You pull me in close so I’m surrounded by your body
Like warm air on a beach day. I bask in our energy.
Your shirt comes off and my fingertips are drawn to your skin;
Your body is an art form I can’t tear myself away from.
My hands travel down your chest like I adventure on rock trails and my eyes shine just as brightly as my fingers skip over the chiseled trails your muscles form.
I’m giddy with curiosity and the innocent sparkle in my eyes causes you to wonder.
We wander for a while in the chasms of each other’s eyes and minds.
I want those arms to hold me down while your chest presses against my naked body.
Press that rocky path of muscles and hot sunshine skin against me while I struggle.
I’ll make you beg and whimper with longing till you wrestle me in place.
I tried to kill myself. It didn’t work. I keep wondering… was I even close?
Why is it up to someone else to determine what is right for my life? Why is it up to others to tell me that it’s wrong for me to want to die? It’s a conflict of interest when family says it’s selfish for me to try to kill myself. If I’m in pain, isn’t it selfish of them to ask me to stay, to spare them from pain?
Mine is only one life. I want to go out as inconsequentially as a candle. People who don’t speak to me or spend time with me in my painful moments tell me I have to stay. It’s what they need, it’s what they want… but if they aren’t interested, they can’t be bothered to give their time to me, would they even notice if I was gone? This reminds me of my incessant need to shop and inability to throw away purchases I’ve neverused.
I’ve heard it said that people who think about suicide aren’t necessarily going to kill themselves. When people decide to kill themselves they are often calm or at peace. This is what I felt. A sudden peace, knowing that this is what was right.
Afterward, I only regretted it not working. I may have been at peace or perhaps was so detached from the event that I had very little feelings toward it. Leaving this world was going to be harder than I thought.
I didn’t want to face my boyfriend. He kept asking to see me and I kept making excuses. When I tried to cancel on him for the millionth time in the course of three days, he called me out. I let him come. I left the door unlocked and lay in bed. When he entered my room I looked at him, emotionlessly.
I couldn’t bare to hold the weight of his pain. I rolled over uninterested and detached from his feelings. Why didn’t how I felt matter.
He climbed into bed and held me and cried.
It took me a few days but suddenly it hit me. If he had tried to kill himself, how would I feel?
“Do Not Let the Sun Go Down on Your Anger” Ephesians 4:26b ESV
Forgiveness. Often it is something I forget to give myself. I am capable of mistakes I did not believe I would ever make. Yet, in the moment they happen, the decision is so easy.
Last week I travelled somewhere tropical for the first time in my life. I got to escape winter. I hoped I would also be able to escape depression. The sunshine kept me warm and my anxieties were basking in it along with me. Silent, but ever present.
A perfectly tempered breeze came to caress me exactly when I thought I might be getting too warm. The Cubans smiled and held the same perfect warmth. Cuba made me question why I ever felt content in a country with winter.
Varadero, Cuba Sunset
Sometimes the person you need to be gentle with is yourself. Sometimes you must forgive your own mistakes, no matter how hard. You must do it to survive.
I went to Cuba seeking peace. I found that seeking can be dangerous when you don’t know what you’re looking for. I am curious. I want to touch, feel and experience everything. There is no sense of danger and no awareness. There is only seeking with a hunger close to starvation. I would break down prison gates to find it. It: that something I’m longing for. I broke down prison gates only to find myself locked inside the prison of my own mistakes.
Absently Searching 