A Shared Anxiety

If the last months have taught me anything, it is that I’m human, and I’m afraid. 

Where is my life journey taking me? I don’t know anymore. I lack total control; it scares me. 

I think it is like a singular, exposed raw nerve frayed to the point my root ends like beaten down white threads begging to attach to certainty. I float helplessly, taken by the ocean’s tides and currents. 

Give me some hope? Please. I’m tired. I don’t want to care about anyone or anything. 

Is there a happiness waiting for me just over the bright morning horizon? 

I have lots and lots of interesting questions and thoughts. But I do not have any answers. 

Maybe, maybe not. 

So I fall back, I retreat to what my grandfather and grandmother taught me. 

I’ll get on my knees. 

I’ll whisper a prayer. 

I’ll ask for forgiveness. 

I’ll request protection for those that I love. 

I’ll beg for mental mercy and an allowance to help me sleep through the dark night. 

In private I cry, I try to empty all my angst. 

I give the invisible higher-power everything. I’m vulnerable. 

I suspect my feelings are similar feelings oozing within other women and men and most of all, children. 

I cry for the child abuse victims, the once innocent children. I wish I didn’t understand, but I do. 

We all have a shared anxiety. 

We are all marked down to our basic genetic code. 

We are all living with the same anxiety. Uncertainty. 

Perhaps all I want is a simple reassuring hug. 

It’s not my nature to hug, I prefer to be mean to someone I care about. It makes life easy, cold and calculating, but it leaves me an empty vessel. 

So, I try to make amends and offer a hug. 

I try. 

I suspect there are many fights and misunderstandings built up from this shared anxiety. 

We have time to think and not enough moments to process our thoughts and feelings. 

It has been a cruel season. I beg for it to end.

I pray for a common kindness to return. 

I pray for a shared love to emerge. 

In the meantime, I’ll get up early and I’ll go for my walk. 

I’ll stand down near the dark waters and wait for dawn. 

The new light gives me a bit of hope. 

NS