better.

It is never as drastic as snapping your fingers, but one day you wake up or look in the mirror or are sitting at a traffic light and you realize that you feel different. Different than the body-slogging, soul-tired, just-barely-eking-by 'normal' to which you've resigned yourself. 

And it feels like spring. 

You realize that this didn't just happen, that you worked for it. That even if on a minute-to-minute basis, nothing was different, on a week to week basis, you did the things and made the change. 

And maybe there's still a long way to go, but, really, maybe not. If happiness isn't a place you can arrive at, then maybe the isolated moments of happiness when they arrive, however fleeting, are what we're living for, anyway. 

It's belly-laughing during sign-language charades, or hearing your favorite song on the radio, when you're alone and can really belt it out. It's seeing the bulbs you planted last fall but maybe never truly believed would grow, poking out of the wet February earth. It's another mile at a faster pace than yesterday or a bright new robe for around-the-house lounging. 

And my god, it's all so imperfect that it would be easy to diminish and dismiss. 

But, one day, you don't. You don't diminish your life into a blur of status quo. You start noticing the little joys. 

And it feels like hope. 

Reframe.

Trying to vibe positive on a cranky Tuesday. 

Cheers to those delightful souls who think we are funny, nice, helpful, and great at drawing. And who tell us so, especially when we don't expect it.

haunted

Today is Monday and it is the first day of my very least favorite month and it is your birthday.

Naturally I'm starting a crazy fad diet today to illustrate my mood and sentiments. Deprivation will set me free. I'll starve these feelings out. I've got a goal, for the next 30 days, at least.

To be fair, I can eat as much as I want. It's depriving myself of the things I like most of all which provides the most exquisite type of torture. I've started to think it's the only way to get through to myself.

I had crazy dreams about you last night, of course. When I woke up, my mouth felt dry and stale, probably from gasping for breath.

It's wild to me that even in my dreams, you don't forgive me. And you don't even know the half of it.

Tonight I'll tie my laces and run, going nowhere, staring at a screen, until my body is as exhausted as my mind. I'll let the spinning belt of the machine have it until I'm sure that I'll regret everything tomorrow.

That getting out of bed will be even more of a struggle than it was today.

Then I'll lie in the cool water, floating, with voices bouncing off all the walls. I'll let it revive me just enough to continue to revise my apologies.

I'll get home and do exactly the same thing to him that I did to you. I'll be cool, aloof, preoccupied with a task at hand. Harried, hurried, worried. Unfocused. Not quite cold, but not exactly present, either.

This is what I always do. I might as well start writing these apologies down, so they're ready for him next.

Maybe they would have worked, had I said them to you. You of all people, would have forgiven me

But that's another thing I always forget to do.

I wish I didn't always figure these things out way too late.

Happy Birthday. You've got to be the only person to become a ghost while still living.