I wake up and remember that I’m not eternal. I’m not sure when the days started bleeding together to make months vanish quickly. I’m not nineteen anymore. I miss my father. I miss feeling young and I hate the gnawing of its absence. I miss the nativity of it all. The world knuckled through with its slimy truths and I absorbed every shock without blinking. Watched everything go dark for a while and when I woke up the room changed. Peeling wallpaper. Dusty shelves. Holes in the floorboards that I swear weren’t there before. I started worrying about the structure- if I could build a home on the crumbling foundation. But I found a way to reclaim all the pieces and start again. Sometimes I feel boring for leaning into the monotony of it all- like I’m counting the days as they rise and fall between the sun and moon. But maybe that’s not so bad. Maybe numbness means calmness. Maybe this is the aftermath of the hurricane inside me that left damage. Maybe this isn’t a product of getting older- maybe it’s my way of rebuilding. -AMT©️