This morning during my free-writing journaling time, I was thinking about the fact that most days are unremarkable except that they are links in a chain. Not every day is a milestone day. Not every day can be a standalone thing worthy of note and notice. Some days are a link in a chain: just one link. Without links, a chain cannot come to be at all. The chain is created when one thing and another are linked together.
Today is a link in a chain. And the chain is important; all the chains. All the things I weave from my choices. From my discipline. From my intent. From my will.
A chain of writing (52 days in a row today). A chain of relationship (so many to count, and all of them important to me). A chain of chronic illness symptoms. Tracking each thing so that I can look at it and ponder. Today is a link in the PMDD chain; I do not want this chain, but I am keeping track of it because I need to know what it means and what it may reveal to me if I pay attention.
My mind changed topics and then I thought about love, because love is often on my mind. Love is, to be honest, always on my mind.
I pay attention too much sometimes and it takes a lot of energy. I am afraid to miss the good things. I am afraid that if I do not pay close attention, closer than necessary, that I will miss something that could matter to me. I collect future memories like jewels. I keep them close to me, I string them up and wear them. I scatter them across the ceiling as I lie on my back and dream. I cherish them. I wound myself with them, letting their sharp edges carve shapes on my skin, over and over and over. I let love ruin me and I invite it to happen again and again. I want the memories. I want to know that love has left its mark on me. I want to know that I have the scars that deep love leaves. I want to know that my pain has been worth it in some kind of way, even if the way is difficult to discern.
I want love to harm me but only when it must. And I want to be what love has harmed, because if it harms another, does that not mean I was not loved enough?
Why is it that I believe that love must hurt me or it is not real?
I cannot conceive of love that does not harm. I cannot conceive of being loved in ways that never hurt me. I cannot conceive of a world in which there is no darkness. I cannot understand how to live if there is no loss lurking in the corners and in the shadows. I cannot see a nebula until it is spread across the backdrop of dark space.
I cannot comprehend beauty except as it is in contrast to horror, to pain, to loneliness, to sadness.
I cannot yearn to be alive if I do not also yearn to die.
(I will not seek death, I have made a promise.)
As promised, two songs:
Lost pt. II, Lost Sky & Shiah Maisel: dedicated to a person that knows who they are and how much they are loved and missed and how eager we are to be reunited.
Been trying to find you
As long as it takes we got you
Just hold on you’re almost through
Just hold on now
We’re so close to finding you
Just know that you got someone out there who loves you
There’s nothing left to do
We’re fighting
For you
To come back
Home soon
The families miss you
Lost now but we see you
…
Seasons, Rival & CADMIUM & Harley Bird: dedicated to myself so that I can remember that even to wait is a gift, and that love does not forget what it loves.
The seasons come and go like thoughts of you
Like a wave returns to the sea into the blue
They change but in a cycle that I can’t lose
Each painful but delightful to live through
You came into my life just like another season
Not for long just a time, just like another season
Maybe this time next year you’ll reappear for unknown reason
But I’ll cherish every day, until you come my way this season
The seasons turn and change just like your mind
Like the sun gives into the moon into the night
Time continues marching, it slowly crawls
With each new one starting, I recall
You came into my life just like another season
Not for long just a time, just like another season
Maybe this time next year you’ll reappear for unknown reason
But I’ll cherish every day, until you come my way this season
Each time of year carries memories
Like a never fading whisper in the breeze
Oh, we will keep on changing all over again
Yeah, we will keep on changing just like another season
May love find you. May love leave you better than before.
xox,
Nix
