retrospect

"we write to taste life twice,
once in the moment
and once in retrospect."
- anais nin

little lion man

up in the air

this morning i woke up,
and the first thought in my head was
today, i hope i will be a "pretty" girl.
i know that is selfish,
i know its the extreme of selfishness.
and today, really, its over half of what the world thinks about, constantly.
vanity.
i'm gonna stop myself right here,
and look around.
i have the basics. if you were to build a foundation
for my life out of the things i own- you would not run out of building supplies.
if you were to step back and take a look around my room,
i don't just keep warm at night. we have a furnace running comfortably
and i have a cozy bed in an cozy room in a very cozy home.
and i don't look in the fridge and wistfully wait for some sort of
magical food to appear. i don't even have to go further than a stretch of the fingertips.
my parents, well, they are still together.
happily married after 25 years of being together. *insert smile*
i love them. i don't say it because it looks good on paper,
or it sounds good to other peoples ears,
i don't look to impress anyone.
i love them, more than anything.
not only do i owe my comfort, my home
i owe infinite love in return.
it has not been easy for them.. it has been unexpected.
so really, not only do i owe the "basics"
i owe to them a thank you that will stretch the rest of my life
because they gave their full hearts to me
their full attention in the middle of a crisis.
in the middle of the least likely time to ever find
the capability to love something unexpected.

and going back to my looks,
i am fairly normal.
i don't have any obvious problems,
and i imagine if you looked for a while you might find something.
but you see, its not important,
because i can save you some time.
i have never considered myself beautiful
and i don't say this for any emotion- i don't even need a response, just stay with me-
because a few years ago when i gave everything
and got nothing in return, and then some more taken away
i realized that nothing else mattered.
because the person who took it away, i thought was the most beautiful person in the world,
on the outside. but really, when you got to know them
they were ugly, and selfish, and incapable of trust
people often took one glance at the two of us, together
and their eyes would linger on the more beautiful- her
so by the time i managed to see this person again, i made sure that i was
strong, confident that i was a good person.
confident that i could take and give equally.
hopeful that i could trust, again. hopeful that i could beat the odds.
i never turned to anger, in fact i made the mistake of apologizing to them
when really i had nothing to even give, and yet i still gave an apology
that they didn't deserve.
and because no one is perfect,
to this day, a few years later, my confidence is still shaky
and sometimes the thoughts of facing someone like that still makes me
want to run, far far away.
but to this day, i have never turned away.
i have never walked out and i have never said a word in anger.
i don't know what this makes me:
a good person? a kind soul? someone to trust?
i don't need a title.
i don't need to be a "pretty" girl.
you can't figure me out in one glance
and if you think you have, please, keep walking.
i have a home, i have a place that i belong,
i have people who love me and want me to be happy, forever. long term.
and if you think i would choose anyone over people like that-
you are sadly mistaken.
so maybe this does give me a title.
maybe i am a "beautiful" girl,
not in all the obvious ways that people mistake for important-
so get to know me.

damages