Threads, Beds, Hiatuses

Yesterday I broke my right hand punching a wall having reached peak of a losing streak. Today, I got a tattoo of a black widow spider to remind myself of how dangerous I am.

It’s physically painful to write this (on account of my cracked knuckle) and the chuckling masochist within me sees it as overdue, and welcome, penance. 

That said, she’s not my sole operator anymore. 

That said, I’m pretty fucking sick of that bitch. 

Ha, here I am. I’m back from my hiatus. I was sorry for a while but I’m not anymore.

It’s been months now since I’ve written anything of substance. It got to the point that I started actively avoiding my journal and my computer. I was fearful of myself, in that regard. And for that same reason, I think, I began to circumvent the people and places that made me feel so welcome when I first arrived in this city. I guess it was some fucked up form of self-preservation.

I mean, I knew my words and my friends and my family would be too confrontational for the tiny little girl wearing my clothes, living in my room, working at my job. The tiny little girl who should’ve called her mum but got blind drunk instead.

I still haven’t called my mum.

I thought I was seeking help in new-fangled ways. Really, I was handing people my loose threads and walking away.

Untying myself, unpicking myself, unraveling myself.

Unraveling, and for what? Jagged, spindly fibres: Unrecyclable, weak, and completely useless.

It's November and I've managed to bind my loose threads back together. It's a gnarly, misshapen and ugly knot. It's strong though - and nothing else matters now.

Yeah. 

I just cleaned the whole apartment top to bottom but I didn’t make my bed. And I often don’t. And I think there are people who make their beds and people who don’t. Whether that means anything; whether these categories even exist.

This room houses my night terrors and my black dogs and this white flag is imprinted on my broken hand. 

Even if I make the bed they’re going to mess it up anyway. They live here too. I mean, I resent them, but they live here too. I mean, there are those who like their bridges burnt, those who linger and those who reappear as if from dead. I mean, I’ve reappeared.

I mean, I’m gonna call my mum.

Post Office, South Van Ness

Photo: Daniel Valencia