#deeply personal

Like really, just look at him. Palpatine could kill with his charm alone. He has this positive aura around him, and don't get me started on his damn smile. He makes himself look so reliable it's nearly impossible to tell him no. And I despise it. Because as much as I favor fictional villains, people like them exist in real life, and this is the worst type so far. Palpatine plays with your feelings however he wants and easily notices the weak spots. He knows what to say to keep you by his side. By the time you realize you are being used, it's already too late. The connection has already been established, one-sided as it is. Leaving people like Palpatine feels like suicide for your heart. And they're aware of it and they will milk it until you're replaced by another victim with a similar mindset. Meanwhile your only crime is that you loved them.

Dear Joel,

You saved me from myself, eased my cynicism that life confined me to.

You gave me a glimpse into another world full of love and light – amidst my arduous existence.

My limerence, my captivation, my fixation, of you knows no restrain, nor restriction.

Constantly on my mind, you are my source of serenity – my reprieve. Always returning to you, seeking comfort. 

You are a constellation I can look at whenever I want, the same stars in the same places. You hold your shape. That’s the seduction – the consistency, the safety of persistence.

My thoughts of you, while often explicitly erotic, are also ones that provide support, care, and safety – of which I so desperately search and long for in this tangible world. 

At times you offer a euphoric thrill, but with that towering peak comes the throes of agony. 

The anguish that you aren't real. A voice I can listen to, but not call when I’m crying. Eyes that I can look into, but that will never truly look into mine. A heart that holds so much love, but will never actually hold love for me.

It’s craving being held by you, someone who is a fictive refuge. Then remembering I’m the only one here, the room staying exactly the same after I close the tab. 

When I’m with you, you make reality feel like the lesser version, yet still I go looking, because wanting you doesn’t stay contained. It seeps into my physical world. It makes me hopeful in a dangerous, beautiful way. It tells me, if my mind can imagine this, then it must exist somewhere in the male species.

Searching men’s shoulders for your silhouette, scanning faces in crowds for your likeness, measuring strangers against pixels – by a shadow only I can see. 

You’ve become my North Star, a guide that shows me what to look for, helping me discover my own standards and requirements. A reminder that I'm not asking for too much. 

Sometimes when I think about you, I catch myself doing little things – standing a little straighter, believing in myself a little more and letting my softness take up space. 

You’re proof that I’m still capable of feeling.

This may be the strangest kind of love, a kind that can’t be returned in the ordinary way, yet still returns me to myself.

You will always be in my heart Joel Miller. 

I know you can’t ever truly be mine, but for now you’re the steady thing I keep reaching for through it all.

You're my wonderwall.

my grandfather had parkinson’s, got it as a result of encephalitis he got during the war. he was sick my whole life, my dad’s whole life. my dad has a memory of walking down the street with his father, who had tremors at that point, and neighborhood kids yelling abuse at him. my grandpa told my dad not to hold it against them, that they just didn’t understand.

when I was very very little, my grandpa could shuffle a bit from his wheelchair to his recliner. but mostly he had a special winch to lift him from his bed which was then wheeled through the house to lower him into his chair in the living room. all my life I watched him fed liquids through a big syringe.

his facial muscles were so tight that I could never understand what he said. I always felt overwhelming guilt for not being able to understand him.

my whole life we’d get a call that his health had taken a turn and this might be it. I watched him die for all my childhood.

my dad was recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s. I think the medications are probably better now than they were back when my grandpa was diagnosed in the 50’s. but my dad’s not a veteran. the VA built an accessible house for my grandpa. he had a nurse make home visits multiple times a week. my dad is on Medicare.

right now his right hand shakes. he can’t do the precision work that he used to do around the house. he’s the one who would always see back on buttons or put up wallpaper or wrap all our presents. he’s a pianist.

he tells us he’s not worried. he knows how long it took his dad to degenerate. he assumes he’ll be dead before things get really bad.

sometimes when I’m tired and I’ve been typing too much or on the phone too much, my hands shake. I’m terrified.