the wilderness

 One day, we will all walk into the wilderness. We know not when, we know not why. It is something that will happen whether we ask for it, whether we live good lives and do good deeds, whether we drink green smoothies, run great miles or sit on the sofa drinking ginger beer out of a tall can. The end of a season, the end of a love, the end of a life, it is all just a matter of clock spins and what we choose to do within them. I say this because I watch the world around me and I see a small army of ruthlessness and hurt that makes my own eyes fill with salt. Why do we have to always be 'experts' on everything? Why do we make friends only to talk over them? Why don't we ask more questions? Why is "how are you" considered small talk? When will we rise in the morning and discover the bees need our help, the girls need our love and taking a second out of our day to think of somebody else and not for them is beautiful like flowers in the spring or dogs putting their heads on our laps. We spend so much time wanting our hearts to be like mountains — the bravest, the tallest, the least footprints on it. We want better, always better and we don't want others to know that we too can fill our bathwater with tears.

I know the world has its greatness. I write those stories all of the time. I know the clouds will part to reveal hazy sunshine and happy children running home to a warm supper, but sometimes, the floorboards snap beneath my feet and I become air - floating and falling while my heart beats on. I overhear somebody say "she's just a girl" or "look at me, look at me!" When this happens, I can feel myself walking closer to the wilderness and then I have to pause to remember the times when I saw something treasured - like people being themselves or the sea whispering in and out by the sand where I built my castle. I have to remember for every crooked moment, there was a hummingbird buzzing or a mother being kissed on the cheek. Yes the opposite is also true, for every awing moment, there was somebody breaking glass or bruising a heart, but I can't afford a life where I am haunted by what could be dressed in the darkness of night.

I don't want to live in a world where I forget what is beautiful and what bandages the broken skin, but I also don't want to live in a world where I turn my head away from the crying and only look for the days dressed by sunshine. It is a trying balance and it leaves me tired. Who will mend this suffering? Who will keep the poetry alive? Who will allow us to marry or not? Who will turn to the girls and say "you can do this." 

You can do this.

We are learning and we will always be learning until the day when we leave for the wilderness

 and

 we

 don't

 come back.

outfit details: all thrifted

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