#creative essay

Don't Be A Stranger | Author's Note 2/40

Witness No. 1: “So what exactly is going on between you two?”

Principal Subject: “Infatuation.”

– 08/03/2025

...

Return rarely announces itself. It arrives the way interruption does: quietly, almost accidentally, as if it had not yet been granted permission to exist. The first return is rarely the last, and rarely the truest. It is more a hand on the doorknob than a step inside.

Rhythms reveal this. Attempts at reentry often begin as a reflex rather than a responsibility. A sighting. A shared room. A familiar doorway. What looks like intention may only be proximity. What feels like progress may only be the instinct to remain near what was left unfinished.

Early approaches, when they occur, are clumsy. They carry the weight of what has not been resolved, but not yet the language to name it. They are shaped less by courage than by curiosity. Yet, even in their incompleteness, they confirm something essential: the ending claimed by quiet withdrawal was never complete.

Reentry is sometimes mistaken for repair, but the two are not synonymous. A step back into proximity without acknowledgement merely resets the distance. It does not bridge it. What collapsed remains collapsed until named, and what was abandoned remains uncarried until claimed.

There is a myth that time softens consequence, that distance dilutes impact, and that silence can function as a neutral placeholder until one feels ready to reemerge. But time does not erase what was left undone, it only defines its contours. The longer the pause, the higher the cost to resume. Delay is rarely confusion. More often, it is convenience, protected by the silence of those who know the truth but choose not to disrupt it. Delay does not reduce responsibility, it compounds it.

There is a quiet calculus behind the absence of closure. It was not cruelty that kept the door from shutting, but fear. Fear of finality, of accountability, and of losing access to something once felt but never fully claimed. The distance was not clean because it was never intended to be. It preserved the possibility of return without the discomfort of responsibility. To step away entirely would have required acknowledging what was left behind, and to step forward fully would have required carrying it.

So instead, the door remained ajar, not out of certainty, but out of hesitation disguised as strategy. Closure was never offered because to end something clearly is to admit what it once meant, and what was done to it. But that safety has an expiration. What once functioned as openness now marks a limitation. What once preserved opportunity now reveals the refusal to arrive.

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Read the full essay and follow the full arc on Substack

Visual art and updates on Instagram

Don’t Be A Stranger is a forty-part essay series about what people do with intimacy when they don’t know how to carry it. About silence after harm — and the architecture built in its place. Each essay functions as a standalone structure: declarative, critical, poetic. Together, they form a long-form companion to a conceptual art arc releasing from April to June 2026.

In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the myth of Narcissus is often served as a cautionary tale of vanity, obsessive self-love, and unfulfilled longing. As the myth goes: when Narcissus was born, he was doomed from the start, the famous prophet Tiresias, prophesied that he would live a long life “Only if he never gazes at himself.” (3.536-537) Narcissus, before finding his own reflection, was wanted by many people around him, including the nymph Echo, a nymph who has a curse of her own, who he cruelly rejects over and over again. This cruelty towards others, especially Echo, causes Narcissus to be cursed by Nemesis, the goddess of vengeance, “Though he may love another in this way, let him not have what he desires from love.” (3.620-622) One day as Narcissus was out walking in nature, he came across a stream so clear that he decided to drink from it. “As he is drinking, he sees an image, the reflection of his face, and falls in love, desiring a thing which has no substance.” (3.636-368) Once he sees his reflection, he becomes obsessed and falls in love with himself, he tries to pull his own reflection out of the water, but since it is only a reflection, he fails to do so. After many failed attempts, he begins to hit himself, pounding on his chest. “In his grief, he ripped the upper border of his clothing and beat his naked chest… As he struck, his chest turned rosy red.” (3.737-740)

Narcissus’ story is one that deeply resonates with our modern world, a world shaped by social media, faux praise, and fleeting love through likes and comments. Platforms like TikTok and Instagram encourage constant comparison and the pursuit of a perfectly curated life and in exchange, we receive validation in the form of likes, comments, and followers. This can create a blurry line between reality and our online personas, making it hard to create our own happiness when we are not living in our perfectly curated life. Much like Narcissus, who became obsessed with his reflection and the constant attention of admirers, we too can become consumed by our digital image, the chase for followers, likes, and comments, all at the cost of an authentic connection. “Why then, you foolish lad do you keep trying to clutch a fleeting image?” (3.662-664)

We have continued to observe that when we tie our happiness and self-worth to online validation we become vulnerable to its fluctuations. A dip in engagement, including drops in followers or less likes and comments, can lead to feelings of inadequacy, anxiety, and depression. Just as Narcissus despaired over the reflection he could never touch, we despair over the approval of people behind our screens. Our obsession with maintaining a flawless image can lead to an unhealthy relationship with ourselves, fostering insecurity rather than self-love. When we reach this point, we begin to rely on these outward and digital stimuli, we grow hungry for it, for need it, and this is something else that we can see in the story of Narcissus, “Let me gaze upon the face I cannot touch, the food I need to feed my wretched madness.” (3.735,736)

Narcissus’ story also serves as a cautionary tale about narcissism, both in our personal and our digital lives. The psychological term “narcissism” originates from this myth, pointing to the traits of self-centeredness and lack of empathy that Narcissus shows when he rejected others who loved him. In today’s world, especially on social media, these traits can sometimes be mistaken for confidence and are even celebrated. While self-confidence is important, it can become dangerous when it shifts into a strong central ego and a disregard for others. The myth warns us to find balance in valuing ourselves without placing ourselves above everyone else. 

The final, yet extremely powerful message in this story is the pain of longing for something unattainable. Narcissus falls in love with an illusion of his own reflection, and wastes away trying to reach something that can never love him back because it isn’t. What he loves does not have a corporeal form. “What you are seeking does not exist.” (3.664-665) In our time, this mirrors the endless pursuit of perfection. We reach one goal and immediately strive for another, and another, and another, creating an endless and painful cycle of dissatisfaction. In this cycle we, like Narcissus, risk missing out on real, meaningful relationships and experiences while chasing illusions of what we think will complete us. We waste away while we stare at our own reflection, hoping that we one day will fall in love with what looks back at us. But like Narcissus, we never will.

(A creative essay based on a true story)

The summer winds blow hot and dry, siphoning even the faintest remaining moisture from my body.

The sky is blue. The trees are green.

I lay rocking in a pink hammock, tied between two trees, swinging from the gusts of winds that blow hot from the west.

It's supposedly cooler than it was a few days ago. But it feels hotter.

It's the wind.

There is no cooling breeze, carrying the faint moisture, an echo of water in the wind. Instead it blows as a furnace. Seeking to cook me alive.

The sky is blue. The clouds are white. But the dappled lighting turns yellow against my skin.

Yellow-green is for tornados. Or maybe hail.

Dark green, bordering on grey, for thunderstorms.

Red for an oncoming storm at sea.

Yellow is for fire. Soot and ash on a blistered wind.

The sky is blue. The grass is green. And the light is yellow as the west wind blows hot.

A column of smoke to the north-west. Close enough to see the dark blooms puff in the center before joining into a single imposing billowing cloud.

The helicopters swing low overhead. Coming in shifts, every 5 minutes their propellers rattle my windows, shake my bed, and leave my bones aching.

I'm inside now. The faint taste of ash on my tongue.

I watch the fire from my phone. Keeping up to date on how it grows.

Its tripled in size in 20 minutes. Burning over 200 acres. A mere 2 neighborhoods away.

The evacuation order does not come.

I lie in bed and watch the choppers fly low enough to be just above the tallest tree on the street. The shadow it casts blankets my room until the light comes through again. Yellow for fire. Yellow for ash and soot and devastation.

400 acres.

They say the main flame is contained. But sparks light up new ones close by. Its taken the field I used to walk my dog. Back before we moved across the main road. The field sits behind the school at the end of the old neighborhood.

Our old neighbor is out of town, visiting family. My brother checks on their dog.

500 acres. There is one neighborhood between us and the flames. The one we moved from.

Everyone has their sprinklers on. Hoping to keep the sparks from catching.

They say it started in a house on the hill. Where the people with money, or those who live like they do, reside.

They say it was an unkempt garden. Set away from the main home. Withered from the heat, unweeded and unmaintained. Tender sprouts left to choke and crisp and die. It's said they had plenty of glass decorations in their garden. To keep away the birds I suppose.

As though there was anything to steal.

The garden hadn't been tended well enough for that to be a threat. There was nothing for the birds to eat.

But there was plenty for the summer sun to catch.

Glittering glass in rainbow hue, caught the sunlight, that bright summer sun, and scattered it about. I imagine prisms of light and color danced around the withered garden. Between dying tomatoes and failed squash. Blind and uncaring to their thirst. They danced and danced, taking what little water remained from their bodies. Until the heat was too much. Their bodies too dry. The thirst too great. And they caught fire.

527 acres. 20% extinguished. 90% contained. And none of the large houses on the hill were lost.

I go to bed with smoke in my throat and soot on my tongue. And a prayer to not need my inhaler on my lips.

I awake to sirens, and smoke from the east.

The night before you leave will be strange. You will sit, on your bed, listening to music with no head phones, because they sit downstairs already packed. You will eat your favorite take out for the last time. You will feel like your life is about to begin. You will see the road stretch out before you, long and incomprehensible. The night before you leave will be strange.

The house will sit in an odd and eerie stillness, as if the first person to draw breath at the wrong moment, will break the suspension of time that holds everything in its grasp. No one will want to face the truth any more than they have to, even if you have been longing for the moments tomorrow will bring for as long as you can remember.

I want to think that things will never change. But I also know that nothing will ever be the same. Nothing can ever be the same. Its not supposed to.

The house is cold tonight.

I still don’t understand the play.

The thing is, I don’t know that I’ve ever been excited. Scared for sure. Resolute, definitely. Ready, well that’s still to be determined. This is supposed to be the biggest moment of my life, but these ‘biggest moments of my life’ keep happening in rapid succession. Sometimes it feels like the world has sped up around me, and that I’ll never be able to catch up.

I wish I hadn’t packed away my throw blanket yet. I wish I had looked at the weather before packing away my pants thinking I wouldn’t need them these last few days. I wish summer was still summer.

I don’t feel old because I’m leaving. I don’t feel old because college is going to start and the adult world is about to chew me up and spit me out faster than I can blink. I feel old because now the others are going into their junior and senior years, and before I know it they’ll be in the same boat as me. I hope that they know that I’m proud of them. That I care for them deeply.

This is a micro-medium of creative work I found on itch.io.

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