Alive

"The shortest distance between two points is the line from me to you." 

I laughed. Really laughed.
And I cried. Really cried.
In different clothes but always naked.
Feeling the sun on my shoulders
Picking an orange off a tree as we walked.
Escaping the winter
Looking for that premature spring
Between us.

I find comfort in the way he can predict me with near flawless skill.
He seems to know me better than I know myself.
I always romanticize this thing, whatever it is.
Couldn't grasp the aftermath of Christmas break.
It had been so raw and candid, the words we chose.
Struggling over each syllable.
The funny thing about the truth is that it gets easier,
As freeing as Jesus promised it would be.
Though I never seemed to be good at doing what they suggested.
For my own good.
Let me burn in my own conquest.

It's amazing to me, the way life ebbs and flows.
Where was I this time last year?
Trying to make something work that was broken long before I ended things.
Doubting and hating
Trying to tear away the skin
Like there would be something more underneath.
Last night my professor told us that it's amazing, the amount of things a person can cope with.
It's strange to think that just one year ago I was different, at a lower place.
People.
They have a large impact on our lives.
Relationships over and under
Lapping
At the sand and stone that make up our very foundations.
And some
Rebuild with mortar.

I learned a lot, watching signs pass on the freeway.
It's a scary thing, when you let someone inside.
I once read that it was important, the way a father treated his wife in front of his child.
She would learn how she was meant to be treated by the way he loved her mother.
Sadly, relationships are lacking and little girls are crawling into bed with devils at 2 am,
Wishing they were pretty as they slide off bra straps and dresses covering self-conscious thighs.
My father taught me that money is more important than people
And that it's not okay to be emotional,
That if you're struggling you should feel ashamed.
A woman should remain as cold on the interior as her exterior.
Thank you, father. That's one of the qualities that he loves me for.
For the cool exterior, anyway.
Although he asks for me to learn to be soft again.
Over break he took it in stride, letting me speak with words that didn't always make sense,
Learning to express the emotions I had long held in.

I don't care anymore because for once, I'm so fucking happy.
We ate double bacon cheese burgers
Delicious freedom.
Across the table from one another, turning the burger over and over in my hands,
Not because I was afraid of it, but because I needed to figure out the angle of my attack.
So juicy, taking big bites, laughing at the ketchup on my face.
We'd been driving all day,
Getting out to kiss at the edge of the Grand Canyon
Wind whipping
Exhilarating possibility of the fall
But we already had.
Alive.
We got out to run breathless through a field and explore.
Air colder in my lungs
Cheeks rosy
Alive.
I sat at my chair as a new master's student.
Nervous and excited, knowing that I was leaving behind the bad
Pioneering the good
And prying my fingers off my comfort zone.
Alive.

It's a process,
Beautiful, painful, introspective and retrospective
Changing with kaleidoscope intensity.
Look away,
Dive deeper.
Healing, healing.

I think,
I think I'm learning what it means to be truly happy.
And I'm so alive.