I Used To Be Such A Good Swimmer.

I am floundering on the shores of my own bad decicions, stranded on this island alone and forsaken (by fate and by man). Regret and loss swim in the shallows waiting for me to wade in so that they may wallop me with their great mass. There is an undercurrent of blistering cold watching for the tops of my two knobby knees to appear before pulling me beneath the surface. Just now, I can see all these things and I watch them from the shore; the waves break mistily against the sand and in their foamy beauty I see an echo of who I once was, of the giddy, love-struck girl who swallowed your music in gulping mouthfuls and sprayed it back out at everyone she could. The strange thing is I set off for these shores of my own volition. I hoisted my sails and raised my flag and departed for this far off land full of strangers and sunshine. And I left you- to live as a ghost in my heart- naively expecting that you would be my Penelope and fend off all potential suitors until my dramatic return. But, I cannot provide a dramatic return, as much as my heart pulls me to you- I know that you have found another to lose yourself in-to find yourself in.

Fueled by some ancient manifest destiny, I took off across the country, guileless in my expectations, that everything would come together where it needed and we would spend our hours productive and resourceful. But, no matter how productive anyone is- he will never live up, in my eyes, to the promise that you have, to the deep and intense beauty of your songs that strikes me deeper and harder than anything I've heard or seen before. I hid from myself those last days before leaving, I cowered in the darkness of corners, pretending that all would be well and that there would not be the great unraveling that my mind kept whispering to me about. And now I am here, still unsettled still staring longingly at the past and wishing things were done differently on both sides. Pangs of jealousy seize me and the tears come crashing down. It is funny that I am now suffering at the mistake of my own hands, my own heart. I live out my life here in this sunny state living side by side with a sadness so great it spills out over everything. Sometimes I wonder if anger is no better than complacency but they both weave a wicked path which leads to nothing but despair.

I am drowning in wild, emotional abandon, heaving heavy breaths that choke out at their ends. There is an emptiness which lingers, longing, and it feels like the pit of my stomach hollowed out. It has been years since I have cried so much, since I have choked on the sobs that spilled from my lips and ignored the snot that dripped from my nose in a steady, sticky, stream. It has been years since I have felt an emotional release so strongly, so steadily and for so long. Yesterday was the 6th day in a row and today marks the first day without crying. I need to get a hold of myself. I need to figure out what I want in the world.

Regret and fears chase each other around my swollen and tear-addled brain. I have done the wrong thing. I have hurt someone who may be the only person who can give me the things I need, who I can give the things he needs. I made a choice fueled by alcohol and fear; I chose the one who hurt me because he was willing to leave. I knew he was like this- the Jekyll and Hyde- the drinking, and I thought, for some reason, that it was okay. I hid myself behind the delicate clanking of a drink and told myself there was nothing left for me in Baltimore. And, it's true- for the most part. I needed to leave, to find myself somewhere else- but I also needed to get myself there on my own and not rely on someone else to do all the legwork.

And in my haste to leave the barren city that held little for me but memories of the past, I made the most important person in my life a memory. I abandoned everything I had worked to build for so many years and no one, not even him, asked twice. I wonder now, surrounded by the marks I have made, facing the mess I have made of the most honest and productive relationship I have ever had, if things really were as bad as I thought. I had backed myself into a corner, screaming to be heard and he sat there stone-faced, trying to understand but failing. And I flailed my arms and jumped up and down and he said, "Stop jumping. It's noisy." He fell into a darkness that I could not contain, that I could not alight. And I stayed there with him, trying, but often failing, to be a support system.

I, repeatedly, ran to others to satisfy my need for emotion, for words, for fiction. And I was wrong on so many counts that I have failed to realize until now. I want to shout apologies across the barren mid-land plains. I want to say, "Don't forget me. Please don't forget me. Make it easy on me just for a little while. I know you think about me. Let me know you think about me too." I want to say, "I'm sorry, so sorry, that I was such a fool. I didn't know love could be so cruel. You tell me mistakes are part of being young. But, that don't right the wrong that's been done. Love is blind and I was too blind to see. "

There is an all consuming sadness and it grips me often, more so now than ever before. And now I am fading into fog, mired in the muck, fighting to breath beneath regret and fear and sadness. I miss having your hand to hold. I want to light the path, yours and my own- to be what we once were, to work toward the dreams of our youths and the dreams of now. I want to not be afraid anymore. I want to fill the hole inside me that was torn so long ago when I was such a small, fragile thing. It's been a long life of denial that I have lived beneath the lie that I am not affected by the large number of family members that disregarded me as a babe but I am finally forced to come to terms with it and I can only hope that I can find some way to plug this constant outpouring of emotion, to stop from becoming a walking embodiment of my own fears. I can only hope that when I have figured out how to be someone by myself that I can figure out how to be someone by your side.

I am drowning in my own lack. I am reaching up for someone who isn't there. I am slowly sinking but struggling. I always used to be such a good swimmer.