And here I am, lying underneath this wooden desk in this empty classroom in the furthest reaches of campus.

There is something so unnecessarily dramatic about the situation and yet I cannot bring myself to emerge from my cavern of solitude.

Nowhere else is safe.

To be honest not even this cold linoleum is safe.

My own mind is a goddamn war zone. My heart is full of disquiet. I cannot get up. I cannot face reality. I cannot face myself or my issues or the light of day. I am fucking stuck here on this snot-green floor, staring at old pieces of chewing gum and this old dusty pipe, praying to Christ or Allah or Buddha or Vishnu or whoever the fuck has the divine power to get me out from under here.

Because I am not fucking strong enough to do it myself. I am a weak fucking person and I am riddled with flaws and now I am stuck.

And it is only when I hear the first footsteps, a set of heels click-clacking loud against the ground, that I will myself to stand up.

Keep moving.

Keep going through the motions.

Keep plastering that same fake smile on that same ugly mug I’m forced to look at in the mirror every morning until maybe one day that fake smile is not so fake.

In the end it will always be other people that save us from ourselves.

A set of footsteps.

A smile.

An acknowledgement of your existence that reminds you you are alive and that you are not alone in this fucked-up world.

In the end, everybody needs saving. In the end, divinity presents itself in something as simple as a set of footsteps. You just have to open up your goddamn ears.

And I will get through this life if I have to drag my feet the entire fucking way.

And I am at my worst.

Where as previously the nature of my depression would beg in anguish for someone to save us, it has now given up. My depression, now a discrete and discernible entity inside the four walls of my body, longs for the absence of love. On both knees it clings to the ankles of my life, asking for the departure of all light so that it may find solace in the justification of its own existence. So that we may both slip quietly out the backdoor. 

Without word. 

Without notice. 

The lack of reason amplifies the pain; makes it loud upon my ears. Dampens all other sounds. Brings an awareness of the now desperately beating cardiac muscle in that same cavernous space.

The lack of reason awakens another beast. 

A

  n

    x

      i

       e

          t

            y. 

And I imagine them at war with each other. I imagine my anxiety and my depression like monsters; cold and massive bodies covered in dark green scales, towering above the concrete giants of the city. Snapping jaws and sharp teeth and long white claws tearing into each other, fighting for control of my body. 

And I am helpless. I am left watching. Waiting. All I can do is sit, frozen, staring at this computer screen while they fight their bloody fight. Hoping that they will destroy each other in the battle.

I am drowning. 

I am literally drowning. There are words in my lungs where the air should be. 

Trying to stay afloat in the sea of depression and anxiety and insecurities while trying to stay strong and happy for another person and being enrolled in a full course load in your final year of university and working part time and ksljhdeiwyrgFDBCJEHKwrtuewadjsb

Ok. Okay papers. Write the papers, Lisa. Write the papers. That's your only job right now. In this moment. Just write the fucking papers.

Fuck.

Inadequacy follows me around wherever I go.
Like a stink.
A putrid stench of lack
I can’t get rid of.
And it fills my nose.
And it fills my lungs.
Asphyxiate.
Until I become desperate.
Until each breath reaches out like long and clumsy fingers.
Grasping at the air.
And I come up with nothing every time.

The downside of being a wallflower

“We accept the love we think we deserve.” 

For the longest time I refused to believe that this quote had any sort of validity what-so-ever. I refused this idea for a number of reasons, but mostly I just did not want to take responsibility for my own failed relationships. I didn’t want to accept that it was maybe my fault I had been broken up with 6 times in the last 6 years. I didn’t want to accept the series of never-ending heartache; the ebb and flow of a heart getting attached and detached and reattached to another. I didn’t want to accept that it was my fault I had been cheated on, and my fault I was left depressed and anxious and destroyed. Crushed beneath the weight of it all. A million scattered pieces. I couldn’t accept my own weaknesses; my reliance on others for approval. The need for confirmation that I wasn’t a completely useless fuck up. I couldn’t accept that I had settled simply for the sake of repairing my own deflated sense of self-worth. 

At the time, I struggled to establish the existence of that very fine line between driving the hand that hits, and standing in the way of it after you realize it’s about to collide with your face. Is there a difference between action and inaction? I couldn’t be sure so instead I felt all of it. Every failure, every pang of guilt. Every insecurity. I welcomed all of it into my heart, openly, without discrimination. I let these things infiltrate my deepest thoughts. I let them wrap their cold, bony fingers around the last bits of self-esteem that my mother tried to instill in me; let them cling desperately onto me until what remained inside of me was all but recognizable. A lot of people use the expression “a shell of what I once was”, but I wasn’t a shell. I wasn’t empty, or hollow, or void of emotion. Not even remotely. I was a complicated mix of a thousand other people’s damning disappointments. A thousand excuses. A thousand broken hearts. I was not a shell. My inner being was completely saturated with mistakes, unrequited love, things I dared to dream that were far too great for the scope of me, other people’s mistakes, other people’s unrequited love, other people’s unfulfilled dreams.

I couldn’t believe “we accept the love we think we deserve”, because believing it meant I thought very little of myself. And it also meant that I willingly allowed these things into my life, and as a result of my inaction, I let the hand make contact. These are things you cannot feel when you are trying to find strength within yourself. When you are trying to connect with your own intrinsic worth.

So, I left blame where blame was due. At the source. 

But did that make me happy?

No. 

And did that send me into the arms of someone better?

No. Not initially.

All it did was create a host of unrealistic expectations and caused me to project those expectations onto my partner. Disappointment followed suit, as one can imagine.

So now what?

Okay, so we really do accept the love we think we deserve. I get it. You can’t expect anybody to be anything. You fall in love with someone and you accept their flaws and that’s it. If they’re shit, you leave. But when you truly, truly think you deserve nothing (or less than nothing), even when it’s perfect, you find flaws. Make excuses. You hold onto depression and anxiety and broken hearts like they are goddamn security blankets; they make for really good fucking excuses not to get out of bed in the morning or get involved with anybody who wants to love you. And you hold onto those flaws, and you hold onto those excuses, and you push. Push for the sake of pushing. Push because you are convinced you are a completely fucking unlovable human being. Push so that whoever has decided to love you, doesn’t ever see the things you do when you look at yourself in the mirror. Push so that you never have to be vulnerable, or afraid, or sad. Push so that nobody can break you. Because everyone ends up breaking you. Keep pushing until all of the good things are completely removed from your life, so that you can justify your own emotions. So that it starts to make sense. So that you can cling to that depression security blanket and avoid all the fucking unanswerable “why?’s”. “I don’t know” is not an answer. Push away every single goddamn thing that could bring any sort of meaning to your life, because good things force you to face the bad things that you don’t feel strong enough to face yet. And especially push away everyone who wants to help you be strong. Because you are too busy stubbornly holding onto the stigma that people need to have it all figured out before they’re allowed to let anybody into their life.

Then find somebody who feels the exact same way. See how much pushing results.

When will we ever be ready to let each other in? 

I guess that’s the nature of the fucking beast though, isn’t it?

I wish any of that made sense.

Sometimes love means letting someone go.

Were love a choice, you could have chosen to love me. You could have chosen to be certain about your feelings. You could have chosen to be better for me.

I tried my absolute best to be what I thought you needed. Until I realized what you needed and what you wanted didn't really match up.

I am sorry that you are hurt, but I have done nothing wrong. I will not apologize for pursuing happiness. I will not deny myself those things that make me feel good. Especially for someone who believes everything in life is a conscious choice and who subsequently chose not to act.

I gave you all of me and every opportunity to love me the way I deserve to be loved. So it was your choice not to be what I needed.

You can only hear "my heart is not open" and "I don't know if I will ever introduce you to my parents" and "I don't know if I can ever love you" and "maybe we shouldn't do this" so many times before you begin to pull away.

You pushed and pushed and pushed. Where did you expect me to go?

Never forget that I love you. My heart is big enough to love the world.
But I never fit into your definition of love. I wasn't the "one" and you made that pretty clear.

"MY DEAR
FIND WHAT YOU LOVE AND LET IT KILL YOU.
LET IT DRAIN YOU OF YOUR ALL. LET IT CLING ONTO YOUR BACK AND WEIGH YOU DOWN INTO EVENTUAL NOTHINGNESS.
LET IT KILL YOU AND LET IT DEVOUR YOUR REMAINS. FOR ALL THINGS WILL KILL YOU, BOTH SLOWLY AND FASTLY, BUT IT’S MUCH BETTER TO BE KILLED BY A LOVER.
FALSELY YOURS,
CHARLES BUKOWSKI”

“I said goodbye again
sucking up all that was left of her into the
little that was left of
me. I said, 'don't look for me again. fuck it.
we are all lost. goodbye, goodbye.” 

It was silent. Completely. Which didn’t make sense because everything around me appeared to be making noise. The speakers  were pulsating. Everyone around me was talking and laughing; deep belly laughs that spread through their faces and caused them to clap their hands together in amusement. Glasses were being dropped; glasses shattered. Cars outside the windows hurried past. Men and women were all grinding against each other, moaning in pleasure. But all I heard was silence. Dead on the night. Not even the whir of all the hundreds of sounds occurring at one time in front of my eyes. It was as if every sound wave in the universe collided together at exactly the same moment and destroyed each other. Or as if I had been deafened by the blow. 

The only thing ringing in my ears now was the hum of a million of my own thoughts swarming in my head all at the same time.  What and why and how could this be happening? Because none of it made any sense and it all went against everything I ever thought I knew about myself. A million thoughts but the feel of it all remained a consistent and unwavering guilt; gripping at my stomach like the chubby hands of a child, making it impossible to move, and even more impossible to sit still. 

Empathy is the world's greatest gift, but the individual's greatest weakness. 

Will I ever allow myself to be happy?

Questions.

"If you live in the past, you get what the past gave you"

I know that it is time to move on. I know it is time to let go of everything I was and everything I thought I wanted to be. 

I know it is time to accept my limitations. The set of circumstances that I was born into. Accept them, and relish in them, knowing that they are fundamental pieces of my self. But do I love that self? And if I do not love myself, why do I not love myself? Can I fix those things, can I learn to love myself? And if I cannot love myself, can I at least respect myself enough to make sure my needs get met and stop at nothing to make sure that they are met? Are all my needs realistic? Should I assume that everything I want in life is within my grasp if I try hard enough to attain it? Or should I sacrifice a few things to arrive at some sort of inner peace? 

What qualities do I value? What makes me who I am? What characteristics can I sacrifice in my search for happiness, while still maintaining my identity? Do my values align with reality? (Answer: No). Should I hold steadfast to my values, even if they don't? Even if it means I may never get the peace I want?

I feel a constant hum of anxiety. Inner conflict that bubbles and boils and erodes. I am hearing that I should love myself, I am telling myself that I need to. I am hearing that I should never sacrifice who I am because somebody makes me feel like that person is worthless. But I am hearing that I need to change "this and that and this other thing", because those are silly things to think and silly things to feel. And it's silly to care so much. I am hearing that I should believe in my own inherent worth and value. I should be able to validate myself. I am hearing that I shouldn't let anybody dictate who I am or what I do with my life. I am hearing that I shouldn't let others invalidate my feelings. But I am hearing "that is silly", "I don't understand you", "just stop". 

How do I defend myself against "shouldn'ts" and "don'ts"? "You shouldn't feel anxious. You shouldn't be sad.
Life is okay, it isn't that bad. Don't be nervous, and don't be ashamed, don't feel you are silly, and don't assume blame".

How do I listen without listening? How do I stop caring, but still care? How do I retain the empathy that comes so naturally to me, while ignoring those moments when others do not afford me such kindness?

How do you explain to somebody the incredibly dark things that you feel, and how do you explain to them that it is not their fault, not your fault, not anybody's fault? And how do you explain weakness, while at the same time explaining to them that you are, indeed, very strong? That you have made it so far already without succumbing to that darkness, and you have done it all on your own. And how do you explain it without feeling ashamed when everybody uses words like "shouldn't" and "don't", as if you could somehow control those things in an instant? And if I should be able to control it, maybe I am not actually so strong. 

On the one hand, I want to stop caring, but on the other I think I am a wholesome, generous, kind, compassionate person and I don't want to change. 

I want to get rid of my anxiety, and I want to find that unwavering self-certainty that ensures I don't get anything less than I deserve (especially when it comes to love). But I feel like the things I need to let go, and the things I love about myself are inextricably linked. How do I part with one and not the other?

And all of these questions run around in my head all day and all night until people get frustrated with me because I can't be what they need. Because I am too busy trying to understand who I am and what I need me to be. And then they decide they are so frustrated with everything I am working on (and I swear to God I am working so hard) that they overlook all those things about me that make me great. 

Maybe I have too many questions. Should it really be this complicated?

I often wish I could just slip quietly out the back door of my own life.

We live in a society where a person’s worth is sooner judged by a scrap of metal on four wheels than on character and integrity. Where a suit and tie mean power, and success, and the goodness of intentions go unrecognized and unappreciated.  We live in a society where beauty is measured by a waist line rather than our deeds or the warmth inside our hearts. Where obsessing over a number on a scale, or a number on a tag, is considered normal and an estimated 70 million people worldwide will have an eating disorder; some of them as young as 11 years old. Where people take their own lives because they hate so deeply what they see in the mirror. We live in a society where a father would sooner teach his daughter the value of appearance than the value of self-respect and demanding respect from others; and sooner teach his sons the value of the figures on his pay cheque over compassion, empathy, and patience. 

We live in a world where you can get product in every colour, shape, and size but the models selling them in the pages of magazines come in one colour, one shape, one size. Where it’s okay to be different, but not that different, not that kind of different. Where breast implants and butt implants, face lifts, tummy tucks and books on “why men love bitches” are real things that people feel that they need.  We live in a world where self-esteem is still FOUGHT for, and not a basic human right. Where niche campaigns that promote health, wellness, and happiness, have to exist because for some reason our daughters and sons are sooner taught fractions than how to love themselves and treat others with that same dignity. Where a sense of self-worth has to be earned through accomplishments or validation from others instead of being instilled in us from birth.

We live in a society where scars have the ability to prevent connections, and the shadows of our mistakes are forgiven, but never forgotten. Where our past has the power to dictate our future regardless of who we are or who we might want to be. 

We live in a society where the worst thing you can be is sensitive. Where people would sooner expect you to toughen up and move on than expect somebody to be a little more considerate, or have a little more sympathy. Where we have no hesitations in honking our horns, or yelling at our servers, or criticizing our fellow-man, but every reservation in putting ourselves in another person’s shoes and inconveniencing ourselves for the sake of another person’s well-being.

Today our success is measured by meaningless numbers. By money and things. By ownership. And then that success and that ownership is compared to the success and ownership of our neighbours and our hard work is either substantiated or not good enough. Today our contribution to society is measured by our income, our spending habits, the money we pump back into the economy and not on how we treat the people around us. We live in a society of first impressions and everybody is fighting to make the perfect one for strangers who don’t matter and who won’t actually care. 

People are fighting for legacy in the wrong ways.

And I feel so lost.

---I have so much more to say about this---

Wake up 4am. Eat? Maybe? Bike to job #1. Work. Work. Work. Try not to pass out. Bike home, feed cats. Eat coffee for lunch. Bike to job #2. Work. Work. Work. Go to UBC to check on dog. Work. Work. Work. Work. Bike home. Feed cats. Shower. Bike back to UBC/work. Walk dog. Feed dog. Get to house at 11pm. Collapse into bed. Sleep for 5 hours. Wake up. Repeat.

Okay. Okay I got this. 

Remember what you were like when you were 23 and then cut me some slack.

Heavy

I think I cry more than anybody I know. 

I think the idea of graduating is affecting me a lot more than I realize. I have been in school for 19 years...the security of those four walls and the desks lined in rows and the smell of chalk is all I know. There is safety in university. A comfort in knowing I am allowed to be in debt and I am allowed to be uncertain. Comfort in knowing that I don't have to be getting married or pregnant. Right now I don't have to know where I want to buy my first house, I don't have to know anything about mortgages or property taxes, I don't have to worry about what school to send my kid, I don't have to worry about my parents getting older. These things have been reserved for future Lisa. Reserved for the right time and the right place. But will I be ready to face everything that comes after I graduate? 

The truth is I want so much more out of this life. I want more than the husband and kids and dog and white picket fence. I want more than the 9 to 5, watch-the-clock desk job. And while I want to get married and I want to have kids and a dog and, yeah, maybe even a fence, I want more than routine. Life is about moments, and I want every moment of mine to be something I can look back on and be proud of. Have I set myself up to get more out of this life? Have I kept my options open? Do I have the strength to take what I want? 

The worst thing I can imagine is ending up like my father; so deeply discontent and looking for any escape he can find. Infidelity. Alcohol. White hot, blinding rage. Sleep. The worst thing I can imagine for my life is forgetting how fragile it is, and wasting it on anger or regret or bitterness. 

But what do I want out of life? What am I doing? Who do I want to be? 
I am so terrified and so anxious and so affected by my past that sometimes I wonder if I have the strength to keep going. To claw my way out from the clutches of the beast inside my heart.

I wrote this last year in a journal I had to do for school.

"Growing up was sort of difficult for me. My Dad left my Mom and started a new family before I had even been born and as a result I felt the weight of stress and burden and suppressed resentment for much of my childhood (if only in my head). Being so small and fragile made me an easy target for bullies and I never really had any friends. Instead when I was younger I spent most of my free time alone; preforming scientific experiments on plants, drawing maps to non-existent buried treasure, interviewing my cat. Everyday when the bell rang for recess my heart would jump into my throat and I was showered with an unrelenting anxiety that made it hard to breathe. I experienced early on the amazing thoughtlessness and often downright cruelty of people, and as a result I became guarded. Even as I got older I took it upon myself to become as detached and self-reliant as I could. People were disappointing, and I had already suffered through so much of it that I figured it would be easier just to be alone. Instead I found peace in writing, dance, music, and any other hobby that would distract me from the outside world."

And I find it interesting to read this. Because on the one hand I AM detached. I am detached and I am disillusioned. If I needed anybody to substantiate me as an individual I would have given up on this life a long time ago. I have made myself happy (or I have scraped by, at least) for 23 years while people came in and out of my life. I have gotten by relying on nobody but myself. I have overcome self-inflicted injury, years of eating disorders, drugs, alcohol, sexual abuse. I have worked hard to build myself up despite the cruelty of others. I may have so much more work to do, but here I am. Still standing. So I'm detached and self-reliant...but I care. Does that make sense? No, I'm sure that it doesn't. But I do, I care. I care so damn much about people and what they think and what they feel and do. I care what people think of me. I am detached and self-reliant and yet I am so eager to please, and eager to find that one person that makes me feel good about myself. Male or female, friend, lover. Doesn't matter. I want to find that one person that loves me just the way I am. Now. Not who I am going to be when I figure myself out. I want to find that one person that stays with me because they think that I am great. I want someone to kiss my forehead and love all of my flaws and tell me "it's okay, Lisa, you are doing a great job. You can relax for a little bit because I will make you feel good about yourself until you are strong enough again".

Believe me, I wish confidence and self-assurance came easy. And I wish I could forget my father and the fact that he left us and started a new family. I want to forget the men I considered father figures growing up that I became attached to and then were no longer around. I want to forget bullies and friends who decided I wasn't worth their time. I want to forget the guys who I fell  in love with and broke my heart. I want to forget all of it so I can maybe stop blaming myself and thinking about all the reasons why I may have driven every single one of them away. 

I am trying so, so hard. But I have done it all on my own and I just need somebody to be here and just fucking BE here. 

Ask a boy for a little bit of reassurance and they go running in the other direction. 

Why do stability and certainty have to be all or none terms? Why do they have to mean "marry me, right now"? I am certainly not asking anyone to know that after 8 months. I don't even know what I am going to eat for breakfast tomorrow. 

Why can't certainty mean..."I am certain that you are adorable, and I am certain that you make me happy right now. I am certain that I will see you this week because seeing you makes me happy. I am certain that I am going to make my very best effort not to hurt you when you cannot afford to be hurt. And I am certain that even though I may get distant, you are special to me".  

Why can't stability mean "you are important to me, and I feel distant and confused and tired right now but I am going to put that on hold for just a little bit because I see that you are having a bad week and could use some sympathy and a hug".

Are my expectations really that unreasonable? 

And now my eyes are open,
        And now my heart is closing. 

Working two jobs is rough. Working two jobs while not being satisfied with your school timetable and furiously changing it every day is also rough (this is probably a product of pre-graduation stress). And then doing that while trying to find extra jobs to pay off your VISA. And then grocery shopping and doing laundry and cleaning your apartment and cycling wherever you have to go. And then doing all that while being incredibly ill and not sleeping at all.

I suppose, if I put things in perspective I am quite fine.
But I still would like a hug in a big big way.

I had no inspirations upon starting this post. 

There are clouds rolling past my window in the light of dusk. 

I am currently having some vague internal debate over...my entire life. Although it is all very vague and messy, like my thoughts are a big pile of vague spaghetti.

I ate mangoes for dinner. Although now I wish I had had spaghetti. 

Something awful happened to somebody that I don't know very well and I briefly felt anxious, but I closed my eyes and I took a deep breath and now I mostly just feel all the empathy in my body trying to find a way out.

One day I am going to be old. One day I might be so old that I won't remember anything I've done or anyone I've met. And I would just like to have it written somewhere that I existed and I loved people and I did my best to be good and I felt like spaghetti sometimes. Even if Mark is the only person who  reads this, this is my silly life and I am doing what I can with it. And one day I will look back on this journal and I'll remember who I was trying to become.

I like walking alone at night. I like watching the birds, their fat white bellies illuminated from the street lamps below. I like watching people hustle about. There is no such thing as silence here. And while it is certainly nice to escape, sometimes the traffic and the laughter and the feet on pavement make you feel a little less alone. A little more at home.

I spend a lot of time staying strong. For myself, for others. Sometimes it's nice to just break down. It's nice to just fall apart, alone in the dark city where nobody will judge you or ask you what's wrong.

I'll pick up the pieces tomorrow.

The Nature of the Beast

I feel like a burden. I feel like the very idea of me is a burden to many people. And the idea that I might, in fact, be a burden makes me want to run far far away to a land filled with elephants and surfboards and beaches and no worries. 

In fact I quite often feel like a burden. I burden my parents financially. My mother, emotionally. When I am not calling for help out of my hole of debt, I am calling in tears because I cannot get a handle on my anxiety (which explains why I haven't spoken to my mom in what feels like weeks; I have felt oddly at peace and the weight of my anxiety has lifted--if only temporarily-- I should really call her). I feel like sometimes I have emotions and values that other people don't. People tell me I would get by if I just cared less. And even though I have been spending my days focusing on myself--working, climbing, sleeping, registering for school--and even though I would never sacrifice who I am, I do not agree that it would be best not to care. And that is who I am, I guess. I think caring is important. I think getting close to people, as scary as it is, is important. And sometimes I think that means caring about how they feel and what they think. 

So here I am feeling like a burden to the people around me. To people who know me well, know me a little, people who don't even know me at all. I feel like my mere presence is a burden, a blight upon the earth, an unwelcome blemish. I am a blemish. Every feeling that I have been brave enough to feel has been invalid. Someone has made it invalid. "You shouldn't be sad", "You shouldn't be worried", "Someone has it worse than you, you know", "think about the children in Africa", "well what about so and so, how do they feel?", "stop caring so much", "relax". Geez, sorry. This has happened so frequently, that recently I have taken to invalidating those feelings myself.  My feelings and my thoughts are equal and opposing forces. I have an ache in the pit of my stomach with a brain saying things like "I do not have any logical reason to be upset", "consider the other person's perspective", "don't be sad", and these things antagonize one another until numbness is the only logical response. Until my feelings feel like a burden to everyone around me and I have no choice but to carry their weight on my own. Until my knees buckle and I resolve to feeling nothing.

So my feelings are a burden. And I guess the rest of me is too. Although I can't really figure myself out long enough to tell. As far as I've gathered I'm on the extreme end of whatever it is, though. I am either too loud or too quiet. Too chubby to be a head turner or too skinny to be healthy. I'm either a pushover or a bitch. A suck-up or lazy. I either annoy--incessantly pestering others with unwanted cheer--or I furrow my eyebrows in a look I am sure is uninviting. Somebody somewhere feels burdened by my  enthusiasm or bitchiness or compliance. Heck, somebody somewhere probably feels burdened by my kindness. "How dare she be so nice to me". 

And that's where it gets sticky. I'm not caring, right? I'm numb. And now I'm a mess because the one thing I thought I had going for me...this compassion and empathy and kindness that I have FOUGHT to make a part of me in spite of the cruelty I've faced...well the only thing it gets me is criticism. "You care too much", "you're too nice". In my struggle to become a good person I seem to have missed something.

I guess I should be asking if my needs are being met. But that would require knowing what those needs are.  But to be honest I feel like I am a fairly simple person. I need food and water and shelter. I need time for activities, I need to be outdoors. I need to feel the forest floor on my feet, sand in between my toes, rain on my face. I need a little bit of sympathy sometimes, a lot of sympathy during a certain time of the month. And I need to feel like I am doing somebody, anybody, just a little bit of good. Because I refuse to believe the world would be better off if we didn't care about each other. 

I certainly have a lot of things to work on. 

I was standing in a grass field; my thin white dress rippling with the wind and tickling my knees. The surrounding buildings dusted everything in a heavy orange glow with their pulsating lights. My plain brown hair fell onto my shoulders; I could feel its ends sliding across my back while a perplexing scene played out in front of me, the characters acting so naturally and without the slightest of hesitations as if I was invisible. A man and woman standing together, softly trembling and entwined with one another, whispering nothings into each other's ears. There he was. There he was with another girl, his hands softly gripping hers. His lips pressed onto her forehead. And that's when the panic struck. Every impulse in my body told me to run. I couldn't breathe. Without warning and beyond my control, my diaphragm expanded and air noisily rushed into my lungs. He noticed. They noticed. And I took off. Suddenly the orange glow from the buildings was gone and the field was dark. Green and black speeding past, broken up occasionally with my small pallid hands clenched into fists and pumping at my sides with each stride. All I remember is the hysteria. The running and sobbing and the quick shallow breaths. I remember feeling a warm, strong hand make its way around my arm and slow me down. I remember words. I remember words and the tone of it all and I felt like I was reliving every single disappointment I've ever had. My chest felt like it was going to collapse and my heart like it was going to suddenly stop beating. And all I knew was that I had to keep running or the reality of it would catch up with me, grab hold, sink into my bones and break me from the inside out.

I woke up gasping for air and clutching at my chest.

This is a sick joke.
Because it can't be what it feels like. It just can't. 

The fire in your heart is out.

I don't even want a boyfriend. I just want someone who wants to hang out all the time, and thinks I'm the best person in the world, and wants to have sex with only me.

I had the most bizarre dream last night. I was walking down 12th avenue on the way to get a coffee. A lady was biking along the road, a wire trailer fastened to the back full of cans, a wicker basket on the front full of flowers.  She wore layer upon layer of tattered cloth, her hair a matted mess underneath her oversized hat. Her face was adorned with well-earned lines and black charcoal. I remember watching her pedal for some time until she stopped her bicycle in the middle of traffic, swung her leg over, got off, and lay down right in the middle of the street. She lay down and outstretched her arms to the heavens as if to accept her inescapable fortune. Whether or not she intended to meet with fate at that exact second, or whether she was trying to prove a point remains a mystery to me. Her dull grey eyes gave not even the slightest indication. She looked neither sad nor manic and unhinged. If anything she looked, to a certain extent, determined. The two furry caterpillars above her eyes inched stubbornly closer to each other in a look of resolution.  But at that point an SUV came barreling towards her. It began to slow, realizing as it drew nearer what the large black mass in the middle of the road was, but then, as if to prove its own point, ran over her. Slowly. Agonizingly. Front wheel, then back. I covered my ears in anticipation of a bone-chilling wail, but there was none. Everything was silent. The world was silent.

I woke up and it was as if I was taking my first breath of air as an infant, or maybe like I had spent my entire life underwater and I was just relearning how to use my lungs. I felt very confused and I remember thinking "oh that's right, I'm alive". And then I remember thinking what a strange feeling it was to have forgotten this very real, very obvious, very inescapable fact. 

Sleep inertia followed me around most of the day. I lost huge chunks of time; one minute it was 10 am, and the next minute it was late into the afternoon and I was still sitting in the exact same position.

I need a better distraction. Or maybe someone to talk to.

I gave my everything, for all the wrong things.

Today I am a slave to my anxiety. 

And I can't say I'm sorry for loving you and hating myself.

Quoi qu'il advienne.

I am breathing. I am breathing and this is highly unusual because I am also dreaming; and in dreams you are not normally so hyper aware. But there I am, standing under the soft white glow of the streetlamp, surveying my chest as it rises and falls while a thick, shapeless smoke expels from my mouth. I feel my lungs inflate but I also see them inflate as if a third eye has taken residency at the apex of my diaphragm. Molecules of oxygen and carbon dioxide exchange across my capillaries and the thin membrane of my alveoli. I am watching a million of my physiological functions take place all at once; DNA replicating, RNA translating, heart pumping, blood circulating, neurons firing. I am everywhere but nowhere in particular. I am very small, like an atom, but I am large enough to see the entire picture too. I am so large I extend outwards into the real world and I watch myself sleep. 

---

Today I woke up ready to be bad-tempered and full of self-commiseration. My alarm went off at 5:15 AM and I wanted to throw it across the room and shout obscenities at it until someone heard my call and turned back time so I could get, "just another hour even!". My stomach was so angry at me; the stress of this thing and that, and the stress of not eating, and the stress of wondering why I wasn't eating. It growled loudly at me but I had no appetite to appease it so I simply washed the sleep out of my eyes and dressed for work. I placed my feet in my shoes one at a time, muttering under my breath, furrowing my brow, pleading with my stomach: "if you would just settle down, maybe I could feed you!".  I walked out of my house; it was cold and it was dark and, "why should the sun get to sleep in while I can't?" I cursed the empty streets and dark windows and I cursed the sun for being asleep. "Why should anyone get to sleep in while I can't?" When I arrived at work I was so driven with an all-encompassing rage that I threw myself into my tasks with a vigor unrivalled by that of my coworkers; past and present. I fed the dogs, swept, mopped, let them outside. I greeted each customer with a smile the likes of which you have never seen on someone harbouring such emotions. I made sure no mistakes were made. Applications were filed, emails were answered, dishes and clothes and dog paws were washed. I ran up and downstairs, scrubbing whatever there was to scrub while on the phone and petting three canines at once. I rescued an Australian Shepard from what could have been it's very demise and in doing so received the brunt of it's teeth on my cheek. I didn't even flinch. I bled. Surrounded by howling dogs and an icy breeze, I stood in the warehouse bleeding; wearing my wound and my blood and my heartbreak and all of my anger like a badge that I earned from a hard-fought battle. I was the only human soul in that building and I felt so alive and liberated; finally the walls came crumbling down and took all of my composure with them. I turned the music up and I howled. I howled with my face still bleeding and my heart still broken and my stomach still twisted. I howled until all the dogs in that room joined in chorus. I howled until the noise rolled from floor to ceiling, filled every inch, and after reaching every cavity it could reach, spilled onto the surrounding blocks. I howled until we achieved a frequency that trembled through every cell in my body; pulsed through my flesh like an artificial heartbeat. The hair of my arms stood on end. I howled until the vibrations pressed their way into the backs of my eyelids and the palms of my hands. I howled until all the stale air was gone from my lungs.

Sometimes I feel like my life is so ridiculous, there really isn't anything to do but laugh. 

And so I did. I laughed away all the anger. I laughed away the throbbing heat in my face and the ringing in my ears. I laughed away the knots in my stomach. I laughed until I cried and what a sight that would have been; one lonely girl amidst a pack of domesticated beasts, hysterically sobbing and laughing simultaneously with her face buried in their fur.

Maybe I am broken. Maybe the frenzies and the badges and the howling and the inappropriate laughter are activities reserved for broken girls. But there is something so hilarious, and so unlimited, about being me. Broken or not, I get by just fine on my own. 

A woman who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd; but a woman who walks alone is likely to find herself in places no one's ever been before. 

The question fits the question mark

I dreamt of nothing. I lay on my back, my eyelids wide open and fixed on the ceiling, my stomach twisting, weaving itself into thick knots. Every night it's the same; the emotional stress presents itself as a real and tangible discomfort in the pit of my abdomen and at the bridge of my nose. When sleep finally comes and offers it's reprieve from the physical manifestation of my anxiety, it torments me instead with uneasy dreams of senescence, of ashen and inhospitable wastelands, of ruin. Worst of all are those dreams of pleasant memories that lure me into false comfort and make my heart sink that much deeper upon awakening. I found consciousness before the light of day and opened my eyes one at a time to blearily face a reality I have been trying my best to escape. I am greeted with yet another overcast day and the same thick knots in my gut.

I kicked off the blankets, regretting not wearing clothes to bed while my body shivered and nearly sent me back under the covers. Pressing myself to keep moving (always to keep moving), I got out of bed, threw whatever dirty clothes lay strewn about my room onto my body, and hurried into the kitchen.  My body physically rejected the thought of consuming solid food for the third day in a row, so I hastily poured juice down my throat, brushed my teeth, and left my house.

Under the pressure of the world's merciless and disparaging stare, the thin veil of composure I conceal myself with threatened to come undone. A loud and marked hunger bubbled underneath the surface, and it was all I could do not to scream and cry and accuse the world of it's cruelty and unfairness right there on the 99 B-Line. 

I spent the rest of the day with my face hidden behind my computer and my lips pressed firmly in an expressionless gaze. I did not trust my mouth to keep quiet my disquiet, and had I opened it, the whole class would have surely heard the roaring coming from my insides.

Trust me, I feel as pathetic as I am sure I seem.
But perhaps it was foolish of me to think we could speak freely so soon. I know this man not as a friend, but as a lover. We were nothing and then we were something and maybe now, in the absence of lines, I have no idea where to tread. 

This will run its course. I just have to let it somehow.

A thousand lies, you tell yourself; that no one ever loved you right

Dark Side of Me

I was running. At first my legs carried me fast and far; over pavement, through deserted, narrow streets, buildings passing by as indistinct but uninterrupted panels of gray, ready to bury me under their heaviness like the sides of a coffin. Something inside of me, some bloodthirsty savage began taking hold of my body and, threatening to paralyze me in retribution for my sins, grew like a shadow at sunset. I willed my legs to accelerate, to run faster towards a destination, any destination, where I could escape from the suffocating encumbrance of concrete and steel rising up around me; and the monster rising up inside me. 

I ran for quite some time before I realized it was snowing. Thick white flakes fell down around me, settling in my hair and climbing up around me as tall, exaggerated drifts. Like Atlas and his celestial sphere, I carried the city's desolation on my shoulders; an unassuming emptiness, however ripe with it's own unyielding density that bore down on me and sent my feet crashing through the crystalline ice. It reached the height of my hips and I could no longer run at the force I had been. Slowing down, the blur of metal, concrete, and glass became clear and well-defined. The buildings became giants observing me with intent and disapproving eyes. An overwhelming urgency spread throughout me; my heart beat faster in an unavailing attempt to provide my limbs with the blood needed to get me out from under their gaze. 

The snow disappeared and my legs gave way. My eyes left my body and I saw myself slow down, my ankles gradually melting into the asphalt. Now without feet, my knees buckled and I was sent hurtling into the earth ahead of me, all the while my body parts slowly becoming indiscernible from one another, liquifying, and yet still trying to make ground. My frame unfurled; reduced to a puddle, my toes found themselves laying nearly a kilometer away from my head. I felt more removed from myself than ever, a thin stretch of water; my skin, muscles, blood vessels, bone exposed for men and giants alike to catch glimpse of and assign value to.

I could do nothing but watch as my illegible spill of flesh lost all worth.

This wall won't hold forever.

Your time has come, it's now or never.

Patterns

My heart feels heavy. The room feels loud. His words beat against the side of my head one syllable at a time. The air feels so thick I think I might choke on it. This isn't the first time I have sat across from a man while he tells me I'm not good enough, while the world blurs out of focus in a haze of soggy tears that slowly creep down my face and fall onto my knees. This isn't the first time I have given all of myself to somebody only to be led on and hurt by them. This isn't the first time I have doubted myself, hated myself, wondered if I will ever find love and if I'll deserve it when I do. But something about this time feels different. Something about this moment, sitting here beside him while the blurry world falls silent on my ears, watching his muted silhouette pull the plug...something about this moment feels different. As if every word of his uncertainty, all the context and subtext, compounds with the last. Years of heartbreak claw their way from their distant depths, capitalizing on my vulnerability, adding insult to injury; like squeezing the life out of a lemon onto newly opened wounds. And with each syllable, now ripping into me with savage teeth, the light inside me dims. 

Until he tells me to give up and the light goes out completely.
And so I do.

It was raining. I remember it so vividly; it dripped from his hair, each bead rolling down his cheek until it settled on the smile that played across his face. Tall concrete giants rose out of the thick mat of clouds sulking over the city in the night before us. His hand, wrapped around mine, felt safe and warm despite the dropping temperatures and biting sleet. Until my dreams caught up with reality and I dreamt of elderly women singing softly over the ocean; their white hair like a billowing fog dancing around their weathered faces. Their leathery hands reaching out and grabbing at my ankles; threatening to pull me out to sea where I would surely be consigned to oblivion. I dreamt my face deeply entrenched with grooves from years of furrowed brows and long forgotten laughter. I dreamt my skin a pallid grey, stark against the dark blue water reflecting the midnight sky; floating there alone, the last consoling note from the most unconventional of sirens, fading off into the distance. I dreamt of unbridled winds, imprisoning me in long and cruel arms. Rendering me so wholly immobile and helpless, that my muscles could do nothing but accept their fate one by one; my body hanging lifeless and limp. And completely emotionless.
------
This is not because I needed him to substantiate me in any way. This is not because I wasn't ok before he came along. This is not because I'm not ok on my own. This isn't necessarily because I was certain. This isn't because I was ready to call it quits and send out the invitations because I thought "that's it, I found him!";  three months is certainly not long enough to know that. My feelings were real, but maybe it's not about him at all. There is only so much that the body can take. There are only so many times the heart can be hurt until it just doesn't seem worth it to fight any more. I have given everything I have to give and then some. I have put myself out there time and time again. I have fallen more times than I can count; not once has there been anyone to catch me. But each time I have told myself that I deserve better, found my legs, and soldiered on with my head held high. Alone, but optimistic and empowered and marching the best I could. But this time is different.

This time it doesn't feel worth it to be me any more. 
And I don't think I am strong enough to be.

So I've given up. But not on him. I've given up on myself.
Can I go to sleep yet?

I can hear cars on the road. Mechanically they hurry past; crude and clumsy textures with no persistent beat. A wall of percussive sound with no distinct notes or melody. 

Today I awoke to find a rampart forged of mist and fog staring at me from across my backyard; inaudible, unmoving. Unwavering in its density and impinging on my world with its weight. The cars hurrying past. I stood, somewhat rigidly, staring into the grey void threatening to engulf me; my clothes wrinkled, my hair bedraggled and knotted from the uneasy dreams of the night before. Dishes lay heaped in the sink to my left, shoes stockpiled in a characteristically insouciant manner to my right. Disorderly as it may be, my near nano-scale, disaster of an apartment, provided refuge from the encroaching brume and rooted my body to the earth; my thoughts with it. Soberly I closed the door, retreated to my bedroom, and slunk under the covers. 

However sleep delivered no solace from my unease. Panic struck. My mind reeled. My limbs seized. My body lay there motionless; paralyzed and helpless while my anxiety cocooned me just as the fog did. I dreamt of babies. Of diving into icy lakes, legs tangled in seaweed, my lungs collapsing under the pressure of being suspended under hundreds of meters of glacial liquid. I dreamt of the prairies. Of being enveloped in tall grasses and endless blue sky. I dreamt of emptiness and solitude. Those same prairie grasses on fire, the heavens thick with smoke and ash, filling my nose with a suffocating redolence until finally I dreamt of nothing except an overwhelming darkness. 

When I awoke again the fog had lifted but I was met instead with a pounding between my eyes and a gentle nagging in the pit of my stomach. There is something so fragile about the way the blood pulses in my ears when I have run out of things to distract myself with. 

I promise to not let this get the best of me.