If I could just turn my head inside out, zzzip, flip it all around for everyone to see then maybe I wouldn’t feel like I need to explain myself. I don’t want to explain, I just want to be, to exist without needing further details and diagrams, as if a child’s toy yanked from twist-ties and clamshell packaging only to require a multi-language instruction manual before use.

I want a lot of things. The hole I’m somewhat snug in right now doesn’t exist for the lack of desire.

Today I heard my baby crying over the phone because she missed her dad, she missed me and all I wanted was to give her a hug, to believe when I told her everything would be okay. I so badly wish to have a secure job so I can welcome Ash home in a few months, so she doesn’t have to wonder why I’m home so often lately, so she can go to and from school with only the worry of what kind of Sponge Bob Play Doh thing we’ll make that night. I wish she didn’t understand when I say I’m paying a bill that she asks “water or electric?” I want to provide for her the best in every way that I can. Yet I sit here, browsing ads, working on my resume, my gut squashed, my desire muffled with despair and wonder. But I can’t explain how heavy it is, so much that hours have wasted away while nothing is accomplished.

Oh, I want a lot of things. I want someone I can talk to about everything, nothing, someone that actually tells me they miss me, that tells me it’s okay to stop joking around and be simple, serious every now and then. To be comforted instead of the comforter. I want someone to be strong for me, to hold me, and I know their touch isn’t fleeting or for a purpose other than to say “It’s okay, I’m here”. But I am alone and I am left here wondering how long I can be the tough one, the determined soul that battles through everything when I just feel like collapsing in defeat.

I dance, move to the energetic beats, yet sit deflated as the last sound of each song fades. I want to be around someone, anyone, to laugh, to enjoy myself but at the same time I just want to hide away from everyone and do nothing.

It’s not that I don’t want to do something, that I am not motivated. It’s that I can’t get these lead weights off my body. I feel like I can’t breathe in this dark pit with the air so contaminated.