Dancing to Infinity - a sequel

Sara stared at herself in the mirror. Curly red wisps had escaped, framing her face like a ginger cherub. She tried not to think about how she hated the way her nose turned up, or how her eyes squinted behind too large plastic frames. Her cankles, tankles had long since disappeared; still, she couldn’t help but wait for the familiar sound of snickering kids and swine calls. Cold panic started rising in her throat, she stifled a silent scream as she looked away from the waiting eyes and hid her shaking hands in one elegant movement, running her fingertips down her hips, extending her claws in feline glory.

Breathe, she thought. Just remember to breathe.

With a nod the music started, lilting out of the ancient record player in the back corner of the room. Time had taken its toll on the recording, faint scratches and scuffs marred the instrumentals. Sara started, right foot then left, trying still to not look at herself. She had been cautioned against closing her eyes, she would surely have to repeat this agony if, even for a second, her focus dropped back inside her personal fortress of solitude. After all, as the teacher so often liked to point out, Sara was hardly Superman and Nietzsche had no place in this studio.

Each step swayed with the soft rhythm, crimson red brushing gently along polished grain, whispering under the floating notes. Out of the corner of her eye, Sara noticed what, at first, she thought were tiny dragonflies hovering near the speakers. The tempo sped; the swarm grew larger, adding more and more black wriggling shapes. They drifted towards her, a miniature ocean of darkness carrying the music, waves washing over her ankles, former tankles, and weaving up her shaking knees. The darkness enveloped her body, glove-tight, and commanded muscles no longer under her control. Sara opened her mouth to scream as her vision faded and lungs filled with sharps and flats.

She twirled, faster and faster, legs flailing and chest heaving. Every note clawed its way into her body, hooked and pulled her in a thousand directions at once. Her toes pointed and flexed, arms posed in long lines. She leapt through the air in her living bodysuit, forcing improvisation to a tune which she no longer heard. Rests and key changes sewed her lips together, barring her from screaming for help. Her body pulled upwards, high on her toes towards the ceiling, and released, a million little half notes and quarter beats falling with the tink-tink of a crystal chandelier on the hard wooden floor.

Gasping and shaking, Sara opened her eyes to the stunned faces of her peers, Degas’ self-indulgent smirks wiped from their faces with a few random brushstrokes. A slow, steady staccato penetrated her confusion and she realized the teacher was clapping, black liquid streaming down the deep lines in her cheeks. Sara dropped her arms, fell into a shy curtsy, then quickly retreated to her customary corner near the studio door. The other dancers performed, clumsy interpretations of classic movements which left the teacher shaking her head and spewing insults in her native Russian. Sara edged closer to the door with each song, glancing to the floor as the eyes of her fellow students locked hers with burning hatred.

She wept quietly to herself, knowing this would be the last time she ever danced in her short life. Bad things happened when she lost control. It would be best for everyone if she were to avoid repeating the experience. As the final girl danced, knees jerking and elbows locked in rough approximation of a soldier’s march, Sara pulled her bag to her hollow chest and eased out the door. The cold air slapped her still-wet cheeks, stinging, and the door banged shut behind her, the echo bouncing off the walls of the dark alley. A chill rushed over her; a crumpled entertainment section tumbled down the street.

Go back inside, he whispered. Or, turn around and let me look at you. It has been too long, my love.

She froze, refusing to turn around. His lips brushed her neck, ruffled her ginger cherub curls falling from their band. With a single sob, she ran and leapt onto the idling bus, swiping her card and curling into a stiff seat. She dared one glance, a peek out the window at her former lover as cold mists swirled around his sky-blue eyes, fading to black with the coming night. She traced a heart into the moisture from her breath, and silently cursed the figment of her vivid imagination.

She was still alone, and he was never real.


Previous Sara Stories:
Dancing with Invisibility (prequel)
Maybe Tomorrow will be Yellow
Swing Away, Girl

An Experiment in Stream-of-Consciousness Rambling

my brain flipped a switch and suddenly i'm writing again.

i missed being able to get it out on paper. to close my eyes, unhindered by the downward spiral, and let the words pour out my fingertips tapping away at lightning speeds across the keys, processor barely able to keep up with the thoughts spinning out of my mind.
i didn't sleep more than three hours last night. had to get the ideas out while i could, so afraid that i'd wake up and lose the ability again, crippled by my own intelligence over-analyzing every situation.

as usual.

i blame my brains for the mess i'm in. ignorance may truly be bliss, but i can't fake being stupid. and, although i know i'm barely above average, i'm still too smart for my own good, still dream what i know is an impossible dream that i am powerless to make true. yet. for now.

maybe one day that hippie artist writer actor colony will happen. where everyone can do what they want according to their talents and desires. where egos don't have to be constantly pacified because you have a doctorate degree in education from a state with some of the worst educational practices in the world. where those that like to garden can grow, those that like to cook can feed us. those that like to teach, to talk, to laugh, to sing can keep everyone entertained. where we can all keep learning, never stagnant in our own little skill set, and sing kumba-fucking-ya around a campfire while toasting s'mores.

unless you can't have graham crackers (sorry amanda).

i think what brings me down the most, most often, is the realization that people are not inherently good. people are assholes. stupid, mindless, mob-mentality zombies blindly following the latest trend from corporate masters, wearing Che Guevara tshirts and preaching rebellion while sipping starbucks pumpkin spice frappucinos.

i am jack's bitter beer face.

people are not good. but a person can be great. kind, warm, beautiful, amazing. a person can understand without judging. i think i need to get back to dealing with persons, not people. individuals, not egos or narcissism. and maybe i'll find myself again. i get lost in the anger and hate that constantly surrounds me in my circa 1974 mauve cubicle jungle. and i'm tired of absorbing other people's moods. i'm a sponge, picking up the negative energy until i burst, tears streaming down screaming face, and people think it all comes from within me.

i need to let it out. release the evil. popeye's chicken is the shiznit... cover Winkler with bees.

(even in stream of consciousness i can't stop making random quotes)

maybe the point of all this is i just need better coping mechanisms. learn to not let the man (or woman, hey, equal opportunity colloquialism) bring me down. learn to smile and laugh it off without becoming as uncaring and unfeeling as everyone i never wanted to be. of course the other alternative is to encase my heart in ice, my own fortress of self-imposed solitude, so the world doesn't bring me down to its dirty, gritty level of taxi-cab confessions and street corner hustlers.

i'm trying. i may fail, it might take me a while to get back up, but i won't stay down forever.

... i'm trying.

like finding little ways to harmonize myself with my surroundings:
walk that extra mile to the next bus stop when i'm able, blue raspberry sunshades to avoid early morning squinting as i take in autumn colors, leaves falling in windswept piles of red, orange, ochre, and occasionally green with envy for those suburban housewives jogging in matching spandex gym clothes, Nike clad pedicured feet pounding pavement beside perfectly groomed pets.

inhale, deep, and let the cold damp air cleanse the negativity away.
take time to breathe and enjoy quiet moments of simple beauty; like watching the sunrise pinks and blues, staring through the plexi-window on the hour long bus commute to work, finishing a novel every 2 days instead of every 2 months, writing down my dreams for once, in vivid detail, not relying on half-remembered sparks of imagination 2 years down the line when some idea or word triggers a flash of recognition in my tongue and hands.

today's show is brought to you by the number 2...

and maybe one day i'll look back at the path behind me and not recognize where i was.
maybe it isn't about the destination, but the journey. and all the endless bits of useless trivia and arcane knowledge i've collected will serve a different purpose than over the last 27 years.

maybe, eventually, being a walking encyclopedia will actually help me feel complete and whole, warm and safe in my own skin, and not alone.

Close a door, open a window ... or "Untitled of yet"

She picked a dandelion from the uncropped grass, twirling the stalk between her fingertips.

“You don’t, you couldn’t begin to understand what or who I am,” she said. Her eyes flickered up to meet his gaze, held the look with veiled pain behind the gray blues. She raised the flower to her lips and gently blew, scattering the spores on the soft wind.

“Every possibility, every road we didn’t take is a seed. A gentle breeze - it could be an earthquake at 3 a.m., a common cold, a motorcycle ride on a rainy night; they’re all a single representation of infinite possibilities. Every breath removes a few more spores until all that is left is the root idea of what could have been – dead and lifeless in some child’s hands.”

She tossed the empty stalk away and kicked at it with the tip of her paint-stained chucks. He stared at the awkward movement of her feet, her toes pinching inwards, digging the stem harshly into the ground. He looked up at the sharp intake of her breath.

“On one of those spores,” she whispered, “we didn’t always hate each other; we were friends for ten years. On another, you went to MIT straight from high school and ended up being my TA. One I went to Northwestern instead and we only met by chance at some greasy spoon in New York waiting for a conference. There are only about twenty percent where we haven’t met yet. But we will, I don't know whether by chance or design.”

A sly smile suddenly flashed across her pale face and she looked up at him with her crooked grin.

“Do you want to hear about the world where you and Steve …”

“You’re fucking kidding me,” he stammered, shifting his weight uncomfortably in her silence.

“Ok, well on one world you have moobs, one world I have a cock. One world I died of Polio at five. One world you … you were in a motorcycle crash on the way to our rehearsal dinner about three years ago. Simple, small events yet everything is so different. Everything is floating on the wind, waiting to settle in a thousand different locations. Everything produces the same result - more weeds, more spores, more chances, and more regrets.”

She glanced at her watch, fidgeting with the band the way she always used to do in the lab waiting for the program to run. She always had a problem with waiting.

“In about 90 seconds an ambulance and 3 fire trucks are going to go by, there was a fire a few blocks over and –“ she was interrupted by the sound of wailing sirens.

“Guess you were a little off on the timing,” he muttered, “so what does that mean? You can tell the future? Travel through time? If you're theory is right, IF there are thousands of other worlds, how can one spore see where another is floating?”

“I told you that you couldn’t understand. I’m not from a spore. I’m from the stalk, the root, the original. And every time I find you again, but it is never the same. You … we’re never the same. And so far every version of us I’ve gone to ends … badly.”

“You’re telling me we always end up meeting , we always affect each other in some way. But you’re the only you I’ve met. Are you trying to tell me you have a clone somewhere out there, that we’ll meet and bad things will happen? Do you really expect me to believe that every relationship with you ends that way”

“ yes.”

“why?”

“it isn’t that simple-“

“You’re a scientist, give me proof.”

“… statistical analysis predicting future events based on past findings. And current.”

“current?”

“that fire. I … the me from this spore … she just died. The experiment created a feedback loop that just happened to travel into my, well HER, kitchen. The house burned down. I – she – was electrocuted. You caused it. Your experiment was enough to count as contact with her on this world. And it ended … very badly. Enough proof?”

Swing Away Girl, Swing Away

Sara sat in the rubber paddle seat, the plastic wrapped chains digging harsh frowns into her palms. She squeezed hard, hoping that maybe the sharp stab would wake her up, force her sleep-filled eyes to open. She’d realize this was all some horrid nightmare destined to be forgotten in the early morning sunlight streaming through her second story windows with the bubble-gum pink curtains. She hated pink, but her mom always insisted she’d grow to love it. Every inch contained some piece of pink - mauve carpets, pastel walls, or rose metal daybed frame. She couldn’t escape the Pepto Bismol feeling whenever she set foot inside her own bedroom. The chalky aftertaste sense memory rising as her feet stepped over the threshold, from neutral to frilly in 0.6 seconds.

The biting chains didn’t help; she didn’t open her eyes to a surround-sound diarrhea commercial. It wasn’t a nightmare. This was real.

Crap.

She pumped her legs a little to give herself some air - barely moving, but just enough so she didn’t look like she was moping. She didn’t want them to know how badly she hurt right now. They didn’t need to know she was fighting the urge to cry, choking back the tears and biting her tongue to keep the sobs from pouring out of her. They didn’t need to know.

Pretending to tuck an errant hair back into her messy pigtails, she brushed away the lonely teardrop that had passed the gauntlet of self defense mechanisms. Sara looked down and noticed her knee was bleeding. She must’ve fallen harder than she thought, gravel cut like knives into her soft skin. Too soft, she was too soft.

Not for the first time in her short life, Sara wished she could be stronger. Not muscular or scary, just … strong. Strong enough to let it roll away without obsessing over what happened and why. Strong enough to just let it be and not care what anyone thought of her. Strong enough to just be happy in her own gravel-bruised, porcelain skin.

Sara wasn’t strong. And they all knew it. They looked at her swinging back, pigtails flying as she tried to build up height and maintain the illusion. Adam kicked the gravel and spat in the grass. Jamie laughed. She sounded like a hyena, but no one ever seemed to notice, or were too afraid to say anything if they did. Sara pumped her legs harder, hoping the built up speed hid her flinch at that evil sound. No human should laugh that way.

She focused on her shoes moving up and down to stop the shaking when they started in again.

“Soooo weeee! Sara Swinegirl! Sooo weee! Here Sara swine! Soooooo weeeeeee”

The pink plastic toes were scuffed from falling off the monkey bars. The buckles needed stitching, they were starting to fall off their bands.

“Saaaaraaa! How many rolls does it take to fill out Sara’s dress? I don’t know, too many to count!”

The white socks with frilly tops floated like bloated jellyfish with each pump of her legs. The shoes were losing their shine, she’d have to ask her mother to polish them soon. Patent leather is so hard to keep looking new.

“Cankles, Tankles, how do you walk on those Sara Swinegirl?”

The socks bunched unevenly at the ankle straps. It looked like marshmallows escaping a pastel s’more., oozing all over and scalding if you touched them.

“Jiggly Wiggly Sara on the swingset. Jiggly Wiggly Sara pumping high. Jiggly Wiggly Sara’s gonna break that swing and die!”

She pumped her legs harder. She was flying high now, her plaid jumper dangerously far up her legs, threatening to show everything with one false move or slip.

“I hear that squeaking - Sue, do you? I think Sara hears it too. A few more swings, a few more tries. A few more pumps and Sara dies!”

Sara couldn’t stand it any longer. She alley-ooped, somersaulted as she reached the top, and soared into the trees. Her arms bent, retracted, curved and flattened. Her legs shrunk in - cankles, tankles gone forever - and tucked up and under her plaid jumper dancing in the wind.

They all stared: Bobby and Adam, Jamie and Sue. Sara was shrinking into herself, escaping her oversize clothes that never fit quite right even on her most normal day. Her red pigtails turned to crimson feathers, wings flapping happily out of her clothes. The plaid monstrosity fell helplessly to the prison yard below, shriveled and empty like a snakeskin left behind. Sara was free.

She chirped happily, sang her little song as she flew off into the trees. They’d never see her again, she’d stay this way as far as her little arms could fly. She’d start over somewhere new, where she wasn’t Sara Swinegirl; somewhere Sue didn’t call her piglet and Adam didn’t pull her pigtails. Bobby wouldn’t throw gum at her new dress, Jamie wouldn’t steal her diary and read it to the entire playground at recess.
She glanced back at their staring faces, at jaws wide open in wonder at her amazing feat. They’d know how great she was now that she was gone. They’d miss her when she wasn’t there. Wouldn’t they?

Below her and far behind her wandering, the school bell clanged the end of recess. Sara stopped pumping, her little legs forcing her to a halt. Delicate human hands in pockets, she shuffled over the gravel to line up in the grass with everyone else, studying her shoes like she always did waiting in line. Adam placed himself alphabetically behind her, gave the left pigtail a sharp tug and chuckled as Sara jumped in pain. He yanked the other one, then sighed with disappointment when Sara didn’t flinch.

Clenched fingernails digging half moons into her palms, Sara walked single file back into the prison, back to her plastic desk in the baby blue classroom. Someone, probably Sue, had drawn a pig with curly pigtails on the chalkboard. Everybody laughed. Sara sighed. Bobby had stuck gum in her seat.

Doodling in cursive lettering, she chirruped once under her breath and snuck a glance out the window at the V flying over the electric lines. Sensing Adam’s eyes on her, she coughed away her grin. They wouldn’t stop until they thought she was completely broken. Best to let them go on thinking that…

Silly girl, dreams are for the birds

silly girl, you should have known to keep your feet planted and your head out of the clouds. eye on that pie in the sky, never noticed that the roots were slowly twining, slowly climbing, wrapping 'round flesh and bone, snapping sinew, twisting tendons, disfiguring and dislocating. you never asked to be planted, never asked for this tiny little patch of grass, never knew that while you stopped, standing here, transfixed by all the endless stretch of plains before you, you'd never move one inch from where the seed was watered, fed, and grown.

silly child, you should have known you are your parents' progeny. unmovable and unmoving, yet you keep reaching your stubby little fingers to the heavens, desperately trying to grab the nearest star, arms too short to even reach beyond the treetops. ocular refraction, you gaze through coke bottle lenses, maneuvering a path through the galaxy's defenses: planets and asteroids mooning you in childlike defiance, shooting stars on a collision course to never-never-land, but burning brighter for 15 minutes than you ever could accomplish in this oxygen-depriving state.

silly girl, you should know better than to dream, to let your mind wander to the what-ifs and maybe-could-bes. maybe, only not for you. look down. look at the roots, twisted and tangled, crooked to the planet's core. stop thinking of everything you'll never do and never be. it just isn't possible, you see? for the likes of you, with roots like yours, with feet so firmly planted and arms so short, your dreams will never be reality.

so just stop reaching.

so just stop moving.

so just stop. just stop. and realize that you are all you'll ever be. and any hope you might have had, the idea of transplantation to another field, another crop, another stock, another state... any idea of maybe being more than you ... well, that's what is funny too. had you tried a little sooner, had you realized you were so firmly entrenched, had you only ...

but what's the point in what ifs?

they are simply never-will-bes, silly child, and no amount of wishing on those swiftly burning stars will ever change the fact that your own roots betrayed and trapped you. and you are you. and you are here.

and here and you are all you can look forward to when there is no hope left inside you.

Baklava Induced Ramblings, or You Say You Want a Revolution

i woke up this morning with a jolt, startled from my slumber by two realizations:
1) it was very light outside and
2) it smelled like rain

in my not fully functional morning mentality; windows to my soul still foggy, i ran a systems diagnostic. i lay in bed staring at my closed blinds, blue denim curtain rustling in the artificial breeze from my borrowed window unit. my apartment felt stuffy; i kicked off the comforter and lay on my back, fully exposed to the cold drifting air in my black and blue x-men boxer shorts and black wifebeater covered in latex stains.

(not that type of latex, perverts. i work with makeup prosthetics.)

my eyes squinted, searching for the nonexistent clock i don't let keep me awake in my bedroom. i dimly wondered what time it was, how late i had slept in, how late i would be for work, how that ONE person would stare at their watch as i came in the door, no matter how many hours of overtime i had put in the week before.

i breathed deep, popping 3 places in my back just from inhalation. certainly that isn't healthy, but i can't exactly afford a chiropractor on my current paycheck.

i stretched, toes to the bathroom door, arms wide, fingers spread out and pointing to each side in the typical "LOOK AT ME I'M FAMOUS" pose. groaning slightly, i sort of undulated in the lazy girl's equivalent of effort.

i think my face scrunches up from the strain of a really deep stretch, makes me look like i've just eaten a lemon whole and had an allergic reaction, all while slowly morphing into james carville. i'm not pretty in the early light of morning.

i turned to my side, curled back into my usual fetal sleeping position, then elongated back into a swan dive preparation. pushing up on one arm, the way Andrew Gaupp taught me back in voice and movement class, i rose to seated and fell forward over my knees, dangling feet and arms off the edge of the unkempt bed. slowly, i realigned myself popping my spine back into place and ending with a wet-dog shudder to shake off the dreams.

these weren't particularly bad, just kind of random. parkour. leito. a community center in peril. dance dance revolution to save the day... yes, my District B-13 residual dream somehow morphed into Breakin 2: Electric Boogaloo. I'm still avoiding the urge to put on a hot pink headband and walk around in a skimpy tights/leotard combination.

i slipped my feet into purple flip flops to avoid cold tile on my sleep-muddled senses and shuffled, nearly tripping over a pile of laundry left-to-do, over to my borrowed window unit. i flipped the switch, peeped through the blinds...

it was effing pouring rain. in austin. in summer. on my birthday.

i opened my back door and bathroom window to let the saturated air flow through my apartment. i noticed my alarm clock, safely nestled by my sink so i don't stare at the flickering numbers in yet another fit of insomnia, was blinking angrily a nonsense time. the power must have gone out at some point from the storm.

i still haven't reset it. it isn't looking at me, and i can't see it from my current vantage point of my blue comforter twin bed, staring out the back door at cars and people tearing through the rain.

i think today will be a timeless day. with no ticking of the clock, no alarms set with deadlines and meetings and to-dos and must-finishes.

i ordered lunch, for i will do no cooking on my birthday - it is a rule i just made up. i took a shower. i towel-wrapped my dripping hair and changed into a sea green tank top and black yoga pants, neon green toenail polish staring up from the purple flipflops. i don't match at all...

so now i sit, hair slightly curly and still a little damp. stuffed full of red beans and rice, a little tabbouleh, and 1 piece of baklava - what can i say, i come from a mixed heritage out of louisiana. these are the comfort foods i crave. cajun, mediterranean ... and donuts.

freaking donuts. jelly donuts. ich bin ein berliner. with a little want thrown in there.

i think i'll hide my toolbar on my computer. listen to the rain while i stumble in the dark recesses of bookmarks and favorites, finding links i never knew existed and having nothing that needs to get done right this second. i think that is what really makes people unhappy - the lack of freedom that comes with being an adult.

as a kid, you had a curfew, you had a bedtime. you had playtime, you had school time. then you had homework. then you had test preparation. then applications and SATs and standardized tests to make your eyes bleed. you went to college for NINE FREAKING YEARS to get two degrees that, although interesting while pursuing them, ended up not getting you jack in terms of useable experience. you're now a secretary, not that there is anything wrong with that, but you were always told you had so much potential. you are jack's wasted life. 8 to 5, but really more like 8 to 7 most days. so tired on the weekend from trying to do everything that you just can't let it go; so you sit and tune out reality with netflix and streaming radio, never really progressing because you know, in two days time, you'll be back on someone else's schedule doing what they need done when they need it and ignoring your own ticking time bomb inside you.

breathe.

i wasn't really cut out for this type of society. i wake up at 3 am, more productive than i've ever been, but can't get the words out or put the picture down on paper because i have to be awake in 3 more hours to make myself presentable for work. shower, shave, makeup, hair pulled back because you're just too lazy to style it. wait 20 minutes for a bus that never runs when it is supposed to, when you could have walked to work in 30 if it weren't triple digits sweltering outside.

maybe society is the key to all this, the answer to the question i've been asking all this time - what am i supposed to do with my life? maybe i'm supposed to eschew society as we know it, start a revolution, redefine how we live our lives and how we measure our success. stop being a cog in the corporate machine. stop determining a person's worth by the size of their bank account or the classification number after their job title.

become a community of free thought, free speech, free education, free pursuits. where anything and everything is attainable to everyone. where knowledge isn't copyrighted and it doesn't cost $150,000.00 for three years and two letters after your name.

just artists and thinkers, builders and designers, revolutionaries at odds with how we're supposed to live and how we're supposed to be.

maybe the problem is with them and not with me.

What-ifs and Maybe-nevers

i wish i could make my brain shut off and stop playing chess in my head. if i make this move, this could happen, which I would then counter with this action... 3 or 4 steps ahead in what-ifs and maybe-nevers. I see the options laid out like little tightropes before me, criss-crossed in places and disappearing in spaces. Unknowns and wrenches spinning through infinity, life's debris waiting to knock me off whichever course I choose.

Life is what happens to you while your busy making other plans. John Lennon, smart man, shot in the head, very sad.

I need to put away the pen and paper, graphs and lists and diagrams of Venn. Just be me, but I never quite learned to go with the flow... how to give up and ride the current wherever it may take me. i always wanted some semblance of control in an uncontrollable environment, a computer light flashing that I have an option to push this button or pull that lever and set myself on path again. I like to pretend I'm in the driver's seat, although I never learned to drive and this 1957 Chevy with red leather interior is speeding downhill with no brakes.

Might be moving to swiftly on this one, jumped the gun 3 years out of desperation and depression. The realization that everything and anything I want or need to be just won't happen to me if I stay stagnant in this murky blue of run-together days.

Nothing I want to do is ever taken lightly; and while my decisions may seem nonsensical or rushed to some, every one is carefully mapped and planned with a choose-your-own adventure range of scenarios. I dream in technicolor, 3D road maps of where I am and where I want to be. Google maps in my unconsciousness, from here to there by public transportation, change the arrival or departure time to figure out just which route to take to avoid downtown city traffic or high school kids running naked from their schools. Get off my lawn you damn kids, I'm trying to get somewhere and be someone... sit down, you're rocking the bus. Public transportation depends too heavily on everybody else's schedule and plans...

So maybe I want the private option? slightly better, same cost. start over fresh in new state and new state of mind. but I don't think I'll ever escape the me I've become; and as much as I may wish to be someone else on all these just-another-gray days, I'm Eeyore for a reason. the experiences and skills I've learned wouldn't stick with me if I were another drone, a clone of some bubblehead in a magazine or flat glossy image from my tv screen.

I guess what I'm trying to say is I'm just confused and can't suss it all out, can't determine what is best because best right now might be worst in 3 years. too many variables and my brain, though super, is hardly a supercomputer for mapping out that many strategies.

I may be able to kick your ass at RISK, but I'm kind of afraid to take that risk myself. especially when it all could blow up in my face and leave me homeless, lying face down in a gutter, drowning in my own student debt that no amount of bankruptcy will erase ... until I'm forced to fake my own death and live off the grid as a former French stripper named GiGi LeFriebusch. Dealing out diner advice in a sweet southern accent at greasy spoons nationwide, packing up and leaving before I get too settled and Uncle Sam comes knocking for his kickback, a bank named Slickback in a purple pinstripe zoot suit riot.

... I have way too many obscure pop culture references in my ramblings...

and I think this all would be easier if it were socially acceptable or economically feasible to be a renaissance woman in this day and age. but the people want specialization, bounce from idea to idea too many times and they begin to think you don't have focus or stamina. But in reality, I'm just pulled in a thousand directions at once because I want to do and experience everything in my brief time here, three quarters of a century and one of those split spent in diapers and drool (part crib, part raisin ranch).
Maybe it is time to put away childish things. Pick me to be and let the other ideas die. Not pursue those little whispers that this might be fun or that could entertain.

But somehow I don't think I'll be happy just being one thing. Swallow my soul in self denial, slowly fade away and become the dimensionless character we watch every night with popcorn and soda and 3D glasses to make them somehow seem real.

I am complexity. I am insanity. I am abnormality, abstrusity, absurdity, acerbity, adaptability, ambiguity ... and that is just the a's.
I am too many things to define.
I am me.
... and right now, I am confused. *sigh*