goodbye
In an envelope, inside his coat
Is a chain I wore, around my throat
Along with, a note I wrote
Said "I love you but, I don't even know why"

But darling, I wish you well
On your way to the wishing well
Swinging off of those gates of hell
But I can tell how hard you're trying
Just have this secret hope
sometimes all we do is cope
Somewhere on the steepest slope
There's an endless rope
And nobody's crying

Well a long night turns into a couple long years
Of me walkin' around, around this trail of tears
Where the very loud voices of my own fears
Is ringin' and ringin' in my ears
It says that love is long gone
Every move I make is all wrong
Says you never gave a damn for me
For anything, for anyone

But darling, I wish you well
On your way to the wishing well
Swinging off of those gates of hell
But I can tell how hard you're trying,
Just have this secret hope
Sometimes all we do is cope
Somewhere on the steepest slope
There's an endless rope
And nobody's crying

May you dream you are dreaming, in a warm soft bed
And may the voices inside you that fill you with dread
Make the sound of thousands of angels instead
Tonight where you might be laying your head.»

- Nobody's crying, Patty Griffin

I guess it's all a question of perception. I will miss this city like it were my own. And for a time, for a few select moments, maybe it was. Red ink immortalises every dying hope, every living dream. I am partial to any amount of kindness and every amount of sweetness.

I've lost your voice.

I hate feeling like I'm being made fun of. It has to be one of the worst feelings known to man. Humiliating. Demeaning. And all happening in the (dis)comforting silence of your own head. Never sure whether its just another petty insecurity or the fact that two people share a private laugh whilst you have the floor is proof of mockery. I suddenly shrink to the size of a mouse, squeaky, unwanted. It wakens the dormant thought in the back of my mind that I've so (im)maturely been avoiding. I'm trying too hard. I try too hard. Will everything fail in comparison from now on? It was so easy. For just a few days i didn't need to try, i didn't play a part, i could just be.. and that was enough. Maybe its only me i am not enough for. I don't want to go back to my old ways. Incessant worry about intake and outtake. If only willing my brain to stop would make it so. Stop. Just stop.

Is it so wrong to want to be liked? Someone has to. You first.

my hands are cold.

«And I'd give up forever to touch you
Cause I know that you feel me somehow
You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be
And I don't want to go home right now

And all I can taste is this moment
And all I can breathe is your life
Cause sooner or later it's over
I just don't want to miss you tonight»

- Iris, Goo Goo Dolls

I’m tired. And a little drunk. Perhaps the reason for admitting to liking such a cliché of a song. My throat is burning. With more than broken promises. A week until my return.
Christmas is maybe my hardest time of year. This year will either be the same for entirely different reasons or entirely different for the same reasons. Then comes New Year. Rebirth. The pledge of change. So much has changed already.
I can barely keep my eyes open but my chest is bursting. It’s 3 a.m, I must be lonely. I’m sure that’s the lyrics to a song. Yes. Matchbox20. Aren’t I in a teenage mood. Breathing suddenly comes easy. A quiet relief. I think I may be asleep already.
I haven’t the energy to wipe off my make-up. I haven’t the strength to push forward. I do. I just don’t want to. Not yet. I’d rather listen to acoustic versions of every love song ever written and compose my own reminiscence. The city night-lights are like spots on your eyes when you stare into the sun. You pull your eyelids down but for a few seconds those colourful bruises remind you of it’s brightness. A few more minutes of madness and then I’ll close the chapter on this long long day. Wait for me. I’m on my way.

Post Hoc Ergo Procter Hoc

And suddenly there is silence. A different kind of silence. Not the pause where you guess what the other is thinking or take comfort in hearing them breathe. An emptiness. All is quiet. All is still. The mind strays to those places it doesn’t recover from, a tendency that must be fought in the name of self-preservation. I can feel my heartbeat, an acute awareness. My feet cold on the stone floor. I should go to bed but I dread the waking from my dreams. Any minute now I’ll wake from this one. I wish I could save every word, and every absence of one. Maybe if I try hard enough, I can expel these emotions that mar the grace. But I embrace them; every last one of them is a faithful reminder. Even unfairness, even jealousy. Not that I need to be reminded. I couldn’t even sit through an extremely compelling play without going off, in the back of my mind, to mental reruns time and time again. I would hate to sound desperate. I hope my penmanship too falls into that singular understanding. It is what I think about and it is what comes out. It is what it is. Above everything, I am grateful. The seeming melancholy is inevitable. I am almost proud. Tomorrow everything will be different. For once, the past will be the healthier option. I will close my eyes and find myself lying on the grass, in the wintry sun, aware of the closeness, body and soul. I’ll know it was real, no photographs, no drawings, just a consciousness under my skin.
I miss you already.

black tears

«Just hear this and then I'll go:
You gave me more to live for,
More than you'll ever know.«

- Last Goodbye, Jeff Buckley
(because music is so conveniently misinterpretable)

You wanted something sweet. And I gave you nothing. Not because there was nothing to say but because nothing was good enough. Nothing at all seemed better than some common place overused quote from a soap. So, in the end, you didn’t get what you wanted but you got me. Hopefully, that was enough. It’d be a great screenplay, the whole thing. Maybe I’ll give it a try.
The line between sweet and awkward wears pretty thin. I’m so terribly afraid of awkwardness; I always think it’ll taint perfect moments. Usually it makes them more memorable, more real, more personal. Now there’s something I like, personal. There are so many things that I could say, but to what avail? Speak your mind and it becomes truth, sound in time, free to judge. I will not be judged. Not for this. It is mine. My little treasure. My Jerusalem.
I cannot remain unmoved. I do not. My cold cold heart has melted. I know the unknown. Life and time continue, two of 6.7 billion share a story all their own. A sole human being counts. When time has done its bidding and loss becomes forget, I will hold on to my little details. Irrelevant recollections. How I never felt as beautiful as when seen through your eyes and spoken from your voice. That in itself, a thought to exile my sins.
I tread carefully still, yet the transition from present to past has begun; idyllic memory, utopian reflection, the tools to fill the void.
A proud romantic feels intensely, perhaps disproportionately. Excess emotion is my geographic birthright. My home a fragile web, spun of instant, time and place. A single fragment left behind, the fact beyond the fiction.
Fate is too unfair a concept to believe in, my decisions are my own. With that, each one is life-altering, consequential, corollary unpredictable. I try so hard to hide my sense I risk losing it to confusion. I am inarticulate before you. Unusual but refreshing. A welcome peace of mind. I think I may have found my truest self. It certainly feels easier. What I mean to say I am not sure. That words are few but sentiment is not. That I am afraid to spoil reality by embracing my desire to think of nothing else and in writing spoil yours. That assume what you will goes on in my mind, it won’t be presumption. Yes. Here is what I have to say: it is whatever you wish it to be. You have my words and my permission to fill in the blank at goodbye with anything. Your choice becomes what happened. That shall be the truth.
Enough.

«Sadness is easier because its surrender.»

I am happy. It’s hard to admit. It feels like tempting fate. It holds no place to hide. It is, however, the truth. Life is not perfect, not even close. Colours aren't brighter, tastes aren't stronger. I didn't wake up one day with all my problems solved and all my troubles soothed. Nonetheless, I will repeat myself. I am happy. I feel younger everyday, regressing from the age of 60. I see beyond the bad. I acknowledge, appreciate, and am grateful for the good. The good that was always there, trapped underneath the full weight of my guilt. I ignore the unpleasant, enjoy the unexpected. I am patient. I listen. I learn.
But happy endings don't sell as well as tragedy (of Elizabethan proportions). So I thought about it a while. My words felt shallow, even empty. My mind, my heart, are not. Tragedy, it turns out, need not be a Greek masterpiece. I have never aspired to such greatness. I have my own tragedy, tragedies, in varying degrees. I can, I must, profess them without falling to that pit of sorrow. Pain is immortal yet it reminds me that I am alive. I shall call them, instead, misfortunes. Remove the element of disaster. One becomes fond of one's misfortunes - like holding a grudge. We nurture them, analyse, obsess, provoke. Amidst all the frustration I sometimes forget how it first came to be. Some could, perhaps, have been prevented. Others, I wouldn't dare. It is the Shakespearian way. That the end comes with tears is not to say it wasn’t worth the beginning. It may even add a certain charm. The romanticism I crave. Excess sentimentality keeps my innate stoicism at bay. Poetry and prose fill the lack of beauty I feel. My lips don’t say enough. My voice speaks only silence. The need to confess is stronger. Becomes a gesture of hand, an equivocal look, shaking knees – oblivious to the unsuspecting, blatant to the searching. Music has always been the most eloquent communicator. I don’t have to explain how you make me feel, I can show you. Here:

The Nutcracker (Tchaikovsky) - Pas de Deux, Intrada.

Dangerous thoughts carefully encased in manipulated truth.
Even when the door was locked, from you I learnt my youth.

Here lies no reason, merely rhyme. Torn illusion, be still - be mine.

The dimming light, it blinds my eyes, the sand, it heaves my heart.
Wandering mind finds wandering soul, the end before the start.

In short supply, this time so cruel. You’re the clown but I’m the fool.

My nonsense for your sanity, your present for my past.
There is no room for tragedy, I know the verve at last.

Find a secret, keep it safe. I drink the poison, blissful fate.

Fill my lungs with air and drop me in the deepest sea.
I will find my way ashore, to you the faintest memory.

Hand in hand, don’t say a word, what keeps you warm will leave me cold.

Close your eyes. Lose your step. And I, in turn, shall too.
I can but heal, with sad surprise, this love I barely knew.

Time's up.

Time. So much is said to describe it. Time is slow. Time is fast. Time is not enough. Too much. Time is forgiving. Time is cruel. Time heals. Softens. Erases. Time is priceless. Time is money. Time is an illusion. Time is inflexible. Impenetrable.

Time is what you choose to do with it. I chose to ignore it, for a long time. I woke up one day, not long ago, and time - my time - was irretrievable. I wanted it back instead of wanting to go back. I wanted to give it purpose, meaning, opportunity. I couldn’t. I can’t. Every minute I spent grieving for my lost time I was losing more time. So I stopped. I took the time to take my time and use it. Think it. Feel it. Hear it. Breathe it.
I would give you all my time. We have so little time. We had so little time. All the time I gave away was worth the waste. Without it there would never have been our time. A long time in exchange for a short time. I wouldn’t have it any other way. So I forgive my absence, my excuse, my failure, my flee. These hours are timeless. You set me free.

going.. going.. gone.

«Haven't laughed this hard in a long time
I better stop now before I start crying
Go off to sleep in the sunshine
I don't want to see the day when it's dying
She's a sight to see (sight to see)
She's good to me (good to me)
But I'm already somebody's baby
She's a pretty thing
And she knows everything
But I'm already somebody's baby
You don't deserve to be lonely
But those drugs you've got won't make you feel better
Pretty soon you'll find it's the only
Little part of your life you're keeping together
I'm nice to you
I could make it through
But you're already somebody's baby
I could make you smile
If you stayed a while
But how long will you stay with me, baby?
Because your candle burns too bright
Well I almost forgot it was twilight
Even if I think that you are right
Well I'm tired of being down, I got no fight
You're wonderful
And it's beautiful
But I'm already somebody's baby
And if I went with you
I'd disappoint you too
Well I'm already somebody's baby
Already somebody's baby»

- Twilight, Elliott Smith