Home

I focus my eye on that spot on my ankle that I somehow always miss when I’m shaving. I watch so intently I think I can see the pesky little hairs grow. I watch because it’s simple, still and unchanging. I know exactly what to expect.

I try to feel the wave of breath as inhale turns to exhale, exhale releases and becomes the inhale. Inhale pause exhale. I want to be in the wave.

But we all know that’s just a thing I use in moments of desperation, the thing I want to say works all the time – The thing that cured the fire that lives in my belly.

In reality, we all know my insides are hot lava, my head is stuck in a groove in the record that was never fixed. I meant to take it in and get that worked on, it’s just that it played fine for the whole summer, when the weather was better and the seas refused to be stormy.

So I find myself in the grass, with sweaty legs and sweaty palms and a sweaty brain, if thats possible.

My stomach is in my throat and I swear I’ll never need to eat again. I’ll starve out this beast in my chest that tells me that nothing that’s gold can stay.

I pray for peace, which is a thing to do when you’re about to throw up. But god and I both know it’s not my chosen form of spiritual practice.

So, I stand from my ass print in the grass with itchy, shaky legs and I find all the courage I’ve got and I ask you to grab my hand because I want to be home.

I squeeze tighter and I ask you to keep loving my imperfect self loudly, that I hope to someday be a less frazzled version of me. You tell me you don’t want that version at all, that you want the one that’s here. That version is home.

We throw a housewarming party, because home is always better with family and flowers and a strange tool with which you squeeze your lemons.