useless desires

i keep thinking about that night. i was in my bed, wide awake, freaking out. it was when i had my bed shoved up against the wall in the corner. i was lying face down, with my head in a pillow. i wished that the dark space between the bed and the wall was a black hole, and that it would swallow me whole. i had just quit my third job in a six month span. my dad had died eleven months before. my attempts at being an adult were coming up short. i had no money, a car payment, and i had somehow racked up $10,000 in debt. i could feel my heart beating so hard i thought it was going to burst out of my chest. i couldn't breathe. i wanted to crawl out of my skin, my body, and be someone else. anyone else. i was stuck and i knew it. i also knew i had no one to blame but myself. so i went back, back to the beginning, back to where i started.

i remember the day i left there. it felt so good. i was happy. one week earlier, i called T and told her that i was quitting that very moment. i told her before i told anyone else. i gave them my two week notice, and took week two as my last few vacation days that were owed to me. it was sunny and warm out. i got in my car, put my sunglasses on, popped in a mix tape and drove off. knowing that my decision was the right one. no questions, no doubt. certainty, a rare thing in my life. it felt good to see the place i was leaving growing smaller and smaller in the rear-view mirror.

so i went back. back to the place i used to dream burned down. back to the last place i ever thought i'd see again. same pay, same everything from when i left two years before.

and my temporary solution to digging my way out of debt has somehow become the last five years of my life.

i don't know where all of the time went. i don't know how i remained there this long. i suppose when you just give up you can talk yourself into doing just about anything. you can let time pass you by because you're in no way living, i guess you're just surviving. maybe it's because the dreams you had for your life when you were young didn't exactly pan out the way you thought they would. and being so easily discouraged, you just stop trying.