A memory from ten seconds ago and one from ten years ago are both equally far away. Time is the only difference.
Today I ate a gingerbread. The crumbles between the wooden table and my bare arms itches, and for a moment I'm no longer sitting in my kitchen but on a toilet seat desperately crutching the three pieces that once made out a ginger heart. Whispering, once for each piece that I ate, for my parents to finally see that there was nothing in this world I would like more than a cat. Hiding with the door locked so no one else could see me in my most vulnerable moments I whispered into my hands as my friends were knocking on the door asking me to stop slacking and come out and play.Â
I wondered why the entity behind granting wishes from breaking gingerbreads into that magical number never answered my call, I swore I had stolen so many of them that it was a miracle the teacher didn't ban me to some fat camp. "Maybe I'm overflowing the gingerbreads with wishes", I thought. Or could it be some technical issue, maybe you could never get exactly the amount of pieces that was needed for the wish to be heard. Maybe I didn't want it enough. Maybe I was wishing to the wrong god. I lost count of how many gingerbreads I delicately broke and violently crushed in my quest for this one wish to come true. I lost count of how many years this was my biggest dream.Â
I still can't pinpoint the exact moment those wishes stopped. Although I'm sure it didn't happen overnight, as some lessons younger-me learned on the way to stop eating gingerbreads piece by piece still sticks by me to this day. The most important lesson being that if you want something, you can never show it. As it gets thrown out into the universe, there is a chance to be held against you. If you act indifferent towards everything, things close to you might just have a chance staying intact. If you just don't flinch when asked if you would like it crushed or not, if you just don't move when you see someone hurt because of what you did. And never ever let them see you cry. Maybe then everything will be alright. Maybe then you'll make it.Â
The worst feeling I have known to this date, is the feeling of helplessness. There were many things I swore and wished upon when younger. Some on the toilet seat outside of my classroom, some hiding in my sisters closet griping onto the fabrics of the clothes until my knuckles grew white, some silently whispering into the sky to a god that never answered. There are some feelings you will never forget, and some promises that are meant to be kept forever. I swore that I would never forget how it felt. The feeling of the unknown being the only way out. The feeling of being trapped, being in someone else's power. I swore that I would never forget how it felt like having no one listen to what you said.
For those with their voices taken away, those who still have not had decided to lock their inner wishes away. For those am I giving my life to, those who still believes in the entity of a three-pieced gingerbread. For me that ginger heart has stayed the same, it is the one who is eating it who has changed. I brush the itchy crumbles from the table onto the floor. I can sweep that up tomorrow.Â
Ah, and tomorrow, I think I will eat another gingerbread. And who knows, I might even eat it in pieces.Â