my only swerving

Dear K-

Sometimes I wonder whether happiness was made for people like you and me. I keep thinking back to something you said the other day, when we talked on the telephone.

We should try to talk on the telephone more often. To each other, at least. I am not good on the telephone, but somehow you help me get past that. It doesn’t matter if I am crying, or laughing, or even just sitting quietly, listening to the sound of your life so many, many miles away…something about it feels relaxing. Enjoyable. I feel comfortable speaking to you in ways I don’t talk to anyone here. I don’t mind that you know I am damaged goods, that I worry about everything in such excruciating detail, or that you know I can be a terrible person. Sometimes it feels good to talk to someone who knows your faults. The faults that don’t always readily show.

Anyways, I keep thinking about what you said the other day, while you browsed for groceries and I folded my laundry. You said that perhaps happiness isn’t something we should strive for. Perhaps happiness isn’t the culmination of a successful life. For some reason I have always thought of happiness as something like the end reward, the proof that you’ve done everything well in life, worked really hard and put in your dues, and in return some unknown force of the universe provides you with happiness and contentment. Maybe you strived away at a miserable job for years and hated every moment but you put in good, honest work and tried to always be nice to your co-workers…then one day, out of the blue, you are given the opportunity to step into your dream job. The job where you look forward to working every day. The job where you feel fulfilled and productive. Or maybe you have been very attentive to always treating others how you would like to be treated, never turning away from someone in need, even when it might have put you out…And then viola! One day, you meet that perfect someone and you get married without a single god-damn doubt in your mind, and you live a beautiful and satisfying life until you both die, after which your children tell your grandchildren about how you and pop-pop were so in love, and how you died within 20 minutes of each other because you couldn’t bear the thought of living on without the other.

But I’m realizing that is not how life works. Especially if I’m behind the wheel. Even if I am in the perfect situation, I seem to find a way to steer everything off the bridge and into the river. Is it because I am a person that isn’t meant to feel happy? Maybe I don’t know what to do with happy. I’m trying to stop thinking about trying to become happy. Maybe, just as you aren’t ready for romance, maybe I’m not ready for happiness. As much as I want it, maybe I can’t have it right now. Maybe I will never have it. As you said, this whole show ends at some point, so perhaps I shouldn’t waste so much of it lamenting over what isn’t meant to be.

The other day I was thinking back to when we used to meet to play chess in a coffee shop that probably has long since closed its doors. I was reminiscing upon it so fondly, wondering why my life couldn’t still contain such simple pleasures. But then I thought about it a little longer, and remembered that those games also used to cause me great stress and frustration. I was so competitive that I wasn’t easily able to relax and appreciate the game for what it was supposed to be: a mechanism to bring us together to chat and share some coffee. Instead, I became so concentrated upon the embarrassment of losing that I shied away from those meetings.

I wish I could slap my younger self, tell her to straighten up and look beyond the game. I would kill to be able to wander to the local coffee shop every week and kill a few hours moving pieces clumsily over a board while talking about life, writing, relationships… Instead I sit in my office, staring at a wall covered with little snapshots of my past life, sipping at some lukewarm, instant coffee blend. Why do I keep these pictures here? To remind me what I’ve lost? To remind me what a beautiful thing it is to be alive?

I listened to the radio this morning. They were describing a man as “the most humble, caring man you’d ever meet”. “He’d never talk about himself”, they remarked. Such a selfless, compassionate character with wit as sharp as a knife’s edge. It got me to pondering. Maybe I think too much about myself. I always twist everything into my perspective. Perhaps I need to become a shadow. Listening attentively but physically incapable of being in the spotlight. Perhaps then I wouldn’t take everything so personally and the world wouldn’t hurt so much. But then I wonder what the point of living would be if I wasn’t meant to feel at all. I’m going about it all in the wrong way.

I can’t be kinder to myself. I’m still too dissatisfied with the product. We both seem to have difficulty finding the good parts in ourselves.

Remember the good times for what they were, but know that they can never occur again in their original skin. You will never again hold her in your arms the same way and breathe in her scent, I will never sway back and forth in the trams of Brno with my head resting on the shoulder of a gentle Slovenian, and we will never return to drink on a couch-covered porch at twilight on a lonely street in Kirksville. We are both longing for feelings that can’t return. But maybe we can find something similar to fill the void, at least for the time being.

Our lives are a poem. There’s so much meaning lurking between what's visible on the page.
-K

Smiling As The Rocks And Oceans Cover Us.

Dear K,

This is all going to be terribly disconnected.
Treat it like a poem.
I wish somebody had said that to me when I was little.
That would be a good way to live your life.
Like a poem.
I guess.

I know I'll be happy someday. I know I'm not right now. I broke up with her. I ended my longest relationship. There were very real reasons, but that doesn't make it hurt any less. I'm lying in bed. I've been staring up at my ceiling fan feeling so sorry for myself for the last two hours.

I created an OKCupid account and deleted it before it was completely set up. I did the same with Tinder. I know now that those things don't work for me.

I want a romance. I want to be ready for a romance.

I'm not ready.

It's going to take me some time to get ready.

I want to make sure that I love myself before I love somebody else.

Look, this whole thing is going to end. Your life. My life. The world's ability to support life. Everything is going to end. We're going to do. That is not up for debate. There is no negotiating around that. Everything ends.

I told her as quick as I could that I thought we should break up. She was expecting it because I had talked to my sisters that day. She was worried about me talking to my sisters. She was worried that they would convince me to break up with her. They didn't convince me, my mind was already made up. It was my gut that did it.

Everything ends, but still moments are suspended. I imagine the past as frozen echoes that are still there. You and I are still drinking on a porch in Kirksville, Missouri somewhere back there.
Somewhere back there I'm still stroking her hair and breathing in the smell. I'm still holding her hand as we walk. I'm still grabbing at her belt loops and pulling her in to kiss me. I'm still telling myself that her middle name is Forever.

That's how it was in my phone.

I looked through pictures I took from our relationship tonight.

That was a mistake.

All of the good times have flooded back into me.

My pillow is soaking up what makes it down my cheek.

God I miss her. I just want to talk to her. I just want to go back, not forever, but just for the night.

Then I think to myself how lucky I am to feel all of these things and the pain lessens. Pain can be turned to joy, it happens, sometimes.

I called an old friend from college tonight. One I used to put on a pillar and call it love. We talked for an hour and a half until I threw up. I think it was a combination of bad tea, cigarettes, and old unrequited feelings that I should have dealt with a long time ago. Somethings never get back in their box.

I need to be kinder to myself.

You need to be kinder to yourself.

You've always been nice to me, turn some of that back on yourself.

You know why I titled this "Smiling As The Rocks Cover Us" ?

Because someday the mountains will crumble. Someday you'll be buried in the dirt. Someday I'll be buried in the dirt. Our lips will melt away, eaten and consumed.

We'll Be Smiling As The Rocks And Oceans Cover Us,
Because It Was So Good To Have Lived,
K

penniless patron

K-

So much has happened to you. As much as I know it is terrible to say it, I am actually glad to hear you’ve broken a few hearts. I don’t necessarily think it is a good thing to hurt people, but I think that it is also inevitable in the dating world these days to let someone down. It also shows you how it feels to be on the other end of that relationship. You know my story, you know I’ve ripped out the hearts of boys at times without even batting my lashes. But now when I look back on those moments I cringe. I wouldn’t play it out differently, but it makes me realize that I am not a nice person. Sometimes we get backed into corners and like a frightened animal we lash out, just looking for an escape. We don’t know what we want, but we know it isn’t this.

But so now you’ve found a new love, eh? It sounds like you have similar spirits. If she makes you happy, then I am happy. Just make sure she’s happy. Never take her for granted. Always respect her. Amen.

I’ve been reading lately about people who quit their steady, respectable jobs in order to travel around the world. They were admitting how social media glorified their decision and hid some of the travails of their “freedom”. If you looked at their Instagrams or Facebooks or what have you, every week would be a different photograph. Something beautiful. Something that make you suck in your breath and wish. They were doing yoga on a beach at sunset. They were standing in bright yellow rain slickers on a blackened rock on the rugged coast of Ireland. They were wandering down a narrow cobblestone street between brightly painted buildings exploring crowded market stalls. Everything seemed so lovely and carefree, it made the viewer wonder why he was content to sit in his office all day tapping on a keyboard when there was such a world waiting to be explored. But the travelers admitted that their carefree lifestyle wasn’t as easy and beautiful as all the pictures made it seem. They scrounged for cash, doing odd jobs like scrubbing toilets, spreading manure, sorting cans. Sometimes they could only afford to buy floss and no other toiletries. They admitted that several times they broke down in frustrated tears, worried about where they would sleep tomorrow and whether they’d be able to eat. But at the end of it all, they were free. They said they wouldn’t have it any other way. So, I guess, in a way, I can understand your sentiments.

Some days I don’t want to go to work at all. I arrive in my office and I want to just go immediately back home. I glance at the schedule and wonder which patient today will make me feel like a sham. I miss the days when I could sit in coffee shops and read all day, without worrying about the work I was putting off or how I should be more productive with my time. My biggest frustration of those days was simply finding the quietest spot in the café and hoping no one would disturb me and that the espresso machine wouldn’t stop working half-way through the day.

Let me know where your travels take you. I am slightly jealous, in a way. I think if I didn’t have this looming, terrifying burden of student debt hanging over me I would leave my job. Or at least work less days a week. Maybe find something more fun to do on the other days. Something that I could do without worrying how much I got paid. Something I could just do because it was a fun distraction.

Maybe I should start writing a book again, too. Who knows.

All the best to you and your new adventures.

-K

I Threw Out My Map And Compass

Dear K,

I'm going to skip the part where I apologize. We've apologized enough to each other over the years, its more of a formality now than anything. The important part is that we pick up again, and I don't think we should apologize when we start writing to each other.

It's been a long weird couple of years.

I got my heart ripped out of me. I put it back in myself. I went to the hospital in an ambulance when I fell down some stairs trying to impress a girl. I got staples in my scalp, but nothing was broken. My body hurt for months.

I was homeless in Chicago. I had a warm place to sleep every night, but it was a different place every night. I would carry my suitcase with me all day until a different friend got off work. I was a permanent traveler in winter. It was a dark and uncertain time. I rode Amtrak a lot. I rode Megabus a lot. I ran out of money.

Then I moved back home. I moved in with my parents. I lived in my Mother's basement, and I walked everywhere and rode my bike. I got a job working for RAGBRAI. Then I got a job running an improv theater.

It was the best of times. I had a long sweet summer.

I met a girl. I told her I loved her, and then I broke her heart.

She moved to Des Moines for me. I broke up with her a month later. Three months into our relationship.

Three months later we were friends. Then we got into a fight and I haven't talked to her since. I've been cold. I grew scales on my heart.

I started dating another girl.

I broke her heart too.

We broke up in February, just before Valentines Day. I became heartless.

The whole time I was working six days a week, sometimes seven. I was working seventy hours a week, and I was barely holding my self together.

I got yelled at almost every day. I worked for a married couple that owned the theater. They would get into fights and communicate through me. I would smile and nod and try to make the best of things. I made things work. I plugged holes. I stretched myself too thin.

I lost myself in the grind. I evaporated day by day.

Somewhere along the way I met somebody. I'm pretty sure we're going to get married. Most days I ask her if she wants to marry me. She came after me. She pulled me out of my cold heartlessness. She asked me what needed to happen to make me dance. Nobody has ever asked me what it takes to make me dance.

We're planning to move. I want to see the world. I want to live in other places.

I have no clue where I'm going.

I quit my dream job in June. It was killing me. I didn't sleep most nights. I just laid awake staring at the ceiling cringing about what I had missed that day, and what I would miss the next day. Who did I not call? What did I not do? Everything I did seemed like it would make or break the theater. It seemed like everything depended on me. Everything did depend on me. I was the buffer. I was the whipping post. I was a piece of inanimate would. I was a punching bag. I was the janitor. I was the front of house manager. I was the one who asked drunk people to leave. I took the money. I counted the money. I dreamt up all of the reasons it wasn't our fault nobody came to the shows. I emailed everyone we knew every week begging them to come to shows.

Then I started slipping. I would miss crucial tasks. I was paralyzed by fear. I was afraid to work on anything because it might not be the right thing to work on. I was tired of doing everything, and I needed a break, but there is no break. I had chained myself to a rock, and the tide started to rise. Summer came and the audiences stopped coming. I started slipping.

At the end I had been underwater for a month, and I was pretty sure that I would never breath again.

Then my commitment was questioned. It had worked before as a motivational technique. A psychic whip crack to move the mule. Only this time it made me look around. Was I committed? I had given everything I had to the theater. I had given my entire existence. I lost sleep every night over it. I had poured myself out.

I reacted with pain and rage, and a day later I said I wanted to step down. I offered to stay on until a replacement could be trained, and a transition plan could be made.

I was done a week later. I came in on a Tuesday morning and found out that Friday would be my last day.

I've spent the last couple of months pulling myself together.

I have no idea where I'm going. I don't have a job. I've eaten all of my savings.

And I've never been more free.

Freedom tastes differently than I thought it would. I thought freedom would taste like a beach or a summer's day. I thought freedom would feel like sunshine on my skin. Freedom is hungrier than that. Freedom takes more than that. Freedom does not mean easy living. Freedom is hard. Freedom makes you question yourself more than chaining yourself ever did.

I feel free when I ride my bicycle without a plan. Every summer I ride with twenty-thousand other people across Iowa. That week is heaven. I wake up without knowing where I'm going, and then I ride with my friends until we feel like stopping, or I feel like stopping, or until we get to the place where we are going to sleep. I never know the route. I never know where we will turn, or what hills will be in the way, or whether the wind will make me struggle, or if the rain will pour down on us. My existence becomes simply pedaling and looking around, and then more pedaling. Nothing is better.

I have no idea where I'm going right now. I don't know if I'll make it to the next town. I don't know anything. I've thrown out my compass, and I'm trying to throw out my expectations.

I'm going to work on a book now.

Wish me luck. Wish me aimlessness. Wish me twists and turns. Wish me a long summer's night under the stars in good company. I wish all of these things for you.

-K

the ghosts i've met

Dear K-

Look at us. At some point, we lifted our anchors and each began to drift, and now the waves have taken us out of eye sight. We lost connection.
The last time we spoke, our mutual acquaintance had killed himself. Sorrowful times for a reconnection. I didn't know what to say to you. So I just stared out the car window and wondered what street I should take to get to the nearest bar while your voice hummed on the other end of the phone line. I felt ashamed.
But now we both have returned to our customary courses, waving at each other silently from afar. I'm a doctor now. Feels strange to say it. Introducing myself is still a strain. It doesn't sound right, far too much youth, far too much doubt in my tone when it struggles past my lips. I am hoping that eventually it becomes easier and I become more confident in my role. I wonder if all doctors feel this way at first. I wonder if it ever feels better.
Tell me about your life now. It has been too long. I've come to find that nostalgia is the closest thing to regret that I can stomach. I'd like to shake the dust off our letters. I'd like to remember what it was like.

Out to Sea,
-K

les jours triste

Dear K-

I miss it all. I miss it more than I have in a long time. When I think of living out my days here in the Midwest, in some suburban house with egg-white siding, I can feel my soul sigh and drift to a distant dark space where it tries not to admit that this is life. I want to be back in the mountains, hiking through the Tatras, with the rhythmic pacing of Slavic tongue awaiting at every greeting. My life here is nothing to scoff at, mind you. It is content. It would definitely make do and be an enviable life to many if I continue on this trajectory. All the more, then, it seems so strange and unseemly to be restless, to desire to return to Eastern Europe and disappear from American soil.

Even we have lost connection. What remains here but the broken shells of former moods and inclinations, no longer a correspondence but rather a segmented diary of individuals. The entries have grown more listless ever since I returned 4 years ago. If it had been my choice, if it had been within my power, I would have probably never returned here.

Some days I wonder what life would be like if I had never left Brno.

I miss it. I don’t want to be here anymore, and I am not sure how to approach that subject or whether I should bury these sentiments as deep as I can and hope I can find satisfaction with this American life and prevent these sentiments from erupting again.
Hopefully your new love is treating you well and you are finding the recent autumn weather pleasant.

Restless again,
-K

i lost connection

Today I snuck out of the house as early as possible to avoid seeing him. I longed to know whether everything was resolved but too terrified to confront the truth. So instead I slipped out to my car before the sun was fully risen and set off for the familiar space of a big, empty room which would stay empty for the next few hours.

I fear what his next words will be. I shudder to think something so trivial could cause such a rupture.

I just want to wake up and have it be happy again. I'm sick of all the bile.

Adrift,
-K