Strawberry Swing

Love: l,l,l and then an “uh,” then that soft v resting on your lips and then you’ve said it; but what have you said? My love for each and every thing deserves its own name. I love him like a mumble or a stutter or a stumble when I want to be loving him like a force of nature or a pair of wings. But really it's a selfish need, to burrow under his skin and steal his heartbeat.

Sometimes I am at peace on a highway at sunset listening to a song say “goodbye” and suddenly I’m open and he lies gentle in my heart, not tugging, and that I think is when I truly love him.

ode to the perpetually untidy room

What if I'm meant to write but have nothing to say? I should sit down every morning and put down two pages, but I'm afraid I'll be sucked dry. What's the worst that could happen, really? I'm boring? What else is new? My spectacularly ordinary life is devoted to what the less enlightened deem dull. I enjoy little things, small comforts, and best of all I shall never run out of those. If I force myself to sit down with a pen daily, I'll become a better and better translator of the petite beauty that strikes me daily.

I love my cluttered room, for example, my tumultuous sanctuary. True I hate not being able to find things, but I wonder if there isn't comfort in having some chaos of my very own. I am like God, master of a mess that seems without purpose. In daily life I am ordered and in control (or so it would seem), but without the freedom to sprawl and clutter sans reproach I chafe and then wither. I do value simplicity and every time I tidy I purge. But to me perfect cleanliness, the obsessive kind that comforts some people, is just a pristine lie. Nothing will stay that way. What's the point? To feel efficient for a few days but not remember where anything is? Probably also to a degree because I'm lazy, I'll admit. There are all different species of people in the world, however, and the ones who think me lazy I find neurotic. I'd say I'm casual, easily satisfied, someone who doesn't buy into the frantic and ambitious. My room is dirty and I am content.

I Don't Know How to Love Him

Him. The best friend, the only boy I’ve ever loved. My feelings for him are knotted. I honestly adore him, though he is not perfect. He loves me too, though I don’t know that he can love me in the way I love him. What if he had never met her? Would there have been an us? Potentiality gnaws at me. I wonder about the margins of love, the borders and restrictions and definitions. I wish that the English language had more synonyms for the word, so he could know exactly how I love him. I love how he smiles when he sees me, and I him. I love how comfortable we are despite the past. Most of all I love the moments. The time when we were driving home and he pulled over because a spider attacked me. When we watched “Monty Python” while layered on my couch. And the night when he offered to lead me home even though I knew I could find my own way. He dutifully drove 55 in the slow lane, calling me whenever a car got between us or we merged onto another freeway. This from the boy who usually flies down the highway at 80, this from the boy who had work in the morning, but added a half hour to his trip just so he knew I’d get home.

I love his floppy hair (sometimes). I love his long musician fingers. I love his strong arms, goofy smile and mismatched nose. I love how tall he is. I love his stupid band t-shirts and baseball caps that make him look like he's 12. I love how he laughs. I love his insecurity and how easy it is for him to show affection. I love his old person car. I love how good his heart is and how innocent and fragile he is in so many ways. I love that he loves his family, and his dog. I love how he softly and earnestly sings along to songs in the car. I love how good he looks in blue and I love his mustache. I love our philosophical conversations and dirty jokes and even the awkward silences. I love when he teases me. I love how common his name sounds. I love the way he stands with his hands in his pockets. I love that he can dance but he never does. Maybe someday someone will convince him to waltz under streetlights with them.

I wish I knew one thing he loved about me.

Damn the noisy, extroverted arbiters of well-being

Some of us just want to live quaint little lives, magnificently plain and of no great consequence. Is that so much to ask, to not be required to aspire to matter? Constantly I condemn myself for my lack of ambition. Is there something so wrong with being still, being simple, being satisfied? I suppose for some there is. A life without frantic going is no life at all to them. A pulse proves your aliveness, but I feel such an exquisite, subtle rhythm in the quiet places. I don't need power, don't need fame or success. I will never be cool or hip or important and that is a blessed thing. My greatest gift is my shabby sincerity. I am that I am and I fail utterly when I try otherwise. Why strive for different? A better me is a worthy aim to be sure, but life will hone me if I am open and do my best. This I must always remember, for the loud, the clamorous, the eternally dynamic who demand that I shape myself into their image are in fact unknowingly in pursuit of my own happiness.