Ani Was Writing

  It's now February. The cold of the last storm disappeared on Thursday and left behind the tempting weather of a spring day. The park across the street is filled with children and adults enjoying this momentary warmth before the Polar Vortex greets us with more cold weather and chaos over the course of the next week. Instead of enjoying this pleasant day like the rest of my neighborhood, I am inside my home, in front of my computer. I sit in a position that I slowly realize is uncomfortable. I glance outside my little basement window and ponder what the last month of my life has been like.   January was a rather odd month for me. A lot of what I left behind in 2018 tried to stick with me. A lot of the same drama and problems tried to creep up and suction themselves to me again. My work and the news in general were (as usual) the biggest creepers. Working for a school bus company (in my opinion) usually means that a lot of the same messages get repeated year after year. Not...

  I am done with having a lot of stuff.   Up until now, I thought having more stuff in my life meant that I would be more liked and accepted. I wished for a giant library of books, stacks of journals for future generations to thumb through, enough art to make art galleries look small; I thought all of this stuff would make me happier and make me look more educated and refined. For the last eight years, I had been accumulating stuff and designing my room to showcase as much of it as I can. Studying English at university only made me feel like the library I would eventually have needed to showcase the life I have accumulated and want to present to those who walked into its aura.   Then I came to a thought that changed my thinking: Am I accumulating stuff for status, or because it reflects who I am?   Within a year, I went from wanting to gather as much as I can to wanting to get rid of it all. The status I wanted no longer applied. I didn't care anymore about what ...

  "You seem so certain about this. I can't believe you are actually doing this." Amethyst sips a cup of ginger beer and lime as I throw some of a sketchbook into the fire pit. We both look over to the bin of thirteen journals, a writing prompt book, and what remains of the sketchbook I tore apart. I am determined to get this fire pit going, even in four inches of snow and a cold wind blowing around. "You know, your mother and I thought you were going to do this tomorrow, in 2019. Not now."   "Might as well do it now, just to send a message to myself." I shiver with a few matches in my hand. A handful of matches later, and I start enough of a fire to put the rest of the sketchbook in. The fire accepts the fuel and burns the pages quickly. I throw in some more of a different broken journal that fell apart earlier. Amethyst watches it as I grab my smallest journal and toss it in. The flames dance around their new prey. I toss in the rest and watch as...