Preserving Who I Am

Some days are chock full of revelations. Other days are chock full of clocking time between one sleep and the next. I used to be able to fill the time with gallons of blame and guilt, but now I just feel drained. I've filled containers with all the fault fluid, labeled them, and shelved them according to perspective and reality. My head is a library of sample jars. Don't open them: they stink.

I'm a packrat in all aspects of my life. Do you know I still have the first story I ever wrote from second grade? I don't think I'm gonna peak an agents interest in "My Dog." It's one page, and not even a real page. It's that three lined alphabet paper we used up till third grade. You remember the stuff with the dotted line so you could differentiate between capital letters and lower case? Yeah, I won't spoil the "My Dog" ending, but let's just say the title tells the story. No plot, no conflict, no crisis fulfillment. Man, being a kid was great. Then I started collecting other things as I grew up. Report cards, love letters, both said the same thing: "Rob has such potential. If only he'd apply himself."

My head is the same way. I store every grievance, every wrong doing, and every crime. Some days, I inspect each container for flaws. My shelves are full, except the newest shelves: they're filled with empty space.

It's the newly single person's curse. Before I was married, I filled my space with single stuff. I don't remember what that was, but I remember my space was full. My thoughts were either of being single, or wondering if I'd ever not be single.

When I married, I filed those thought jars and replaced them with the newly married stuff. The fluffy love thoughts. Those gave way to routine mason jars. When MyUnwife left, she took a bat to my space, spilling jars, combining fluids that made sense into brothy chaos. Now I've filtered everything and replaced them into their original containers, I'm left with labels on jars that don't pertain to who I am. I'm anxious, but there's nothing here. Each day I look for something new to fill the shelves, and some days are like today: Empty.

Some days I have to go to bed with only an empty jar labeled "huh…" The good news is that I look to each day like a box of Cracker Jacks: I can't wait to see what the prize is. So today was "huh?" Maybe tomorrow will be stick-on tattoo cool. So long as it's not that two faced guy on the flip upside-down picture; that was always such rip-off, but no matter what I get, each day is something fresh.