As I put the laundry away this morning, I thought about how lucky I am to have the worries that come with the particular story I have been a part of for over fifty years. I am fortunate; I know this, but I will also, always fall. It is in my nature, in the chemical makeup of my brain and the darkness that makes the heaviness of my bones unbearable. I am an ink stain on the page, but also transparent and wind. I am easily fooled by what is temporary, by the sparkling grin that comes with hope. I want to reach higher, look toward the sky, but belief is fleeting and the wheel spins so quickly. 

Today, I have that hollow feeling that comes when your heart disappears, when something that seemed incredible begins to feel unreal. If you give your whole heart to a poem or a story or a book, the minute it is out in the world, the emptiness becomes a shroud and takes on the weight that comes with feelings of failure. It sounds crazy when I write it down; how can I feel like a failure when I have put so much of myself into creating something?  But, that is exactly it, I suppose; it feels like I have broken off pieces of myself and given them away.  I love the breaking part and the sharing part, but the aftermath, the silence that comes when it feels like there is nothing left, that part is hard.  

This weekend, the voices started, the voices that say I will never write again, that perhaps I should stay in bed all day and let the darkness swallow me up.  My heart, after all, is just a shell. But, I am not only silence.  I am the rebellion and the storm.  I am defiant.  I have choices.  I choose to write these words.   I am reminded that even in the deepest darkness, I find my bootstraps, and I get up. 

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