44. Midlife. Doesn’t quite come at me like I thought it might when I was 20.
I woke with trepidation on my birthday. Feeling drained. Feeling as if my heart no longer existed inside the protection of my body. I was physically ill with that fact and terrified. What is a heart if it is exposed? What is a heart if it can no longer be warm?
I pulled my sheets over my head. I took a breath. I rolled my body to it’s side, swung my legs over the edge, my feet slowly finding purchase on the wood floor beneath them.
I have a ritual.
5:43 am. I’m naked. Stepping determinedly into the inky blackness of the lake surrounding me. I’m barely knee deep and frozen already. And, quite honestly, I’m terrified. It’s so dark. Something pulls at me. From the lake bed, from the shore across, from the water itself? I have no idea. But, I step hurriedly to keep up with the force and plunge face first into it’s grip. I convulse. The natural physical shock of the temperature taking over. I place my hand on my bare chest.
An act of defiance.
But, it’s already gone. And I know it. Grit and resolve have no power against a frozen heart.
I crawl out. Sit on the rocks as the sky turns from black to gray. Stare at the shadows. Shake uncontrollably.
A single piercing light from directly across the lake startles me out of my stupor. The light is shining point blank on me. Not moving. I stare into the tractor beam like I’m being abducted. Like whomever or whatever is over there can take me if they want to. I’ve got nothing left. I stand up. The light pulses once. Then goes dark. A message. A savior.
I slowly dress. Walk through the trees up to the house. I’m numb all over. I slink back in bed. Curl into a fetal position. Sleep comes unexpectedly fast and deep.
I wake. I cry. I write. A compilation of 5 years of ‘she is’ statements.
They are me, at times. Her at others. Who can tell the difference between the two, I’m not quite sure anymore. They are the remnants of things people have said to me/about me. They are experiences. They are my heart living outside my chest. They are my mirror.
she is long winded conversations
punctuated fragments
silence
she is stoked coals after midnight
bitter swallows
tequila
she is nervous words slurred in margins
drunk on skin and a sideways smile
she is storm clouds
flash floods
blue-sky rainy days
she is lies sunk into lockets
skipped on lakes
swallowed whole
she is secrets in chest pockets
torn pages thrown to the moon
she is hot tea
shots of lemon juice
run on sentences
she is barefoot, muddied
on the brink of an
African rain
she is squeaky swings
grass stains, voted out
she is flecks of fire in an ocean
of blues, tredding whitewash
sucking salt
she is yesterdays denim
she is weighted lines trailing
into muddle monochrome
she is technicolor memories
full length playbacks on
perpetual rewind
she is carousels
gilded horses
ups and downs
she is shivers
standing naked
knowing it’s only in her head
she is shards of glass
shattered bulbs
darkness
she is loose threads
peeled postage stamps
she is angels
dagger eyes
strength behind
the crying child
she also knows
she is