Lately?

Lately?

I’ve been living on a raft,

waterlogged pieces of driftwood

tied together by the frayed rope

I found in the garage of my last temporary home—

the home I thought would be my last

temporary home.

I feel like if I make one wrong move

I’ll lose my balance and fall into

the never-ending rapid that is my new home,

a place of fear and anxiety that I disguise

as freedom and excitement

so I don’t worry the parents, and the grandparents,

and the aunts and uncles and anyone else

that may have taken some well-meaning,

albeit stressful interest in my life plans.

Plans I thought would’ve taken me

out of my hopeless hometown,

to a bigger city with far more karaoke bars

and mid-day parades

and far less rejection letters

and empty checkbooks.

I guess I just thought

I’d have more figured out by now.

But almost every day feels like a loss.

Of sleep, work,

life. I don’t really have a word

for the kind of emptiness I’ve been feeling lately.

And it’s far too much to explain

in a simple greeting, so

I’ll settle for telling people I’m tired,

even when I’ve spent the entire morning in bed.

We make so many plans for the life we hope to live,

but we don’t make any plans

for failures or shortcomings.

They tell us to dream big,

but what if we dream too big,

too much, too quickly

and wind up using those wilting paper plans

to signal larger vessels that

I’m still here,

on this makeshift raft,

barely floating above all this ache.

But all this isn’t really worth going into with someone

who’s only interested in being polite,

right?

I wouldn’t want to worry

the parents, and the grandparents,

and the recent college graduate I met

at the plant store the other day

who is still so full of plans.

What have I been doing lately?

Lately,

I’ve been working on my writing

and I can feel it taking off.

I’ve been taking care of children in my spare time,

just to make ends meet.

But soon I’m sure I’ll be off to New York

or some other big city.

I’m not in any hurry.

Life’s good. What about you?

* * *

What have you guys been up to lately? Are there some things you’ve been doing or feeling that you would never actually admit out loud? That’s okay, me too.

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