collections 5:17

I need to get in touch with my roots again. As I sit here, all I can think about is standing on an empty plain with the wind passing around me, picking up the grass as the cornfields sway around me, with a pack of cigarettes in my pocket and one dangling from my mouth, clinging only by the moisture of my lips. I need space to breathe- space that the city doesn't offer. I've spent years running- running from everything that I thought I didn't deserve. Like love- when you look back at my history, I've got a bad habit for getting into relationships and then abandoning them by setting dates for the future. "In two years, I'm leaving Varna to go to community college." "In two years, I'm leaving community college to go to Chicago." "In two years, I'm leaving Chicago for Japan or grad school or whatever." I don't even know where I'm going, but I feel like there's so much I have to do and I feel like I can only do it alone. Like I'm standing in that plain, watching the sun set into the cornfields like I had when this whole life thing began at eighteen. Words like, "I love you," used to quiver on my lips with every girl willing to hold my hand, but now it feels so scary to admit anything that isn't just, "fun" or "convenient." I'm hiding my depth, assuming there is any, because I'm not ready to explore it yet. I remember driving between those cornfields with something blaring over the radio, speeding up and slowing down at my convenience because there wasn't another car on the road for miles, but now I have no car and the road isn't as endless as it once was. The speed and direction has already been set because I don't have it in me to swerve off and try something new- I'm too committed to my debts, my education, and my career. I look at my past lovers and it's like, "Who was I to leave you behind?" Why do I feel the need to abandon everyone who cares enough about me to help me on my journey? There're so many girls out there with hurt feelings buried in their bosom and they treat me like I'm a casualty of war or something- being careful not to remind me of the past that they so blatently pretend to ignore. I understand that these were my mistakes and they were only my mistakes to make, but I'm not the only one bottling things up inside. My most recent ex, Erin, is someone I might consider a hero for not bottling a goddamn thing up. She isn't afraid to dig into me, pushing me beyond my barrier of safety- I almost regret leaving her because she still cuts right into the core, unlike those other girls I've abandoned. But even she will begin to treat me like just another gimp shipped back when she's found someone better to spend her efforts on. I'm still a wasted effort. I remember going to work and easing back, waiting for my shift to end with a pocket full of cash to do whatever I wanted with. Some of it would go to rent, some of it would go to bills, and some of it would go to thoughtful moments to my friends and lovers. I can't afford friends or lovers anymore- and looking now, I'm troubled that I don't have a usual "group" to hang out with. I'm stretching myself thin for no reason but to hide that depth. In the end though, I wonder if there'll be anything at all hidden within- or if it'll be as empty as I feel to this moment.

Things were so simpler then.