how your two younger brothers will decide to be an engineer or a navy seal or a pilot. aren’t they still the little boys that dressed up as indiana jones and played with monster trucks?

your childhood best friend is dating the same boy from middle school but she doesn’t live in the house with the toy room loft. she had the cool barbie house. you haven’t spoken since middle school.

your grandparents have more grand babies, and hearing issues, and a declining mind, and trouble walking sometimes.

or maybe you think about your parents, and how they were so excited when your youngest sibling was born. you had to wait until they arrived home from the hospital to meet him. he’s graduating high school next year. empty nesters, I think they’re called.

and now you live in an apartment with a boyfriend and two cats and a big girl job and you are many miles away and you never miss being young but you miss the way the air smelled the summer before your sophomore year, and your childhood chocolate lab, and your grandpa’s key lime pie.

to see the pretty lights

a simple parade of favorite animals

familiarity, monotony

same difference.

I choose the giraffe

you the rhino

the argument begins with a high note

in the elevator music

only a musician’s ear could hear

I was always bad at the flute

and you even worse at piano

fatal flaw?

all at once I get what they mean

“we’re going in circles”

“circular reasoning”

“you said that already”

but the carousel goes round

and round 

and around yet again.

how much longer can I repeat myself

before I become a relic in an abandoned strip mall?

before the paint begins to chip

and my smile becomes garish

and ugly

my brain is buzzing with what if’s

once again

too much to drink tonight

who would’ve thought?

I would rather a real breakup

than a friend one

I think you mean more to me

but maybe I just hate you?

I've never felt so lonely

in the middle of summertime

no longer a danger to herself

I wish I could communicate the emotions I feel but it’s too complicated to put into words.

Taylor Swift was onto something when she said “happy, free, confused, and lonely at the same time”. I want to go back to when I didn’t understand those lyrics.

I am in love with everyone I’ve ever met and I hate them intensely simultaneously. How do I become indifferent? What if I don’t want to be indifferent?

Imagine an ocean wave rolling through a forest fire, salty and smokey and sweet. The fire never goes out. How do I fight the fire?

Maybe that’s too abstract.

I want to be a simple girl and I am not. Please, God, I know I never speak to you but I would like to be simple. Every fiber in my body needs to be simple.