funny which words stick around twenty years down when you're driving alone...

[this is what today sounds like]
telluride is a strange place to move if you are a girl with abandonment issues. the transient nature of the town breeds deep connections on a shortened time line. there's a lot compressed into a little bitty village. and the feelings are real and the relationships are good if not brief. and then you are left morning this wonderful thing that vanished, perhaps never to be seen or heard from again. but this person has touched your spirit. and perhaps on this occasion you have created a lifelong bond. or maybe this is someone to always hold dear in your memory. gratitude. no expectations. i'm still learning this one.

but this place is magical. a vortex of healing and escape. i hope i am in the former category. i waited a long time before i made my move. i wanted to be moving on instead of running away. and yet, some how, so many of the difficult questions have followed me through the winding western roads, into my cradle. my safe place. and i find myself fumbling again. short of breath and anxious. insomnia plagues me. and nightmares haunt my restless sleep. i drag myself from bed in the mornings. and i often cry myself to sleep. this sadness wont leave. i have begged it. pleaded with it. and although i would never be so selfish as to take my own life, at these moments i can see where it might seem appealing. an end to all the pain and suffering. but that is the great lie. and i push past it in hopes that the sadness, doubt, and fear will be met equally with joy and fulfillment. someday. when i stop doubting myself. when i can feel my worth.

thirty hit me over the head. all these years and i am still no farther along. how emotionally defeating. i simple phone message from my father can send me spiraling. and all my fears come rushing back. will i ever be good enough? how do i keep from being too much? too much, but not enough.

i woke from a fretful dream the other night. i found myself confronted with my ex-boyfriend, curled on the carpet with another woman. it broke my heart all over again. and i turned and ran down the hallway. but this time, in this sleepy reality, instead of allowing his lies to defeat me and condemn me, i fought back. i yelled. i swung. i beat the shit out of him. and i woke even more exhausted than when i lay my head on the pillow. and when my tears subsided and i drifted off once again, i found myself alongside a good friend. and he did me favors and made me laugh and when i thanked him he kissed me on the mouth. i watched myself stand there in awkward silence. and this dream "me" mustered up the courage to ask him what he meant by that kiss. and the question was greeted with a laugh. and dismissed as if i was absurd for thinking it would ever possibly mean anything of importance.

i lay in my bed, watching through open blinds, searching the black for signs of snow. emotionally wrought. exhausted but unable to sleep. the phrase "dating is not an option" loops through my head. the idea that i'm not datable. unlovable. i never questioned this reply, but how do you recover from such a vague dismissal? how do you not blame yourself for the wrongness of your character? how do you accept this girl that everyone else leaves behind? how can you love her enough to make it all alright?

this summer i met a boy who didn't walk away. but he moved two thousand miles from my embrace. and i find myself wondering if this is the only reason he hasn't left me. and i find myself waiting. always waiting. for him to leave. and as much as i prepare myself for this possibility, it will hurt. his absence will leave a hole. and i find myself wondering how many holes before i disappear completely.