Mundanity

writing an essay in my notes app during Fall like the depressed person I am

1

The house is quiet with Jordan gone and summer is over. I’m realizing I needed to download a bird app to take care of myself

2

My credit card thinks that my movie tickets at Laurelhurst are a recurring monthly purchase

3

Two grey hairs, one on each side of my head

4

I move all the stitches from one cable to another to try on a sweater I am trying not to fuck up. Somehow they’re all twisted when I go to put them back. Jordan has to help me make sure none of them fall off. I hate losing stitches and being a perpetual beginner. I am thinking about how much I hate my body and how much I hate that I hate it. I add morning pages as a daily goal to the bird app

5

The bird app tells me to say an affirmation three times. I’ve never done that before despite being told by therapists to try them. Affirmations have never felt genuine to me, they’re hard to say with a straight face. I say the affirmation and I think, huh, I actually feel better, like it could be true

7

A little bird against the wind

8

I feel like texting my brother that I’m proud of him but I don’t. I talked to my dad earlier and made bad jokes. I felt angry when he attributed something I did to his own behavior - who does he think he is, doing that - thinking that he is part of me?

11

Who combs the Icelandic grass at night? I think we bring the people we mourn everywhere we go. I see a fox on the trail after Annie read about how they’re the only native mammal to Iceland. I think of Ashley. I wonder where the foxes came from

14

Traveling like this you are both unnoticed and noticing. And then, suddenly, also noticed

16

My friend Izzy tells me to put the stickers on my water bottle. This encouragement is an act of kindness

21

Reading through my old livejournal in an attempt to get access to an old photobucket account. September 18th, 2008, in bold, I wrote: “my biggest fear is that I will never leave Texas.”

23

Three pumpkin patches, three wings, three

25

Making fun of myself as a defense mechanism when in reality I just am just a soft inside, exposed and belly up

26

Watching kites fly as the harvest moon rises and the sun sets

28

The passing thought of this is not the first time

30

Dreamt of waves overtaking an old friend’s apartment in Paris, a friend I no longer talk to

31

Looking for four leaf clovers

32

I often feel like I don’t know how to talk about anything without it being a thing. Scrolling on my phone and getting reels about loneliness. Reading messages like, let’s do a day like this, and I say, let me know when, and then there is no response

*

I am thinking about doing the thing where I cut the thread across the threshold. But I am afraid of magic. I think if I do it wrong I am fucked. I think I’ve done it wrong before so I’m scared. Maybe I am cursed?

*

Don’t want to think too much about the post that’s about thinking too much so I just post it even though it feels unfinished

33

Depression is sneaky and always there, sometimes I wear it like this weird scout badge, and other times I just walk around the park and cry and cry

33

Folding up my quilt and crying

34

I’ve worn the same outfit for four days and haven’t checked off “wear a cute outfit” in the bird app which is a little sad

37

Dreamt about taking photos

*

I come home from the bar and cry because I miss Ashley. I send her a message on Instagram that she won’t see because she is dead. I write, I miss you, I love you. I didn’t expect to get triggered by a Red Hot Chilli Peppers song at karaoke. God, I think about her, all the music she loved and all the music we shared

*

I tell my friends casually about a thing that isn’t very casual and then I go home and feel weird about it but I feel weird about everything lately. I didn’t tell someone how I felt, actually, which is a first for me

41

We’re all just waiting to take left turns

43

Thinking about one of my brothers at the concert, all the music we listened to, wishing we could have shared this together

44

The grief of anger

45

I think a lot about bell hooks’ essay in all about love, where they state how being honest, truly honest, is one of the most pure forms of love you can express

I think about how I want to be more honest. I can’t go because I am uncomfortable, I can’t go because I am not sure where I fit in, and no amount of reassurance from you in the world will help me feel that belonging. I can’t go because I don’t know what to do with my hands when I watch. I can’t go because I need to feel included now, not later, not out of obligation.

I don’t want to become a friend out of obligation but I also fear not going, the constant conflict of it all

46

Dreamt about my mom

47

Feel like an open wound, googled tarot card with open wounds, ten of swords

48

Waiting until it starts to leave

49

To explain to you what it means to keep a secret, to feel absolutely and fundamentally cursed to loneness, to not know how to start, the remnant of onion in your cheeks

50

My mom taught me to be cool. But I still jump when someone comes home, pretend to look busy

52

Even in dreams I try to be polite. I say excuse me to the table to go spit out the broken shards of a tooth

56

On a hike, thinking about what to do with all the film photos of trees I have. I take another photo of a tree. I take photos of rocks, thinking, well at least it isn’t another tree. I take a photo of bark. My friend asks if she can bring home something from the forest as if I am the arbiter of this decision. We both admire the lichen clinging to the wood. I think about making a book where maybe you’re a little stressed but then you just turn the page and between the writing is just trees and trees and trees. Maybe that’s what I’ll do with the film photos I have. Make them into a walk in the woods

57

What if I get to the end of the bird app and that’s all there is?

59

What if I get to the end and there’s nothing to show for it?

60

I take a deep breath and realize I’ve been holding it as if going through a tunnel

62

The inner turmoil of not knowing what to say

68

Park as a place of dreams

70

Vulnerability of fruit to open flies

79

Would my little brother judge me for using the bird app?

holding a hand made quilted kite and watching the moon rise over a river