My words will either attract a strong mind or offend a weak one.
If it will not alter my today, why not?
I have a few names in mind.
In fact, some of them I would like to meet again.
But experience taught me that things like that could complicate situations a great deal. So, I guess better not.
They say you are handsome.
I didn’t see that.
They say you have amazing eyes.
I failed to see that too.
They say you have a body of a Greek God.
Why I didn’t notice?
To me, you were just one of those.
Looking at your pictures now, I can see they are right.
Too Late.
Not that it matters.
It will never work out.
Come to think of it, maybe I vanished you due to hearsay.
So stupid of me. Naive.
I wonder if you are innocent.
Like you always claim to be.
But then again___
What if___
Does it make any difference?
I guess not.
So, it is better you’re there and I am here.
Like probably it meant to be.
I took off photographs from the wall. They no longer serve their purpose.
I also unfriend someone very important. Until just recently.
It is sort of liberating.
Everything is crystal clear now.
I never mattered.
So, why should they?
Unfortunately, it is true.
It happened to me in the past time after time.
From family members to hotel crew to random people to men that translate friendliness into something else.
My fault of course.
My father said must I greet strangers as if they are my long lost friends?
Some people read down to earth as an invitation to overstep boundaries.
I learned it the hard way.
I didn’t believe in the status and social classes.
For me, everyone is created equal.
Unfortunately, for most, social distancing is truly necessary to avoid being used and abused.
What a pity.
Losing friends…
I call it an achievement. I considered people I knew or I hung out with as my friends. I realized much later that friends are people who accept you and cherish you as you are. Friends are on your side no matter what.
I had close friendships in my life. Yet, I’ve also been betrayed by them. I carried the pain of feeling betrayed for many years. It became difficult for me to form close friendships with people after that.
But when you understand yourself, the outside world becomes easy to understand. I realized I was carrying the wound of feeling betrayed, which was not supposed to be carried. It didn’t belong to me. A person who betrays has to live with him or herself ultimately. It’s her relationship with herself. The way we treat others is how we treat ourselves.
When I choose to leave a betrayer, I am choosing the quality of life I want for myself. Today, I choose who I want in my life as friends with a better checklist. This filters out selfish people, and those looking for some benefit from association with me. Or those only wanting to get and not willing to give. It filters out those who are manipulative.
The betrayal I’ve experienced from past friendships has been a gift because I now have better quality friends in my life today.
If you are willing to negotiate loyalty and honesty with friends just to have them in your life, no one else is responsible apart from you when these people hurt you.
(AUTHOR: AASHIMA BHATIA)
A long time ago I forced myself to write about something that hurts me the most. You can read it here.
Yesterday, I found via Facebook that the person is dead. Too young! Too soon! But then again, under the circumstances, perhaps it is for the best.
When she died, I have no idea. I will not ask. I stop talking to them millions of years ago. I’m not going to start now.
How she died, I don’t want to know. Living on the streets says enough. I could imagine hundreds of different scenarios. None of them good. She had been beaten up, raped, wounded and God knows what in the past. It hurts to remember. It hurts to think. It hurts to imagine.
Now, she’s gone. End of her sufferings. She lived a hard life. Never known love.
If I have a place in heaven and if there is truly a God, please, give mine to her. She deserves it more than anyone I know.
Rest in peace sister. May you find love and happiness wherever you are.
Each year starts out with 365 days, and I will be damned if I am giving up even one of them to misery. ―
And your heart knows the risk is worth it.
Then I met him. It was a love I resisted at first. On paper, we didn’t match. The lens into the future was foggy at best. But, maybe the best romances are the ones we can’t push away—the ones we can’t ignore because the pull outweighs the resistance.
I often wonder if God placed him in my world to love me so profoundly that I hang on forever, or if he’s here to rock my soul. To teach me never to accept any less than a love that makes me feel this wildly alive.
After all, some lovers only need a season to teach us what others couldn’t in a lifetime. And a traditional love story is boring anyway.
(AUTHOR: JENNA IRVIN)
I wear other people’s moods
As if my life and theirs
Depended on the reflection
On the mirror of my face.
I carry their hope and mine,
Sticky and rotting
After a debilitating day
Of walking on eggshells.
I balance my dreams and theirs
While I try not to stir too far from center,
As I lay me down to sleep
Every night on my bed of nails.
-Naila Hess
I have a love-hate relationship with myself. On some days I hate everything about my hair, my face, the sound of my voice, the life I live — and it affected my relationships more than it damaged me. Sometimes I wake up thanking the heavens for the life I have, for my imperfections, for my inimitable nature, for the things that only I could do. I am trapped in a body that constantly seeks whatever my brain dreams yet my heart is already contented with who I am. Being a living paradox is hard but I’m in for the ride! I’ll enjoy every minute of this confusing life because it’s all I have.
— Princess Arvie
MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO 