It's always a competition. You don't even know you're competing... I try so hard, but you're always a step ahead. Maybe even two or three.
I don't have to compete, I don't need to win, like you. I won my own a long time ago. It's the draw of the race that gets me. I can't break away from the race itself. I know there must be others competing; I can only see you.
You aren't running--you walk carelessly, ahead of everyone. No one can catch up.
I feel like I'm just behind you, but I can't reach out to touch you, so I must be so much farther away than it looks.

I want to stop running.

I never want to stop competing.

I have no idea what to say. Just felt the need to write another heartfelt note that no one reads. It's difficult to be a tortured artist when no one considers you an artist.

I'm going to stand by quietly to watch you go down. I can't do anything more. I wonder how many people will actually look at those last two sentences and think I meant them. It's none of your business.

All I wanted was you to acknowledge that I wanted to save you even though I can't. I'm not that person. I'm the person that gets to watch you drown. You think it's easy? I've never felt like a hero... I'm just supposed to be a vessel to swallow up the pain I can get from others. I think if you share it, it can't hurt as much.

"...Am I supposed to be happy, if all I ever wanted comes with a price?..."
--Cat and Mouse, The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus

I don't know why I have to be the way I am. I was put together wrong at the people factory I guess. I hear laughter, feel the alcohol buzz, cringe as that familiar feeling sinks in, and fight back the bile in my throat when I hear that one specific tone.
It tells me that NOTHING is alright, it won't be ok until someone dies, and reminds me to nurse that hatred of myself along with the beer I'm holding. You know, the one my body doesn't want and my brain says I need to stop me from taking a serious dirt nap.
I've smoked so much in the last few days that my chest aches and I've got a semi-permanent nicotine buzz. I want to get in this thing's face and make it stop, but that's pretty damn tough to do to something intangible. Trying to rip out an idea's throat in a non-metaphorical fashion. You can't.
I was up all fucking night, replaying all those memories. We all know what that's like: It's like when your kid sister was 3 and wouldn't stop watching that one damn Disney movie you COULDN'T FUCKING STAND at full volume and you wanted to put a bullet in the TV or someone's skull.
I don't want to think about it anymore. I thought this damn nightmare was over the other day when I couldn't feel anything and my brain switched off. Now it's back, worrying at a wound that just won't heal.

In life, you're given so many choices, and you agonize over which of your options is right for you. I'm not too good at it.
All around me, I see the ramifications of the choices I've made. The consequences can be tough to live with.
Who do I help, who do I turn away, what dreams to pursue, what to wear to look appealing, how do I get through today... Sometimes it's the little choices that change your life.
I once agreed to distract someone so they didn't have to tell the truth. That was five years ago, and I'm still paying.
I have to look into my own eyes in the mirror and ask myself, How did I get here? Was what I did in my past so wrong? My life isn't bad; it's quite good actually. But some old hurts never go away.

"Everybody lies."
--Dr. Gregory House of HOUSE M.D.

My stomach won't let me get drunk enough to forget. I have a lot of things that don't need to be carried around with me all the time...

I could be your everything,
I could be your dream,
Be everything you want and more
With nothing left of me.

I'm standing here waiting,
Wishing you to move
I'm not that great a hunter
I can't read you like you're prey
Just another game
Another heart
Another fire to burn away the pain...

I'm forever changing
To watch you stay the same
When I let the drugs take over me
They catch me whispering your name.

I'm never what you wanted
Always what you need
A friend, a voice
A pair of hands
Why is Fate so mean?

I could have been your everything
But that's too much to ask.
I settle for your some-time fling
Since all the moments passed.

Yeah, that’s all me, babe. I wrote it for you.

I got a new job as a Personal Assistant. Again. This guy is pretty chill, although my interview took place at a gas station...
My first day went well, I got a lot done and had a great time. Then, as I'm straightening up the kitchen, my phone rings. As always, it's Christian calling for a ride home. I, however, am out in East Jesus Nowhere half an hour away.
Phone rings again. It's you, and you has a surprise for me at home.

I stumble home an hour later, tired as hell but feeling good about working. I walk into your room, and I see her. A pair of gorgeous green-gold eyes looking up from miles and miles of your shirt. She fits in the palm of my hand, and she's singing for me in her quiet cat language.
For a moment, life is pure bliss, and I suddenly love you more than anything except this tiny, fluffy stranger on my lap. You says her name is Charlotte. It's perfect, but I downplay it.
Then the dog headbutts me and licks Charlotte's face.

I wake up in the morning feeling great. My fur kids are sleeping peacefully, the significant other is snuggled up next to me, and I'm going to work in a few hours.
Wrong.
I drive him to work when some crusty old man yells from atop his mountainous truck that my right rear tire is flat. I drop the s/o off anyways (Hell, I'm not seeing sparks yet) then pull into 7-11 to administer an oxygen mask to Old Bessie. She's 14 now, these things happen.
The right rear is flat and dragging, with a split the width of a nickel and deep enough to be bad news. The right front is also split, and both are leaking air even as I fill them.
I didn't get to work.

I got away from that with my job intact, and the boss not pissed at all, but I feel like shit. I go home to bullshit, boredom, and a lack of booze.

Oh, and Charlotte has worms.

Days later…

My heart is dark and tharn, for my friend stopped running today.

That’s what they said in Watership Down.

Seamus has crossed over. In his final moments, he was surrounded by his brothers. I sent him to the afterlife as best I know how, and tomorrow I will hold a small service for him. He was the greatest soul I've ever known.

In June 2006 I turning 16, and Seamus had just been weaned. He was sent to my store to die as another creature's dinner. I looked into his eyes and saw the whole universe.
At that moment, I knew I couldn't end my life as I planned. I needed to save his.
He was with me through all my first time rat mother mistakes--poor quality food, less than optimal housing... the illness that nearly took his life. He treated me with love and understanding. He loved me when I felt no one else did.
We learned and grew, and we became strong. Seamus made everyone love him with his quiet presence. He was patient with my sister and mother, who were afraid. He accepted my boyfriend, as rats do, without complaint.
In 2007 we became homeless. We lived in a old, dark room where I nearly died from complications from chronic bronchitis.
In 2008, we found our home. He and his brothers and sisters knew love. My time was so strained, and when I finally had things straightened out, he was dying.
My dear heart waited until I was ready. My soul is screaming in longing and fear. I can't fathom what the world will look like tomorrow.
The ground here is hard--the torn muscles in my back will protest strongly tomorrow, but I will bear the pain for you, my heart. My Seamus.

I suspect his soul will return to me--the day my Grandfather died was the day I suspect Seamus was born. They were so much alike I believe their joint souls are watching me. I was raised by my Grandfather, and horrible illness took his life before he could keep his promise to me. I believe he and Seamus will try to keep this promise, and soon their souls will resurface as one in time to keep it.

It may sound crazy, but that belief is going to keep me from going to pieces.

Introspective…

So, I have a question:

Why am I not good enough?

I've spent a week in pain, getting no farther than 7-11, only able to lay in bed or in this damn chair, unable to drive and on medication that makes me sick. Why have none of my old friends called? Why are my only girlfriends ditching me? What did I do to any one?
It's not just since I got hurt, either. Everyone is pulling away from me, especially a certain few people I need more than ever. The people I trust to hold me and tell me they care just aren't here.
I try my best to be there for everyone--driving them to work, giving them a place to stay when they need it, storing people's stuff when they've got nowhere to go, always offering a shoulder to cry on, feeding them when they can't afford food and making sure they still can smile when their worlds are falling apart, even if the laughter is at my expense.

I've got something to say to a few people, but I'm not going to naming them. If you think I'm talking about you, just ask me. Most of this is pretty universal anyways. If you think it's for someone I don't talk to anymore at all, just send it to them. It won't mean anything, but whatever.

Do you know I love you unconditionally, and always have? You make me so damn angry, but I'd never abandon you, no matter how much you push me away and make me cry.

Do you know how much I miss you, and wish you were here right now? How much I needed you the other day when I hurt so bad I couldn't move for over an hour and all I could do was cry?

Do you know how much you hurt me, and do you even realize how much I love you to let it hurt so much, and how special you are to me, no matter how much you hate me?

Why are you never here? Why do your new friends demand so much of your time, and why can't you introduce me to them? Am I not good enough? Do I embarrass you somehow?

Do you remember when you held me tight and told me I needed to take good care of everyone while you were gone? We practically grew up together, and now you hate me because I stood up to you. I feel like my brother stabbed me right between the ribs. I found a picture of all of us while we were still in school. I was reaching out to you, and we were laughing. I miss you so much, and I don't want to hate you.

Do remember when we used to stay up all night talking about nothing, watching movies or hanging out at IHOP or 7-11? When we first introduced you to everyone? I miss those days--these days you just sort of look through me. It hurts, and I wish you could do for me what I used to do for you.

Life is a series of moments. Our memories are disconnected over time, and we end all things with meaningless flashes of who we were and what we knew.
I don't feel the need to bring all my moments together like puzzle pieces, trying to give my life the semblance of meaning or wholeness. Maybe I'll change my mind in thirty or forty years, but right now I live as I do completely comfortable.

I treat each moment as it's own life time. Who I was in that moment is what matters. Who I was and who they were. I've lived, loved, died and been reborn in my moments. I don't carry around the burden of mistakes and grudges. I've already learned what I needed in these micro lives; I needn't carry them around constantly.

Like old books and nursery rhymes I have favorites. My mind is a great library of romance novels, adventure tales, young adult fiction and self help books. In this vast place I am more truly home than I shall ever be on Earth.
I identify with every main character--the little girl in the basement, talking to the cats in the dark; the the angst filled teenage girl dreaming of vampires and true love; the woman breathing hard caught in a great and tragic forbidden love.

I believe we live whole lives in our moments. The smallest desicion alters the rest of the moments immeasurably, and we all play many roles and live many lives. All is not lost if you have at least one good story to go back to.

I remember being about 4 feet high and wanting to be surrounded by books the rest of my life.
Books don't mock you. Unless you've got a collection of titles that mock your life staring you in the face all the time, like if you're having a religious crisis and your parents have everything written by Dan Brown displayed on the mantle you have to walk by in order to snag free food from their fridge. That totally never happened to me.
Books and cats go together. This is a great excuse to have cats. They come with all kinds of perks. Like, bad attitudes and claws, and a dislike of whatever gender their master isn't.
Back to librarians. Are they all naturally quiet people who love books? Is there any way to accidentally find yourself working as a Librarian? I understand accidentally becoming a butcher, or tap dance instructor, but librarian? I don't think so.
Aside from the books, and the modest skirts, and black plastic glasses, and the years of Librarian school what else do librarians do? They help nerds and dunces alike find tomes of wonder and knowledge. That's pretty damn awesome.