{ we remain }

i want to always remember what i was wearing, standing in that empty room reading the news. i don't know why. it's a way of cementing the moment in my memory, the moment when everything and nothing changed. even now i have to think a moment, but after a minute my body appears in my mind's eye: dark rinse denim, pleated chiffon blouse, three-inch heels. two gold bracelets on the left wrist, jangling against each other all day, giving me a strange auditory satisfaction. hematite on my right hand, antique bijou rings on my left (people stared at them all day as i touched my hair, likely wondering if the quirky but terrifyingly efficient girl at the doctor's office got engaged over the weekend). i held my phone in my right hand, scrolling with my thumb, and absentmindedly ate pita chips with the other.

the moment with everything and nothing changed.

//

strange how we find ourselves on parallel arcing journeys* with other souls in the world, souls both shockingly like or unlike our own. we soar and plummet in tandem, catching sight of ourselves in other worlds, other bodies, other ages. i don't know how it all works. i don't know if i believe in fate or destiny. but i know some things just feel meant to be, and some of those meant-to-be things make a lot of sense and others defy reason. like, why is one of the dearest humans in the world to me more than a decade younger than i am? why are we so connected to one another? how could we have known when we met ten (?!) years ago that we'd still have each other today? you were a distant younger sibling to someone i had chosen (who, incidentally, never really chose me back). but somehow through all the ecstatic whirl (and then suffocating pain) of that relationship, we remained.

we remain.



*for the record, i despise the word "journey." i've only ever watched one season of the bachelor (a fact of which i am ashamed), but the number of times the dimwits on that show used the word "journey" to describe the fiasco they were participating in totally ruined it for me. however, sometimes it's the only word that fits.

//

i just texted a relatively new friend: i perpetually feel so lucky to have found you. truly. one of the faults of INTJs is that we are detached, inscrutable, hard to reach. i'm not offended by this; in fact, i agree, at least in my own case.

if i tried you'd probably be

hard to find

{ the national }

the thing is, once you've found me, you can count on getting all the sappy text messages. there's a well of affection in me that's invisible until i show it to you, and by then you'll be drowning. i don't think it's a good thing; i think it scares people. you think i hate you until you realize i love you more than you could've known. it's just the way i am.

//