Out of the one-hundred things I wanted to do this summer, I’d be surprised if I’ve completed a third. I always long for the beginning of things, a fresh-start, a new hair cut and color, a new job, or new classes. A new years resolution or a new semester involves the chance to reinvent oneself. I am constantly in a state of reinventing myself. Starting over in January, then May, then September, then again, and again, and again. Always drafting long lists and routines to stick to, plans to branch-out or lock-in, but without fail I drift back to my true center.
I find myself in between refreshes with chipped nail polish and overgrown roots. Overplayed songs traveling through headphones over missing earrings and lost rings. The same outfit over and over, flipped inside out and accidentally stained light pink in the dryer, worn with the same black purse and brown shoes. High screen time and unhealthy caffeine consumption, scribbling bad poetry on both-sides of receipts, because I once again left my notebook in my bedroom.
This is the time when I realize I am quite unsure of everything, and I think about it often. I interrupt conversation frequently and then forget what I was going to say. I listen in a way that I fear comes off wrong and judge-mental. I love attention until the afterthought. I hold my secrets like a bleeding hand, and it becomes obvious my pokerface is only good because I don’t know what I’m talking about.
September is a new deal but even when I’m dealt different cards, everything still plays out the same. A different semester. A fresh-start. However, the breeze on the back of my neck feels as it always has, and I am suddenly starting to grow tired of the facade of a freshly-painted apartment with mice in the walls. I know I’ll always hate iced lattes and chocolate ice cream. I’ll always have cold feet in the mornings when I can’t find my slippers. I’ll always be worried I’m going to be late only to get there 10 minutes early. I’ll always love my guitar and be embarrassed by how horribly I play it.
Somethings never change, until of course, as everything does (as we hope it does), they do.
Feral in the barrel 