march 9th

12:33pm

i wrote a “w” a certain way earlier and all at once could see and smell and feel a particular middle-school classroom. i have no idea how to describe the scent, because all middle-school classrooms seemed to smell the same, and that scent was unique to only middle-school classrooms. i remember purposefully drawing my “w”s that way sometimes, mostly when i wanted to feel something. just a differently neat thing to pull me back together.

i am very disconnected from my childhood. i don’t remember things i should and the things i do remember are so fragmented and strange. i think i’ve been disassociated for a long time, in and out and in and out. nothing lasted, either. everything was constantly changing, i was ever adapting—i don’t think i had the time to get comfortable in a single emotion.

but i had the running shadow man, like everyone else. i watched raindrops slide down windows. i woke up and felt a small amazement at the morning sun lighting my room. i felt the dirt and smelled the Christmas tree and brushed my hair. as odd as i may have been, i wasn’t so different. i’m not sure what went wrong.

there was a daycare once that had a lot of kids, including me, including babies. one of the workers used to let me help out in the baby area during nap time, and sometimes i could help feed them, too. i loved the babies so much.

there was another daycare that had a weird storage room we had to pass through to get to the playground. there were a lot of random things in there. i would always look at the preserved shark on the shelf on my way to the playground with everyone else. that was the playground i discovered just how alluring tree sap could be.

i remember burning a bug and i will carry that regret for the rest of my life. that may have been what caused everything.