pastpresentfuture

i feel tugged and tugged and tugged, like a stretched fabric, fraying.  every entry is addressed to a different "you."  every night i have a dream about the pastpresentfuture, all rooted deeply in reality. 

girl, you don’t know how you break me.  you don’t know the dreams i’ve had of searching for you, of your cul de sac evaporating before my eyes, of driving blind in the darkest night needing to find you.  when did you become blind to me?  i never expected this insensitivity, not from you.  we grew up like sisters in so many ways and here you are, taking me completely out of the equation of your life, and in your own words "not on purpose." i just never believed that you would forget to include me in your future.  but here we are: me reeling and you cocking your head to the side and managing both a smile and a deep drag on your cigarette. 

and past boy.  i couldn’t stop my hands from steering away from home tonight and down that steep winding hill.  hardly thinking, there i was, outside a house you may or may not be living in, staring at the white van i guessed you might be driving to work.  why i chose to dive headlong into this tidal wave of the past, i don’t know.  but there i was, drivingdrivingdriving and letting tears stream silently down my face and neck, into my shirt collar.  it must have been that dream last night that we were making love. i awoke to find myself ten months younger, trapped in your acid green room and sweating in the afterglow.  until i blinked away the past and roused myself.  i assume that’s why tonight, after everything else, i could only concentrate on navigating that neighborhood that i used to know by heart.  to prove that it exists somewhere outside of my imagination.

present/future boy, i haven’t dreamed of you yet.  maybe it’s because i don’t remember your smell and i’ve never touched your face.  it’s my waking thoughts of you that trouble me, because i vascillate between elated hopes and grounded fears.  the extremes are too prominent in my mind.  that’s why i leave a bit of distance, let you wonder where i am at night when i’m not talking to you.  because i need you here, i need to have your physical presence in order to move forward.  but what if, when you arrive, i realize i’d rather be alone than "with" you? that i’d rather brave Ohio winters without the burden of a trans-national relationship and a two hour time difference?  or maybe we will find out that we are not "soulmates" after all, that the chemistry between us isn’t anything special. 

so those are three of the people weighing me down, tugging gently enough to elongate all painful sensations without  allowinig any true sense of relief…