Tuesday, September 21, 2010

RIBCAGE

{photo by Laura Waterbury}


I want your arms around me and I could make this about missing you but it’s not.


At the hospital today, the nurse answered my mother’s question without looking at her. She looked at me instead. How does that make sense to anyone with a brain or manners or home training? I wanted to slap her. I asked her to address my mother. Since my mother asked the question. This is not the DMV. These are people’s lives you’re dealing with. She has an accent. She speaks English numbnuts.


I’d like to give myself permission to be imperfect. I never have. If you see a flaw it’s probably because I didn’t know you could see it or because I let you.


The pressure is so much my neck hurts. My throat has hurt for weeks and I keep forgetting to eat. Who has time to crumble? I have shit to do.


By the way, I’m coming out to my father. I wrote the letter. Just have to send it.


But that’s not why I started writing this. I’m writing this because I’m sleepy but don’t want to sleep. Want to let go and hold on. Want to let someone in without feeling like I have to hold it all together. Me letting people see my pain is like trying to tidy a messy house for an unexpected visitor waiting on your stoop. Disconcerting. Awkward. If I knew you were coming, I would’ve done the laundry. If I knew you were gonna come inside my ribcage, I would’ve cried over this last week. Instead of now.


Maybe I should run off from my life for a little while. Do what rich white people do—travel to Southeast Asia to go find themselves in the cultures their forefathers desecrated and whitewashed. But I don’t want to go to Southeast Asia. I want to lay in my bed. That’s it. I want to be able to love you from the love in my chest, instead of lashing out with the pain in my chest, pushing you away because I can’t imagine letting you see the dirty dishes and dusty shelves. I love you too much to let you love me.


Isn’t that the most fucked up something you’ve read today?


My hair and head have been wrapped for 2 weeks. Like a band-aid on my subconscious.


Sometimes I have to forget about my individual life. If I were to focus on my problems, I would stop writing and cry myself into a dehydrated state. Instead I think of the heartbroken, the unsure all over the world. So you know you’re not alone


Here, have this.


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