before i thought i was apathetic. last thanksgiving i didn't do anything. this year i was around but i haven't looked at the festive sized hole. Of all the ways I can empathize no holiday feels particularly special. in many ways, i vehemently regret this insensitivity. my family loves me & i've established myself as the distant cousin, semi-prodigal, far off relative. if there were any romance in the idea my story would be better. i've just been thrashing toward each & every present I find myself in. I'm so much more gentle with time. I can't assume time has changed, so I take responsibility (or project useful imagination of agency). i can say the static that coddled time out of me is quieter. i can measure in more useful minutes.
the man i love reminds me how long i've been sober. not of the actual length of time, he wouldn't remember that. i don't know how he feels. there are times i wish he could be envious of me in some way. i've never decided on what exactly. i'm not sure i need my man to "love me more than i love him" but I need to know if I hurt him he'll tell me, assuming he loves me enough to hurt him at all. I'm curious why he reminds me with a beer in hand. The man i love celebrates me in a way that makes sense. we share a moon sign. capricorn. the sea-goat. building a wall on the shore made of rocks from the ocean floor. we have mutual respect for personal labor.
now that living life feels worth a damn, the fears of being nowhere again hit different. this will be found & annotated. so i'm not worried but hate far the present feels sometimes. trying to be here for me has started feeling right. i'm the first & last fan of my work. it takes the hardest to convince myself. it's gotten easier to enjoy the now. still feels like a pacifier instead of sustenance.
recently, i've been delving into century-old Black girls. Their interiority, experiments, & beauties. i want to silhouette into the new millennium archive for Black girls. I want to give the historian something beautiful to recount. all they ever write about is our bravery until we don't need it anymore. i'm more oblivious than brave & more disinterested than discrete.
i'll be absent from so many family photos. i left home at 14. i cameo through photo albums. now as an adult i can't articulate how my holiday feelings got so empty. i can only perform interest by proxy. im happier so many others are happy. none of these feelings relate to birthdays which are the only mortal days i consider sacred. in Amerikkka, most of our holidays are ad campaigns of historic & contemporary ritual bastardized into a marketable season. my cynicism isn't deep or demonstrative. i just have to learn new ways to value this season. i'm coming into a new life & want to support new life.