real fiction

She had become bored.  That's what happens when a person lives on a routine for too long; they get bored.  The highlight of her week had become the one toffee caramel latte she'd worked into her budget.  She'd sit in the cafe every Thursday, as the late afternoon sun streamed through the window and onto the notebook that she wrote in.  Every once in a while, she'd look up at the apartments they had applied for together the fall before.  She had been willing to pay just a little bit more for the corner unit, which looks over her favorite downtown street, where a small farmer's market is held every Saturday during the warmer months.  She'd often pictured what their weekends would be like together, full of comfort and all things happy.  She'd imagined waking early to coffee in bed and writing a bit before getting ready and walking across the street to this little cafe for breakfast.  Or perhaps they'd grab breakfast from the farmer's market.  There was bound to be some sort of baked goods down there. Some weekends, she figured, they'd stay in and have breakfast in bed. Either way, life would be so good and easy.

Eventually though, she had realized they weren't right for each other. She craved adventure, whereas he was content staying in the same place his entire life.  He had no desire to even leave the country.  She found this absurd, but still, she tried to calm her wanderlust and convince herself she could be happy anywhere.  It was constantly troubling at her, though, asking her to stop and consider herself for a second, begging her not to settle.  She'd talk with him and ask him to reconsider, but all she'd get was dismissal. After a long time, maybe too long, she finally ended the relationship.  It was horrible and heartbreaking, but she knew it was for the best.

Several months later, she had become bored. That's what happens when a person lives on a routine for too long.

a recommendation

“He awoke each morning with the desire to do right, to be a good and meaningful person, to be, as simple as it sounded and as impossible as it actually was, happy. And during the course of each day his heart would descend from his chest into his stomach. By early afternoon he was overcome by the feeling that nothing was right, or nothing was right for him, and by the desire to be alone. By evening he was fulfilled: alone in the magnitude of his grief, alone in his aimless guilt, alone even in his loneliness. I am not sad, he would repeat to himself over and over, I am not sad. As if he might one day convince himself. Or fool himself. Or convince others--the only thing worse than being sad is for others to know that you are sad. I am not sad. I am not sad. Because his life had unlimited potential for happiness, insofar as it was an empty white room. He would fall asleep with his heart at the foot of his bed, like some domesticated animal that was no part of him at all. And each morning he would wake with it again in the cupboard of his rib cage, having become a little heavier, a little weaker, but still pumping. And by the midafternoon he was again overcome with the desire to be somewhere else, someone else, someone else somewhere else. I am not sad.” 

Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything is Illuminated

Thoughts on where I'm going.

I graduate from college in 216 days, and I have no plan. 

It's going to be hard to not be a student anymore. To live on my own. To find a job and make a living and be a member of the adult-non-student society. Here's my logic, though. It's going to be hard no matter where I am, so why not struggle somewhere great? Even if everything else about my life is ridiculous and out of control, at the very least, I could be somewhere worth being. And that's my point.

I want the struggle to be worth something. I want new stories to tell. I want to see beautiful things and meet interesting people. I want to eat delicious food and take awesome photos, and I want to write every day about all of this and more. I want to walk out my door and be in complete awe of everything around me. I want to live in a place that I could fall in love with. I need to.

When I graduate in 216 days, and I'm going somewhere else. Somewhere that isn't here. Somewhere fantastic.

street lights

The cobblestone streets were dark, lit only by the street lights that shined down from above us. As we walked through each circle of illumination on the ground, you asked, "Who are you?" "You know who I am," I laughed. "I do, but tell me anyway," you said.  "Well, I'm dark and quiet. I'm a cold, overcast day...a slow song." You stopped, took my small hand in yours, and you spun me around and into your arms. "You are marvelous," you said, looking at me. "You're all things breathtaking." The crisp air had turned the tip of your nose red, and I admired as the corners of your mouth curled into the sweetest smile I'd ever seen. My face was close to yours, and your breath warmed my flushed cheeks. "Where would you like to be?" you asked. "What do you mean, love?" "Right now. If you could be anywhere, where would you be?" The question didn't require any thought. "Right here with you. I'd be nowhere but here," I said. You looked a long time into my eyes, glancing away only to push back the hair that had fallen into my face. "So soft," you whispered before kissing my forehead. You pulled me closer, wrapping your solid arms around me, and you rested your chin on the top of my head while I breathed in deeply your cologne. "I do love you so," you confessed into the cold air. I stepped back just a bit so that I could see the blue of your eyes. I took your face in my hands before whispering, "and I you."

anymore

you don't even seem real anymore


often times I forget your face and for a second,
just a short second,
I wonder who it is that's standing next to me in all of those old photos.

I cannot recall your voice and especially not your touch.
your name doesn't resonate the way it once did,
and I am being so honest when I say I don't ever miss you.

you simply aren't real anymore.

haiku

uncertainty is,
above all other troubles,
the death of today.