work is kicking my ass, and i’m sorry. i have a job. i’m sorry that i have a job. i’m sorry that i’m not “living my dream” and writing about tik tok once a week for all of you. i am a 27 year old woman. i send money to my parents every month. i pay my rent and car insurance and buy prescription cat food. i have an hour commute each way and sometimes eat lunch at this vietnamese place but i haven’t had an appetite since march began so i just pick at meals i brought from home all day long at my desk. i’m sorry that we made it this long and i’ve had nothing to say to you.
i still have nothing to say to you. the problem with this arrangement we have, you and i, is that i have to keep owing you something or else you’ll take your love away from me. i have to be loyal to you. when really the work i make is what it is because i am most and only loyal to myself. sometimes i have no way of letting you know what’s going on because i don’t yet know what’s going on, and i’ll need some time in this life to learn what the fuck is up. i’ll have good stories when i do, i promise.
so i don’t waste too much of your wild and precious time i will just share with you something i was thinking about while i force fed myself a bowl of plain greek yogurt with coconut granola for breakfast this morning (seriously. what do you do when food has lost all appeal? seriously, i would beg for an answer if i thought begging would illicit the right answer). okay, here we go:
my own karma is baked in. the problem is that i did survive. that the malnutrition— the protein in my urine, loss of white blood cells, loss of hair, a permanent loss of appetite, yeast infections so viral and strong willed that it changed my yonic chemistry and how i fuck forever—did not do me in. my hot little body with a natural curve from waist to hip returned as it once was. my hair grew long again. my teeth were repaired by a dentist. i got fat in my hips and my arms. i still have chronically dehydrated cowboy skin but egyptian magic and tallow help with that. i did not firstly die. what i went through was, in fact, not enough to kill me. nor enough to maim me. my mom said i lost all the “child” in my face after, so maybe that’s a loss, or something. i have wrinkles before my 30’s so maybe that’s a loss. but i still look like a woman. i still am a woman. i am still a woman you may not suspect has been places. i am still in the world, doing my tasks. i was not crushed by my actions. this is a kind of karmic problem. i think, really, you shouldn’t learn that you can survive without love, you can endure, be held without, and still come back from the ledge. that all you need is yourself. you can come back with all of your necessary and beautiful parts. it is an awful realization that you maybe don’t need the love you thought you’d kill yourself for. this knowledge, this ability to be here for yourself and no one else, keeps you so reckless. keeps you so ready to risk it. because you already know you’ll be just fine. the grip of love isn’t enough to hold you still. you are compelled to action. the love is not enough, or it is too late. the relationship with self and self is so great that discovering you may be unloved again isn’t a threat, or dangerous. it is a fact as anything.
i watch people my age are turning inward, looking for love and companionship, watching them find something while everything about the world becomes more complicated and confusing. i don’t find myself easily relating. i am still outside looking for something to jump off of. i am still not certain i need to be scared. i am not sure at all that there’s anything to be afraid of.
ok well, that was all i thought about while i ate my breakfast. then i got in my car and had to turn the heat on because it was so cold and then i got to work and did work and then, i don’t fucking know. i’m just doing work. for now that’s all i’m doing—my fucking job.
I just wanna say, as I've been trying to figure out my place as an artist I've been looking toward other writers/artists/creatives who inspire me. You're at the top of that list. There's so much pressure to make art your job even though that's not really realistic for most of us, and I've been trying to remember that that's fine. Idk, I read this piece the day you posted it and I've just been thinking about it a lot. I appreciate your authenticity, always <3