Quiet

I look at pictures and see what my life looks like. To me. Inside my head. It's quiet and purposeful. It's a cute cottage with built-ins, tucked away in the heart of Portland. Full of people and life and love. It's surrounded by community. Bountiful garden, deck pregnant with friends. It's idyllic, if only for me.

I look at my life, how it really is, and it has snippets of the vignette in my head. But overall it's filled with real life and stress and trials and parenting that I never get quite right. It's filled with love and hope and dreams, but they seem far away, sometimes. It's filled with wistful and tears. Joy and pain. Worry of what could happen. What does happen.

And it's filled with me and my faults. I talk too much. Too loudly. Stupid opinions. I'm shaky and unsure, so I babble. I let fear of offending rule. I always doubt where I truly stand with everyone, waiting for people to leave. The pregnant deck devoid of life, out of fear.

I wonder where the fork in the road is. Where my life in my head diverges from my life in reality. I know it's true for everyone, that fork. But sometimes I think it should be closer together. And I want to work at making it closer together. I'm a little lost at how to do it, but I know it can happen. I'm coming to the point where I need to make some decisions and make things happen. Shed the faults and the hesitancies and go for it. Live the life in my head.


(world through my eyes, dm)